Quick bit

Milletos, the name of the group that approached Juliet is an anagram for "lost time". Either the producers are making it really obvious or totally messing with us.

Lost 3:8 Review (spoilers)

First, re: my theories from the end of the fall set of episodes:
- I was quite sure Alex was a set-up. Turns out, not so much. Now I still think this isn't so feasible, considering she was captured by the Others as a baby, not a 10 year old. So her alliance and belief system would be according to what they had taught her. But, maybe she remembers her mom or something, so okay.
- I was also certain the fish biscuits were laced (with some kind of hyper fertility drug). This one I'm thinking is even more plausible considering what we learned about Juliet's work off of the island.

Onwards:
- Good flashback. Not at all annoying and I didn't feel as though it got in the way of the (excellent) island action. If this is what all flashbacks were like (i.e. about an interesting character, revealing things that add to both their development & island mythology, and most of all - brief!) I wouldn't be bitching about them.
- Great action, with Kate and Sawyer running around getting shot at, Ben waking up (super creepily) on the operating table, Jack making decisions, etc.
- The secondary characters are totally not necessary. I didn't even miss Locke.
- Randomly, I still miss Boone. And sometimes Shannon.
- "God loves Jacob" ... good for him! Could Jacob be Ben's father since Ben was born on the island? It might explain why Ben has a fairly powerful position amongst the Others. Or perhaps he just "creeped" his way into it.
- So ever since the sky turned purple (the hatch exploded) time started working differently between the island and the real world. Likely it slowed down in a relative way, meaning the human race has probably self destructed. This would explain why Ben couldn't go there to get help on his spinal tumor. Or perhaps the time warp itself is enough to make travel impossible. BONE TO PICK: even so, Jack and Kate and Sawyer were already being "hooded" and taken to the Others' side of the island when the hatch exploded. Thus, Ben had made the request for Jack before they knew that the time had gone all wonky. Gaffe.
- Juliet & Jack are doctors named Burke and Sheppard. Just like on Grey's Anatomy!
- I liked the shot of Juliet and the Portland guy talking while their faces have the X-ray image on it - how artsy! But why is that guy wearing massive eyeliner?!

Concluding:
- Well I guess I'm suppose to like Juliet more now, but I totally don't. What a whore. That entirely inappropriate insult aside, I have come to accept her as part of the cast. She is, at the very least, interesting. But I still wouldn't buy any Jack-Juliet love. I just don't see it.
- Very, very excited for 15 more weeks of episodes like this! (hopefully!)
- 9.2/10

In honor of tonight

Lost is back! Yay. Now here's one of the most interesting interviews with Lindelof and Cuse that I've read all year. They 'answer' some of the typical fan's most burning questions. Of course their responses are mostly just vague hints, so I wouldn't really call this spoilerish. But don't blame me if you disgaree! I really liked all of the responses they gave, especially the one about the skeletons. One thing I didn't like was this soon-to-be-infamous tidbit:

" ... it speaks to an interrelatedness among characters, why these people, why do they all connect. No amount of mythological answers will ever speak to this. That's the one thing that when the show ends, you won't have a causal explanation for why did all these people interconnect. Why some, why not others? The answer is just that they just do."

Hmph! I guess if's not a big deal if this is the only significant mystery that remains unresolved. But, along with other remarks like (paraphrased), "I think the fans put more thought into the mysteries than we do!", shakes my faith a little. As Matt would retort, they've been good so far so I'll trust them. So I'm just a little bit worried.

PS. Sayid's name anagrams to (I didn't come up with this): Y I sad? LOL.

Marijuana is Fun, Part 2

I am now 6 episodes into Weeds Season 2 and let me tell you, it is fan-tastic. "Turning it up a notch" is an understatement. We're talking the same great dialogue, acting, and good storytelling, now complete with plot twists that will blow your mind!

