SPOILERS: Do not enter. Pay no atention to the man behind the curtain unless you’ve already seen the May 9 episode of LOST.

So, Ben is the Wizard. And there’s no one behind the curtain, no Jacob, unless Jacob is an invisible poltergeist. I agree with Locke. Ben’s the Wizard of the Island, manipulating the curtain, producing his own special effects. And Ben, as I’ve said all along, ia a liar. However, just as there is in The Wizard of Oz, there is “magic” or something supernatural that supersedes Ben’s machinations. He was surprised that “Jacob” spoke to Locke, and now Ben realizes, if he didn’t already, that there are forces or personalities on this island that he doesn’t understand or control.

Jack, on the other hand, thinks he’s still in control. He finally has a plan that he deigns to share with the other Losties. They’re going to have a big battle, and Jack’s the general. Sayid couldn’t be trusted to take part in Jack’s wonderful planning process even though he’s the only one they’ve got who know anything about fighting battles. And no one else could be told until now either. (Can you hear the sarcasm in my writing?) I don’t know who Jack thinks he is, but we don’t have time to argue about it now. Live together, die alone—whatever that means. It’s time to circle the wagons and fight off the Others who are appaarently not Dharma folks, but rather “Hostiles.” Hostiles kidnap pregnant women. I think we’d better put a guard around Sun. And would somebody (Sun) please clue Jin in on what’s going on ASAP? They’re going to need all hands on deck. (I mix metaphors and cliches just as well as LOST mixes symbols and allusions.)

Symbols and stuff in this episode that I don’t really understand completely:

White rabbit: Why is Ben so fond of white rabbits? White Rabbit was the title of the episode in Season 1 when Jack kept seeing his dad —his dad who was already dead. In this episode, young Ben sees his mom —who is also supposed to be dead. Is this island a place where dead people who have unresolved issues with their kids re-appear as ghosts? Alice followed the White Rabbit in Wonderland. Ben sort of followed the White Rabbit into Hostile Land. Ben also used a white rabbit to con Sawyer into thinking that he had a pacemaker implant that would kill him if he got excited.

The empty rocking chair: Jacob is supposed to be in the rocking chair, but it reminds me of Psycho. I think Ben’s psychologically disturbed, probably as a result of his dead mom and verbally abusive dad.

Skeletons: Skeletons abound on this island. There are skeletons in the slave ship, skeletons fall out of airplanes and a VW van, and now we have skeletons in a pit. Is this the Island of Death? Are the skeletons meant to imply that the Losties are already dead, too, or that they will be soon? Doomed.

The pit: People die or sometimes live in pits on this island. Anna Lucia had Other Goodwin down in a pit. Nikki and Paolo died in a large grave/pit. Now Locke’s dying or dead in the pit along with a bunch of Dharma skeletons. Of course, the hatch which preoccupied all of us first season was just big pit which became a death trap. Only no one died? Didn’t Rousseau live in a large underground room or pit?

Alice in Wonderland. The Wizard of Oz. The Pit and the Pendulum. Psycho.
I think those stories about summarize tonight’s episode.

Next week: Apocalypse Now?

Shannon at Rocks in My Dryer: They Don’t Call it LOST for Nuthin’.

Amanda: The Wonderful Wizard of Lost.

Olive: Ben’s as crazy as we thought.

WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD! You say, I can’t do that: don’t tell me what I can’t do!

I. don’t. get. it.

O.K., it’s called “The Brig.” A brig is a ship’s prison. Obviously, Locke locked his daddy up in the brig, and James/Sawyer was locked up, too. James has also been “imprisoned” in his revenge, and now he’s free? Are all the LOSTies in the brig, so to speak? Imprisoned on the island until they work out their own salvation with fear and trembling? We’re back to purgatory. Locke’s dad Sawyer thought they were all dead and in hell, but if someone’s already dead, how could James/Sawyer kill him?

I don’t think they’re in hell or in purgatory.

Why did The Others want Locke to kill his dad? And why didn’t Locke either do the deed or tell Ben and The Others to go jump in the lake? If Locke’s capable of finding his own private assassin and sitting outside listening while Assassin James strangles his dad, why couldn’t he just do it himself. Why does the whole plot remind me of a Greek play? Not Oedipus, but some other Greek play where a guy is supposed to kill his father out of revenge? Locke’s on his own journey. O.K., Locke is a loose cannon, no more to be trusted than is Jack.

Is Kate an idiot? She decides to tell Jack about Parachute Girl, Naomi, and then because Juliet won’t leave immediately, Kate blurts out everything to both of them. Again, is Kate an idiot?

Is Naomi telling the truth? I rather doubt it. I think she’s a plant. Maybe she’s one of the Others or someone sent by the Dharma folks to spy on them. That communication device isn’t going to work.

Oh, nice touch, Sawyer’s fake name was “Tom Sawyer,” the ultimate con artist. Tom Sawyer was really interested in pirate ships and kidnapping people and finding treasure, too.

So Brown Bear Daughter and I are caught up on back LOST episodes, and we watched the one tonight.

***********SPOILER ALERT***************
I’ll start with my good list/bad list.
LIKE: Hurley, my Number One Best Guy on the Island, Jin telling ghost stories in Korean, Sayid, still the most level-headed of all the men on the island, Spunky Sun, Rose (I want her back).

DISLIKE: Locke the Loser, Kate the User, Jack the Sap, Juliet the Spy.

AMBIVALENT: Charlie (kind of whiny but still cute), Claire (a good match for Charlie), Desmond (still running), Sawyer. I like Sawyer With Attitude, but Sawyer Mooning Over Kate is a little hard to stomach.

Ben’s in a class by himself. What a complicated character! Could he really be as omniscient as he appears to be? Definitely not likeable, but Ben’s keeping the whole story going.

