Lost Season Six Is Off And Running

Needless to say: Spoilers ahead!




I think it's safe to say that the big question going into the start of Lost's final season was, "Will the attempted reboot of the timeline (via the detonation of a hydrogen bomb on top of the island's mysterious energy source) fail or succeed?" About five or ten minutes into the season premiere last night, it became apparent that the answer to that question is, "Yes!"

Now, if you're thinking, "That doesn't make any sense..." then you either haven't seen the 2-hour premiere yet (in which case, why are you still reading this?) or you weren't paying much attention to it. What we appear to have gotten as a result of Juliet's brave and noble actions at the end of Season Five are two divergent universes:

• one in which the past was changed, and Oceanic Flight 815 not only arrived safely in Los Angeles on Sep 22, 2004 but it also passed over a very much deserted and underwater version of the island
• one in which the past wasn't changed, and where the only visible effect of the bomb's detonation was a resetting of the main characters' location in time (they've been thrown out of the 70s and back to sometime in December 2004 or later)
  

Since both of these versions of events are playing out simultaneously (from the viewer's point of view), we're left to wonder if one (or both) of them will be negated before the season ends. It's the sort of ballsy twist that we'd never have believed could be thrown into the show had it not featured time travel last season!

I can't help but think that somehow the two divergent paths relate thematically to the battle between Jacob and the Man in Black. Since those two entities have such opposing views of humanity, after all - Jacob sees all of the strife and turmoil as progress, whereas his enemy considers it corruption and destruction - perhaps what we're seeing is how things would play out if either of them were proven right. Babylon 5 fans will naturally recall that something similar played out in that show: the Vorlons and the Shadows held diametrically opposed views about the role of intelligent life, and did their level best to nudge their own ideology into a winning position. What's happening in Lost feels very much like that to me.

On the other hand, we know that Jacob brought the Black Rock to the island hundreds of years ago, and presumably caused the Oceanic 815 castaways to get there, as well. So maybe the "new universe" simply represents things as they would have been had he never interfered. That's a less judgmental, more fact-based interpretation, without any inclination to worry about what's good or evil, or right or wrong.

Those were the broad strokes of the episode, without even touching on any of the many, many smaller bits: Saiyid's death and resurrection; the return of Boone, Claire, Charlie, Dr Arzt, Frogurt and others; the revelation that the temple is still actively populated and guarded by a strange mix of races; Juliet's brief return and postmortem declaration of "It worked"; and the mystery of why Christian Shepherd's body and Locke's set of knives both went missing from Flight 815, suggesting that perhaps this new reality isn't quite as detached from the old one as we might believe.

If I have any complaint about the show of late, it's that the characters are becoming almost too complacent about the weird turn-of-events that seem to be building up. Jack doesn't even ask "what risks?" when told that healing Saiyid in the temple's waters may have complications. We assume that what was done to the former Iraqi interrogator is the same process used by young Ben in Season Five, but at that time Kate and Sawyer were told that he'd never be quite the same again (or words to that effect). With all of the strange happenings zipping by them, and Jack having just been proven horribly wrong (or so he believes) in his quest to reset time by detonating the bomb, why wouldn't he or his companions at least demand to know a little more before proceeding?

All in all, though, this is an amazing show that's giving every indication of getting stronger, season by season. It looks like we're in for a fast-paced, mind-bending conclusion over the next three and a half months, to which I say: bring it on!

[This may also be worth reading, if you're into the show like I am. Or even this.]