(If you don’t watch LOST, these posts will be torturous to you. I apologize in advance. Just skip them and come back on Wednesdays, where I will try to make it up to you.)
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Season 6, Episode 3 “What Kate Does”
What do you know, it’s a Kate-centric episode, but the lead picture has to be of Claire. I think maybe Kate would want it that way, wouldn’t she? I mean, it’s looking more and more like her destiny wasn’t to fall in love with Jack or Sawyer. It’s looking like her destiny was the help Claire and Aaron stay together.
Before we get into it, one thought on the two timelines. Last week I wasn’t sure that it was as simple as Timeline A being the original and Timeline B diverting off in 1977 creating a whole new timeline. Now, I’m thinking it is. Timeline A is the original timeline. It’s where all of the Seasons 1-5 footage has come from. Timeline B is the Parallel timeline, a new timeline created in 1977 by “the incident”, when the H-bomb was detonated. How the two timelines relate to each other, I have no idea. But interesting to note that Kate did seem to have two moments of recognition in this episode, one with Sawyer and one with Jack. Does she know them from events in Timeline B that we just havent seen yet, or does she somehow know them from Timeline A?
[side note: Interesting to note that when the Ajira flight took off in 2007, it had 5 of the Oceanic 6 on it: (Kate, Jack, Hurley, Sun, Sayid, but not Aaron). Of those 5, only Sun was born after 1977 (born in 1980 i think). Does that explain why she was the only O6 member not to flash to 1977? Was it important that she wasn't in 1977 when the incident occurred and the timeline split? Or did it have to do with the fact that Locke never visited her?]
Before we get to the episode, here’s a quote from Damon Lindelof, executive producer of the show:
“There’s a reason (we’re showing you both timelines). You’re supposed to be asking yourself the question of why are they showing me both shows. The fundamental mystery is what is the relationship between these two things.There are going to be a lot of good theories about it, we hope. That’s the fun of Lost…If you can make it another 16 episodes, your patience will be rewarded.”
The PARALLEL TIMELINE (B) – 2004
Forget the fact that there’s no way Kate goes back for Claire and there’s no way Claire gets in the car…but whatever, it happened. The interesting point is that the adoptive parents no longer want the baby. Why? Because daddy ran away and left Lindsey Baskum all by herself. Who were these people anyway? Well, in the original 2004 they were a couple selected by Claire’s psychic. Remember him, Richard Malkin? First he was freaked out by Claire (maybe because he saw the multiple timelines in her future…or cloudiness because of the two timelines?), then he insisted she keep the baby, and finally he found the LA couple willing to adopt.
Oh, and by the way, Lindsey Baskum anagramed is “Used by Malkins”. Coincidence? I think not.
Who is Mr. Baskum? Some think it will be Ben. Others think it will be Tom “Mr. Friendly”, who as we know, is gay. After all, Mrs. Baskum says, “My husband…he left me.” (and doesn’t finish the sentence with “for another woman.”) Rest assured this will be an interesting reveal.
Great to see Ethan again. Remember, right before the incident and the splitting of the timeline, he is taken off the island in the dharma evacuation. In Timeline A he comes back, recruits Juliet, kidnaps Claire, and is shot by Charlie. In timeline B, the island is sunk and he becomes a doctor at Angels of Mercy Hospital.
Speaking of the Hospital, that’s an interesting name. Is Jacob the Angel of Mercy and Black Smoke the Angel of Death?
And speaking of the hospital again, the date on the Ultrasound printout was October 22, 2004. There’s 1 more thing that is completely different about Timeline B from Timeline A. These folks are all flying back from Australia in October, not in September. Claire was 36 weeks prego though, and in Timeline A she was 32 weeks prego at the time of the crash, so in both timelines she got knocked up at the same time.
The ORIGINAL TIMELINE (A) – 2007
Sayid and Claire are infected with the sickness. They have been “claimed” apparently. This seems to be connected to having a near death experience? Who does the claiming? One would assume it is smokey claiming his chess pieces for the coming war, but I’m not sure.
Speaking of claiming, remember when we saw Jacob visiting our LOSTies in their youth, touching them all? What if that was his way of “claiming” them? He touched Sawyer, Kate, Jack, Jin, Sun, Locke, Hurley, and Sayid. Of those 8, Locke is dead (and so is Jacob), Sun is on the beach, and the other 6 are in the temple. Only now Sayid has been “claimed”, maybe for the other side? Does almost dying give the other team an opportunity to “steal a piece”?
