I Voted Saxon!

So I’m back for the week and we get to see John’s side story, and his New story, as The new Man in Black (apologies to Johnny Cash). Oh, yeah, SPOILERS as usual.

Locke was really getting sick of receiving all that Dharma spam in his inbox.

This week is John Locke’s turn at the sideways swipe. This time, however, things are different AND the same. John obviously had a healthier relationship with his father (yet STILL ended up in a wheelchair, how does that happen??) and is happily engaged to Leela, err, I mean Helen. No sex lines for THIS Locke He still tries to go on his walkabout, however, and is denied. What we get this time is more of the asshole boss, who ends up firing him and Locke bumps into the owner of the paper company, one Hugo Reyes (who never twigs seeing a bald wheelchair guy on the plane earlier, or vice versa) who still basks in luck in the alt-universe, and offers to help John with a new job.

Basically we see John agonize over the card given to him by Jack in the second episode during their past encounter. He decides to stop believing in Miracles and hopes that Helen can accept him for who he is and not keep holding onto a hope that one day he’ll walk again. It’s a sweet moment.

Back in Timeline A,  Fake Locke (or Flocke as he is known around the Lost forums) is running and ca-chinking around the island in hope to recruiting some people to his cause. His kidnap of everlasting Richard last week doesn’t help a bit – he refuses and ca-chinks back over to ex-Otherstown where Kate has tearfully left and somehow there’s still enough power for Sawyer to crank some Iggy and the Stooges on the turntable, and I crank the speakers for a few minutes .

Back on the beach, not too much happens. IIlana sooks a little about her dead crew. I don’t know why. Maybe they’re some sort of “off-island Jacob cult” and very close, but until these last couple of weeks, she’s seemed not much more than a muscle group here to help Jacob. However she scoops up some of Jacob’s ashes, buries Locke, and decide to all go to the temple, but before (of course) will have all sorts of zany adventures and stay out of the way until needed just before mid-break finale, where they will most definitely tease us with the Sun/Jin meetup as a cliffhanger…

Back in ex-Otherstown, James in his drunken state has gotten to the point where he just doesn’t CARE anymore about the weirdness of the island. I want to say he takes it all in his stride, but it’s more than that. More of a resignation in some ways. It’s very sad. Still, Flocke offers him answers and after a run around in the jungle with a warning by Richard and some creepy little kid, we fall down a rickety old ladder (good question – how in the hell are they getting back UP that cliff-face for next week?) and Flocke throws a white stone out in the ocean. I was right about the ying/yang thing. There are two sides to this show. Whoever Jacob WAS and Flocke IS, they are the ying/yang to all of this. Stands to reason whether black is evil and white is good… We see a large list of crossed out people, the list of the dead. The remaining on the list are the main characters. Jack, either Sun or Jin, Sawyer, Hurley and Sayid, all accompanied by those good ol’ numbers (according to the show, Jacob was a bit of a maths nerd). For once, we GET SOME ANSWERS! Jacob/Flocke were once men like them, Jacob is there to protect the island. Flocke, most probably, is chaos. Chaos/Order, anyone? Someone needs to replace Jacob, and “the list”, are the candidates. The remaining main cast of this show. Flocke gives him the options 1. Do nothing, and get struck off of the list (does that mean die, though, or be removed as a candidate?), 2. Become Jacob’s successor, or 3. Get off the island with Flocke, which is all that Flocke has ever wanted to do. And just as Sawyer decides, “stuff it, let’s leave”, it’s credits time.

i liked this episode. Out of all of the characters in this show, it seems that they let John Locke suffer the most. Nothing in this guys life ever seems to work out. Here though, despite his disability, he’s doing alright. He learns to deal with his drawbacks, and becomes a better person, something he couldn’t really do on the island as he was chasing faith every week. Locke’s a believer, and all this mystical shit is like Heroin to Charlie… In the real word of Timeline B, he’s decided – “enough dreaming, time to grow up a little”. It’s sad that I feel like all of this “what if” is going to be swept under the rug somehow, and we’re going to be left with the John Locke we buried this week.

The secrets? It’s good to finally, (if slowly) see some answers. My big question is do they ALL need to be part of what is to come? Is it destined? Something they can’t escape? The way Flocke was talking to Sawyer, it sounded like Death will be certain if he chooses not to take this path. We’ll see. And what about Jacob/Flocke? Did they come in the times of the Black Rock? Did these two replace some other people? Is it a never ending battle that started at the beginning, like the Egyptian times? I’m happy to see the black/white side though. And I like the little moment with Timeline B’s Locke’s alarm clock sounding very much like the alarm that the hatch used to make. Great episode and well done enough to keep us fans guessing and thinking for the week to come.