'Lost': My recap of 'LA X' is live

WAAAAAALT

Personally, I thought that some big questions were going to be answered tonight. And some mysteries were definitely solved (Is Jacob's nemesis the smoke monster?, What is the significance of the circle of ash around the cabin?, What is inside the Temple walls?). Ok. Great. But to say that more mysteries were raised than resolved would be putting it lightly. In fact, there are currently 55 unanswered questions for this episode posted on Lostpedia. Coming from someone who has seen every season of LOST 5 times, it really hurts my enormous ego to say that I found this episode more confusing than a Rubix cube...and I'm color blind! How long do you think the writers are going to keep piling on new mysteries until they give us some friggin' answers?

I feel like LOST took a step in the wrong direction tonight, and I wanted to know how you felt about the direction TPTB are taking by starting off the final season with an episode that challenges everything we thought we knew about the LOST universe.

The purpose of season 6 isn't to check off mysteries episode by episode. If that is your purpose 4 8 15.. then you will miss a good story and the whole point of the show.

WAAALLLTTT!

I need someone to tell me Faraday-style how the alternative reality ties into (or even allows the existence of) the world of Island 2007, because right now, I can't see the "What If?" scenario as anything more than a cute but interesting gimmick. From a standpoint other than for the enjoyment/information of the audience, how will this alternate reality affect on-Island actions going forward in a real way?

"Normally I use protection, but I figure when am I ever going to get back to Haiti?"

LOL! Man, given recent events, you get the brass balls award for the "Bad Idea Jeans" reference!

Seriously, great recap!!! I'm just chagrined that you've already covered every one of my little observations, so I had to resort to the above.

Plus I'm too zonked right now for major analysis anyway, in part because I just got caught up with last several days of posts... I've been avoiding everything to be absolutely certain of remaining spoiler-free.

(By the way, speaking of dual realities, we're back to the connundrum of whether to post our comments here or at the recap. I choose here... this feels more like "home".)

Okay, one more nitpicking point:

"Most innocuous hydrogen bomb ever". Though in the recap clip Faraday did (incorrectly) refer to it as a hydrogen bomb, as Sawyer said in the episode proper it is actually "only" an atomic bomb. Nothing the island's special matter couldn't handle, mate.

Just have to add that I also loved the opening Juliet/Sawyer scenes! (Though now I, unfortunately, am hearing [due to my overly associative mind] Krusty singing "we're sending out love down the well (all the way down!)"

MARC: "'I was killed by an old friend who grew tired of my company'. That could be a potentially very revealing line in the back story of Jacob and the Man in Black."

I thought the same thing. In fact, going back to my thoughts the other day regarding the personification of TMIB and Jacob at the beginning of "The Incident", I think perhaps the biggest revelation of the S6 premiere is that TMIB and Jacob are (apparently) not pseudo-gods, above the notion of good and evil, after all -- but in fact rather human-like beings (in their emotions at least, even though they have special powers), and that at least in the case of TMIB, quite capable of doing evil to get what he wants (escape from prison and back home).

So perhaps the backgammon analogy is even more apt than we thought: after all, even though they have massive powers the game pieces can't comprehend, ultimately the players are, after all, humans, not gods.

I loved last nights episode. I was afraid that it was just going to give us a pile of answers... It wouldn't add up. I mean, questions have always been raised and just because we have reached the last season doesn't mean it needs to change the title to "Found". So my top six parts of the premier were:

1) The goodbye between Sawyer and Juliet.
2) Seeing many dead losties on the plane.
3) "I am very disappointed in ALL of you!"
4) Seeing the old Jin/Sun relationship.
5)Sayid's death.
6) Sayid's "resurrection"?

I also thought that Sawyer returned to who he was in season 1. Now, my main thoughts about last night's episode, and the cut on Jack's neck, is that it isn't an alternate timeline at all. Maybe, it's two co-existing timelines that impact each other indirectly? Who knows...
Also, why was Dharmaville underwater in the AT (Alternate Timeline)?

WAAAAAAAAAAALLLLLLLLLTTTTTTT

So do you think the producers are going all in on a Dark Tower-inspired story? I mean it has all the thematic elements, reliving your past with only cursory knowledge that you've done this before and making subtle (or not so subtle, like the plane landing) changes.

I'm glad I spent (a good chunk of) the off-season reading that behemoth.

So..
The Alternate Reality folks are in 2004 and the reality we're familiar with is rocking out in 2007. I think Kate waking up in the tree is the point where the realities course correct and rejoin.

I think Sayid's importance may not be that complicated. If he dies, MIB can possess him. Maybe this allows him to work from inside the ash ring and slay those hippies (Sayid battling hippies just isn't fair).

One other thing I thought was interesting, the people inside the ash ring vs the people outside. Who could lure the insiders out? Sun > Jin, Claire > Kate, Juliet > Sawyer, Pierre Chang > Miles, Richard > Others, Christian > Jack. Crazy stuff!

Personally, I think Sayid is dead. Jacob is now using his body, as notLocke is using John's.

LOVED this episode. It was entirely worth the wait.

So, my wife has a very cool theory about the alternate reality we're watching throughout the episode.

Her feeling is that we're definitely not watching a "what if" scenario, nor are we watching a timeline that will eventually converge with the Island timeline. What we're watching is actually the epilogue of the whole show! We're watching the end.

She believes that the bomb didn't reset anything at all and all it DID do was facilitate getting the '77 Losties back to 2007. So, whatever happened, really did happen. The bomb was all part of the Incident all along and DHARMA built the hatch and poured concrete over the remains of the drill site, which became the wall in the Swan station.

So, what we're watching in the Alt-time is not the result of Jughead, but in fact the result of the endgame. The Island having sunk into the ocean (something I myself have been calling since S3) is what is SUPPOSED to happen; it's the result of what the people who were brought to the Island were meant to accomplish.

I think she has a pretty darn good theory on her hands. And it seems to fall in line with the atypical method of storytelling the writers love to do. The net effect is you get a great way to say goodbye to all the characters you know and love while at the same time finding out what happens to them and only at the end of the series will you realize you've been watching the ending all along.

Even if she turns out to be wrong, it's one of the best theories I've heard about the Alt-time yet.