LT309: When 1 + 1 Equals 1...and 2

SEASON 6 TEASERS

Look no further…because there are none. The producers have convinced ABC not to release any promo photos or video. Now this is right down my alley for I despise teasers and spoilers. It also suggests that advance snippets – even a still photo – could be a giveaway meaning that Season 6 will answer a lot of questions. How cool is that?


DESMONDS BACKSTORY

Ok, not Desmond, but the actor who plays Desmond…he has settled the sexual harassment lawsuit filed against him with confidential terms. This clears him for being included in Season 6, but soils his reputation. I can’t help but think that just being on an island for filming would be cool in its own right without have to eat of the forbidden tree.


PERSPECTIVE

You may have seen the TV commercial which shows various perspectives. I’m not even sure what the product is, but I think it is a car and most of the scenes are at the beach…well, in the parking lot at a beach. One shot shows a rather wide person standing at the trunk of a vehicle and when he walks away there is a smaller person standing in front of him but hidden from the viewers’ perspective (until the big guy walks away).

If we were standing at the front of the car, our perspective would be totally different. The same question, “How many people do you see?” would be identical but the responses would be different.

In many ways, this is LOST. Often with flashbacks we see the same scene but from different perspectives. First we see John fall through the window and later we see that same scene from Jacob’s perspective. This is important to keep in mind.

Or is it important? I suggest we are shown two or more perspectives in order to entertain like a magician who wows us and then reveals, “I was standing on one leg, see? It was easy!” Easy, once we know the secret. But it amuses us, the viewers.

What is important then is just that the event happened for whatever happens happened. This leads to my essay, “Same and Different”.


LOST RETOLD ESSAY #2: Same and Different

Before the boys, Lew and Chris, were present their father felt like there was a void in his life. He had a burning desire to share his knowledge and dreams and yet there was no one to share it with.
Lew and Chris were the beneficiaries of a brilliant father. Their education was started from the beginning. The first hour they would learn about cosmology. That was followed by a second hour spent on geology. The next hour focused on organic botany, then astronomy, zoology, and biology. The boys would then play after that which consisted mainly of games of chess.

The only variety to speak of in this pattern would be the occasional swapping of the order of studies. The father might teach his sons biology first and then zoology.

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Meanwhile, in another place and time, two other young people were also beginning the life journey of learning and exploration. They two studied six subjects: meteorology, psychology, parapsychology, zoology, electromagnetism and utopian sociology. It was standard for this pair to also rest on the seventh day.

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All four young studies of higher thinking shared the same feeling that each day seemed like a repeat of the day before. The feeling like was being stuck in a loop.


CONCLUDING THOUGHTS

The essays are meant to spark some personal interpretation, but I’m hopeful that at this point we recognize this main aspects. First, we have two characters which have the same father, the same environment and the same nurture. Second, that the Bible introduces the concept of loops in the first chapters of Genesis. And third, they are more than one plane of existence (heaven and earth).

Give me some feedback if you like one essay in particular or if it prompts an idea in your head.


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Enjoy,
KC

LT308: LOST Retold

MY LOST OBSESSION

In the last TIDBITS, I mentioned an idea had occurred to me. This posting begins that idea. The plan is to write a short series essays about LOST. Now this will quickly become clear how obsessed I am with the show and that in itself reveals more than is probably good for me. But it sounded like a good idea at the time and my hope is that I don't run out of steam for the project.

It is also my hope that you enjoy this twist on LOST. My objective is to actually share a theory which could be described as "The Bible According to LOST".

It has become clear already that this is a fairly time intensive project, so let me begin with an apology. I'm not a writer. But I use writing to often help myself sift through ideas and so the theory I'm exploring will sort of reveal itself as we progress. There are no plans to edit, spellcheck or even verify facts. It is merely an effort to explore LOST from a different approach.

There is an outline of the story completed and so each posting on Wednesday and Sunday I do hope to have at least one or two essays ready to go. Who knows where this will end up or whether I'll run out of steam, but for the time being, I do hope you enjoy these.

I've decided on the official name of this collection: CHECKMATE - Lost Retold. So without further disclaimers, justifications and with out an ounce of common sense...here we go...

CHECKMATE - Lost Retold

ESSAY 1: The Opening Moves

Chess is a cerebral game. It is a thinking person’s game. The opening move is said to offer dozens, if not hundreds, of possibilities. It is the possibilities that make the game interesting, challenging and unique each time the board is set up.

This story however is not about chess. It is about the players. Two players in particular are the subject of this story. These two players are some of the finest chess players in the world. These chess masters are Lew and Chris.

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Lew’s father was an intellectual and it is then of no surprise that his influence would be seen in his son. One of the many areas of study he mastered was astronomy. It is of little surprise to those who knew the family that the man and his wife would insist on a name derived from the stars.

