The Lost Chronicles

Diagnosis: Stuck in a remote city on the East Coast of America with no current addiction to any hour-long, primetime television drama

Prescription: Start watching Lost

So apparently there's this show called "Lost" and it's a big hit in these parts and I've been totally missing out because I've been hiding under a rock instead of watching it religiously. Well let me tell you something, my days of hiding under a rock are over.

The last season is coming up and so I'm determined to try and get a sense of what's going on so that I can follow along. So a buddy of mine let me borrow the DVDs for a few of the seasons and I'm trying to catch up.

Now I feel like one of the best parts of watching a show like this is that you can watch it with friends and see all the crazy stuff they throw at you, and then during the commercial break you can be like "What the hell was that" and then speculate as to what's going on. Well, unfortunately, I'm missing out on that a little bit. So in order to try and make up for that, I'm posting my reactions here. And yes, they will be rife with references to Lord of the Flies.

Fair warning, these reactions will be full of spoilers. So if you don't watch Lost, don't read along and let me know if you wanna come over and watch some episodes. If you are a Lost fan, hopefully this can be a fun refresher course, and it'll let you know about all the cool commentary you could've been getting from yours truly during the commercial breaks over the past several years as you enjoyed this TV series.

So, without further ado, here they are:

Thoughts and Questions from watching the First Season of Lost:

• So when Jack wakes up in the forest and runs to the beach, everyone's just running around screaming and yelling and panicking as he tries to help the people who are injured. For some reason though I got a flashback to Steve Carrel's character in Anchorman when he just starts yelling "LOUD NOISES!"
• Who the hell are the people in the suits that Jack sees randomly?
• I think I get the whole symbolism of the oxygen masks. You’re supposed to put your own mask on before you help others. Jack clearly has a problem with this. Literally and figuratively.
  
• I recognize that pregnant girl from somewhere, I just don’t can’t put my finger on it.
• I IMDB’d it, she was on the WB show Roswell. Sadly, I remember now that I used to watch that show back in the day. I tell myself it was cuz of the cute brunette, but I think I actually enjoyed the plot too. The show was about aliens okay! And aliens were cool! Don't judge.
  
• When’s the bassist from that band gonna go through withdrawal from his coke addiction? Is it gonna be anywhere near as entertaining as Jack Black’s rendition from Tropic Thunder?
• Oh snap the man in the suit is his dad. W effin TF.
• The theme song to Roswell is "Here with me" by Dido. I just looked it up. Thought you might like to know. Also, that brunette girl from Roswell was on ER too, which just proves my theory that every "that girl" ends up on ER. That girl from Bend It Like Beckham, that girl from Freaks & Geeks, that girl from Roswell. The list goes on and on. Only question is where they'll end up now that ER's done. My guess is CSI or something.
  
• Locke, the creepy old guy, is by far the most interesting character so far. But for some reason, whenever I see him, I only think of Randy Quaid’s Cousin Eddy character from the National Lampoon's Vacation movies.
• I remember I saw one of the episodes later on when they found out that the Korean woman spoke English. That definitely ruins all of the scenes with her right now.
• Jack gets all teary-eyed for the woman who died going for a swim in the ocean, but how come no one ever felt bad for the dude who got sucked into the propeller of the plane and blew up during the first episode? (See 5:05 of video clip above) Wasn’t that a much worse death? Wasn’t anyone sitting next to that guy on the plane? I’m positive that whoever that actor was, his favorite pickup line at a bar is to tell people how he was the dude who got sucked into the propeller and blew up. That guy has to get so much action cuz of that story. I mean, probably a lot more than these unfortunate souls.
  
• Alright, that Korean guy kinda melted my heart with that scene at the airport where he’s holding the flower and his wife decides to stay with him on the flight. I completely forgive all of his chauvinism right now.
• The Korean wife just revealed that she spoke English. Totally wasn't a surprise. I feel like I was robbed of a "oh snap" moment right there, and I want it back.
• I don’t know how I feel about how there are never any scenes of people eating or starting the fires. I guess it’s like the anti-Cast Away approach. Just focus on the drama of the island spookiness and the personal histories so that the audience just forgets about the small details.
  
• So Jack just had the cave collapse on him, and some randoms named Scott and Steve were just called upon to help out. That was the first time we found out their names. How many other nameless extras are out there? Who are they? I need to know these things.
  
• Oh snap, someone just smacked Sayid in the head with a huge stick right when he was about to use the tranceiver to triangulate the location of the distress signal. I'm guessing it was either Locke or someone else. I hope I'm horribly wrong.
  
• Okay, so the bassist kicked his addiction and it was more dramatic though not as funny as Jack Black in Tropic Thunder.
  
• Alright, I’ll say it. When is someone going to say “Sucks to your ASSMARRR!”to that asthmatic blonde girl?
• And the Korean woman just cured the girl with eucalyptus. Folk medicine 1, "scientific" medicine 0. Take that Jack! (note: for the important purposes of making my point about folk medicine vs. scientific medicine, this score does not include all the scientific medicine that Jack used to help out everyone else)
  
• It's gotten to the point that whenever someone goes off into the jungle on their own they're bound to have some crap happen to them. It just gets weirder and weirder. Sayid just followed some random rope leading into the trees and he gets caught in a trap that has him hanging upside down. I'm also just going to assume that it's always Locke who's at the root of it all.
  
• Okay, I was wrong about that Locke being responsible for that last part. Daaaaangit.
  
• I changed my mind, Hurley's my favorite character now. He's so laid back and chill and doesn't seem to have any serious character flaws. Truly the Piggy of this Lord of the Flies tale, only no one's really picking on him. AND he just built a golf course in order for them to have fun, that's awesome and makes total sense.
  
• My favorite exchange of the season so far: "We're constantly worried about getting attacked by boars, monsters, freakin polar bears" "POLAR BEARS?!" "Oh, you didn't hear about the polar bears?" Classic.
  
• The French woman who has been chillin on the island for 16 years just completely came out of nowhere. Nothing makes any sense to me now.
  
• Claire, the pregnant Aussie girl, just woke up from a nightmare claiming someone was trying to hurt her baby. Is it bad that I immediately thought that it might've been a dingo?
  
• Hurley just goes to Jack, "Who the hell are Scott and Steve?" Isn't that EXACTLY what I was saying earlier?
  
• Hurley's real name is Hugo Reyes! Coolest guy on the island is Latino - hollerrrrr. AND he just suggested to Jack that they start a census. Woohoo Latinos make yourselves count census 2010! Hagase Contar!
  
• I should've suspected that Ethan guy from the start. You just can't trust Canadians sometimes. (Totally kidding to all my Canadian friends.)
  
• Jack just went toe to toe with that Ethan guy in the jungle, and he got a beatdown. He also punched Sawyer a couple of times earlier in the season and barely left a scratch. I guess Doctors are just lovers and not fighters.
  
• Kate just told asthmatic girl that "if there's anyone on the island that your brother's safe with, it's Locke." I feel like in these kinds of shows, anytime someone says the phrase, "if there's anyone that so-and-so is safe with, it's so-and-so", you know that the second so-and-so is gonna do something jacked up.
  
• Kate and Sawyer find some lake and go for a swim and then find two dead people at the bottom of it. It doesn't even phase them anymore. It's just totally expected at this point.
• I just noticed that all of the episodes have really clever names, like this last one about the case was called "Whatever the Case May Be," and the one before that where Jack's flashback shows him turning in his Dad for malpractice was "All the Best Cowboys Have Daddy Issues."
  

That's as far as I've gotten so far, but trust that there'll be more to come.

Stay Lost my friends (as opposed to staying thirsty),

-DR