LOST: It Wasn't Purgatory, Season 2, Episode 21, ?

On-Island Events: Ana Lucia comes to Eko in a dream in a bloodied condition and tells Eko he needs to help Locke. Eko goes to the hatch and finds his brother Yemi, who tells him he must make Locke take him to "the question mark." 

Michael bursts out of the hatch and tells Locke, Jack, Kate, Sawyer, and Eko a story about being shot by a man who escaped from the armory. As they look around the hatch and find Ana Lucia and Libby's lifeless bodies, Libby suddenly coughs out blood. Eko and Locke set out to track "Henry." Locke confronts Eko in the jungle, accusing him of tracking something other than "Henry;" Eko responds by knocking Locke out. When he awakens, Eko discusses the question mark with Locke and Locke shows Eko the map he made during the lockdown. 

Kate and Sawyer retrieve heroin from Sawyer's tent but run into Hugo, who is looking for Libby. Jack prepares to administer heroin to Libby while Hugo talks with Michael in the hatch about the picnic he had planned. 

Locke and Eko eventually find the cliff where Boone was injured in the falling plane and Locke dreams that Eko, like Boone, falls from the cliff. Locke tells Eko about the dream and Eko climbs to the top of the cliff. Looking down, Eko sees an area on the ground where a large circle has worn away from the grass. The two discover that the ground has been salted, so nothing will grow, and that the area underneath the fallen airplane is hiding another hatch. Inside this hatch is a small room filled with television monitors; when Locke switches them on he sees Jack inside the other hatch. A printed log of the numbers entered and accepted lies next to a pneumatic tube; Locke folds the map he made and thrusts it inside the tube, disgusted. Eko finds a VHS tape labeled "Orientation" with the same octagonal logo from the first hatch for this, the Pearl Station. The same scientist from the other hatch training video appears as Mark Wickmund, and explains the Pearl was created for observation and monitoring of other stations for a secret psychological experiment. Eko asks Locke if he'd like to watch the video a second time; Locke says he's seen enough.

Eko states the button-pushing work is now more important than ever but Locke becomes angry, comparing his life to the useless act of pushing the button. Eko shares the story of Yemi with Locke and insists the work in the hatch has meaning and must continue. 

Hugo talks with Libby and apologizes for forgetting the blankets. Libby awakens, says only, "Michael," and dies. 

Flashbacks: Eko, dressed as a priest, meets with a man who gives him a forged Australian passport needed for a trip to America. Eko's plans are postponed when the church needs to investigate a miracle: a girl who was believed to be drowned came back to life again. Eko tries to meet with the girl but her father insists his wife has made up the story of the drowning. 

The day Eko is scheduled to fly out of Australia on Oceanic flight 815, the girl tracks him down and tells him Yemi thought he was a good priest. She assures him that Yemi has faith in him and that Eko will see his brother again soon. 

Greater Meaning: The question mark in the title refers to the middle section of Locke's map from the blast door that identifies the hidden hatch in the ground but also reflects Locke's confused state over what his role on the island should be. The episode is focused upon Eko and his faith, but Locke is very much a part of it, too. In a way, Locke and Eko switch roles: Locke, who has always had an unwavering faith in the island, is thrown for a loop when he realizes the hatches were created to be psychological experiments by the Dharma Initiative, and Eko, who lived a life of violence before assuming his departed brother's role as a priest, finds faith for the first time after his dreams lead him to the hatch. Locke feels he has been made a fool of; Eko trusts the words and guidance of Yemi, who has come not only to him in dreams but spoke to the girl whose death and alleged resurrection was thought a miracle even before Oceanic 815 crashed onto the island. It's more than a little coincidental that the entrance to the new hatch lay directly beneath the plane that brought Yemi to the island and resulted in the eventual death of Boone, both events that tested the faiths of Eko and Locke.

