S5E5 - This Place Is Death

That's right kids, it's that time of the year again. So grab your spouse/partner/significant other/self and settle in for a very special edition of...

***LOST VALENTINES***

To: Robert
Card: Bright yellow card depicting a cartoon teddy bear.
Outside: "I've noticed something different about you lately. Have you been working out?" (pic of teddy bear flexing muscles) "Get a haircut?" (pic of teddy bear sporting a buzz cut) "Lose some weight?" (pic of skinny teddy bear) "Get possessed by an enigmatic creature comprised of some freakish semi-solid smoke-like substance?" (pic of teddy bear w/ horrified expression being dragged along the jungle floor)
Inside: "Either way... I'm going to shoot you." (pic of two teddy bears pointing rifles at one another)
From: Danielle

Wow. Well there goes the time sickness theory. I guess it makes sense that it was something else wrong with Rousseau's team because the time sickness seems to only cause forgetfulness on the light side, make your nose bleed on the medium side, and death on the heavy side. Apparently whatever effected her team "changed" them somehow. I'm assuming it made them "bad people," which is obviously the case if Robert was willing to kill his own wife and child at the end. And what's up with what he said? It's just a security system guarding the temple. Yeah, the First United Temple Of Make-You-Crazy.

Anyway, I'm happy we got to see this unanswered piece of Rousseau's background, though in typical LOST fashion it brings up more questions. I'm still mildly curious about how the others managed to kidnap baby Alex, but as far as I'm concerned Danielle Rousseau may now rest in peace.

To: The Island
Card: No card. Just the same message carved in trees, spelled out with rocks, and drawn on the beach, over and over...
Message: "I want to have your baby."
From: Locke

Here's my crazy theory. Remember way back when in season 1 when Locke actually saw the smoke monster for the first time? He told Jack he saw the "eye of the island and it was beautiful." Maybe that's brainwash talk for "The island told me to keep you here against your will and kill everyone else." Think about it, he was mildly crushing on the island before that encounter. And who could blame him, it healed his legs. But let's assess his behavior ever since then. In season 3, alone, he blew up the com station to allow outside communication, blew up the submarine that would have allowed Jack and Juliet to leave, and knifed Naomi in the back. And I have a feeling even though he's "friends" with his fellow LOSTies, he wouldn't be too hard pressed to kill any of them if they got in the way of whatever he believed to be his destiny.

What if that's what the "true" others are as well? People who've been exposed to the smoke monster or gone to this crazy temple? Remember that stewardess, Cindy, that randomly popped up on the prison island they took Jack, Kate, and Sawyer to at the beginning of season 3? She along with the kids were all going to watch Juliet's trial. She seemed to be sipping the Kool-Aid hard core... smoke-flavored Kool-Aid. It doesn't explain everything, I know, but it certainly would shed light on why some people (Richard, John, Ben) are so die-hard.

Okay, thanks for entertaining my whacked out ideas.

To: Daniel
Card: Black with white lettering.
Outside: "This place is death."
Inside: "Seriously."
From: Charlotte

Alright, so Charlotte was not my favorite character. Still, it was kind of sad to see her final moments. It was confirmed that Charlotte did, in fact, grow up on the island. Her mother was with the Dharma Initiative, but moved away. I wonder if along with creeping out little Charlotte, Future-Daniel also scares the crap out of Charlotte's mom which is why the woman decided to leave. We know that Daniel (will be) among the Dharma folks at some point in episodes-to-come since we saw him hanging out in the Orchid station of the past in this season's premiere. Her warning to Jin and the gang to not bring Sun back was creepy. As always, there are conflicting messages and you don't know who to believe. Ben/Richard/Christian say they all need to come back, Charlotte on her death bed says they shouldn't. I have the uneasy feeling that Charlotte is spot on.

To: Jack and Sun
Card: Homemade card made from colorful scraps of construction paper.
Outside: "I tried to think of the perfect gift for you this Valentine's..."
Inside: "And if you had ANY idea of how much effort I put into MAKING this $%#@! card you'd be ON YOUR KNEES kissing my feet."
From: Ben

Is it just me or was Ben being super pissy in the van? I guess if I blindly thought I was doing the right thing and going through who knows what to keep people safe, I'd be upset too if everyone wanted to kill me for it, but come on dude... chill. And I think he's way out of line to say how hard he's been working to keep all of their friend's safe. As if he even cares. He wants to get back to the island and just happens to need them in order to do it, is all.

