UConn James

Except that Bush II never claimed that he went to Nam. He was in the Texas ANG, and even if some people deride the location, etc. of where he did it (BTW, your post makes it sound almost like Dan Rather never offered a retraction and retired/was fired by CBS for reporting with such flimsy evidence), Mr. Bush completed his service. He didn't make it out to be something it wasn't. Hey, if someone's service comprised of saying "GOOOD MORNIN' VIETNAM!!!" on a radio station and they never saw action, then they should freely admit this to any and all. No shame in that, a lot of people didn't see action and were nonetheless important and played their own small part. I guess it's only/mostly people who have actually served in the military who consider this to be a gross fraud, "stolen valor" is something that you just don't do b/c it cheapens the sacrifices other people made to claim credit for things you never did.

Doc Jensen's thoughts heading into WTDF. For those still questioning the worth of "The Candidate" (so, pretty much everyone) this is a worthy, quick read. Link.

Given that the remaining candidates now know exactly what FLocke is doing (namely, trying to get them to kill each other), he's got to change tactics. Methinks he'll be enlisting the help of the Ben/Richard/Miles group, unaware of the sub bomb, that went to the Barracks for explosives to blow up the plane. But what can kill the candidates now? Last week's ep, titled "The Candidate" was about Jacob's candidacy. Still TBD who is the chosen candidate among the current pool. We'll also be learning an interesting bit about being a candidate vis-a-vis the names on the cave wall. Yellow-fonted for a spoilery tease: Kate's name was crossed off in the cave, so that means she's not a candidate anymore.... right?

Just like the Tim Graham thread, it's a few vocal *s who can ruin everything. Why do some people enjoy pissing in others' corn flakes? Ya wish it weren't like that, you wish there was a big button that would make these people go away permanent-like, but it is like that. There's always a fresh supply of ignorant, argumentative and stupid.

Kerry has more honor in this regard than Blumenthal has in his pinkie. Kerry at least served in Vietnam when he said he served in Vietnam.

NYT story link I have an uncle who was among a handful of guys 1/2 mile from the DMZ (with pictures to prove it) when Tet came down. "Eight divisions of Charlie half a click away, headed for your 20!" was the last call he heard on his radio there. How he got out, Lord knows. He gets royally, royally pissed when people brag about service they didn't perform. Mr. Blumenthal is a very intelligent man. No excuse for lying and misrepresenting with some of the statements he's made over the years that made it seem like he went to Vietnam. Not cool, Dick. Not cool. Mr. Blumenthal has survived for 30 years in state politics making these statements. Now running for higher office, it looks like his words are catching up to him. His poll numbers were initially strong against any Republican in the field, which includes Rob Simmons, a former U.S. Congressman from eastern CT and a highly decorated Vietnam vet. Wonder how this will affect the race....

We had a pair of robins that were pretty much trying to do the same in many glass surfaces (car and garage windows, our door, cold frame in the garden). Very determined, and it was crashing/fluttering at our door every couple of minutes for a while. It was a little aggravating and there's a few scratches, etc. Didn't call the police or animal control, tho... and in a couple of days, they moved on. But there comes a point at which a nuisance animal needs to be dealt with. Animal behavior can get pretty odd, and you have to be careful wrt rabies, etc. Now, I'd just plink it with a BB gun, but then again, that can get you cuffed and stuffed these days. State agencies and PETA would rather that $18/hr be spent on sh-- like this rather than a homeowner doing a 1-cent solution.