Many of the survivors have seen things on the island that may or may not have really been there: Jack saw his father Christian, who led him to water; Shannon saw a soaking-wet Walt before anyone knew that the raft had been destroyed; Charlie saw various visions of Aaron in danger; and Hugo saw his imaginary friend Dave, who slapped him and struck him with a slipper. Knowing that the island has the ability to cure maladies such as paralysis and cancer, it's really not a stretch to accept that it may also allow the dead to communicate with the living or its inhabitants to have visions, but are these events motivated, somehow? Does the island have an agenda? If it does, Locke's crisis of faith is significant. We've already seen "Henry" try to manipulate Locke in playing him against Jack, in adding the bit about coming to get him before getting caught Henry seems to have marked Locke for his own, calling him "one of the good ones." Is Locke's goodness tied up in his faith? Is Jack not good because of his absence of faith and devotion to science? How will Eko proceed as the new island faithful? Locke's legs are still not fully healed, which, if we believe that the island takes and gives at will based on Locke being on the right track, seems important. 

Further Questions: 

1. Will Locke get his faith back?

2. Will Eko be in charge of the hatch now?

3. Are there ghosts on the island? 

4. Is the island messing with Locke? 

5. Were Boone's death and the discovery of the new hatch meant to test Locke's faith?

6. What was The Dharma Initiative and why does the scientist use different names in the videos?

7. Is The Dharma Initiative still on the island?

8. Is "Henry" part of The Dharma Initiative?

LOST: It Wasn't Purgatory, Season 2, Episode 10, The Twenty-Third Psalm

On-Island Events: Claire introduces Aaron to Eko, who speaks to her about Moses and his brother. When Claire inadvertently discloses that Charlie has been carrying a Virgin Mary statue around with him on the island and shows Eko, Eko breaks open the statue, revealing the heroin inside. Eko finds Charlie and demands he show him where he found the statue.

Michael shows interest in weapons; Locke takes him into the jungle for target practice. Later, Michael offers to take Kate's shift in the hatch and she agrees. 

On their way to the site where the Beechcraft airplane crashed, Eko sees the black smoke flicker through the jungle but pass them by. Charlie tries to explain his experiences with addiction to Eko, but for naught. They find a parachute and the skeleton of a priest in the jungle, whom Eko says he knows. Later, as Charlie climbs a tree to get a better view, the smoke monster creeps right up to Eko, hovers there, clicking and snapping, then flickers away back into the jungle. Charlie demands to know why Eko didn't run from the smoke; Eko states he was not afraid of it and continues on his way to the airplane.

In the hatch, Michael is again contacted by Walt on the computer. Walt assures Michael he's okay, he's alone, and that he can't talk for long as "they" were coming back soon. Jack interrupts the chat and offers Michael his sympathy, but soon leaves. 

Eko finds Yemi's body inside the Beechcraft and weeps for his brother. As the plane burns, Charlie asks Eko, "Are you a priest, or aren't you?" Eko answers he is, and recites The Lord's Prayer (Psalm 23), which Charlie joins.

Ana Lucia and Libby are greeted warmly by the beach camp; Claire kicks Charlie out of her tent. Charlie retreats to an area in the jungle where he has hidden several Virgin Mary statues of heroin.

Flashbacks: Opening the episode, a group of Nigerian boys play soccer near a village marketplace. When a truck of armed men pulls up and begins pulling children out of the group, a little boy clings to an older one. The leader of the armed men seizes the boy, puts a gun in his hand, and implores him to shoot an older gentleman. When the little boy refuses, the boy he earlier clung to, which turns out to be Eko, intervenes, shoots the man himself, and is taken by the truck of armed men. 

When Eko returns to the village as an adult, he oversees a drug deal with some men who speak in Arabic, one of which who tells Eko he has no soul. Eko ends up killing the men but spares the life of a child who witnesses the act. 

Eko returns to the village again and visits his brother Yemi, the boy who was left when Eko was taken. Yemi has become a priest, and Eko asks to use the church's protection to move the drugs out of Nigeria by plane; Yemi stresses that while he still loves Eko, he cannot be involved in drug-running. Eko comes back again, demanding that Yemi help, this time suggesting he sign papers ordaining Eko and his friend as priests so they can fly the drugs out of Nigeria. Yemi refuses at first, but then agrees when Eko threatens to burn down the church. 

