"Anthurium Redux - FWIW"

Back in May after "There's No Place Like Home" aired, I tried to find some info on the meanings of the flower used as a directional signpost to the secret hatch in the Orchid Station. I didn't find much except, "...two Victorian meanings in anthurium-giving; either hospitality or intense attraction." I didn't put much importance on either symbolic intention, even though we were given the flashback of Ben's possessive feelings for Juliet.

Then today I was reading a book that I bought because I'm going to begin drawing and taking photos of stone statues soon. The book is, "Stories in Stone: A Field Guide to Cemetery Symbolism and Iconography." Under Anthurium, it says: "Although there is not a lot of symbolism attached to the anthurium, it is often used to decorate graves in Hawaii...a gift of an anthurium from a man to a woman is supposed to signify his enormous attraction to her, for reasons that do not need to be explained."

I doubt that TPTB purposely put this plant in the show to point to Ben's seemingly unhealthy affection for Juliet, but I thought that it was interesting just the same to imagine Ben nurturing this plant that held the meaning of the feelings that he obviously felt for her. Considering that Juliet was so clueless as to Ben's affections (even though others seemed to notice) and the way he insisted that she should have known as they stood over Goodwin's corpse, "reasons that do not need to be explained", took on some interesting meaning in distant hindsight. Just sayin'. :-)

"Happy Holidays"

Happy Hanukkah, Merry Christmas, and Mele Kalikimaka to Losties everywhere! I'm really looking forward to having something new to talk about with you all in January. :-D

"Neat Things"

I normally don't post the updates that can be found elsewhere, but I really like this ad for the Sky channels that was posted on DarkUFO.

I guess that new Lego Lost characters will be released soon. Just in time for Christmas I suppose. Pretty neat, but I wonder why Sayid's "chest" is more pronounced than Kate's. :o) Info on DarkUFO seems to imply that New DI Recruits can get a discount with their DWY cards.

http://meltcomics.com/Melt_Lost.html

"When Worlds Collide"

In the last episode of Season 4, we were shown an alive Locke and a dead Locke. Pierre Cheng's frantic video led us to think that due to Kerr's time-shell theories, there could be two realities "existing" at the same "time", meaning that there could be two Lockes co-existing, i.e., an alive one and a dead one. This got me wondering about how Ben told Jack that they have to take "him" -- Locke -- back to the island with them. Does this mean that the alive and dead Lockes will come together and inhabit the same time and space like matter and anti-matter? Will the two separate time-shells converge into one colossal astronomical event? Is there an island in each of these time-shells? If so, will they converge in some kind of atomic collision? So far I'm still looking forward to finding out, although I must admit that my patience in waiting for this story to start to gel is getting about as thin as our patience for "The Project", if you know what I mean. Hopefully I can hang in there. :-o

Image from :http://www.skinbase.org/zoom.php?id=3233

"Second Entry:Young Frankenlost"

I was thinking about this movie and couldn't resist skewering our remaining Freighties. :-)

And of course I always pick on Locke and Ben, here in an old pic that I made up long ago. Have a safe Halloween, everyone who partakes.

"Lostoween Is Near"

Here's my contribution to this year's Lostoween season. I didn't feel as creative as last year, but Count Deadlocke did manage to inspire something suitable. Since I was so lazy, here's last year's parade of costumes for new visitors who may not have seen it: http://capcomslost.blogspot.com/2007/10/happy-lostoween.html

"Autumn in Keamyland"

Since I seem to have nothing interesting to say about Lost at this time for some reason, here is a lovely picture of autumn foliage from the mystical forest in Keamyland, for your viewing pleasure -- courtesy of the fertile minds at 'Keamy's Paradise' blog (see sidebar links). People have written sentimental songs about autumn in New York and Vermont, but I have a feeling that seeing this vegetation in the woods would inspire some pretty interesting emotions as well.
:-)

"A Fox Network Idea For Lost And ABC"

People who watch Fox's new series "Fringe" may have noticed that the show spends less time on advertisement breaks than most shows. I thought that this was just supposed to be the procedure for the Pilot, but it seems to be carrying on for the rest of the season.

http://www.fringetelevision.com/2008/07/will-fringe-pilot-be-remote-free-tv_18.html

Excluding the mini-recap that precedes each Lost episode, according to my VCR, most Lost episodes run about 33-36 minutes on the average. This last Fringe episode ran for almost 48 minutes, while the ad breaks are quick (60-90 seconds) and few. It would be nice if J.J. and company could convince ABC to allow them to follow the same guidelines with Lost, that they can over on Fox with their new series. Considering all the mysteries and questions that we would collectively like (read: need!) to see satisfied in the final two seasons of Lost, 10-12 more minutes per episode would really help to facilitate that. Right? :-)

"Shut Out At Emmys"

Flame on: You know, it's not as if there are no other creative and talented shows such as Lost on TV that deserve to be recognized, because there are. And it's not as if good entertainment can't have morals, warnings, and messages, as the memorable Twilight Zone series certainly did for example, because they can. But maybe some day the political elitists in Hollyweird will realize that there is more to entertainment than pushing their own propaganda, and that a lot of the people in the flyover states actually enjoy pure entertainment because it is just that...entertainment, not politics. Until then, they'll just keep giving themselves all the awards, and we'll keep watching the shows that they don't want us to watch for fun. 'Nuff said. :-p And this is as close to making political commentary as I'll ever get here on this Lost blog again, I promise. Flame out.

"Jorge Wins ALMA Award"

A hearty congratulations to Jorge Garcia for winning this award for his excellent work on LOST!

http://www.almaawards.com/2008-winners.html

"A Little Help From My Friends"

Wayne volunteered to recharge my brain of mush with an interesting question. Here's how he put it for me in an email:

"Last night I was on the Sayid-flashback in S4. I went back at the end to replay the talk between Ben and Widmore in Widmore's bedroom. I had always concentrated on the "ah, Ben's going after Penny now because Alex died." But there was an important exchange that I should have picked up on after "Meet Kevin Johnson."

