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 9: Season 3, Episodes 11-19 ("Enter 77", "Par Avion", "The Man from Tallahassee", "Expose", "Left Behind", "One of Us", "Catch-22", "D.O.C.", "The Brig")

Forgive me if I sound confused and incoherent in the next few paragraphs.  After breaking my vow of slowing down on my Lost intake--I added nine more episodes and I just realized I'll hit the third season finale by the weekend--it occurred to me that the show is much more hard to follow than I thought, because there are just so many threads to follow.  I thought I could keep track with it.  All of a sudden, I couldn't.

So these next paragraphs will be, more or less, me trying to clarify stuff to myself, but of course you could help along.  Or you must.  That's the point, right?

First, the Others.  I first thought they were island inhabitants, and then I thought they were part of the Dharma Initiative, and now I think they aren't.  The "hostiles" being referred to in "Enter 77", perhaps?  It makes sense if Ben's story of him being born in the island is true.  Personally, I don't believe him, not because I have learned never to believe him, but because Tom had a fake beard, and Ethan faked being a rag doll look-a-like.  ("You mean he is a surgeon?")

But they're recruiting doctors and researchers and that sort, so what are they exactly?  They cannot be the Dharma Initiative, surely.  I know I theorized a few weeks back that there are many of these initiatives, but now I think it's dead, and the Others are a different group of people entirely who have just taken over the old hatches and did something along the lines of medical research.  After all, there's the increased sperm count, and Locke being able to stand up, and oddly, Ben's tumor actually developing in the island he was supposedly born in.

With this Naomi girl on board, I'm now starting to think that the Widmores have something to do with this entire thing.  I mean, Widmore-labelled drugs?  The one Charlie found for Claire?  It must be purely medical research, judging from how clueless the Others are with some aspects of the island--unless, of course, Juliet was lying when the smoke monster attempted to attack her and Kate.

Oh, but they were scary enough to implant something to Claire, who didn't really need whatever vaccine they had to combat that disease that kills off people who got pregnant in the island.  I already have this idea that the Others are stabbing each others' back: Ben has one idea, Juliet has another, Tom has another, and so on.  Maybe some are in it for legitimate research, and the others, well, are more into mind games than anything.  Of course, how else will Mikhail survive?  (I don't think he really died.)

Which brings me to Desmond, the guy I wanted to talk about this week.  (My feeble attempts at connecting this paragraph with the last one?  Of course, Penny.)  Look like you are all right: after "Flashes Before My Eyes", I started losing track of everything, especially when I started to think about it.  So he knows Charlie will die one of these days (and I know it'll happen at the end of the week) and the funny thing is, the more he tries to save him, the more he gets sucked into a vicious cycle which will end with Charlie dying anyway--especially when, say, Desmond dies first.  And yet I laugh at the idea of Desmond trying to get Charlie killed.

Anyway, I got a bit confused when I watched "Catch-22" until I realized that the flashbacks there happen before he met Penny.  So he ditched his bride, went to the monastery, got booted out and met Penny, and put everything in motion.  He says the monastery was a calling.  Heck, maybe he had flashes already!  I don't know why, but after that episode, I don't think Desmond started flashing because of the electromagnetic anomaly--I think he had it long before.  Maybe he couldn't explain it to his jilted bride back then.

What I'm saying is, maybe he somehow knew that he has to met Penny, which would led to them breaking up, which would lead him to the Widmore-sponsored race, which would lead him to pressing buttons on the Swan station, which would lead to Oceanic 815 crashing, which would lead to everybody else's fate happening.  And maybe, if Naomi was right, maybe Desmond and Penny are supposed to reunite.

Does the show's entire premise revolve around this dude, then?  If he didn't do what he was supposed to do (or not do) then it'll happen in some other way anyway, which probably explains for the supposed wreckage of Oceanic 815.  Then again, it can't be.  The island should be mystical, which explains why it killed Eko (he was a bad guy!) and didn't really help Ben (he is a bad guy, right?) and... was that a theory?

Oh, heavens, I know I failed to mention my other questions, and right now I feel, I don't know.  What exactly should I feel?


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?





- Henrik Batallones, BuddyTV Staff Columnist
(Image courtesy of ABC)