A couple of notes: A) There was a musical tribute to LOST on Friday in La-La Land, similar to the one a couple of years back in Hawai'i. "We introduced this mysterious 'heart of the island' and I think the finale had better tell us more about the heart of the island." -- Carlton Cuse, interview at "LOST Live." Who knows how much, but to those of little faith here, Carlton is throwing you a bone. So don't look longingly at high rooftops or sit in the bath with an electric toaster on the tub wall. We may get answers yet. Video Link (despite the site name, there are no spoilers on this page. But don't go poking around.) 2) The finale episode is frickin' huge, Mr. Bigglesworth! Ad rates are reportedly $900,000 for a 30-second spot. That's behind only the Super Bowl and the Oscars. Either the advertisers figure that the fanbase is really devoted or a lot of people who stopped watching the show are going to tune in to the last episode (and then B word, whine and moan that they didn't understand anything and that it's the writers' fault for not making it simple enough so the casual/one-episode viewer can "get it"). III) You know, the more I think about it, I wonder if Desmond's purpose was centered around the "heart of the island." He is immune to electromagnetic radiation... or at least, he can survive it. There may be a space-time detour, but twice now, he gets back to exactly where he was when the EM pulse went off --- that may be the sacrifice that Widmore was asking him to make. If we do get a closer look at the "light," it will be through Des.

Well, if you read them, you'll see it's a mix of facts and some conjecture that is based on what we have seen. E..g the off-island Others ran a butcher shop, a legal office, etc. This isn't really a show that expects you to sit back, shut your brain off and be entertained. It never was. They expect you to use your gray matter. I guess some people have a problem with that. As I wrote, in the big picture, DI and the Others both existed to push the candidates to where they needed to go, what they needed to do. Can't say it much plainer.... If you're looking for a 'DI/Others saved the world' definitive answer, the answer is yes, they did and no, they didn't. They kept the status quo going, they were part of the set-up to the fulfillment of Jacob's plan, his 20-moves-ahead strategy. They played an important part (and with Ben still aboard, they still are). But it's the candidates who are the main points of focus. You're losing sight of the forest by looking too closely at a couple of the trees.

You are underestimating those who come to rape, pillage and plunder... and mooch off of the social welfare system (health care in ERs whose bills they never pay, food stamps, low-income housing, social security --- yes, there are people who come to the U.S. who never put a dime into SS and collect a larger check than those who did --- etc.) to a higher degree than their "cheap labor" will ever inject into the economy. It's not just about jobs.

Rest In Peace, BiB.

As I referenced, how many people seemed this peeved over the bright light in "Pulp Fiction"? Does it really matter to the story of Vincent and "Bad Mother F----" Jules what's in the briefcase? It's not like it's a 60-watt incandescent down there. Like radioactive material is warm, that warmth is not the most important property. Light is just the visual of what it looks like from 40 feet away. As you say, we've seen the light plenty of times before, only not as close, and now some people are complaining that we didn't get to see it from an inch away. Well, people aren't meant to see it closely. Bad things happen to those who see it closely. It's a kept secret for a reason, and I can understand if it stays that way.

