Lost - The Shape Of Things To Come

Man, there is nothing better than a Ben-centric episode. Every single time the show focuses on the villain Lost fans love to hate we not only find out more about the multi-faceted Benjamin Linus, but also more details concerning the history of Lost’s mysterious island. This episode seems to have really set the stage for things to come this season and in future seasons…we learned how Ben and Sayid ended up working together in the future, we learned that Charles Widmore once controlled the island and that Ben has the ability to call for and direct the Smoke Monster. The episode also had a ton of Easter Eggs including the name and logo on the Dharma jacket Ben was wearing when he first woke up in the desert, the hieroglyphics on the door to Ben’s second secret room and the re-appearance and death of Sayid’s one true love, Nadia.

I’d be remise if I didn’t talk more about what at first appeared to be Ben escaping from the mercenaries by locking himself in his house’s secret room. How cool was it when Ben opened the door to the then unknown second secret room that was attached to his original secret room and called for the Smoke Monster? I guess there really is more to Smokey than we ever thought possible. And the hieroglyphics on the second secret room’s door evidently translate “to summon protection” which seems to be exactly what Ben did. (link)

The biggest question I now have is who set the rules Ben and Charles Widmore seem to be playing by and how far will Ben go to even the score now that his “daughter” Alex has been murdered. At least we now know Penelope will be playing a much bigger role on Lost in seasons to come, which is great because it means Desmond’s story is far from over.

One last note, considering how absent Claire has been all season combined with the fact we know Aaron makes it off the island, is there any question Claire bites the big one tomorrow night? I really hope this doesn’t happen considering how underutilized Emilie de Ravin has been all season, but whenever a character’s storyline seems to have run its course that character is typically killed off relatively soon after.

I’m hoping this is just a ploy to keep us guessing who will be killed off next though, because I had read a few months back that there were big things in store for Ms. Littleton and we’ve barely seen her at all this season. In fact, I think her baby Aaron has been getting twice the amount of screen time she has and he can’t even talk. All should be revealed tomorrow night at 10/9 central, that is if you believe the promos ABC has been running constantly all week long.

The Flash / Barry Allen Returns From The Dead Today After 23 Years

Today the NY Daily News is reporting that “DC Comics is reviving Barry Allen – aka The Flash – the popular superhero killed off by the publisher 23 years ago.” (link) The Flash’s resurrection is part of a new company wide crossover that begins today called Final Crisis and occurs in the final pages of DC Universe #0, which hits stands today.

The Blot honestly never thought I’d be typing those words. You see Barry Allen, DC Comics’ second Flash, sacrificed himself back in 1986 to save the world in one of comics’ most famous issues, Crisis on Infinite Earths #8. Crisis on Infinite Earths, to this day, is one of the most popular, earth shattering comic book mini-series of all time and the death of the Silver Age Flash is one of the reasons for that. What many people don’t realize is DC has had multiple Flashes. The first Flash of the Golden Age is Jay Garrick. Many years later DC introduced Barry Allen as a new Flash, which ushered in the Silver Age of super hero comics and really revitalized super hero comics in America.

After Allen’s death in 1986 his sidekick and nephew Wally West/Kid Flash stepped up and took over his mentor’s role as the Flash. While Barry Allen has made a few appearances over the years in stories where characters have jumped in time, his death has been one of the very, very few to have ever stuck in comics. It seemed like the highest honor the company could pay Allen’s sacrifice by allowing his death to stand for all these years.

To me it’s a shocking move for DC because the character has been deceased ever since I started reading comics. As a comic reader in his late 20’s the only way I’ve come to know of the character is posthumously and the only modern day Flash I’ve ever followed has been Wally West, one of my favorite comic characters. Hearing this news really brings me concern, both for the future of Wally West as the Flash and what the impact this resurrection will have on the character of Barry Allen.

Thankfully the writing of the return of Allen’s Flash is being handled by Grant Morrison (writer of Final Crisis) and Geoff Johns (writer of The Flash), two comic book writers whose works I really enjoy and admire. Johns told the Daily News “when the greatest evil comes back to the DC Universe, the greatest hero needed to return. Without Barry Allen, we’d still be reading comic books about cowboys.” (link) Morrison added that the Flash is “the God of the modern world, people are doing more everyday, moving faster and I think the Flash can be their hero.” (link) As with life things can change in the blink of an eye, only time will tell if Barry Allen’s return is for good or just another publicity stunt to increase readership in a new title…either way it’ll be nice to see one the DC Universe’s central characters running the streets again.

24 Season 7 Cast Photo

Even though we’re still eight months away from the Season 7 premiere of 24, FOX doesn’t want us to forget about Jack Bauer and his co-workers at CTU. To start building hype for next season FOX unveiled a puzzling cast photo which gives away a major spoiler for the season to come. This is the second time they’ve given away this particular spoiler, the first being in a press release before they started filming the seventh season. So, in a roundabout way I guess the 24 Season 7 cast photo really isn’t a spoiler.

But nonetheless I don’t really understand why they chose to blatantly give away this plot point again in the photo. If you hate spoilers then ignore the photo below, but if you love 24 and either already know the spoiler or just don’t care check out the photo below:


By now you should have noticed the return from the dead of CTU agent and Jack Bauer’s best friend, Tony Almeida (actor Carlos Bernard). They’ve been talking about this for a while now, and supposedly the original plan was for Tony to return last season as the show’s main villain. But instead the creators of 24 have decided to announce to the world Tony’s return for next season as one of the main adversaries for Kiefer Sutherland’s Jack Bauer.

Tony has always been my second favorite character on 24 (after Jack), and I was pretty annoyed with the show when they decided to kill him off. So in some small way I’m glad he is returning from the dead, even if he is going to be portrayed as a bad guy. What puzzles me is why bring him back at all? The show has always had a strict rule of "when a character dies on the show they are dead for good" and this flies directly in the face of that. I just think bringing Tony back sets a bad precedent and lessens the impact future deaths on the show will have on the television audience. Plus, if you’re going to bring Tony back why put him in direct conflict with Jack? Doesn’t that just mean he’ll probably end up dying all over again?

24 has had a good mixture of meaningful character deaths, but they went a little haywire with this last season by killing off a bunch of characters that the audience never had a connection with. Because 24 has always chosen to kill off main cast members the show seemed to be running on fumes last year and it made it hard for the audience to connect with the new cast. Hopefully Tony’s rise from the grave will mean a return to form for 24 and good things in the season to come.