Lew’s birth came with little fanfare. His father paced as he waited with anticipation for the news of his child. Upon announcement of his son’s arrival he turned towards the window for a moment of private examination. What he saw was that moment before the Sun would rise over the horizon. In the morning dawn he saw Venus in the morning sky just before the Sun would take its turn. At that moment he knew his son’s name should reflect this event. He would name him after that Morning Star.

Since the father was well-schooled and the practice at that time was for every student to be taught some Latin, the father would use the Latin name for Venus which means “light-bearer”. He would call his child Lucifer. As one can imagine, family and friends recoiled from the name and it was not long after that the shorter nickname of Lew was adopted.

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Chris was also the product of an uneventful birth. His family and in particular his father was a master of many studies. But it was his mother that selected his name. The manner of the name selection soon became the subject of family lore and was retold several times over the years at family gatherings.

She claimed that the night before labor she had a dream. In the dream she was visited by an angel who told her what to name her son. The angel said, “You will call him Jesus Christ”. She was met with quite a bit of objection for the obvious reasons, but she insisted. However, it was nickname that the son would use in order to avoid the teasing and disbelief that the son was sure to endure. So, they took from his middle name and simply called him Chris.

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These two young men were schooled by the best. Out of all their studies the one thing that held their interest was the game of chess. The game allowed them to interweave many lessons from other subjects they undertook: strategy, mathematics, philosophy, and above all: psychology.

It was not long after before these two men were recognized as great chess masters. They would compete in several tournaments with each interaction becoming an epic contest.

It was also not long before it was clear that Chris was the better of the two. Lew never lost a match except to one player: Chris. In youth this fact seemed to matter little to Lew since he approached this as a challenge. But over time, the second place status did begin to gnaw on his psyche. It wasn’t long before he decided to devise a plan to finally beat Chris and become the champion.

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Those who knew to two men would later recall signs of the rivalry. Hindsight is 20/20 and the signs of change in Lew were too subtle for raise any alarm at the time. But looking back is was clear to those intimate with the world of chess at this high level of competition that Lew was determined to beat Chris.

One family friend observed, “Lew’s opening moves were become more bold and yet more reckless. Those of us around the game dismissed this as experimental from a great chess mind.”

It wouldn’t be until years after before Lew’s degree of obsession in beating Chris was recognized for Lew kept his thoughts mostly to himself and his diary. Like the game of chess, life can punish you for one careless move. Lew’s error was forgetting to put his diary away in its hiding place.

It was the maid who discovered the book, open to the last entry. Without any guilt of invasion of privacy she had merely looked down on the writings and read, “And if this fails, I should just kill him.”

The man of the house was quickly alerted and he devoured the diary that afternoon. It was now clear that Lew was upset with Chris’ dominance over his chess game. Yet the more revealing and disturbing discovery was that Lew was jealous over the attention Chris got over Lew’s efforts. For you see, Chris and Lew had the same parents.

A parent can tell their children that they love them equally, but one most wonder if that is even possible. To Lew’s mind, it was not possible and it was equally clear that his father loved Chris more. Chess was merely the mechanism for admiration and not enough of that attention was coming Lew’s way.

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The family tried to work it out, but after a period of effort a decision was reached. Lew would be kicked out of the house. He was allowed to take about a third of the staff in order to secure a comfortable life, but Lew would no longer be welcome home.

The opening move of two lives had taken place and in this game called Life there are no “do-overs”.


NEXT ON TIDBITS

Each Wednesday and Sunday will be a new essay or two. In addition you can expect to get a summary of the off-season games. We will also keep up on reader feedback and any breaking news. As we've done from the start...there are NO SPOILERS in TIDBITS. I don't peek at the rumors for it ruins the surprise. That isn't to say that we don't gather published facts and draw conclusions, but we do not spoil.

Give me some feedback on the essays after you've read a couple. And as always, Thanks for reading!

Enjoy,
KC

LT307: Reader Mailbag Time

FLY AWAY

I received this question the other day: How was Kate able to board when she was on probation?

Kate was on probation for 10 years. In less than one year she was then boarding a plane and heading out of the country. That does seem odd, but consider that Ben had Mr. Norton as his lawyer. Not every lawyer is good enough to talk a judge into an exception, but maybe this one is good enough. Also, consider the real-life story of a man who was released from his prison sentence in order to attend a Kansas City Royals baseball game with his brother and father. So it does happen.


STRAIGHT SHOOTER

Another reader asks, “Why didn’t or couldn’t Ben kill Widmore?”

There are a lot of possible answers to this question. They could be each other’s constant. Keep in mind that in a deleted scene Ben flashes to the Tunisia desert and sees himself. I wonder if Ben hasn’t done this mind and physical travel several times and needs a constant. But my favorite explanation is that Leaders of the island can’t be killed. Recall that Ben tells Hurley at the pit that this is where he shot John but that was silly and he should have known that. Leaders can’t be killed.