As Eko and his crew load the Beechcraft, Yemi pleads with his brother to abandon the drug deal and to confess. Eko refuses, the military shows up, and Yemi is killed by their gunfire. Eko's partner takes Yemi's body into the plane, kicks Eko out of it, and departs. 

Greater Meaning: The easy connection to make in this episode is that Eko and Charlie's journeys are related through heroin, which is true. Both have been involved in drugs, Eko trafficking, Charlie using, and both have experienced severe and abrupt life changes due at least in part to the events that shaped or resulted from these involvements. Eko's life changed in two ways: he was made into a criminal when he was taken from his village, and he fashioned himself into a proper priest after Yemi's death (more on this in The Cost of Living, season 3). Charlie was forced into a sudden detoxification soon after crashing on the island and since then has been devoted to Claire and Aaron as a sort of father figure. Both men are religious, each in his own way, but where Eko seems to be heading toward salvation, Charlie, after this episode, seems to be heading in the opposite direction. Had Charlie been able to resist heroin, both off and on the island, things may well have gone very differently for him. 

Similarly, brotherhood factors strongly into Eko's and Charlie's actions; both tried to "save" a brother and failed (Yemi was killed; Liam continued to use heroin) but Eko, in his guilt, turned to God's work whereas Charlie simply joined Liam in his pain. Eko was shown to have been a ruthless warlord, but on the island is seen as a strong ally to Ana Lucia (a former cop!), a man of God, and a sort of silent leader. Charlie does not yet possess this kind of strength, but in their joint recitation of The Lord's Prayer, the two men are seen if not as equals, then at least kindred spirits. Perhaps Eko senses what lies ahead for Charlie or has some appreciation for the struggles he might be facing. 

Further Questions: 

1. Will Charlie start using heroin again?

2. What is Michael planning to do about Walt?

3. Will Ana Lucia be accepted by the rest of the group?

4. Where is Walt? Who has him?

5. Will Claire forgive Charlie?

LOST: It Wasn't Purgatory, Season 2, Episode 7, The Other 48 Days

As we don't yet know a lot about the tail section other than Ana Lucia having met Jack in the airport bar before the flight, there's not a ton of discussion about this episode. The characters and events are interesting but we do not get any flashbacks.

On-Island Events: A retrospective look at what happened when the tail section crashed onto the beach. Ana Lucia, Eko, Libby, and Cindy scramble to help survivors onto the beach as the wreckage from Oceanic flight 815 sinks into the ocean. Soon after the crash, a man runs out of the jungle in seek of help for a man stuck in a tree, which turns out to be Bernard. Ana Lucia talks Bernard down from the tree and later learns that the man who sought her help is named Goodwin. When the group goes to sleep on the beach the first night, they are awakened by disturbing sounds---Eko has beaten a group of attackers to death with a rock. While the rest of the group tries to determine who the attackers were, Eko has stopped speaking and begins carving things into a long stick.

Days later, others return and snatch the children; Ana Lucia kills one and finds a list with nine names on it. A survivor, Nathan, is gone for more than two hours on his own, Ana Lucia and Libby are suspicious. Eventually Ana Lucia digs a pit which she throws Nathan into, believing he is a spy for the others, feeding them information on the survivors. Some of the survivors sneak Nathan food, and later, Goodwin lets him out, letting him believe he is releasing him, but snaps his neck, killing him. Eventually the group finds the Dharma hatch and inside it, a trunk full of blankets, a glass eye, a bible, and a radio. When Goodwin offers to go to higher ground alone to get a better signal for the radio, Ana Lucia insists on accompanying him. On the way, Ana Lucia asks Goodwin why he thinks the others are attack them and he provides a somewhat alternative perspective on what the others are doing but soon begins to act peculiar under Ana Lucia's questioning.

