The "Getting Lost" series is about a Lost newbie's attempts to watch all five seasons of the show for the first time, just as the sixth (and final) one rolls along.

What I Watched on Week 14: Season 5, Episodes 6-12 ("316", "The Life and Death of Jeremy Bentham", "LaFleur", "Namaste", "He's Our You", "Whatever Happened, Happened" and "Dead is Dead")

I honestly don't know how to start this week's installment. I watched seven more episodes and it felt like the past few events have been a routine of sorts. Now that I (think I have) figured out how the time traveling aspect of the show works--and now that two-thirds of the cast is stuck in 1977--it's become a matter of how certain things happened. So Ben became an Other because of Sayid? Uhh, okay. And because of Kate, Sawyer and Juliet, in a way? Okay. And then what? It's like watching things unfold, already knowing how things will turn out in the end. Where's the excitement there? And would I have seen these things in a different way if I didn't know the idea that certain things will happen even if some deviations happen on the way?

Admittedly the other remotely interesting question I had was the same question Hurley posed to Miles in "Dead is Dead". Is Sayid shot young Ben, why does old Ben not remember Sayid? So there's this bit about the 815 survivors mucking around with Ben's past in the present--okay, that was a confusing read, but I know you get it--and I thought Ben doesn't remember Sayid because in his past, something else happened, that got substituted with the shooting in the present. I mean, let's say you have an electric circuit, the sort that you make in school. The battery goes through a series of wires to the light. You replace one wire with a similar kind of wire, and the electricity goes to the light anyway. Simply said, they're not altering history because they're actually making it.

And then I remembered that Richard warned Kate that Ben will not remember anything when he gets cured, and he won't be the same. So maybe that explains it? I smell a dead end coming.

One of the things I realized during my three months of watching Lost is this: sometimes you forget you have certain questions you want to answer because your head gets plunked into a tub full of other questions. "Dead is Dead", for instance, subtly reminded me that the smoke monster still exists, and all of the questions I had about it. I remember watching the earlier seasons, when I thought it was the island's "mechanical security system" thanks to the sounds it makes. And then there were its many encounters with Mr. Eko, that moment where flashes from his life were reflected in the smoke. "These are all the things you've done," it probably said, if I am able to translate all the grunts.

I mention this, of course, because Ben summoned the smoke monster to be judged, him feeling remorseful for Alex's death. (Stop calling her your "daughter", Ben.) The same things happened: he saw flashbacks, he saw Alex (sort of), he was told to follow Locke at all costs, he was left to live. For some reason, that tied in with Mr. Eko's death--after all, his past deeds are relatively worse than Ben's--and my idea last week that the Others, or whatever's inhabiting the island, are omnipresent observers of time, somehow able to see the past, the present and the future. Finally, I realized that I've been asking the wrong question all along. I should be asking: "what is the point of all this?"

No, I'm not suggesting that I've waited the past three months going around in circles and getting nowhere. Somehow--and again, I don't think I'd be able to explain it right now--events in the island during the past half-century or so revolve around a certain theme: you make the wrong decisions, the sort that deviates from the actual path, and you suffer the consequences. Maybe this doesn't just apply to the island's inhabitants; that should explain why Oceanic 815 crashed there. Besides, Jack messed up his marriage, and Sawyer was a con-man with a conscience, and Shannon was keeping a secret, and Claire wasn't willing to face responsibility...

Is Lost a convoluted allegory to Judgment Day? Better yet, is it a convoluted way to tell the story of the battle between good and evil? But five seasons later, we know that something can't be black or white, but rather a gray, varying in shades. Unless the island, represented by the smoke monster, is up to something us mere mortals will never comprehend, it is making a huge mistake, or is just playing with everyone. I mean, if it's out to preach about the nuances of human morality, it should have brought everyone on earth to the island! (Then again, that is possible, with all those fluctuations in time.)

On second thought, it probably isn't. Last week I also floated the idea of a French version of events, which didn't go as planned, and the American version of events, which supposedly is going smoothly--a similar set of people doing the dirty work for the island. He has this quality, she has this quality, and so on. The loophole is, the island could've done something when the French failed, the same way they're manipulating the Americans now--unless it is only today when the circumstances are right.

So, maybe, the judgment theory I floated earlier is just a side project, and this is all a battle against... something. Gah. I am totally aware I lost you in the middle of this article. Then again, at this point, crazy ideas are more than permissible, so I shouldn't feel bad. Still, maybe I should just sit back and feel happy that, after fourteen weeks of watching Lost, I only have five episodes left. Five episodes, and then eighteen more! I'm almost there! I cannot believe it.


The series so far:
Week 1: An Introduction and the First Six Episodes
Week 2: I Want My Australian Accent Back!
Week 3: The Week I Felt Like Locke
Week 4: All These Numbers Are Giving Me A Headache
Week 5: I Tried So Hard, Shannon, But I Can't Seem To Like You
Week 6: "I Guess It's All Relative Now, Huh?"
Week 7: The Science of Going in Circles
Week 8: You Know, Like in Cartoons, When You Watch Too Much and Your Eyes Swell?
Week 9: Can You Help Me Untangle This One, Brother?
Week 10: Killing Charlie Softly and Other Destiny-Related Issues
Week 11: If Anything Goes Wrong, I'm Dead
Week 12: An Assault On The Senses
Week 13: Someone's Bending A Lot of Rules To Get Here





(Image courtesy of ABC)