If you haven’t started watching Lost yet, what are you waiting for? This season is getting to the point of being as good or better than the first season. One reason for that is we have almost no appearances of the Smoke Monster and Jacob has been kept to a minimum. So the mystical aspect of the island has been turned down for real exploration of the mystery of why the Losties are trapped on the island. This Kate-centric episode with Flash Forwards was classic Lost, giving us huge bombshells that only seem to lead to more and more questions.
I feel like every segment of last week’s show had a huge question answered only to leave us wanting and needing more. This Flash Forward business may have been the creators’ best idea yet. As for the action on the island, I thought the cat and mouse conversation between Locke and Ben in the beginning was classic Ben, but is just another example that Locke is never really in control. Then Sawyer and Kate pull a fast one on Locke with a quick and easy con to get Kate into Ben’s cell without John even knowing Sawyer was involved. I feel so bad for Locke because even when he was given a second chance on the island the guy is just continually used and abused.
What I’d like to know, and if anyone has any guesses please share, is when do the Flash Forwards take place in relation to the Oceanic 6 getting off the island. There seems to be a much larger time jump than we assumed when at the end we see a grown up Aaron thinking he is Kate’s son. Since we are all assuming that the child at the end is Claire’s Aaron, then he has grown up a ton. Especially, if he’s old enough to talk, watch TV and understand what’s going on. More importantly Kate’s attorney was contemplating putting Aaron on the witness stand, so I’m assuming he’s at least 4 or 5 in the Flash Forward.
If that’s true, then the how do the Oceanic 6 explain Kate having a child? Was Kate pregnant on the flight back to the US? If so don’t you think the U.S. Marshal who had taken her into custody would have mentioned that to his superiors? She couldn’t have given birth while shipwrecked because the story they all construed was that Kate took care and saved the lives of the other injured Oceanic 6. Plus, they couldn’t have been back from the island for that long since Kate is just now being tried for murder and a slew of other offenses. I don’t think the federal government would be giving her that much time before re-arresting her.
The other huge question brought up here is what does this final revelation of Aaron as Kate’s child mean for Claire? And what on Earth happened that Jack would give up the opportunity to be with Kate over not being able to see or be around Aaron? I’m assuming something happens to Claire at some point to have Kate raising her son. I worry for Claire as it seems her storyline has lost all hope of expanding with the death of Charlie. Her character is starting to bug me though because she’s shown almost no sign of loss this season with Charlie’s passing.
Charlie was portrayed for three seasons as her partner on the island and a surrogate father to Aaron and yet here we all four episodes in from his passing and I have yet to see her crying or sad since the initial shock of hearing the news from Hurley. In fact when she was sitting on the porch with Kate she almost seemed happy and was joking around with Kate and Sawyer. What gives? How could the writers have missed such a golden opportunity to explore what Claire is going through on the island while raising a child surrounded by constant craziness and death?
Another thing that’s been bothering me is that if we’re to believe that 6 members of Oceanic flight 815 “survive” and return to America then there really aren’t that many core cast members of Lost still on the island, especially if something happens to Claire. If Lost keeps killing off members of its cast, we’re going to be left with no one to care about! There are already lots of rumors of more people dying and I just don’t get it. At this point we know Jack, Kate, Sayid and Hurley make it off the island, add another two cast members (assuming Ben is not counted as one of the Oceanic 6, which he very well could be) and you’re left with a relatively small number of 815’ers still on the island that have had speaking parts. By my count we’ve got Jin, Sun, Locke, Sawyer, Claire, Bernard and Rose still alive and on the island. Take two out of that list to round out the Oceanic 6 and you have 5. 4 if we consider Claire is in doubt to make it to the end of the series.
It just seems like Kate, Jack and the rest of the Oceanic 6 are going to a heck of a lot of trouble to protect the island and their friends when most of their friends are actually dead or off the island. Plus I can’t see Jack caring all that much to protect Locke anymore. I guess Ben and Sayid working together means that the Oceanic 6 are doing more than just protecting the Losties but also trying to protect the Others and the other passengers on flight 815 who had previously joined the Others. I can’t wait to find out what happens to make Jack and Sayid lie to the world to protect the Others. There's also the question of what impact this episode has on the Kate/Sawyer relationship from here on out. It seems over for now but as we've learned that only lasts about 2-3 episodes.
One final note, if anyone is averse to learning about some big casting spoilers coming up, I seriously recommend skipping this week’s issue of Entertainment Weekly with Will Ferrell on the cover. For some reason they have a huge article in the very beginning of the magazine talking about what to expect in the next few episodes of Lost. Why they wouldn’t give a warning of semi-spoilers being revealed and why the included a huge picture of a new cast member is beyond me. So read the issue at your own risk.
Earlier this year The Blot was questioning whether Jack Johnson was a big enough star to be headlining two of the three biggest music festivals of the year, Bonnaroo and Coachella. I now take it all back after seeing the staggering numbers Johnson’s newest Album Sleep Through The Static has been achieving these past two weeks. The album was released on February 5th and sold a staggering 375,000 copies in its first week out. Just so you can compare, Sheryl Crow came in second that week with her new album Detours, which was also released that same week, and it sold only 92,000 albums. The other big new release that week was by Lenny Kravitz, and his latest album, It Is Time For A Love Revolution, only sold 73,000 units.
That first week sales number was big enough, but Sleep Through The Static wasn’t done. While most albums have dramatic sales drops in their second week, Johnson sold another 180,000 albums the week of February 12th. Yes, the album dropped by more than 50% of its sales, but let me tell you 180,000 is a monster week in this day and age of digital singles and illegal internet downloading of music. Most artists would kill to move 180,000 units in a week, and this was a down second week of sales for Johnson. I love Jack Johnson’s music, but I had no idea he had become such a big star. For an artist who gets relatively low air play and definitely fits a niche market, this volume of sales is almost Kanye size numbers.
What’s most impressive to me is that I don’t even necessarily love the album. It still has that classic Johnson sound, but I still prefer Johnson’s debut Brushfire Fairytales and his 2005 release In Between Dreams to Sleep Through The Static. I think I also prefer his 2006 release, the original soundtrack Curious George over his latest release. That isn’t to say it’s not a great album, it’s just a little darker and a little less pop-y than I would prefer. Check it out for yourself and let me know. Hopefully Jack Johnson will be announcing a U.S. tour shortly to coincide with his music festival dates so more people across the country can appreciate live his environmentally conscious music.
