Meet Dan Majerle

Lostaways-

If you don't get why the title of this blog is funny, or how it relates to the title of this week's episode of LOST (Meet Kevin Johnson), you're probably a girl...or a dude I'm not interested in getting to know. Sorry.

So we've got until April 24th for the next new episode, with only five more left to this strike-shortened season. Booo! But, the writers did leave us with some pretty interesting developments on the island and finally answered some big questions regarding Michael, Walt, Tom's sexual preference, and whether or not the "island" has "powers" off the island.

First off, the time-line of the show is in need of some clarification. In terms of Michael and Tom's encounter in Manhattan, it seems to have been during that month or so (in island time) between when Ben sent Mike and Walt on their merry way and when Tom was shot by Sawyer on the beach at the end of last season. Tom is not back from the dead, and Walt does look 8 years older and a little chubby.

Michael apparently told Walt how it was that he managed to free the two of them (think:trigger happy) and this understandably made Walt freak out and not want to be around his dad. Think about it: the kid never knew his dad, his mom died and Mike shows up to take him to NYC where along the way they crash on a creepy island and Walt is kidnapped and "Studied" by Ben and the Gang. His dad he barely knows then tells him the reason they are busted out is because he shot two chicks in the thorax (or abdomen or something). But, on the other hand, your dad just got you two rescued so some gratitude might be in order. Either way, the kid's pissed at daddio and daddio is on blues-street.

Once again Mamma Cass's sweet pipes find their way in to an episode of LOST, this time in the form of her song "It's Getting Better" which Michael listens to as he is barreling in to a dumpster, and then later when he's about to press the "Execute" (same as the hatch) button on Ben's make-shift (and fake) bomb. He also sees Libby twice, once in the hospital room and once on the freighter. This is the island's way of communicating to Michael's guilty conscience. Just like Eko saw Yemi, Kate saw the black stallion (who was her re-incarnated dad), and Jack saw his father, the island uses the guilty consciences of our castaways to seemingly rehabilitate them for future purposes. Now whether those purposes are for their own good or simply for the good of the island, that is left to be seen. What is interesting is that the island works in the hearts and minds of people who are no longer on the island. This we did not know for sure before. Whatever this power the island (or Jacob) possesses is impressive and far-reaching and apparently not limited to being physically there.

So Tom comes to pay a visit to Michael and recruits him on a make-up-for-past-sins mission to sabotage the freighter from ever reaching its port of entry: the island. Ben, in some typically bizarre showmanship of just how benevolent he can be, psyches out Mike by making him think that he'd have to commit suicide and kill all the Boat People by detonating a bomb in the engine room. But once again, Ben insists that he is one of the "good guys." I'm starting to wonder if we're being led down the path of how creepy Ben can be to blind us from the fact that he may actually be a "good" guy. Now granted he's weird and has even killed to get his way, but the bigger picture of the story arch of this show may include his own redemption....or he'll kamikaze himself in to a dumpster while listening to "California Dreaming" by the Mammas and the Pappas.

The island is powerful enough that it can prevent someone from dying until their "work" is done. Tom even taunts Mike to go and try and "off" himself, and when Mike takes him up on it, the pistol misfires. Michael has a son who hates him, a conscience heavier than OJ's, he's just survived by what all accounts was a traumatic experience on a psychotic island, he can't tell anyone who he is, he's being stalked by chubby gay dudes who punch like a grizzly bear...and now he's not even able to call it a day and shoot his brains out with some dignity? Bummer, bro.

When Michael wakes up in the hospital after attempting his vehicular suicide, he is in a room next to an old man who I think looks like Alvar Hanso (the founder of DHARMA). More on that theory next time, but it would make sense that either DHARMA or the Others had something to do with how easy it was for Michael to stay in a hospital and leave without any identification or explanation.

The next time Mike tries to kill himself is with a gun he purchased by bartering with the watch Jin had given him on the island. That watch seems to be evil too. On the island Mike almost got killed originally by Jin for wearing it. That watch is the reason Jin and Sun are on the island. Now it is used to buy a weapon to commit suicide with. Perhaps the bad karma surrounding the watch is due to its original owner...Mr. Paik. The island knows he is in on things too with Charles Widmore and has therefore cursed the time-telling device. Kind of makes sense, right?

On the boat, Sayid does not trust Michael nor is he impressed with his allegiance with Ben and the Others so he drags Mike in front of the ominous Capt. Gault and rats out his former friend. We're left hanging with how that will all play out, but things get more complicated as I sort them out in my mind because we have to remember a few things to make sense of Sayid's actions and where the story-line might possibly go. Michael told (via note) Sayid and Dez not to trust the captain, but he was doing it on Ben's instructions and based on the evidence Tom presented Mike in that hotel room regarding Widmore's evil plan to kill all the island dwellers. We also know Sayid in the future is hunting down what appears to be the Boat People's bosses or higher-ups. I think eventually Sayid will come to regret his decision to take sides with the captain, and that Michael was right to warn about trusting him. The scene where Michael is shocked to find his crew-mates with semi-automatic weapons was priceless, but a good indicator of what ultimate intentions Widmore (and his Captain Gault) have in mind for the island people.

Switching gears to wrap up here...the plot has thickened yet again between Ben and his daughter Alex. Seemingly with good intentions (something his daughter should have known better than to trust) Ben gives a map to the Temple station (which was mentioned late last season as the place the Others were headed) and tells Alex, Rousseau, and even dopey Karl to roll out in order to avoid the blow-back that may be coming if the Boat People attack and get their hands on Ben's "daughter." Along the way they stop for a drink of water and two of them end up with bullets in their chests. The question then becomes was it Ben's jealousy of losing his daughter's love that drove him to have some of the Others shoot the pair, or was it Boat People? If you remember, Frank took some of the people on an "errand" which we never learned more about. Could the errand have been to come and grab a few more people for questioning, or to find Ben himself, or perhaps they already knew about his daughter and were looking for her? I'm gonna go with Boat People being responsible, but it certainly is not out of the realm of possibility that Ben would pull a stunt like this....sickie.

Thoughts, theories, and pontifications:

-The Island is using some defense mechanism to mess with the minds of the crew members which in turn is "calling" them to come to the island knowing full well that this will kill them (either through the type of brain meltdown that Minkowski had, or through their own suicide because the Island exposes them to the same inner demons as it has to the likes of Eko). I'd also love to think that Walt is somehow involved with this. Maybe the Others use special people like him to mess with their enemy's mind?

-The "innocent people" on the freighter will include CS Lewis, Faraday, and Frank (maybe even Miles). Now whether they actually survive or not, and whether Ben is telling the truth and really cares about being benevolent or not remains to be seen....but I do like the four new-comers this season and at least three of them seem to have pure motives.

-The coffin from the end of last season is Michael or Walt's. This would explain why no one came to the funeral (because no one knows they are off the island) and why the funeral parlor was in an all-black neighborhood. I wonder if Obama's pastor did the eulogy?


So that's it from me for now folks. Sorry this one took a little longer to put together, but we've got a few weeks now to mull over the info we've got. April 24th things get rolling again and I'm looking forward to finding out more about how the Oceanic Six got off now that we know who they are. Don't miss JL's Pants too much this next month, and please post more comments and theories as the mood strikes you.

Sincerely,

Karl's Punctured Nalgene Bottle