Quick recap on Claire, case you forgot: In December 2004 she is asleep in the Barracks when Keamy’s crew attacks. She appears to survive the attacks, and though wounded, she seems to heal quickly. Later on in the jungle, Miles can’t stop staring at Claire and asking questions. Clearly he is freaked by her. Later that night Claire awakes to find Christian Shephard (her dad) holding Aaron. She follows him into the woods, and they leave Aaron behind. We see her later in Jacob’s Cabin with Christian, and she is strangely calm. Now, 3 years later, she looks like Rousseau. Is it because she has the same spirit as Rousseau?
I don’t think so. I think it’s just because she’s been living in the jungle for 3 years. If she was claimed by smokey, or whomever does the claiming, then that’s one thing. But I don’t think Rousseau had the sickness, and I don’t think Claire is Rousseau.
Again, I don’t think the dip in the pool was what claimed Sayid. I think maybe it could have healed him had it not been muddy. For that reason, I dont believe Ben Linus was “claimed” when his life was saved in the spring. But I’m not confident about this. After all, it did force him to “lose his innocence” according to Richard.
The tests they performed on Sayid involving the ash Lennon blew on him and the elecricity they pumped in him. Any relation to the ash and sonic fence that keep out Smoky?
One of the more interesting exchanges of the episode was an easy one to miss, in my opinion. When Aldo and Justin find Jin (right before they are shot by Crazy Claire), they have this exchange:
Justin: “No, we can’t (kill Jin), he’s one of them.”
Aldo: “He MAY be one of them.”
For some reason, they are protecting SOME of the LOSTies from the black smoke. But they are only concerned with saving some of them, not all of them. Finding out who they want to save and why will probably explain more about this war that’s coming.
One last thought on Crazy Claire: when she finds out that Aaron is off the island in 2007, is she going to care or will she flip out? I mean, she didn’t seem to care too much in Jacob’s Cabin 3 years ago that she had just left Aaron in the jungle. What’s Kate’s reaction going to be like if Claire doesn’t care about Aaron if/when they meet?
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This wasn’t one of my favorite episodes ever, but an hour of LOST is better than an hour of anything else on TV, so I’m not complaining.
Tonight…Episode 4, “The Substitute” (just 16 15 hours of LOST left)
Posted by Bryan Allain
Great post. I thought the key moment in the episode was the one (in timeline B) where claire says the baby will be called Aaron, and then has no idea why she said that. (A bit like the look kate gave Jack at the airport)
There must be come kind of link between the two timelines, although B is ahead of A chronologically, it appears that what has happened in timeline A affects timeline B somehow on a deep level… And what if there is some kind of inevitability loop that means that Claire became the new rousseau (baby stolen, wild women vibe) and that means that they are all doomed to repeat the same story over and over again?!
I thought it was a good episode, and certainly didnt want the end credits to appear when they did (the mark of a good episode in my book!)
good thoughts Jimmy. a few counterpoints:
1 – Claire wasn’t sure why she chose Aaron for a name in Timeline A either. Eko asked her once why she chose it and she said something like, “I just liked it.”
2 – Be careful when you say “Timeline B is ahead of A chronologically”. Technically not true. They are showing us different moments in each timeline, but in theory the time is the same. For instance, on 10/21/04 in Timeline A the LOSTies have been on the island for a month and they are burying Ethan, who Charlie shot the day before. On 10/21/04 in Timeline B they are planning to board a plane the next day for L.A., and Ethan is a doctor in L.A. Both moments happen at the same time chronologically, it’s just that the characters are in “different parts of their story”. well actually, they are in different stories altogether.
The two timelines relate somehow, just not sure how.
I can in no way claim this, my friend Kathy discovered this clue, but I wanted to share it:
If you go back and watch the first episode this season (LA X pt 1), you’ll see Jack, after coming back to his row the first time, having to climb over Desmond who “appeared.” Des was not on the first plane…interesting. Anyway, at one point in their convo, Des flashes the front cover of the book he’s reading to the camera. I thought I recognized it, so I went back and watched it several times, and I was right. It’s called “Haroun and the Sea of Stories” by Salman Rushdie; I read it sophomore year in World Lit. Now you, being learned, avid Lost fans as I (;), know that the writers don’t do anything just because…there’s a reason. Locke said it for so long, then even Jack began to believe. The book is about story telling as a whole, and the details inside the book can point strongly to Lost. After seeing the book in the episode, I re-read it today and highlighted several places that are Lost-esque, including “Black Smoke,” an upcoming war, and even a quote about an “anti-story.” Here are a few of the quotes I found interesting:
The acrostic at the beginning:
Z embla, Zenda, Xanadu:
A ll our dream-worlds may come true.
F airy lands are fearsome too.
A s I wander far from view
R ead, and bring me home to you.
