316

I really liked tonight's Lost episode. I wasn't so sure after the first few minutes, though.

As I've said before, I'm getting kinda sick of the whole "XX Hours Earlier" thing that all the TV shows seem to be doing now. I was willing to forgive it a bit in this case, since it set up the opening to be an exact mirror of the original first episode with Jack waking up in the jungle. Still, I wasn't so sure at the time.

Then there was the first act, a giant brick of exposition about The Island and the "Lamppost." Probably a necessary evil, like the most recent exposition-heavy Battlestar Galactica episode, but I was starting to adjust my expectations for a not-so-compelling hour of Lost.

But then everything changed. The rest of the episode was a great look at how much Jack has changed over the series. He was always the "man of science" to Locke's "man of faith," yet now he'd opened his mind to other possibilities -- if not completely, then enough. The scene with his grandfather was a nice little touch, and I thought Jack's story to Kate, about not wanting to waste "nice shoes" on his dead father, hit a strong emotional chord.

Even better, the episode opened up a number of other mysteries. I'm normally intrigued but nervous when Lost opens up a bunch of new mysteries, because they usually involve Island MacGuffins. But tonight reminded me very much of the "who are the Oceanic Six?" mysteries that opened last season so strongly, in that all tonight's question were grounded not in the Island, but in the characters.

How did Sayid come to be on the plane? It appears perhaps he was becoming a "proxy" for Kate in the original crash, a fugitive being taken in by a marshal or some such.

How did Hurley get out of prison, and what changed his mind about going? Given the presence of the guitar, I'm thinking perhaps a "spectral Charlie" had something to do with it.

What happened to Ben between the time he left the church and his phone call to Jack the next morning? We last saw him saying something about an "old friend," and then see him bloody. Penny may have been in town with Desmond... did Ben make good on his threat to kill Charles Widmore's daughter? Or did he try and fail?

What happened to Aaron that Kate refuses to talk about? We know Claire's mother is in town? Did something happen to make Kate give Aaron away? Or something else?

How did Locke come to realize that his suicide was necessary to return everyone to the Island? (One thing that's really not a mystery about his story is his eventual resurrection. If he's the "proxy" of Jack's father, it seems inevitable that his fate will be the same.)

In short, it seems as though we're now set up for a bunch of "flashback" episodes, centering on each of those characters, and telling the tale of their missing hours before the depature of flight 316.

Not to mention the questions... did Lapidis also transport back to the Island? And who was that other guy in the cabin with them that spoke to Jack in the ticket line? On any other show, it would probably be unimportant, but it all seemed a little too prominent here to mean nothing.

Tons of new stories to tell, all with the promise of good drama. Now I feel like Lost is sailing in the right direction this season.