Wow. Quite a list. Some of those have answers of a sort, some whose answers are speculation, and some don't have answers (at least, not yet). The point of the last six seasons was showing the progression ("everything that happens until then is just progress") of how the 815 survivors were shaped by what they experienced on and off the island; by their past, by their present, by the past that was their present.... They needed all of it to pare down who would be the candidate. A long, unpleasant, death-filled interview for a job that doesn't have too many perks. The Others did some of their own things, but they also acted on Jacob's lists and generally protected the Island from various invading peoples. They also aided Jacob pushing the candidates along the paths they had to travel. Had they not cleared the runway on Hydra Island, where would Ajira 316 have landed? The best theory I've seen is that the Jughead bomb directly underneath Dharmaville caused some kind of reproductive anomaly. Either that or babies just aren't meant to be conceived and born on the island, as one of the rules. Ethan seems to be the exception... and it was because his future self directly impacted a candidate, and then he was killed when his purpose was done. The Others could leave and return, ostensibly by ships e.g. whatever that Army unit arrived on, the boat took Walt and after the Purge, on the submarine. Richard Alpert said he went off-island three times (and thence, I wonder why he still said that the Island was Hell a few weeks back...). Twice for Locke, and once for Juliet. He was checking out Locke to see whether his claims of being the next Others leader had any veracity. Richard said he never saw anything special from Locke during these visits.... Combined with the time-traveling stuff, I seriously wonder what Young Locke needed to do in order to get Richard's attention, what with the drawings of the smoke monster, etc. But, then again, at that point, Richard had been on-island for ~ 100 years, and even now, he seems pretty clueless as to what's happening. I'm not sure they controlled those events. They could have. But you have to listen to Eloise Hawking about those things; the universe course corrects. With some give and take, what needs to happen, happens. If you're not needed anymore, the universe will kill you or won't go to any trouble to save you. The Flame station, which Mikhail ran, was equipped with a satellite dish. Perhaps it was linked up with the Others who were off-island. Also, the remote camera shot with Richard showing Juliet's sister wasn't out of the realm of reality, nor require Island magic. It's video. The 305 bearing appeared to be a small break in whatever kind of energy that surrounded the Island, and which caused the temporal shifts in some people. Ben Linus had an apparently sizable network of off-island Others who ran front businesses. The people he had Sayid kill were Widmore's people. Ostensibly Ben did this so he could control the island, and probably as payback for the mercenaries that killed Alex. When Ben went to kill Penny, he lost his nerve, especially once he saw young Charlie. That's an unanswered question about Jacob leaving the Island. We don't know how he was able to do that, or why he needed to leave when it seemed that many others had been "pushed" to the Island without being touched. Can theorize though. Perhaps the Lighthouse had a larger function than just viewing the candidates. Perhaps Jacob could manipulate the mirrors to appear in those various times. Or, one could argue that Jacob couldn't leave the Island if he was the Island. Something in what Mother said there after he drank from the cup, "You and I are the same now." Re: the Lamp Post station, it's my belief that Daniel Faraday, during the '74-'77 time-jump when he became a black-suit in DHARMA, was heavily involved. It was he who found the Island for Widmore in 2004; stands to reason he'd know how to go about doing it again. Eloise Hawking seemed overly... proud.... when she explained that a "brilliant man" had constructed it. Dharma was just another in a large number of groups of people who came to the island and snooped around at its properties; only, their work was more advanced than any previous group. I'm not sure if they were all that important other than to, as I wrote above, be part of what pushed certain of the Candidates to where Jacob needed them to be and do what they needed to do.

MIB did not have the Smoke Monster's properties at that point. It was only after Jacob killed MIB that the transition to Smokey and Island Dead happened. Look closely... his head hits a rock when Jacob threw him into the stream, he goes limp and floats. MIB's dead body came out the other side. It wasn't the act of becoming the Smoke Monster that killed MIB; it was a fulfillment of the rule that they couldn't directly kill each other. Funny about the 'Esau' bit. On the DarkUFO blog, there's a screencap of a Hulu PSIP/show description caption that calls him that. Whether that was one that got out of the lab, or whether it was some intern at Hulu who just put that name in as a space-filler ("Esau" has been a suggested name since the S5 finale when he was first shown) and then forgot to change it.... My money's on the intern explanation. I just don't see how something like that slips. And yet, Titus Welliver said in an interview that he was told MIB's name. Maybe it will come out at some point. As I wrote upthread, not to a large degree, and after the finale it will give something to think about and imagine for yourself after the show is done. I can also see some parallels from within the show --- even on the island, not many people have the answers. We, the viewers, know much more about the Island than any one of the characters do, besides Jacob. The Island is meant to have those secrets remain secret. Even from us. I don't know if this is all a byproduct of CSI showing too much that people in general want to know everything. It's not enough for Quincy, M.E. to say someone was shot in the torso. These days, people want to see the bullet enter the flesh. Real-life juries acquit because they don't get CSI-type evidence. I'm sorry, but I'm one of those people who doesn't have to know every detail. There's just not enough time in the day. And revealing some of these things cheapens the magic. As wrote before, some of the questions and details that didn't get answered on-screen (e.g. the food drops) will be answered in a LOST Encyclopedia book that apparently will hit the bookshelves at or around the same time of the S6 DVD release in August. Here's the link. Before everyone kvetches too much, we should wait to see what exactly is left that you're dying to know when its all out there. "All good things to those who wait" as Hannibal Lecter said. I hate to be a stooge or anything here (That tgregg's job! *ba-da-bing* ), but hey, it's their show. And it's not even over yet. If Dickens hadn't sent the reader-liked, sympathetic Robert Carston to his death on the gallows in place of his doppleganger client, would "A Tale of Two Cities" been as good as it was? We wouldn't have, "It is a far, far better thing I do than I have ever done. It is a far, far better sleep I go to than I have ever known." Yep, I wrote that from memory. Can't change what your story is for the sake of short-term viewers who, ten years later would complain that they got what they asked for.... IIRC, I believe it was Terry Gilliam who, on one of his DVD commentaries, wore a T-shirt that read, "Art is: working on something until you like it, and then leaving it that way."

