Lost- 4.13- “There’s No Place Like Home” (Oceanic 6-centric)
WOW! Season four is behind us, and it has gone out with a bang! I’m going to go ahead and give my thoughts of last nights finale.
- I think Sun may be working for Locke. We know that Locke went to everyone before he was killed and I think he told Sun that Jin was still alive on the island and that she was working on a plan that some exploits Widmore. Widmore wouldn’t suspect Sun because she would have the best reason for revenge.
- Jeremy Bentham was a philosopher that was a contemporary of the philosopher John Locke. Here is a bit from Wiki on him: “The concept of the design is to allow an observer to observe (-opticon) all (pan-) prisoners without the prisoners being able to tell if they are being observed or not, thus conveying a ’sentiment of an invisible omniscience.’ In his own words, Bentham described the Panopticon as ‘a new mode of obtaining power of mind over mind, in a quantity hitherto without example.’ “
- What is the big danger on the island, and why would Jack be responsible. Was Jack more important to the island than we thought? What danger is there?
- When Ben was tossed from the island, he ended up in Tunisia. We have every right to assume that his appearing in the desert immediately followed the island moving. But we know when Ben checks into the hotel he sees Sayid mourning his wife’s death. That means quite a bit of time passes, so did Ben jump into the future?
- But Ben can move throughout the world, jumping from Berlin, to London, to L.A. He seems to have resources, the camera, the pictures of the ‘killer’ in L.A., ability to get into the vet’s office, a snazzy suit he visited Widmore in, and others.
- Did Faraday and his guys/girls get off the island or transport with it?
- Was that really Claire warning Kate? Or was it a dream? If so, she’s telling her not to bring Aaron back, where as Locke is telling them they all need to return. So are Claire and Locke at odds on the island? Does Locke fall out with Jacob?
Doug Wilcox said,
May 30, 2008 at 10:06 am
Well, I never expected Locke in the coffin! Wowsers.
Bad physics! Bad physics!
From an engineering perspective, the “freeze the battery” thing absolutely would not have worked. If the bomb were rigged to go off when the battery was disconnected, then freezing it would be the same as disconnecting it. If the bomb were not rigged to trigger upon battery disconnection, then the obvious solution would be to disconnect the battery.
(If that were not possible, the next best thing would be to slide the limited number of detonators out of the C4. No detonators, no boom.)
Secondly, the liquid nitrogen would not be sufficient to cool the battery to its core, meaning that for the most part, the battery would simply drop in voltage a bit, not be rendered inactive, by reducing its temperature.
And what was up with Jin? He’s way too smart to stand around waving his arms on a boat that he knows might explode any moment. Better to dive off the side, or grab a life jacket and jump. (Of course, maybe he actually did that, and we just weren’t allowed to see it.)
And the heart-monitor-transmitter? Do any of you know of a radio transmitter that size (or any size) that can still function hundreds of feet underground? (Unless they were using ELF.) And, given the nature of such a device, it would need to have a delay built in to account for signal loss or the temporary inability to read a heartbeat or battery changing. In this case, the obvious response would be to move the monitor to someone whose heart continued to beat, counting on doing so fast enough to avoid triggering it.
Otherwise, a fantastic finale.
What got me was that I’d never considered the off-island story beyond what we had already seen, that of the Oceanic Six being in various stages of desperation to return, just as one finds at the end of Lost Horizon. Now I realize that there’s much more to that than has been revealed so far, and that story isn’t anywhere near its end.
ehudadams said,
May 30, 2008 at 10:14 am
yeah, i agree that there was some weakness in some of the writing. I thought the whole bomb on the boat thing was poorly carried out. Desmond freaking out, Jin suddenly becoming an expert to the point where he can correct Desmond and feel he can stay behind and help. I thought that they were really forcing the issue of having Jin not get on the helicopter.
it seems like a good part of the show will be surviving off the island. it seems like we’ve got most of the holes filled of them off the island up to that point, and now its just a tale of survival, again.
BethsMomToo said,
May 30, 2008 at 3:15 pm
Doug, watching TV with you must be like watching TV with Mr. C… but he didn’t say anything about why freezing the battery wouldn’t work. I’ve often told him he needs to hire himself out as a consultant to make sure they get everything right.
Even I, however, chuckled at the idea of doing CPR on a person lying in a rubber raft in the ocean. 
It was a great story, though, and it got my thinking juices going. Very cool way to show how to move the island. I actually liked it better than some convoluted process.
Up to this point I have assumed that the island takes the form of dead people to interact with people, and apparently Hurley is a sensitive. So NOW I’m confused why the island seems to want everyone to return, but Claire appears to Kate telling her NOT to bring Aaron back. [I still think Claire is dead.] Who should be listened to?
Why did Locke leave the island? To get them all back? Apparently he was not attentive enough and Widmore’s thugs were able to do him in. I agree with Tim that we will see a lot of the Oceanic 6 trying to stay safe, away from Widmark’s forces.