Joseph Heller and Catch-22. Has anyone here read Catch-22? I haven’t although I know the basic meaning of the phrase; isn’t it supposed to be an Army term, d—— if you do, and d—- if you don’t? Desmond was in a bit of a sticky predicament. So if he hadn’t saved Charlie, would the parachutist have turned out to be Penny after all. Of course not. How many times can he manage to save Charlie’s life? Maybe Dominic wants off the show at the end of this season.

Why did the monks decide to “fire” Desmond? Because he drank a bottle of their best wine? Did I miss something there?

Desmond keeps having these visions. He’s a prophet, like Abraham. Maybe he keeps having the visions of Charlie’s death because he’s supposed to save Charlie’s life each time. Otherwise, it seems that if Someone really wanted Charlie to die, He’d quit sending the visions. Desmond’s never told NOT to save Charlie; what would you expect him to do? Or are the visions Satanic? Or is someone praying for Charlie? Poor Charlie. It might be hard to be Desmond, but it would really be a pain to be Charlie. I always thought Isaac had the more difficult test of trusting his father, too. After all, Abraham heard directly from God; Isaac had to trust that his dad wasn’t insane, climb up on the altar, and see the knife coming down.

I have some questions and observations abou the previous episodes, too. Did the Others take Locke’s father with them when they left? If so, why were they so reluctant to “forgive” Kate, who as far as I know had done nothing to them, and perfectly willing to take Locke’s dad, a nasty piece of work if I ever saw one?

The Nikki and Paolo episode was a detour, but it was a nice imitation of a murder mystery. I read that Sawyer was even reading an Agatha Christie mystery, Evil Under the Sun, during the episode.

Oh, and I knew that Juliet was evil from the beginning. I don’t know how evil she is; she may have been blackmailed into working with Ben. Nevertheless, she’s bad.

And Jack is blind. I hope Sayid decides to ask some questions—and get some answers. I’m worried about Sun’s pregnancy.

WARNING: Spoilers ahead. I use this space to discuss my thoughts and theories about the ABC-TV show LOST. If you haven’t seen the latest episode and odn’t want to know what happens, I suggest you run like Kate.

Finally, Jack grows a spine (and a brain) while working on Henry’s spine. Well, he hasn’t actually gotten to the spine or the tumor yet, but he does have a plan, and I’m on board for it. Actually, I can see a multitude of holes in Jack’s little plan, but I don’t think I could have come up with anything better, probably not anything nearly as good. However, just to show how smart I am, from the comfort of my living room with no one’s life riding on my decisions, I have a few questions for Mr. Jack to mull over for the next hour or the next three months —whichever comes first:

1. Why can’t the Others hold a gun on Jack and have Juliette stitch up the kidney? She is a doctor, isn’t she? Maybe she doesn’t know how to do surgery on a spinal tumor, but she could surely put a few stitches in a kidney, right?

2. What Jack doesn’t know of course, is that they’re supposedly on an island. What Jack does know is that whatever happens with Kate and Sawyer, he’s still stuck in the operating room with only a scalpel for a weapon. So, I’d say Jack’s in trouble, and Kate and Sawyer aren’t much better off.

3. If Kate and Sawyer will run, and if Mr. Wacko Bereaved Husband will let Sawyer go, and if they can get hold of a boat, Kate and James are home free. However, I can foresee that all this negotiating and finagling might take a little longer than an hour, might take until next February. And in that case, Henry/Ben is dead, and Jack no longer has a hostage.

4. What’s the range of those walkie-talkies? If K and S go to the other side of the water, will they even be able to notify Jack that they’ve made it?

So, Jack’s plan may or may not work, but it’s a good try.

Other Observations/Questions:

I don’t like Juliette. I don’t trust Juliette. Maybe she and Ben are allies, or maybe not. Either way, she’s just as creepy as he is.

What’s going on with Slingshot Girl? (I don’t remember her name.) Is she Rousseau’s Alex? Did I hear Ben ask about her asking about him just before he went under the anesthesia? When she asked to be taken to Ben, was it a take-me-to-your-leader request, or a what-have-you-done-with-Ben request?

Breaking rocks just seems stupid. And “I won’t work if Sawyer can’t come, too,” was sort of lame, too.

The Others must have let Jack get out, get a gun, see the monitors, see Kate and Sawyer. They’re still trying to play with his mind, but Jack shows them he’s not to be manipulated.

I think if I knew, as Sawyer and Kate are bound to know by now, that Big Brother was watching, I’d keep my clothes on. I think, under the circumstances, I’d keep my clothes on anyway. But self-control probably isn’t the forte of either of our lovebirds.

To change the subject a little, we now know that Eko died “for a reason” (other than to get him off the show?). So, the writers have three months to make up a reason if they don’t have one already. Locke and I are certainly not in on the secret if there is a reason. “Lift up your eyes and look to the north?” I don’t get the message, but Locke seems to have had a revelation.

De at Thinklings; “Sawyer hasn’t been beaten up, stabbed, shocked, operated on, or tortured yet [later edit: I forgot about the earlier cold-cocking by Danny. It’s hard to keep track of all the beatings, frankly]. Plus Kate loves him temporarily. Aside from the fact that he’s going to die tomorrow, he’s having a really good day.”
Cute.

We knew the writers of LOST would leave us with a cliff-hanger, and they did. My question to other viewers: was it exciting and intriguing enough to make you mark your calendar for February, 2007?

I’ll be back with more LOST hash in 2007. I want to see what happens to Ben and Juliette, and Charlie and Sayid. And I’m finally impressed with Jack although I still think Kate and Sawyer deserve each other —for better or for worse, probably worse. Jack can find a better mate. Not Juliette.