To: Ben
Card: A simple rectangular card. About 3in x 7in. You know... the kind you typically get from your grandparents just before graduation and you're all like, "Sweet, they sent cash."
Outside: Pink with a red heart.
Inside: Hand written... "Sorry we can't be with you for Valentine's. Here's $20 for gas money or whatever. Best of luck."
From: Kate, Aaron, Sayid, and Hurley

So, Ben only has one-third of the Oceanic Six. The Oceanic Two. Just doesn't have the same ring to it, doest it? I wonder if Desmond is supposed to go as well. I never got the impression that he was supposed to go back too, but there he is with them all nonetheless. Ironically, Daniel asked Desmond to find his mom to help and that's what Ben's already doing. Seems like an elaborate plot device just to keep Desmond around. Whatever, though, I like ol' Dessy. It would just suck if he blips off to the island without Penny and little Charlie. I don't see that happening, though. At least not voluntarily.

To: Sun
Card: Plain white paper with crayon frowny face
Outside: "I miss you mommy."
Inside: Crudely drawn broken heart. "Please don't go."
From: Ji Yeon

Okay, so this is a sad Valentine, but seriously... it looks like Sun has all but packed her bags. Of course she still has a chance to back out of whatever they have to do to get back to the island in the next episode. I'm sure she wants to be reunited with Jin somethin' crazy, but geez lady, you've got a daughter to think about. I suppose she's under the naive impression that she can just waltz back to the island and pick up Jin on her way back to Korea. Yeah, right. Somehow I doubt getting back to the island will be as easy as running an errand, like the space-time equivalent of swinging by the grocery store for a jug of milk on your way home from work.

To: The Island
Card: Hastily folded piece of scrap paper handed to Christian Shepard seconds before moving the island yet again.
Outside: "Oh man, I'm so bad with these things. I'll just come out and say it. I'm leaving. I don't know for how long. It may sound cliche, but it's true when I tell you that it's not you... it's me. I truly want us to be together again. ALL of us. I'll be back as soon as I can. Dead or alive. I love you."
Inside: "P.S. I'm serious about wanting to have your baby. I'm so totally gaga for you. I would bear your children in a heartbeat if I were a woman, and it were possible to copulate with an inanimate land mass, and also if conceiving a child while on you wouldn't kill me by the third trimester."
From: Locke

So once again "the Island" speaks to Locke via Jack's dead father. It's funny how we're all so totally beyond this being strange. Anyway, Christian said the funniest thing of the episode and perhaps the truest thing since the very first season. "And since when has listening to Ben done you any good?" Bam! On a sidenote, I thought it was interesting he said he couldn't help Locke to the wheel. I guess that would make sense if he's for-real dead so is in fact a ghost. I'm not going there, though. It's difficult enough to swallow all the time travel stuff so I can't deal with ghosts. Not this season at least. Maybe next year I'll have to change the name of my blog from
http://timetravelsucks.blogspot.com/ to http://ihateghosts.blogspot.com/.

Apparently the Orchid's wheel had slipped off its axis, which may explain the time jumping. Locke just needed to give it a little nudge and voila, island moved and (presumably) time skipping halted. However, I have a bad feeling they're not out of the woods just yet. We don't know for sure where they are in time, but we do at least know they will be back in the Dharma's timeline at some point and eventually will make it back to their own (we assume), so the assumption is this temporal merry-go-round gone wrong has yet to be righted. Of course as we all know, the side effect of moving the island is leaving and never coming back. But then again that's only partially true. Apparently Mama Faraday (aka Elouise Hawking) is about to lay down some heavy physics mojo and get at least some of the gang back in the next episode or two. Will it be that easy? Somehow, I think not.

Anyway, I'm really looking forward to either the next episode or the next next episode where I bet we'll see all of Locke's post-island interactions with the O6 plus Ben plus Walt.

Happy V-Day to everyone. Your card is in the mail.