GAMES PEOPLE PLAY

A faithful reader of TIDBITS writes, “Is LOST really just a game?”

It could be. If it was a single game I would vote for backgammon. There are 15 pieces per team and 24 spaces on the board…flip 24 to 42 and you have a LOST link. You can double down which is what the man on the golf course suggested before Sayid killed him. There are a lot more similarities such as you can only get hit when a piece is along (live together, die alone). Really ponder that last sentence because Goodwin, Ethan, Alex, Eko and many others die when they are alone on the island. Of course my favorite tie-in to backgammon is the Jacoby rule.


LISTEN CAREFULLY

An old-timer (HA) asks, “What about the Whispers…are they important or not? Has anyone figured them out yet?”

People do spend time search for the whispers and then post their best guesses on several websites if you want to read some dialog. Do I think they are important? No, not important. They play some role, but I doubt we will discover many answers to the mysteries in them. The role they likely play is just another confirmation of the fact that people exist in various states and planes of existence. My favorite explanation is that the Whispers are the Survivors whose voice remains from a time loop, but the body isn’t present. It is clear the Whisperers are watching events and communicating between themselves…even if the events don’t fit a particular scene. The better question might be, “Why do the Whispers show up only at critical times? Why wouldn’t they just appear when something mundane is happening like Kate taking a shower?”


NEXT ON TIDBITS

I’m going to try something a little different and hopefully fun to read. I’m calling it, “LOST RETOLD”. It just a fuzzy idea in my head but for now the idea is to retell the LOST saga in chronological order with a twist. Maybe I’ll get one chapter per week out on TIDBITS.

Until next time…


Enjoy,
KC

LT306: Taking a Closer Look at…

…SEASON 6 PROMO POSTER

There is another Season 6 promotional poster which you can see below:

If you click on the image you can see a larger version which helps highlight the glyphs found in the letters. The poster was analyzed by Dr. Allen from Brown University. He is the guy who alerted the LOST fans that the statue was actually Taweret, protector of mothers and infants. He translated the hieroglyphics and found this: “Who is the guide?” and “Who is the leader?”

Thoughts?


…TELEVISION

If you look closely at episode four (isn’t that a LOST number?) of the new show FlashForward you’ll see a familiar face: Charlie. I must admit the show is not on my must-see list, but this revelation made me wonder if this show isn’t actually some sort of spinoff. It would interesting if slowly we find FlashForward is an explanation to some LOST mysteries.

If you happen to be watching Desperate Housewives you’ll see an Oceanic Airline plane flying overhead. Some sources from ABC are claiming this is the actual Flight 815 in the skies. What could that mean?


…MYSTERIES OF THE UNIVERSE

Episode 4 has been released. The Dharma Initiative documentary has been released. The highlights are:

- A link has been made from the Dharma Initiative to one wealthy man, Alvar Hanso

- Alvar attended college in Michigan as an exchange student and lived with a family named, DeGroot.

- The DeGroot son later attended college in Denmark and his graduate research was funded by Hanso.

There was a comment about Hanso later giving up his weapons and fringe technology research out of guilt for the human cost. That’s strange because as of 2004 Hanso was still funding D.I. and had yet to resign/disappear from the foundation’s work. How did a 1970’s documentary know what was going to happen? Maybe we should research the funders behind this documentary? Could it be the Widmore family? HA!



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Enjoy,
KC

LT305: If I Could Change Just One Thing

GAME UPDATES

In quick summary, the off-season game continues to drop clues that have yet to add up to much – at least in my mind. The latest have featured the group, 88 Keys, which happens to somehow tie-in to polo, Ralph Lauren and a blog.

The first that jumped out to me was that a piano has 88 keys and Jack is seen playing a piano at the Others compound as well as Charlie getting the Christmas gift of a piano. Recall that Charlie also had a vivid dream regarding the piano in the water. I took that to be symbolism, but maybe I’ll to re-examine that scene.

In the LOST University experience I found one thing that was kind of cool: those t-shirts they gave away to new registrants. Here is a picture:




I like the polar bear!


AT ATTENTION OR AT EASE?

We have learned that the US Army arrived at the island sometime in the 1950’s. They brought with them their bombs which at that time were being tested in the South Pacific.

When contemplating this piece of information I had to wonder what significance the Jughead bomb has on the LOST story. When first introduced many speculated that the bomb would explain the radiation sickness. That does not seem to be the case. There were other theories but none of those seem to have a part now. So why include it? Why introduce an Army?

It could be in part that the writers introduced an element that was capable of finding the island. We have gathered that this is not an easy thing to do. The resources available to the US Army however would qualify it as a viable candidate.