When Ana Lucia eventually confronts Goodwin about being an "other," he admits Nathan was not one of them and that the children were better off. In a struggle, Ana Lucia stabs Goodwin with a wooden stick, killing him. Later back at the hatch, Bernard fumbles with the radio and hears Boone's transmission. Even after Boone's voice states, "We're the survivors of Oceanic flight 815," Ana Lucia insists it's the others on the radio, trying to draw them out. Near a river, Ana Lucia breaks down crying and Eko comforts her, forty days after he first stopped speaking. A few days later as Cindy and Libby are fishing on the beach, Jin washes up on shore and a replay of events already seen commences, culminating in Ana Lucia shooting Shannon in the jungle.


Further Questions:

1. Why did the others send Goodwin to this camp and not to the other?
2. Would Ethan have eventually taken others besides Claire?
3. What was the purpose of the Dharma station they found?

Let's not forget about Rose. . .

I have been watching Season One again in between Tuesdays to review.

I still think these shows are very much like the Twilight Zone. The subject matter is mysterious and sometimes creepy, the accompanying score is almost like a 50s horror film (think Bernard Hermann of "Psycho" fame), and there is just something fantastic about all of this.

Knowing what I know now, things are popping out left and right during the pilot and first two episodes ("Tabula Rasa" and "Walkabout")
1. When John Locke is in his box-distributing office, he is adding figures on an adding machine. The sound is subtle, but THE FRICKING SMOKE MONSTER is edited in at the same time just as the scene ends! SMOKE MONSTER SOUNDS! Like a premonition?
Very cool.

2. John Locke obviously meets the Smoke Monster in the jungle when they go out for their first boar-hunt. He looks RIGHT at it. Kate and Michael are off tending to Michael's leg; John is alone. When he surprises everyone by returning to the beach, alive, Michael asks if he got a good look at "it." "NO," he lies. Why does he lie? And why did it just leave him? It totally bitched up the pilot and snatched him from the plane. . .

3. When Kate and Jack are on the beach after she tells him that she wants to tell him what she did, Jack says that he doesn't want to know. Then he says, "We all DIED. I think everyone deserves to start over." Hmmmm. This after Jack (in the pilot) wakes up quite a distance away from everyone else (He walks among them but is not one of them).

4. Rose. When she's sitting on the beach fondling her wedding ring, Jack talks with her a bit. She says, "You have a nice way about you. A good SOUL. I guess that's why you became a doctor." Jack says NO, he was born into it. In a few later episodes comments are made about Jack's **unpleasant** bedside manner. By Hurley, and someone else, I think. As in, he has a nice way about him when he's NOT being a doctor (You don't have what it takes, Jack).

Rose KNOWS things. That her husband is not dead. That her cancer is gone. Not to follow John (I'm not going anywhere with that man!) Then later, she and Bernard seem to know that Juliet is going to croak. I thought at first they were regarding her with tenderness (are you sure you don't want some tea?) because she was pregnant or something; no, she was just a few minutes away from getting sucked into the swan pocket. It's like she isn't influenced by the things that are going on around her, she just makes her decisions and sticks with them and to hell with the rest of you!

There are a few things that I want to know.

1. Explain Horace, Mathematician. What the hell was his deal? Did he build the cabin?

2. Give me some closure on that child, Annie, that was Ben's friend.

3. Lapidus and Miles are the only two from the freighter that have survived. The pilot and the corpse-whisperer. Miles has proven useful by telling Sawyer that Juliet wanted to tell him that IT WORKED. We know that Lapidus is not a candidate. We know that he can fly both helicopters and "big birds" in less than ideal circumstances. We know that they were making a runway over on Hydra Island. Is Yemi's beechcraft still around or did Eko burn it? The Ajira plane must still be there, but I think there were trees in it. . .

4. Why was Dogan the only thing keeping Smokey out? Did Dogan CATCH it? Serling used the staff of truth to keep the devil inside his cage; was Dogan using some sort of holy ash or something? Was there something INSIDE Dogan? A sacrifice to never see his son again?

More, more, more.