Not sure what “ZAFAR” means according to Lost, but the words are interesting…
“In the north of the sad city stood mighty factories in which, (so I’m told) sadness was actually manufactured, packaged, and sent all over the world, which never seemed to get enough of it. Black smoke poured out of the chimneys of the sadness factories and hung over the city like bad news.”
“Haroun often thought of his father as a Juggler, because his stories were really lots of different tales juggled together, and Rashid [father] kept them going in a sort of dizzy whirl, and never made a mistake.”
“The real world was full of magic, so magical worlds could easily be real.”
“a state of war now exists between the Lands [...]” i.e. the war that’s coming between the black smoke monster (John Locke’s body) and the temple people (Jacob’s people).
“Bezaban is a gigantic idol [...] It is a colossus [...] and stands at the heart of Khattam-Shud’s fortress-palace [...]” i.e. the giant statue thing which is now a foot and where Jacob was killed and Black Smoke Monster (BSM) came out of.
Possible Kate: “You think it’s easy for a girl to get a job like this? Don’t you know girls have to fool people every day of their lives if they want to get anywhere? You probably had your whole life handed to you on a plate, probabaly got a whole mouth full of silver spoons, but some of us have to fight.”
“A beachhead was established, and tents had been raised [...]”
“The shadow was attached to the warrior at the feet, but other than that seemed to be entirely free. It was as though its life in a land of darkness, or being a shadow concealed in shadows, had given it powers undreamt of by the shadows of a conventionally lit world. It was an awesome sight.” i.e. Locke’s dead body and the BSM inhabited one. Later, the leader of the dark group is concealed as having broken off from his shadow; there are two of them.
Possible BSM: “he has become Shadowy himself – changeable, dark, more like a Shadow than a Person. And as he has become more Shadowy, so his Shadow has come to be more like a Person. And the point has come at which it’s no longer possible to tell which is Khattam-Shud’s Shadow and which his substantial Self [...]”
There is a Wellspring, or Source of Stories that is being polluted, just as the Temple spring is…
“for every story there is an anti-story. I mean that every story – and so every Stream of Story – has a shadow-self, and if you pour this anti-story into the story, the two cancel each other out, and bingo! End of story.” There is an anti-story going on in the show, and this is the final season…
So, on that note, I have some predictions:
The good guys (Jack, Kate, Sayid, James, Jin, Sun, Frank, Miles, Hurley + Temple people “fought hard, remained united, supported each other when required to do so, and in general looked like a force with a common purpose. All those arguments and debates, all that openness, had created powerful bonds of fellowship between them.”
The leader of the bad guys, BSM was “crushed to bits; not a shred of him was ever seen again.”
They all live happily ever after, but “Happy endings are much rarer in stories, and also in life, than most people think. You could almost say they are the exception, not the rule.”
They live in a synthesized happily ever after: “we have learnt how to synthesize them artificially. In plain language: we can make them up.” So maybe a happily ever after happens, but only because we make one up for them.
I don’t know, maybe I’m reading too much into this. But since Des isn’t even supposed to be on that plane, and he shows up with this book, I’m counting this as more than a coincidence. I didn’t include all the connections I found from the book in this note either; there are plenty more. Go check it out yourself!
http://www.amazon.com/Haroun-Sea-Stories-HAROUN-SEA/dp/B001TI5TSK/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1265943903&sr=8-2
wow. now THAT’S a comment.
i had read a little about the Rushdie book, and agree that it’s there for a reason. all the books in LOST are either clues to what’s going on, or homages to having influence on the story.
can’t wait for tonight!
Agreed! My friend, and I’m not really referencing myself, put a lot of thoughts into this…
Great post. I have some thoughts/theories that I’ll post later.
For now, here are some fun Lost valentines… sorry they are a day late and a dollar short (hey, that’s cliche Thursday material)
http://bit.ly/cmC8Ir
This is an excellent write up. Much better than the one I did. Where to start?
1. The quote from Damon Lindelof is encouraging. The alternate timeline (TB) is nowhere near as interesting as TA, but still it’s keeping me invested.
2. I’ve read a few different threads about Jacob and the MiB being angels. Angel of Mercy v. Angel of Death is an interesting way to look at it.
3. Remember at the end of Season 4 when Kate had the dream of Claire telling her “not to bring him [Aaron] back… Don’t you dare bring him back”? My guess is either Claire will be glad Aaron’s not back or won’t even remember Aaron.
Again, great post.
Amity’s post reminded me of something Michael Emerson said to Entertainment Weekly about this season: What if you saw what the show meant but couldn’t recognize it?
Could that snippet of Desmond reading “Haroun and the Sea of Stories” be that unrecognizable clue?
Great comment, Amity! Thank you for sharing