I really enjoyed this episode. The writer’s found a great way to introduce us to the four “freighter people” while giving us some peeks at what’s been happening off the island in the past 91 days. I’ll cover those off the island events in a separate post.
Let’s start with Locke and his entourage…
As you know, I’ve really come to hate Locke lately. His first appearance in this episode made me smirk. Locke seemed to be “communing” with the island. OK, I know it’s been demonstrated that he has a special connection to the island, but now he’s coming off to me like he’s some kind of island swami, and his demeanor seems more hokey than real. Not that this is a bad thing… it helps reinforce my opinion of him. I just hope they don’t take it too far.
I think that Hurley is going to regret accidentally letting on that he knows about the cabin. (It was obvious to me that Ben and Locke both caught on to this… even though they seemed to ignore it.) Just wait until Ben and Locke find out that Hurley’s also seen Jacob! That will be a hoot!
I would like to have seen a bit more discussion about who Locke is taking his orders from. (After Sawyer questions him, Locke tells Sawyer that he is taking his orders from a taller Walt.) I think that Locke is in reality still taking his orders from Jacob, or whatever Jacob is… and I think that Locke doesn’t want the rest of his entourage to know the true nature of his relationship with Jacob. He used the vision of Walt as a deflection. I think that “Walt” was actually another physical manifestation of Jacob, one that could exist outside the cabin, and that we’ve actually seen three incarnations so far (unknown bearded man, Jack’s dad, Walt).
Sawyer comes across much smarter in this episode than usual. I love the way that he keeps pestering Locke about why he is keeping Ben around. We all know that Ben’s a menace… I’m glad that someone is still pointing that out to the somewhat oblivious Locke (perhaps he’s still communing with the island), who calls Ben “harmless. It takes “harmless” Ben’s shooting Charlotte to wake Locke up to the threat (he finally admits that he must “clean up his mess”).
Locke’s “clean up”, of course, leads to one of the episodes climaxes… first Ben’s denial that he knows what the smoke monster is (I think he’s lying), and then his acknowledgement that he knows who the “freighter people” are because he has someone on board their ship! What does that mean? I think it means that Ben has had a lot more contact off island than we’ve ever been lead to think. Perhaps he’s even been off island himself!
Which leads me to a discussion of the “freighter people”.
Even though I know we are supposed to believe that these characters are the new “bad guys” of LOST, I really liked all four of them. They’re all really intriguing characters!
What a weird guy! Dan, the “physicist” – “I don’t like to be pigeonholed” – is described as a genius by another character, and he is such a bad liar. I guess he wasn’t selected for this mission because of his acting chops. I think it’s pretty obvious that he was picked to participate because it was thought that the team might encounter some strange physical phenomenon (“the light doesn’t scatter quite right”) and that his expertise might be needed in that area.
Even though Miles comes across as a jackass, he’s such a cool character. In just a few minutes of screen time, the writers and actor have made him totally believable as a bonafide “ghostbuster”. After all, Naomi “told” him that our survivors didn’t kill her… more on that later. Why was Miles chosen for this team? I think it was because of the strange spiritual forces of the island (whispering voices anyone?). I think that it was thought that Miles’ talent would be extremely valuable in communicating with the island.
Charlotte Staples Lewis (C.S. Lewis?!) is a bit different than the previous two. She seems almost surprised that she is really “here”, on the island… like being “here” is something she’s aspired to for some time. I don’t quite know why she was chosen. In her flashback (again, I’ll discuss that one in another post), she seems to be seeking out Dharma, trying to find evidence of the Initiative. It seems that she does know some pieces of the story of the island… she’s very curious when she sees Claire and Aaron. She asks if the baby was born on the island, as if she knew the difficulties of pregnant women on the island. Why would she be chosen for this mission when someone/thing/entity is so dead set on keeping everything secret?
Frank is obviously tied directly to the story of Flight 815. Why was he chosen for this mission? We know that Frank was trying to blow the whistle on the 815 cover-up. Perhaps he was sent on the mission not only because he could pilot a ‘copter, but also to get rid of him… to shove him aside so that he couldn’t make more noise about what he knew.
A few notes about Naomi – I don’t think that she’s really dead! Remember last season during Paolo and Nikki’s episode, we continued to see flashbacks from their perspective even though we thought that they were dead? The producers explained that on LOST you NEVER see anything from the perspective of a dead person and that that should have been a giveaway that Paolo and Nikki weren’t dead, just paralyzed. Well… if that is one of the “rules” of the LOST world, then Naomi can’t be dead because we saw a scene in this episode from her perspective. It couldn’t have been from Mr. Abbadon’s perspective since we haven’t met him in the current time frame yet. I expect we will see more of Naomi!
Finally… what is the purpose of the mission of the freighter people? As Miles reveals at the other climax of the episode, it is to find Ben. But why?
At first it seems strange that Miles, Dan and Frank are all unfazed by the presence of 815 survivors on the island. I think that they were told that the survivors might be there, and that they were told to lie to them, tell them anything to keep them out of the way so that the team’s real mission could be accomplished. (However, I have to admit that this does not explain why Naomi originally told the group that she had been dispatched by Penny to find Desmond. Maybe she had to make up that story to cover their real mission?)
I think that the Dharma Initiative sent the team there to avenge the people that were killed in the Purge. I think they were sent to kill all of the Others. Why else would they have a box filled with haz-mat uniforms and gas masks? They were going to do unto Ben as Ben did unto them! If the 815 survivors got killed in the process, then they would be acceptable collateral damage.
So, in a very real sense, Ben hasn’t been lying… he told Jack that everyone would die if he contacted the freighter. He just didn’t say it was because of him!