BTW, It seems like most people are simply calling the Allison Janney character, "Mother." And, Darlton said in the above interview that MIB's name will not be given. And I'm surprised I haven't seen anyone else reference "Pulp Fiction" regarding the tunnel light.

A bit of discussion from Vozzek69 on the DarkUFO LOSTpages. If you follow this link and want to avoid spoilers, don't veer off the linked page.

Hitfix.com Exclusive Interview: Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse Talk "Across the Sea" For anyone who had issues with this ep, I'd recommend reading the above. 'Course, I recommend it to everyone else, too. Doc Jensen's LOST recap: A Boy's Best Friend Is His Mother OK. I'm going to be reading for the next three hours....

Me three. Didn't write it, but thought it, especially filling up the well. She had evidently gone into the tunnel, as she knew things about it not to be discerned by hovering 15 feet away from the entrance. She told Jacob when he drank the wine that he was the same as her now. Might this involve what Locke said he saw after the boar hunt? A white-smoke version of the "monster"? Or is there just one Smoke Monster, she was it, and that part of her went back into the tunnel when she was killed by MIB?

I don't understand the reason for the rule in the first place. What competitive advantage does wearing jewelry have?

And yet, he still loved her. MIB didn't want to kill her, but he seemed to have no choice. After he speared her, it was like he was expecting something to happen... only, she'd already appointed Jacob. This seems to be the same way he knew not all of the candidates died... what he was expecting to happen didn't happen.

THIS. The most dramatic thing of all may well be that nothing in the world changes. That this show simply shows how the universe/island course corrected to "save the world."

A lot can happen in 3.5 hours. Yep. That's a big question. And, until we get absolute confirmation otherwise, I will continue to believe that at least part of MIB or his consciousness got into Locke near the time of his birth. For Young MIB, even a vague awareness of Locke as some kind of Constant... a flash or three, similar to the sideways world... and an equivalent flash in a Young Locke. More to the point, MIB couldn't leave b/c he's dead. Or... island-dead. Off the island, his body couldn't exist. Now that he has taken the form of Locke, that may have changed, but I'm not sure. Plausible. Yeah, I'll take that. MIB died on the Island, and Smokey can take the form of anyone who died on the island (or even of memories downloaded from the living). Just that the MIB body is not his in the sense of having a body. It's like an animation. It was in the same manner that "The Hunt for Red October" managed their language switch. Here, there was a musical chime that signaled it. And yes, just assume that the rest was spoken in Latin and it has simply been converted for us. This brings about the reason why the Others all had to learn Latin... presumably in case they or Latin speakers experienced a time-shift. Actually, it's the story that stay with me most of all. Maybe I'm just weird like that. Actually, I'm cool with some details not being explained b/c it's just something to think about for the rest of my life. It'll keep the show alive, in a way. Also, don't forget that some of the questions still remaining will be answered in the canon Lost Encyclopedia that will supposedly be coming out this summer near the time of the S6 DVDs. Have some faith, everyone. If you're still disappointed after the finale, so be it. But don't be party-poopers just before the cake and presents are brought out.

