Wednesday, March 17, 2010

Lost: Recon

Mommy issues.  Everyone has issues with their parents at some point in their lives.  Sometimes it is something that happens late in life which causes a rift between adults, sometimes it something that happens in our childhood that rears its head later.  We all have them, it’s ok to admit it.  The characters on Lost are not immune to this either, as we have seen in the past.  Jack and his constant struggle to succeed in his father’s eyes, Kate and the alleged murder of her step-father, Penny and Charles, Ben and Alex, Ben and his dad, Michael and Walt, the list goes on and on.  This theme is recurs almost as much as “the numbers” or “black and white – good and evil.” 

In this week’s installment of Lost, we saw that the James Ford Sawyer in the LA-verse is still dealing with the murder-suicide deaths of his parents.  And it seems like his LA-verse life differs from his Island-verse life in the fact that one became a cop and one became a criminal, while both are still attempting to track down the man that caused his parents’ death.  The LA-verse is still not providing me with any answers, it just seems like fodder to fill up an entire hour long show.  Don’t get me wrong, I like the secondary storylines, but I don’t think they are going anywhere.

The meat and potatoes of Recon didn’t have anything to do with the Sawyer-centric storyline.  It was with Not Locke and Claire.  Claire’s attack on Kate was not surprising at all.  Neither was Not Locke’s reaction to it.  I think he almost wanted it to happen so he could dig his claws into Kate a little.  The attack left Kate weakened emotionally, so she would be ready for his influences.  Kate’s will is too strong to be completely controlled by MIB, but I think she is definitely open to suggestion and a little manipulation, especially if Sawyer is following along too. 

I like how Not Locke openly admits to his lies, once they are discovered.  He completely disarms his accusers (Sawyer, Ben, Kate, Claire) when he tells them he had to lie to them to get them to do whatever he wanted.  I wish it worked that way in real life, “Honey, I lied to you about not having any Cadbury Creme Eggs in the house.  I had to protect you from the awesomeness of them.  They could have destroyed you.” 

Not Locke also uses his silver tongue to persuade and cajole.  After the incident between Kate and Claire, Not Locke attempts to bring Kate over to the dark side.  Again, I don’t think he will, but he certainly got her thinking.  He uses his own story (true or not) to show he had his own mommy issues.  This is an interesting new development.  I am not familiar with any such reference in the Bible to crazy moms.  I think that is because the bible doesn’t give much credence to women, unless they are whores or the mother of god (WARNING: this video is NSFW and I would not recommend clicking on it if you are offended by someone mocking Christianity).  I am not as fluent on my Egyptian mythology as I once was and I am not sure if there is a relevant connection here.  I will do some more research on this and get back to you.

Not Locke compared his own troubles with having a crazy mom to Aaron and Claire.  He made it seem like Kate might need to keep her role as Aaron’s mom.  Is this makings of a new deal for Kate’s cooperation?  Claire’s apology to Kate near the end struck me as authentic and not at all like the Crazy Claire we have seen so far.  Is Not Locke’s power waning over Claire now that she knows her baby is safe?  Can the infection be cured?  I was so sure last week that both Claire and Sayid were lost forever.

Ok, that is it for now.  I have to go make my children resent me.  I have to tell the 5 YO that it is time for bed and to turn off the TV (oh the horror!).  He told me tonight that even though he doesn’t watch it, he turns it on so he doesn’t feel lonely.  Then I have to pick the 7 YO up from religion class (the hate burns in his eyes on Wednesdays when we tell him he has to go).  Maybe their stories will make it to network television in time.  One can only hope.

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