Isn’t it funny how in the real world the vulnerable women [Sun, Kate] are now the strong ones, and the men are floundering?
Trouble on the island, huh? I bet Locke is no more the “perfect” leader than Ben was. Both of them were close, but lacking. I bet Aaron is “the chosen one”. Or maybe Walt. I don’t think we’ve seen the last of him. It was kind of sad that none of the Oceanic survivors went to see him!
I’m not convinced that Michael and Jin are dead. Why would Jacob (in the form of Jack’s Dad) appear to him if he was just going to die? I bet he was “transported” out somehow before the explosion.
I also wonder what happened to the professor. I don’t think there was anyone of significance in that boat besides him. I liked him, I’d hate to think he just died out in the middle of the ocean without a ship or an island. The guy who talks to dead people knew it was the right thing to stay. Did he get info from the whispering spirits. And what’s with Charlotte looking for the island she was “born on”? There must be something significant there.
Anyway, it will be interesting next season to see WHO is still on the island.
ehudadams said,
May 30, 2008 at 3:22 pm
Michael is dead. The actor was being interviewed by TV Guide and he was talking about how the producers let him know that his character was dying and they were not going to continue his character. He was disappointed because they didn’t get to reunite him with Walt. He even brought up the race card. an interesting interview if you read it.
Beth said,
May 31, 2008 at 7:09 pm
So I totally missed that Locke went to everyone before he was killed- or was that whoever was in the casket and now we know it’s Locke.
I thought Sawyer was part of the oceanic 6- I thought that’s who kate was talking to that made Jack jealous.
I’m so confused! I did like how Penny and Desmond finally get together.
I think Sun contacting Widmore is Sun going bad- she’s willing to work with the bad guy so she can get back to the island and find Jin.
BethsMomToo said,
June 2, 2008 at 1:38 pm
Kate, Jack, Sayid & Hurley all talked about Jeremy Bentham visiting them after they returned. Then we hear that “Jeremy Bentham” isn’t his real name, and at the end of the show we see that he is really John Locke. [Both names are the names of historical philosophers. I'm assuming it was dangerous for Locke to use his real name, as Widmore would have been looking for him (and, indeed, may have found him...seeing that he's dead!), so he assumed another name.]
In the final episode last year, Kate told Jack she had to get back because, “He’ll be wondering where I am.” At the time we all assumed that she meant Sawyer, but it seems likely she was probably referring to Aaron.
The “Oceanic 6″ were on the cargo plane last week: Jack, Sayid, Sun, Hurley, Kate and Aaron.
Sawyer is still on the island, as is Charlotte, Locke [at a different place in time], Richard and the lady doctor. What is unclear is what happened to the professor… and what about Barnard & his wife? Did they decide to stay on the island the last minute or did they blow up with the ship? Since Michael’s character was written off, he’s apparently dead [but could always appear on the island again!]. As for Jin… who knows?
Sun has a plan, and I think the “2nd person” responsible for Jin’s death is Widmore, unless she is blaming Jack or the helicopter pilot for not going back for him.
She had a plan from the moment she got her $$ from Oceanic, while she was still pregnant. I can’t believe she would honestly help Widmore, who was the cause of Jin’s death. No… she has something up her sleeve, I bet.
Beth said,
June 3, 2008 at 2:57 am
I think Sun is using Widmore to get to the island to find Jin- she believes he’s alive- or she’s working with Widmore to eventually get even with him.
BethsMomToo said,
June 3, 2008 at 2:40 pm
Sounds good to me. What happened to Bernard and Rose? It’s hard to imagine they just blew up such popular characters without even a reference to them.
ehudadams said,
June 3, 2008 at 4:07 pm
they’re still on the island. they didn’t get on the boat.
Doug said,
June 5, 2008 at 9:16 am
Sun isn’t going bad; she already was.
The beauty of the Sun and Jin storytelling is the transposition of how each of them is perceived. Jin appears to be a monster, and Sun his victim at first … but the opposite is true. (Much like the character revelation development in Grisham’s The Partner.)
I’m not normally so critical of television technicalities. (Although I do love Mythbusters.) However, the bomb-battery-radio-trigger thing was so fraught with bad science, and so out-of-character for “Lost,” that I thought I had accidentally switched to an episode of “24.”
–Doug
BethsMomToo said,
June 5, 2008 at 1:49 pm
Dout,
Actually, though I’m sure I’m not representing this as accurately as he would, Mr. C. says you are assuming that the battery was wet-cell. If it was dry-cell, it could make a difference. [or maybe vice versa... not my area of expertise...] I should get him to write a comment on it the way he [tried] to explain it to me.
BethsMomToo said,
June 6, 2008 at 9:07 am
oops..I meant “Doug”. [was that a Freudian slip?
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