I’ve already seen the first episode of Season 6. If you haven’t, don’t read this unless you want to know what happens. Hit N in your Google Reader.
OK. I firmly believe two things: 1) There’s no way Lindelof and Cuse are going to be able to provide all the answers to everything from the first 5 seasons; and 2) I don’t want them to. I don’t want everything tied up in a neat little package. I want there to be loose ends, unresolved issues. I want them to finish telling their story, not the story I think they’re telling, or the story I want to tell. I do have questions (lots of them, as you’ll see), and points I would like to see addressed during the course of this season, but I don’t necessarily think that their exclusion will be disappointing. (Depends on what IS there. Like, for example, if they choose to not return to the Adam and Eve in the cave, fine, as long as they don’t devote another episode to something as trivial as Jack’s tattoos.)
1. So! It looks like they’re going with parallel worlds this season. Or rather, many-worlds. From Wikipedia: “Proponents argue that many-worlds reconciles how we can perceive non-deterministic events, such as the random decay of a radioactive atom, with the deterministic equations of quantum physics. Prior to many-worlds, reality had been viewed as a single ‘world-line.’ Many-worlds, rather, views reality as a many-branched tree where every possible quantum outcome is realized.”
The simpler, less-physicsy version of this goes like this, I think (I could be getting this all wrong): This morning I had the choice between making coffee or not making coffee. I chose to make coffee, but in that moment I created an alternate world in which I do not make coffee. From there, I could choose whether to not drink coffee at all or go out and buy already made coffee from somewhere in my neighborhood. I suppose there’s even an alternate world in which I get on a bus or a subway and go to Cafe Grumpy, or something.
In other words, Sliding Doors.
2. Last season Daniel explained that he’d been so focused on the constants that he hadn’t considered the variables, which were people, who act out of their own free will. If they think they can’t change the past, then the past will not change. Enter Juliet, who exercises free will and detonates the bomb, causing at least two individual timelines to happen: the one where the plane doesn’t crash, the Reset Button World (RBW), and the one where they’re all still on the island.
3. Except they’re no longer in 1977. They’ve caught up to 2007. (Even with Jacob appearing to Hurley just after he died, this took me a while to figure out.)
4. According to Miles, Juliet’s last words to Sawyer were going to be “It worked.” Just before she dies, she says something about getting a cup of coffee. This reminded me of the mind-skipping that Charlotte does when the island jumps around in time/space, and it’s how Juliet knows that what she did helped, sort of. So while I thought that it was sort of pointless to bring her back just to watch her die again, that scene did have some value beyond allowing Sawyer to give her a proper, heartwrenching goodbye.
5. And of course, it didn’t work, not exactly, because the RBW isn’t what it was in the original 2004 timeline. Shannon’s not on the plane, but Desmond is (even though he disappears at some point) and Charlie’s not looking for a fix, he’s trying to kill himself (I think). And Hurley doesn’t feel cursed. I was so sure, based on all these tiny differences, that Locke — after talking about all the stuff he did on the walkabout — wouldn’t be in his wheelchair. Oh, and Christian’s coffin wasn’t on the plane at all. INTERESTING. (Maybe.)
6. All the little encounters that people had in the RBW — Jack running into Kate outside the airplane bathroom, Boone and Locke talking to each other over Frogurt (Frogurt!), Jack and Locke commiserating over lost luggage — all that felt to me like a Richard Bach novel. I sort of liked it, but I was sort of rolling my eyes at the same time.
7. Jack seeming to recognize Desmond — was that an island deja vu, or the stadium run deja vu? Both? What was up with Jack’s neck bleeding?
8. Maybe Desmond was blipping in and out of time/space again? (Henry Ian Cusick would make a good Doctor.) Although he didn’t seem all distraught or confused.
9. In the meantime, in the RBW, the island is underwater. I don’t know what to make of that right now. (But nice cameo from the DHARMA shark.)
10. I did like the conversation between Locke and Jack near the end, when Locke tells Jack that Oceanic didn’t lose Christian, they just lost his body. And then when Jack asks Locke what happened to him and then said “Nothing’s irreversible” — it was like Mr. Fixit was on the scene again, but also it a sentiment that pretty much sums up everything about the island, right?
11. I think everyone pretty much suspected that Locke was the Man in Black, who was also possibly the Smoke Monster, but we got confirmation of that last night. But . . . is he a shapeshifter? Form of: smoke?
12. More intriguey-ness: OK, first — it’s not like the Smoke Monster/Man in Black/Fuck it I’m just going to start referring to this entity as Nemesis was actually inhabiting Locke’s body; more like he was assuming its form. If he’s not in Locke’s body, how did he access Locke’s mind? How did he know that Locke’s last thought was “I don’t understand”? And then, all Nemesis wants to do is go home? So, he’s not an island native? But he’s been on the island at least as long as Jacob has, and was on the island in 1867 or whenever it was that the Black Rock crashed. (Is Jacob also not an island native?)
13. Oh, speaking of the Black Rock! Nemesis tells Richard “nice to see you out of these chains.” Was Richard ON that ship? As a SLAVE? Dude.
14. And we finally saw the inside of the temple. Not gonna lie to you, one of the thoughts that ran through my head was “Are they all in ninja training?” But really, the temple was cool. We get to see Cindy — and it’s a Cindy who seems much more . . . powerful, I think, is the word. Not like “in charge” powerful, but . . . she just seems different.
15. The guy with the Lennon glasses reminded me a little of Dennis Hopper in Apocalypse Now. No significance to that, just wanted to mention it.
16. The temple has a pool of healing water (that makes sense, given how Rose’s cancer disappeared and Locke could walk), even though it wasn’t running clear as it should be, and didn’t heal the cut on the leader’s hand. Yet it somehow still saved Sayid (eventually). So this is what happened to Ben as a child as well, I take it. Does this mean that Sayid is now the de facto leader of the Others? Maybe that’s too simple. But it’s not Ben anymore, and it’s certainly not Locke, so . . . hmm.
17. It’s going to be rough, waiting a week between episodes.
18. What did I miss?
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