LOST Season 4: Episode 12 -- There's no Place Like Home

HARD FACTS

The events in this week’s episode can be broken down in broad strokes into two general categories: (a) event’s post-rescue; and (b) events happening on the Island in the present (at least in the present from the show’s perspective). Therefore, I am dividing the description of the episode’s hard facts into those two categories.

A. The Oceanic Six Post-Rescue

1. A U.S. coast guard transport plane returns the survivors to civilization.

2. An Oceanic Airline representative provides the Oceanic Six with orientation prior to their disembarking.

3. No one greets Kate upon the transport’s landing.

4. The Oceanic Six participate in a press conference at which an elaborate tale of survival is told including drifting at sea for a day until they reached an uninhabited island, Kate giving birth to Aaron on the Island, a fishing boat from a typhoon washing up on the island on day 103, and its use as a means for returning to civilization which occurs on day 108.

5. The Oceanic Six story is met with some skepticism.

6. There is a funeral for Christian Shepard albeit without a body

7. At Christian Shepard’s funeral, Jack learns from Claire’s mother, who attended the funeral, that Claire is his sister and, ergo, that Aaron is his nephew.

8. Hurley’s parents throw him a surprise party attended by many other survivors.

9. Hurley’s father has restored Hurley’s car, the settings of which are 4815162342.

10. Sun confronts her father for hating Jin and informs dad that she has purchased a controlling interest in his company with her own money from the Oceanic settlement.

B. The Here and Now on the Island

1. Keamy & Co. are at the Orchid Station and have arrived before Ben.

2. Faraday knows of the Orchid Station’s role in the secondary protocol and its implications for the Island.

3. Above ground the Orchid is a greenhouse with its innards hidden kind of like the Bat Cave.

4. Ben communicates with someone at the Orchid Station way of reflecting the sun off of a mirror

5. Ben instructs Locke how to enter the Orchid and accomplish the moving of the Island.

6. Moving the Island is said to be dangerous and unpredictable (duh!); it’s a last resort.

7. Ben feigns surrender to Keamy in order to enable Locke an opportunity to make use of the Orchid station to move the Island.

8. Keamy pistol whips Ben after Ben’s surrender.

9. Kate and Sayyid are captured by a fairly large-sized and well-armed group led by Richard.

10. Sun, Aaron, Jin, Faraday and two (or three) other survivors (or extras we’ve never seen before) take the Zodiac back to the Barge.

11. There are a substantial amount of explosives on the Barge.


ANALYSIS

1. Reaching the Barge is not the end of the journey to safety for the survivors. This is almost too obvious since Jin has reached the Barge but we know that he will not make it back alive to civilization. The Barge is a dangerous place: it’s Keamy’s home away from home and, to boot, its loaded up with explosives.

2. The explosives on the Barge are part of a pre-arranged booby trap by Keamy. Keamy intends to blow up the Barge and the device worn on his shoulder is likely a remote control device of some sort. Keamy, however, is not on a suicide mission. The secondary protocol likely provides instructions to Keamy as to how he can make use of the Island’s facilities to transport himself off the Island.

3. Locke will actually physically move the Island. This will not be a time a space/time travel (at least not primaily so) but an actual physical moving of the Island. The future Widmore taunted by Ben in an earlier flash forward doesn’t know where the Island is anymore because its been moved.

4. Moving the Island causes a typhoon (or something even worse). The story line from the Oceanic representative at the press conference mentions that a typhoon caused a fishing boat to wash up on the island in day 103. I believe that the typhoon was caused by the moving of the Island. Coincidentally, on December 26, 2004, there was a massive earthquake off the coast of Sumatra, Indonesia which caused a tsunami resulting in deaths estimated at more than 225,000 people. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2004_Indian_Ocean_earthquake. This tsunami is a sufficiently epic event that it would make sense to incorporate it into the LOST story. The only thing that has become unclear now is precisely what day it is on the Island. Desmond made his phone call to Pennie Widmore on December 24, 2004, which was 93 days from September 22, 2004. It is unclear, however, how many days have elapsed since the time of that phone call on the Island. If, in fact, the moving of the Island coincides with December 26th (i.e., Day 95) then it will still be another 8 days until the survivors purportedly obtained a fishing boat on day 103.

5. It is not yet clear that the survivors will return to civilization on the Barge. The Oceanic Airlines representative at the press conference said that the survivors washed up on a fishing boat. I guess the Barge could be that fishing trawler or it could be an entirely different boat. The story presented also made it sound as though the survivors were the only ones on the fishing boat. Yet, the Barge has a crew of its own.

6. Moving the Island removes the protections previously bestowed on off-Island LOSTies. Sun will die. He is not still alive on the Isalnd after the rescue as evidenced by Jin's angry outburst at her father. However, the past pattern has been that people who have been to the Island while off the Island can not die. Somehow moving the Island upsets this pattern. Either that or Jin goes back to the Island or its vicinity and is killed there. Also, hopefully, this will finally lead to the death of Michael which is a far better fate for everybody else than having to hear him whine and yell WALT!!!!! again.

7. Moving the Island was pre-destined. It is a pre-requisite to Aaron leaving the Island which is a necessary step in his fulfilling his destiny whatever that may be.

8. Kate was captured by the Others to insure that she will act as Aaron’s mother. Richard’s capture of Kate is a form of protective custody. Romping around the jungle on your spare time can be dangerous. Kate’s raising Aaron is important to his perceived destiny. Therefore, the Others can not afford to let her recklessly risk her life on some mission inspired by the moron Jack. Perhaps Sayyid’s destiny also involves having a hand in the raising of Aaron.

9. The Numbers continue as a persistent theme. The survivors are rescued on day 108 and the Numbers re-appear in Hurley’s car. In other words, even though the survivors have left the Island, the Island, in turn, has not left them.


NEW OPEN QUESTIONS WHICH I DO NOT YET HAVE ANY IDEA HOW TO ANSWER

1. Why have the Others stood aside while Keamy & Co. invaded the Island? They are obviously still sufficiently numerous and well armed to launch a serious defense and counter-attack.

2. How will the Oceanic Six gather in one place given that they are now scattered around the Island: Sun and Aaron are on the Barge; Hurley is at Orchid; Kate and Sayyid have been captured by Richard and the Others; and Jack is with Sawyer and Shaggy Frank.

3. Who is the other person responsible for Jin’s death?

4. Who are the two survivors reported to have made it off Flight 815 but not back to final rescue?

OTHER OBSERVATIONS

1. Nice racial stereotyping by the LOST writers. First, Michael gets hired as a janitor. Now, Hurley’s dad, a Mexican, fixes up a car as a form of relaxation. Sun’s father demands respect. What’s next? A Jewish moneylender?

2. I have no idea why any cash settlement from Oceanic Airways for the Oceanic Six would be so large. They really don’t look any worse for the wear. Certainly any settlement wouldn’t be enough to buy control of Paik Industries unless Paik was near bankruptcy . Also, the entire concept that Sun could somehow sneak in and buy a controlling interest especially given the traditional nature of South Korean corporate governance is inane.