So far I'd give the second season a 9.3 out of 10 (or 93 out of 100, if you'd prefer!). Not too shabby. For reference / comparability:

Lost Season 1: 9.4
Lost Season 2: 9.0

Veronica Mars Season 1: 9.5
Veronica Mars Season 2: 9.7

Lost fun!

Top 10 signs you're obsessed with Lost (courtesy of Letterman, of course)

10. After each episode you do an all kitty re-enactment in your basement
9. You refer to your in-laws as “the others”
8. While visiting New York, you stood over every manhole and screamed, “Good God, a secret hatch!”
7. You are halfway to your goal of licking every cast member
6. Your friend phoned during Lost. The next day you beat him to death with a hot poker
5. You pitched NBC a show about 12 people stranded backstage at Saturday Night Live
4. Co-workers affectionately refer to you as “that loser who’s obsessed with Lost”
3. Renamed dental practice “flost”
2. Your wife is getting sick of playing the bedroom game “find the castaway”
1. You sat through all 10 of these lame jokes


Why have the ratings been so bad lately? (from EW's resident Lostaholic, Doc Jensen)

So if Lost's lost viewers haven't been sucked into the mindhole that is Criminal Minds... where have they gone?

Here's my theory: I don't think they're watching anything at all. Not really. I don't doubt there are some former Lost fans who've become Lost haters — who believe the show has ''lost it,'' who seriously doubt the producers know what they're doing. But what I do hear from those who've given up watching Lost on a weekly basis — and I know more than a few — is that Lost has let its urgency slip away, most likely as a result of what TV writers call ''The Stall.'' The Stall is what happens to ongoing TV shows that are trying to tell a story that has an ending when the storytellers don't know when or if they'll be allowed to actually ever end it. Lost has definitely moved into Stall mode, atomizing storylines into tiny bits and strewing them across manymanymany episodes (like Jack/Kate/Sawyer's stay in Othersville) in order to fill the time. Kinda like a football team that's jumped out to a big lead, then adopts a prevent defense that allows an opponent to gain yards and maybe put up a few points, just to burn off the clock, which can be risky, because you also allow your opponent to gain momentum or wrest control of the game. Or something like that.

Tortured sports analogies aside, for people irritated by The Stall, Lost has surrendered its must-see status. For them, the watercooler conversation has lost its boil. At the same time, what I've noticed is that these people are still invested in the unfolding story of Lost. Yet they also know that there are other options available to them that would allow them to experience the show without having to put up with its glacial pacing and its ''answer a question with new questions'' tactics. They can bank a bunch of episodes on TiVo, then watch 'em all at once, to get the kind of full-meal deal they wish every episode could deliver. Or they can just wait until the entire season comes out on DVD and binge. In fact, I know of two people who just recently became fans of the show via the DVDs. They loved what they saw and decided to become weekly watchers when the show began its third season. By the third episode, they were burned out. One of them popped into my office and said, ''How can you stand to watch the show this way? It's so... slow.'' He decided he was going to jump off the riverboat and catch up with it downstream, when it docks at his local Best Buy. (Again with the tortured analogies!)

What Lindelof thinks about the new time slot

''I personally am thrilled. Now I can watch American Idol without feeling guilty.

''Oh. Wait. I still feel guilty.''

Depraved enough to watch some clips?

If you were paying good attention at the end of the fall finale, you'll remember ABC's promise to show some new Lost scenes in a desperate (and unsuccessful) attempt to make you watch Daybreak. Here they are:

Lost Moments 1-3

Lost's Loose Ends

Find a fairly comprehensive list here: http://tv.ign.com/articles/745/745595p1.html

Lost: Post- Fall Finale Post

Thoughts:

1) the fish biscuits are laced the fish biscuits are laced! pregnancy scare in the flashback is classic foreshadowing. however, i don't necessarily think she'll have the baby - perhaps a miscarriage mishap? intentional, forced, or otherwise. speaking of that, good job with the sex scenes. and the post-love was ridiculously cute.
2) i knew jack would come through for kate and sawyer despite the rage over now being the third wheel. he still wouldn't/won't let ben die. why didn't she tell him they're on a different island? i bet she will as one of the first few lines in episode 7
3) no eye patch :( not much of anything in the way of developments to the mythology or big unknowns
4) alex is sooooo a set-up!!! didn't everything about her scene in tonight's episode reek of fakeness? and apparently she's also ben's daughter/protege, which helps explain the set-up. I mean really, if she was taken from Rousseau as a baby, she grew up with these people. Her loyalty is to them, no question. crazy french lady will be mighty disappointed.
5) i still think ben will do a switchy swappy but not for a long time probably. end of this season at the earliest?
6) oh jack will get off the island he's on at the moment! tricky!!
7) "sheppard wasn't even on jacob's list" .... ah .... did I hear that right? so jacob is....?
8) NO MORE FLASHBACKS please. LIMITED USE only, not every episode. Not that I particularly disliked this one, but in general I'm so over them. I'd rather watch Hurley and Charlie gather fruit or Desmond skip his rocks for half an hour than sit through another Charlie/Jin/Sun/Hurley/Sayid flashback. The others are acceptable.
9) have i mentioned that I would give anything to have jin & sun dead and boone & shannon/eko back?
10) juliet needs to be dead by the end of this season. she's walking a very thin line with me. she makes a better villain than heroine. and she should stay the heck away from jack! he doesn't want any of that!! there's no one for him right now, and that's fine. he can use some alone time.
11) 16 episodes in a row will be mighty good. 13 weeks off, not so much fun. but we'll get used to it. i think i like this arrangement.
12) "look north" ... don't mind if I do, dead eko!
13) lame ending. oh well.

Lost: Pre-'Fall Finale' Post

I'm awfully excited for this, probably because it keeps being referred to as a finale. And it rather is: 13 weeks without Lost will follow!

So in honor of this memorable occasion, here are some pre-epsiode speculations/predictions/ramblings:

(some are/could be spoilerish)

1) Kate and Sawyer will do it - because they elude to that in the previews. The fish biscuits have fertility drugs in them to make Kate pregnant.
2) Jack will operate on Ben, and save his life. He took the hippocratic oath, after all.
3) We'll get another glimpse of Eye Patch.
4) Alex is a setup.
5) Ben MAY switch over to the "good" side.

Peace the spork out, Eko

Hopefully you've watched it already, cause clearly I'm assuming you have.

I'd heard beforehand that someone was going to bite the dust in last night's eppy, and had actually pegged pre-show that it would be Eko. My logic: the last 3 deaths have been female, Eko was in a vulnerable position, and after the hatch incident it felt like he didn't have much to do on the island anymore. I wasn't by any means sure.

And by jove, he expired around 9:59pm last night (well, 2004). I'm thrilled it was at the hands of the smoke monster; very fitting after how he stared it down last season. It seems to me this implies that the monster has been the cause for everyone's hallucinations throughout the first two seasons (Jack's dad, Kate's horse, DAVE) and that maybe it judges you and if you repent your supposed sins, you live - otherwise you die. I'm trying to think about how this applies to the other hallucinations but I'm too tired.

In other more exciting news, Benji has a tumor and Jack is gonna save him (oh he so is, you know it). Benji will find out about Juliet's plot, and possibly defect to the Losties, or at least shake up the island dynamics. Hopefully Juliet will die as a result... she deserves it. Or maybe it's all just a big set-up to see if Jack is worthy... of something.

Your lips move but I can't hear what you're saying

• How do you know if you're doing the right thing with the rest of your life? Such big decisions are effectively made in high school, but with consequences that extend far beyond. And if you are a different person now than then, which is more than likely, how can you be sure you're still on the right path? We're talking about the rest of my life here. But opting for a change of course now is risky and potentially remarkably stupid.
• Is it wrong to like Van Morrison's cover of 'Comfortably Numb' more than the original Pink Floyd? Cause wow is it amazing.
• Delayed musing from last week's Lost: what a great final shot of Desmond skipping his rocks. I love it when shows aim for something more in the visual department, without going over the top.
• New Heroes tonight! How could Claire die?

