I think I've mentioned this before, but I don’t read spoilers. To me, watching a story unfold on the screen before you is infinitely more entertaining than reading it as lines of text on some website. This year I’m trying to ween myself from even watching episode promos, even though they are usually fairly innocuous from a spoiler perspective.
One exception I make is that I like to know the episode title before I watch it. Especially if the title is unusual (like “The Economist”); it yields no insight about what you are about to see, because how would you know that Sayid is going to seduce a woman to try to get to her boss, the economist? It doesn’t really spoil anything; instead it gets your mind engaged thinking about various possibilities. Then it is satisfying when the connection between the title and the episode is made on screen (except in a truly mystifying case like “Eggtown”, in which the title is an obscure reference that 90% of the audience, myself included, is going to miss).
That is a long-winded way of saying that I don’t know what will happen tonight on Lost, and I won’t try to guess. After reading some of the reviews of the first two episodes on the net, I have additional thoughts on them.
* The “time loop” theory, in which the end game (or at least a significant story point) in Lost is a return to the moment of the crash. While I am open to this being the case, I wouldn’t consider it very satisfying. It would seem to make everything that happened before for naught, and that would be a letdown after four seasons of trials and tribulations.
One line which has been scrutinized by proponents of this theory is from early in Season 1 when Kate jumps Sawyer in the jungle while looking for his stash. Sawyer says “I made this birthday wish four years ago”, and some people think this is evidence of a four-year time loop.
While it is an odd thing for him to say, I don’t think it makes a lot of sense. By the time four years has passed on the show, Sawyer has, um, slept with Kate multiple times. Certainly he might want to do that again, but I think it was just a general wish of copulating with an attractive female rather than a time loop hint.
* Apparently I completely missed the part in which Faraday told Desmond to go to Oxford and find his mother. I head the Oxford part alright, but somehow I missed the “mother”. Of course, everyone and their uncle now thinks that Hawking is the mother. However, Hawking is in LA with Ben and so she’ll have to hightail it over the pond. Hawking could very well be Faraday’s mom, but it seems like it’s set up so well that it would be a good fakeout if it turned out that she wasn’t.
* I like the theory that the whispers are the sound of the time-travelers, although it still doesn’t explain why they only appear at creepy moments. Likewise, it can explain how Harper could appear out of nowhere and bear a message from Ben. My theory is that the Temple allows the Others to manipulate time, which is why Ben told Alex that it wasn’t for the Claire, Aaron, Hurley, etc. And perhaps Ben sent the Others to the Temple to be inoculated against the effects of the time jumping, which is why Locke was alone after the move.
* One of the scenes that has led me to not watch promos this year is the one where Kate tells Aaron, “We’re going on vacation.” I saw that on a promo and thought it was a great line, but was disappointed when it didn’t apply to them leaving for the island but just running when the lawyer showed up. It’s a throwaway line for all intents and purposes, but I had higher hopes for it than were fulfilled. Had I not seen the promo, I would not have the slightest tinge of disappointment.
* On the other hand, what a great line it is when Richard, tending to Locke’s gunshot inflicted by Ethan, says “What comes around goes around.”
* I happened to be watching 1x03 “Tabula Rasa” and I was struck by the scene in which SIX losties who tried to send out a signal (and instead were blocked by and heard Rousseau’s distress call) decide to lie about what happened (Sayid, Kate, Boone, Shannon, Sawyer, Charlie). Doesn’t mean anything, but groups of six formulating lies…of course, Aaron isn’t really part of the decision, and Desmond, Penny, and Frank are in on it too, but you get the idea.