Widmore: Are you going going to kill me.

Ben: We both know I can't.

Ben can't kill Widmore because the Island won't let Widmore die, like Tom told Michael? I thought it was about committing suicide and/or "The Island has more work for you." Does that mean Widmore is protected in some way because he WAS on the Island at some time? That he isn't just looking for it again, as if it is a legend like Atlantis, but rather he was there, maybe turned the FDW and was banished? Seriously, the first time around, watching it on TV, I thought ah, going after Penny. Makes sense. But, hell, Jann, he slit Keamy's throat. Why not just pump bullets into Widmore right then and there? Why Can't Ben Kill Widmore? "

All good points. This Ben/Charles dialogue evokes SO many questions about Widmore concerning how he originally got a hold of the island (merely via the Hanso Org?), if he ever lived there, how he got separated from the island, why he can't go back, etc. And, if he needs to get back to the island for healing because he's got some mysterious "shpilkes in his geneckteckessoink" (thank you Linda Richman). And like Wayne said, is there more to the reason why Ben can't kill him, than just because the island won't let him? Sometimes I think that Ben and Widmore are dependant upon each other... that is, there might be a reason that Ben can't live without Widmore, and visa versa, because if one dies the other will too. Oy, it makes me all meshuggah!

Can TPTB answer all the Widmore questions by the end of Season 6? Will TPTB answer these questions?! We need some farkakte answers about Widmore soon. :-)

"Klimt's LOST Kiss"

Lately, I've got no theories. I'm all theoried-out. So when that happens I play with the pretty pictures. I was looking at Klimt's painting "The Kiss" the other day, and it reminded me of The Kiss of Season 4, so I made up this little montage of Des' and Pen's special moment. :-)

BTW, here's the original painting by Gustav Klimt (1862-1918, Austrian symbolism artist).

"How Far Will Sun's Revenge Go?"

A lot depends on the information Sun gets from Locke after he visits them.
I kind of think that Widmore is the other person besides Paik that Sun holds responsible for Jin's "death", or their separation, since it was his search and destroy mission that brought on the mercs. That would make the coy merger that she's doing with him all the more poetic in application, in the vein of "keeping your enemies closer", before she destroys him financially or whatever. Or, Locke could use the info of why the freighter blew up to get Sun mad enough to go back and do whatever it is that Locke needs them to do. But if she finds out about what happened in the Orchid, she could go after Ben off-island instead. Then the path of vengeance-begetting-vengeance becomes the theme of her sad future too -- that is, with Ben killing Keamy and blowing up the freighter to avenge Alex, then Sayid killing to avenge Nadia, Sun killing Ben to avenge Jin, and who knows what else in Seasons 5 and 6. (Quite frankly I hope that all the killing on this show starts to wind down soon!)

Hopefully Sun merely wants to mentally and financially twist the b@lls of the guys who are responsible for separating her from Jin (like the coup of her father's business, rather than killing him) and doesn't end up lowering herself to committing murder like those she feels are responsible. Even though she defended herself well against Colleen on the sailboat (most likely due to being pregnant making her even more defensive), up to this point I don't think that Sun is a killer per se, but you never know with this show. Most of the characters are turning tail on their own personalities, for good and bad and crazy, ever since they got to the island.

"Why Kate's Contempt For Dead Locke?"

"Why would I go to the funeral?"
It was a simple reply, and not laced with too much emotion (probably to keep us from sensing too much about it), but I could see enough of a tinge of repulsion in it that I kind of expected Kate to spit on the ground after she said it to seal the sentiment. A lot of other fans sensed it enough that many voted for Ben being the dead-guy, since he has done so much to earn the hatred of any of the 815ers.

I wonder what happened between Kate and John that ticked her off so much? Could it just be because of all his efforts to keep them from leaving the island? His general half-cocked, explosive craziness? Or is it something that Locke did as the alias Jeremy, after they left the island? Makes you wonder if John might have tried to abduct Aaron somehow when he went to talk to Kate, on his off-island recruiting mission. He could have gone to her to convince her to take Aaron back to the island, she says no, and when she goes to get some iced tea in the kitchen to politely send him off, he sneaks upstairs to try to nick Aaron and she catches him and freaks out. As with everything else, we'll just have to wait and see.

"Misfiring Pens And Guns"

We saw that when Claire was trying to sign the adoption papers, her pens failed to work in the same way that Mike's gun didn't work for him at multiple attempts. So come on Powers That Be, when are you going to tell us why the island wouldn't let Claire take Aaron anywhere but to the island? The psychic said that it would have to be that flight. So it looks as if the island was calling the shots there. I hope that we don't have to wait until the finale of all finales, to learn why Aaron was supposed to crash on the island (and, exactly how it is that the island has all this power to control events!). But it's such a huge mystery at this point, that's probably when and how it will be revealed...in the final scene before the blackout-boom-logo. At least maybe TPTB will give us a few hints and crumbs along the way.

Some theories on Aaron can of course be found at Lostpedia. One that sounded interesting to me was: "Jack and Kate are the "nice couple in LA" to whom Richard Malkin wanted Claire to give Aaron. He didn't know that the plane would crash, but only knew of the future where Jack and Kate were happily raising Aaron." That makes it appear that although Malkin was perhaps not an operating psychic, maybe he did get flashes of precognition like Desmond that didn't really fit together, and he just pieced them in his head to make as much sense of them as he could. Hmmm.

http://lostpedia.com/wiki/Aaron_Littleton/Theories