Lost and Heroes in the same world?

from an EW article:


ANALYSIS

Roughly 13 million-plus Americans have fallen hard for Heroes, television's newest cult-pop sensation, and I am proud to say that I am one of them. My friends and family have applauded the expansion of my geek-TV interests; they were worried that Lost had begun to take over my life. Of course, Heroes isn't much of a leap from Lost, considering how much they overlap: Both shows have a diverse, multicultural, interconnected cast; fixations with fate, coincidence and destiny; mysterious comic books; an inexplicable recurring motif (in Lost, it's the Numbers; in Heroes, it's a helix-shaped pattern); a mythology grounded in weird science and possibly sinister scientific experimentation; and even a potentially superpowered kid with estranged parents. Hmmmm...

In fact, after watching the most recent chapter in the unfolding Heroes saga, my conspiracy-theory senses began to tingle and twitch in that crazy Brad Pitt-in-12 Monkeys kinda way that makes my wife very, very nervous. Because it suddenly struck me that Heroes' fantastical premise — that human beings are breaking out with superpowers as an evolutionary response to environmental changes (overpopulation, global warming, war) threatening the survival of the species — is conspicuously similar to the sci-fi conceit of Lost's Hanso Foundation/Dharma Initiative mythology. And by ''conspicuously similar,'' I am indeed suggesting that both shows occupy the same creative universe.

THEORY

The mysterious island on Lost was a mad-scientist laboratory focused on accelerating human evolution that created the superpowered heroes on Heroes.

According to the Lost revelations disclosed this past summer through The Lost Experience (and if you haven't seen the mother of all Lost orientation films, check it out here), the purpose of the Dharma Initiative was to develop radical scientific solutions that could save the world from an impending apocalypse, as predicted by a mathematical formula called the Valenzetti Equation. The Numbers belong to that equation; it seems that each digit in the sequence — 4 8 15 16 23 42 — is a value in the equation that corresponds to a key variable in Valenzetti's recipe for disaster. Those variables include overpopulation, global warming, and war — the same environmental factors that are (allegedly) triggering Mother Nature to sire a world full of X-Men on Heroes.

Apparently, Dharma financier Alvar Hanso believed that if just one of the values in the Equation could be changed, Armageddon could be averted, or at least delayed. Dharma's activities on the island somehow had the ability to have an impact on the rest of the world, perhaps via the ''unique'' electromagnetic energy that radiates from the same section of the island where Station Three: The Swan was located. Remember the radio tower that was broadcasting the Numbers? It was basically a weather report, updating the scientists on the condition of the world; when and if they heard that the core values of the Equation had been changed, they would know that their work had succeeded. Alas, according to The Lost Experience, the Dharma Initiative failed to accomplish its mission.

But what if the Dharma scientists did have an impact on the world, one that defied calculation and measurement at the time? Remember, Dharma was active on the island during the '70s — about the time that all the superpowered characters on Heroes were conceived and born. What if Dharma spiked the world's gene pool with some superpowered hooch? According to The Lost Experience, Hanso is affiliated with a prominent confectionary marketer called the Apollo Candy Company; maybe one of those Apollo candy bars gave Nathan Petrelli on Heroes a real high-flying kick, if you know what I mean.

Okay, maybe I'm the one who's high. But I think there's enough reason to be suspicious, especially since the two shows in question share one unquestionable link: the creator of Heroes, Tim Kring, and the co-creator of Lost, Damon Lindelof, used to work together on Crossing Jordan and remain good friends. So: Are the brilliant buddies quietly engaged in some kind of clandestine creative collaboration?