We also know that Widmore seems to have discovered its location because he sent the Freighter to retrieve Ben.

And of course Richard and company found it.

Dharma Initiative seems to be a separate entity that also has learned to locate the windows of entry via the Lamp Post station. Do you recall that in that station there was a photograph on the wall of the island and it appears to have been taken by the Army? Does this imply that Dharma was watching the Army?

This still may end up being a big government conspiracy story in the end. The DI could merely be a group dedicated to preventing the evil plans of US black ops. And to everyone’s surprise they found the island to be inhabited by Richard and his merry band of recruits.

This then leads me to what is so special about the island that all these groups are willing to spend cold hard cash and lives to find it, own it and use it?

I’m left with time travel as my only real answer. The US Army would most definitely enjoy sending a bomb back in time to use in various historical campaigns. This might make Dharma the moral compass group who would only use the island’s time travel for the common good. Widmore is thinking of perhaps capital gains. And Richard is merely a pawn caught in the middle of these puny humans.

Then Jacob and the Man in Black come along and throw religion into the mix. Are we to debate the morality of time travel?

Something to think about.


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Enjoy,
KC

LT305: Read Me A Story

TELL ME A STORY THEORY

I came across a wonderful thread that suggested that the island is a book. Well, it is more like a library since this is where all the books become real. What a “novel” thought, if you’ll pardon the pun.

It is true that LOST references many books including Through the Looking Glass. The character slips down a rabbit hole to another world. The references of rabbits and even an episode title are obvious so I won’t rehash it all. Instead the readers of the post jumped on this idea and here is a summary of characters that each survivor might be:

Jin’s full name is Jin Swoo Kwon. This can be scrambled around to Swoo Kwon Jin. Twist your mouth and you get something like this: Seuss Knows Gin. Dr. Seuss was expelled from his magazine job when caught drinking gin. He needed an alias after that, so Seuss does know gin. Consider that Jin offers some people a little seafood in the first episode…one fish, two fish, three fish, Jin fish. Jin is Dr. Seuss.

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Hurley is Winnie the Pooh. Just like Pooh, he has trouble spelling words like B-O-D-Y-S. The shape is similar. Change Pooh’s love of honey for ranch dressing and we have a winner! Switch Pooh’s name in reverse and you get H-O, H-O-O-P which matches nicely to all the H-O’s we see around Hurley as well as the classic game of hoops we call Horse…which Jack had scored H-O.

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In the movie “It’s a Wonderful Life” we observe Henry the angel with a copy of “Tom Sawyer”. Also in this movie are the loveable Muppet characters, Bert and Ernie. We also see Kermit from the Muppet Show on a monitor in LOST. Kermit’s eyes are actually ping-pong balls, which Sawyer played. Kermit has 11 points on his neck detail. Sawyer played ping-pong with a 11-point must rule. Hurley told Sawyer once, “Dude, you look green.” Sawyer is Kermit.

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Boone was a bonehead on the show as we saw from stealing water to trying to save Rose’s life with a ballpoint pen. He was seen wearing an Aces shirt which refers to the Red Baron, aka Snoopy. He brought “Watership Down” to the island which is about rabbits, including one named “Five”. Snoopy’s favorite book is “The Six Bunny Wunny” series written by Mr. Sweetstory. Sweet, you say? Boone said he was a lifeguard…or can I say Lifesaver, the sweet candy…which has FIVE flavors. Boone is Snoopy.

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The Temple could be the Library of Alexandria. Many of the books seen on LOST have been banned.

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Wendy is the character from Peter Pan…complete with freckles and the ability to fly…while Kate is a flight risk. Kate slept outside of Farmer Ray’s home in a little shack known as “Wendy houses” in Australia. Kate is Wendy Darling…whose last name is a popular catchphrase of Sawyer’s…whose daughter is name after a song with the lyrics, “Oh my darling, oh my darling, oh my darling, Clementine.”

Hey isn’t there a Peter Pan peanut butter which Claire and Charlie shared?

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And the Freighter Four match up nicely to the Fantastic Four comic book characters.

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Anyway, I thought it was a decent theory as far as theories go.


SCHOOL IS IN SESSION

The LOST University semester is underway. There was a note to contact a Professor Nusseldorf at 818-824-6300. It you press the star key during his voice mail it asks for his passcode. Still waiting for that to be hacked.

They school is sending out t-shirts to all the Freshmen who have registered.


OTHER NEWS

The producers have convinced ABC to not release any footage from Season 6 in their promos. Kudos to those guys…I hate previews.

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Damon will be attending Earth2Comics convention in four days. If he lets something slip, you’ll hear about it here!

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If you enjoyed this post, please take a moment to click on one of the ads after you finish reading. Thanks!

Enjoy,
KC