And as an addition to that, when Locke turned the wheel.... Christian was already down there. Actually, no. I'm sorry. Locke fell down the well, there was a timeflash where Sawyer tried to jump down but the well was filled in, and then Locke turned the wheel. OK. So Christian need not have been there whenever that flash took place (I believe the open well was the same time flash where the Tawaret statue was still standing). In that way, it really seems like the Claudia apparition was akin to a Tree of Knowledge. And yet, whereas Jacob was fairly simple-minded and unquestioning, MIB sensed it all the while. MIB was "special," had the gift of being able to lie.... I also think Island Woman's attachment to MIB was that he was unexpected by Claudia. She only had one name, and it was given to Jacob. IW perhaps figured that she could call dibs on MIB or that he was some kind of a gift from the universe. And I suppose, in a way, he was. MIB was/is part of what needs to happen.

Also makes you think about when it was that Locke turned the wheel near the Orchid station. After another timeflash, the well was filled with dirt. It's also quite possible that the explanation of the light / wheel isn't over yet. I feel that Ben may have more to add. But if an further explanation doesn't happen, is that so bad? We've lived with a fair amount of vaguery since the start, we live with vaguery every day. Some things don't require a molecular-level description --- it's enough to understand the basic precepts. This may very well be a place where as Lindelof explained, we'll have to just accept, similar to "The Force" in Star Wars. Was it necessary to see why the detonation fuse blew out on the Black Rock? Do we need to have a flashback to 1830 at the fuse's building to see that there was a malfunction in the process? No. All we need to know is that the fuse went out. What happened / needed to happen, happened.

I believe she said that his people were from/encamped on the other side of the island. Given that we now know MIB and Jacob were brothers stolen from their mother, that gives us a little framework from things we've seen in the more current storyline. It makes me think of Zach and Emma (and the flight attendant acting as a guardian), especially. Sayid said that those who were with FLocke either died in the explosions or fled into the jungle. Abductions of children, and children who are "special" (MIB intuitively knew how to play the game on the beach. Asked, he says, "I just know.") Across time, there's a repetition of patterns with different players. Ben had a very similar experience to MIB's, yet with some subtle differences. His mother died in childbirth, he saw her apparition (before the Smoke Monster existed.... or was it?) that prompted him to join another group on the island. He killed his parental figure. Only, in Ben's case, he doesn't want to leave the Island. But with all that.... where the hell is Ben? And Richard? IIRC, they were supposed to have gone to the Barracks to get some explosives. Is Richard still all, "I dunno wtf to do!" or might Ben have one of his plans? Back to the ep tho. I wonder if Island Woman was the winner of her own game? Notice how she told MIB, "Thank you!" after he stabbed her? It's like she'd been there forever and was finally getting the release of death. She had two candidates to replace her and she had chosen --- or, as Jacob suspected... she was left with --- our blond demi-god. He drank the cup of wine (with what poultice in it? Island Woman had been at her mortar and pestal again) and was the one. Something changed for Jacob, tho. He didn't need plant mixtures, etc. to do his workings. All he needed was his touch. I think we may have discovered Widmore's quest last night, tho. He is like so many of the men who come to the island seeking the source of that light. As Island Woman said, if men were allowed to have or steal bits of it, soon it would all be gone. It may confound you and have every fan saying, "WHAT IS IT!?!?" but I think you do have to admire the extra-textual bow to the "Pulp Fiction" briefcase. My working theory is that inside the cave is... a large balance scale and the entry point to hell. Remember how Jacob described the Island to Richard. It is the cork on the bottle that contains evil, the devil, hell, whatever you want to call it. Perhaps MIB entered Hell as he passed under that lintel stone, but owing to the rules, some part of him couldn't die, he is a special form of what's come to be called "island dead." That seems to be what he meant by, "Jacob stole my body" in "Ab Aeterno." Still trying to piece some things together, and I'm going to re-watch and read Doc Jensen's column before I give any decision. I thought it was a very good ep, tho. There are some who won't like the mythology and some who see value in it by way of translating events of the distant past into more present-day events.