RESPONSE FROM HEROES CREATOR TIM KRING

Hey! Look at this! Turns out we're onto something, at least in a wishful-thinking sort of way. Asked if Heroes and Lost are in a secret alliance, Kring says, ''Well... Damon and I did talk about a lot of stuff. And unfortunately, we're on different networks, because otherwise, a lot of those things would have been really, really fun to have done.'' By ''stuff,'' do you mean you guys actually discussed the possibility of mythologically linked shows? ''Oh, yeah,'' says Kring. ''We've talked a lot [in general] about how two shows could dovetail. But again, we are limited by the fact that we are on competing networks.'' But couldn't you guys conceivably do this idea without ever technically acknowledging it in any formal way? ''That's true. That's true,'' says Kring with a laugh.

TRANSLATION

Keep dreamin', Doc J. (BTW: Thanks to Mr. Kring for kindly indulging my obsessions.)

ESTIMATED CHANCE OF A LOST/HEROES CONNECTION

Oh, like they would ever admit it if this were true!

Overwhelmed, but not...

I have an unbelievable amount of work to complete from now until the end of the month. Here's a rundown:

Oct 13: Tax assignment due
Oct 24: CFR2 (intermediate accounting) exam ... 8am-12pm
Oct 24: ICFP interim materials due
Oct 25: Tax exam ... 8am-12pm
Oct 27: CFR1 group report due
Oct 31: Athabasca auditing exam ... 6:30-9:30pm
Oct 31: 3 auditing assignments must be submitted

So for tax I am about 1/2 way through the materials I should have read so far, thanks largely to the assignment that was due yesterday which forced me to catch up on a few topics. CFR2 I am at least 8 chapters behind on (we were suppose to read SIX chapters before the course even started, for some ungodly reason). ICFP: my group has been meeting a lot, but we've made very little concrete progress.

In other words, I am just completely swamped. And yet, this is not bothering me or hardly even stressing me out. I am in the ivey library right now, where I will be until 5pm (close) so that I can get through my Athabasca readings and hopefully one assignment. I will also be here tomorrow and probably Monday too. I have plans to go to Toronto on the 28th for a night of Halloween fun with my Deloitte friends.

I guess I just know that I'll get it all done, and it'll all be ok, and even if it's not - hey I still have a job!

In other me-world events, I've been keeping up on my TV watching (the only thing on my PVR at the moment is Six Degrees from Thursday) and, in the order of episode quality, here's what I enjoyed most: Veronica Mars, Lost, and Grey's Anatomy. The last, which I adamently opposed for a very long time, is now unabashedly one of my favorite shows. Yes it's extremely soap opera-ish but sooooo amusing. The characters are likeable, the dialogue is great, and there's never a want for dramatic moments. Oh, Heroes was great this week too. Even The Nine and Studio 60 were good. There sure is a lot of high quality TV being produced these days!

And now for some links...

Did you know that Erica Durance is married? To a bald guy nonetheless? See a picture of the strange couple.

Lost almost loses it's timeslot.

Claire is really short.

Lost 3:1 Review (spoilers)

Oh where to start, where to start... maybe by watching the episode another 5 times? I gotta do this in point form or I'll never get any thoughts out. I'll re-watch and write at the same time for the bonus of added details and extra time wasting. Ok here goes..

- Opening scene: I had heard beforehand that it would be orchestrated to Downtown so I had kind of figured out what was coming. Actually, my exact prediction was: camera moves at a quick pace through the jungle (like it was being chased by something), music starts up quietly in the background, and as soon as it gets to the big chorus line "Downtown!" the camera emerges from the jungle onto a suburban street lined with pretty trees and houses where the Others live. Of course this isn't exactly how it went down, but I didn't really get the same "shock and awe" factor from this scene as most people probably did. However, I definitely loved the muffins and Elizabeth Mitchell's superb acting (why is she so sad?)

- Speaking of this new cast member, who got more on-screen time than anyone but Jack in this episode (!), I like her. I was majorly apprehensive at first of course, because new characters generally frighten me, but I think it was a good choice to have her introduction be full of empathy-inducing moments. Get away from Jack though missy! I know you like him already, I can tell. I will not have you two become romantically involved. I just will not have it.

- Anyways, going back to the first scene: doesn't it seem like Juliet is a nice girl? And yet we see later that she is fully involved with the initatives and manipulation of the Others, so that's interesting.

- So Henry Gale/Ben runs the Others... "here I am thinking that free will still actually exists". Not sure how I feel about this. Of course I love Henry Gale and think that his subplot was what really turned around the second season but when he was a prisoner in the hatch he eluded to someone much more powerful than Mr. Friendly, which I guess now was actually himself. This is kind of creepy, and kind of disappointing. I think I can accept this though.

- It was nice seeing Ethan and Goodwin again, and the plane crashing for oh the third time. Henry's (err Ben's) remarkably quick reaction was nothing short of petrifing.

- I still don't know what book the book club was reading - something by Stephen King, presumably? Why is Henry out of the book club? Why is the Others' camp so small when compared to the size of the island? Why have the Lost people not found them yet? Maybe I just answered my own question.

- I seriously laughed out loud when Jack ran into the glass wall and couldn't stop giggling for the rest of that scene.

- Oh I love Mr. Friendly... is he gay? "You're not my type."

- Ouch! What did they stick our kids with? Were they injecting something or taking out blood to test? Possible theories: they injected the virus, which will take two weeks to activate. They injected the antidote to the virus. They're testing their blood to make sure they are ideal candidates for their new gene pool thingy. This is also why they love kids. Their whole 'wysteria lane' colony seems to suggest that they are trying to create a new, better society. Though some of their housing looks a little more rugged (mainly what you see in Sawyer's scenes). Maybe this is just the Dharma testing facility remnants.

- Who is that other kid in the cage that tried to escape? Why was he in trouble?

- Loved Sawyer getting the biscuit and later sharing it with Kate. Cute. I wonder if it tastes like fish?

- Jack's flashback scene in the lawyer's office: "I just want to know his name" --- I feel for you. I think this is undoubtedly the best Jack flashback yet. Never have I empathized or cared more for him. We finally get to see some flaws, asides from the way-too-repeated 'I need to fix things' issue. I love that Jack is obsessive and jealous. I actually cared more about the flashback in this episode than what was going on on the island - definitely a first for me! I also love that we get some more insight into his papa issues. PS. Why is Sarah smirking as she walks away in the lawyer's office? You can just barely see it, but it's there. Odd. Maybe it was just Julie Bowen thinking "man, I nailed that scene!" or maybe it was something more?

- Oh Kate, you look so cute in your sundress. Your arms are far too muscular for a proper lady though. The scene with Kate and Henry (Ben! damnit) on the beach was my favorite of the entire episode. Such an interesting, scary twist to what seemed like a fairly straight-forward scene (did anyone else think Kate was just going to have to mate with him?! lol).

- She asks about Sawyer first. I wonder who she'll pick. I think probably Jack. Future episode spoiler (highlight with your mouse to read): I heard she will actually pick very soon.

- I desperately want a grilled cheese sandwhich.

- Whoa whoa whoa how did they get a copy of his father's autopsy report? Either they still have connection to the outside world, or they performed the autopsy? Actually I guess the latter is fairly feasible considering his body was on the island. But even still, I don't think they could find out everything else simply from the contents of the plane so they must have contact with the real world. If so why are they choosing to live on the damn freaky island... especially if the Dharma Initiative was a long time ago?

- I always thought that Sarah's new lover would be someone significant that we'd seen before, like maybe Goodwin or something. I never bought that it was Jack's dad. Are we now suppose to assume it was just some random guy?

- "It doesn't matter who he is, it just matters who you're not" --- best line ever. Did she really need to throw in the "now you have something to fix" part though? That just seems cruel.

- End episode. Overall pretty good, 9.0.

A couple interesting things I stumbled across today

Buffy doing a Burger King commercial. She's hardly recognizable, but still awfully cute!

One disgruntled Lost fan writes a letter to the producers. I agree with some, but not all of his criticisms. If you're a huge Lost fan this will not amuse you, but it is still interesting.

More Lost... action figures! I think all but the Kate one look remarkably realistic.