Tuesday, February 16, 2010

The Substitute


First and foremost, I've decided to keep this photo up until I get sick of my MSCL joke. Which may be never.

This was oh-so-much-better than last week's episode. Let's get straight to the point:
Everyone's got a number! Except Kate. WHY DOESN'T KATE HAVE A NUMBER? To recount:
4-Locke, 8-Reyes, 15-Ford, 16-Jarrah, 23-Shephard, 42-Kwon
Locke is dead and gets crossed out -- will they go in order? Is Hurley next?
Why are they candidates? Does the island need protecting?

We also have a kid running through the forest that Sawyer and Fake Locke can see, but Richard can't. Why can't Richard see him? Is the kid young Jacob?

Is Sawyer going to take up with Smokey? Is this really bad? Do good and evil even exist anymore?

Remember when people had constants and Faraday's constant was Desmond? Sigh.

I did like the parts with Ben, though I think he's more of a math or English teacher. Not History. And I enjoyed his eulogy. More Ben!

I totally didn't get the Jacob's Ladder reference until now.

Also, Allegory of the Cave. I remember high school English after all!

24 comments:

gabriel said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
gabriel said...

"For the last time, I wasn't in Dune and I don't have Sting's number."

lil' maxwell said...

I'm too exhausted to comment about what I think about anything. I liked the episode, though. I especially liked smoke monster vision, and creepy kid smoke monster ...vision?

who's the kid!?!?!?!?!

Anonymous said...

Jacob? From the future? Belated complaint about the Lost fantasy league: why wait until Season 6, when we are LITERALLY existing in parallel universes, to start parsing between "real" and "not real" vis-a-vis John MF-ing Locke? That's what we in the fantasy game call "bullshit-ass bullshit".

-DB

Anonymous said...

Or Aaron? From the past/future/present?

-DB

Cody said...

Totally Aaron.

Yeah, the fantasy game is kinda B.S.A.B.S. I should've known that season six would somehow find a way to change the formula so that so much of the game we become confusing and debatable.

Speaking of B.S.A.B.S, whatever happened to the E Street Film Society watching Nightmare on Elm Street? Don't think I didn't notice, DB.

Dylan Thomas B. said...

Ok, he acts too much like John Locke to not be considered as such. Here are my 2 reasons:

#1: He fell over. Smoke Monsters don't fall over and Locke always did.

#2. "Don't tell me what I can't do!" Total Locke line.

Also, this episode kicked ass.

Cody said...

Oh yeah, Kate wasn't on the wall cause not even Jacob gives a shit about Kate.

Eryn said...

lol Cody, I wish that were true! Come to think of it - was there ever a flashback scene where Jacob visited Kate? I could be wrong but I don't think so.

Just because they didn't show her name doesn't mean it's there. However, maybe "candidates" can only be male, hence no Kate - and since only one Kwon name was there, maybe it was Jin, and that could make sense.

That kid is totally Aaron. Aaron was "taken" from Claire and she's been on the island ever since turning into the next Russeau.

beckler said...

Enough with the Freckles hating! You guys are a bunch of "Katers". That's my new catchy term for people who hate Kate.

That was cool that Sawyer was listening to the Stooges. Sawyer was awesome in this episode.

Also, thrilled at the return of Peggy Bundy.

Anonymous said...

Hi everyone my name is Andrew Jackson, yes, like the president. i'm a huge Lost fan from Minneapolis and i was searching for lost blogs and this has to be among one of the better ones. I identify the most with Locke since he works in a cubicle (or worked) and his boss is a total d-bag. i'm in said cubicle right now and my boss is probably sexually harassing all the female workers right now so i have some time to write.
anyway, last nights episode wasn't very good. i think most lost fans have forgotten how good lost could be and now they're just willing to accept anything from the show and settle for less. it's like a bad relationship. we're stuck in it; we want the show to respect us a little bit and maybe even love us, but its been seeming unlikely that this will happen.
the numbers were kind of interesting. but there are so many reasons for the nuymbers to be the numbers. if you go back far enough to one of the Desmond episodes you'll find that the monestary he was at made 108 bottles of wine a year; that is the total of the numbers. jin's dad died when he was 16. lock was thrown out of an 8 story window and on and on. i think cody is right though. no one gives a shit about kate.
the kid was probably jacob, but that was also kind of lame; i mean, seriously, where do you think that is going to go? it might be a little angel or something or it's just little boy jacob. this episode had so much potential to rock us all, but sigh.
the Jacob's ladder thing is going to be inconsequential, just the producers trying to help the audience feel smart. next week is going to be great or is it?

---A.J. Jackson

Cody said...

Hey Andrew Jackson! That's rad you like our blog. We're mostly just a bunch of folks from Sacramento who like to keep this shit light hearted and casual, and it seems you fit right in. Especially if you can hate on Kate, or "Kate" as Beckler calls it. Yeah, those numbers come up so often it's not even worth keeping track anymore. There's supposed to be something going on with a thing called "The Valenzetti Equation" and I believe the producers said something about plugging all the numbers plus one unknown variable into the equation and it's supposed to give some answers. Maybe Kate is this variable?

Anonymous said...

The kid is definitely Aaron. If you look closely, he's carrying a juice box.

Jacob did visit Kate, didn't he? He said something like "Keep your chin up, Katie". I am similarly mystified by the Kate hate...whenever she carries a pack, she always puts the strap right between her tits. That gets a thumbs-up in the Book of Barnesyard.

The Armeniac said...

DB, great analysis of the Kate situation. And I believe last nights ep proved once and for all that Smoky is Locke is Smoky, it's hard for some people to get this, not sure why. Lost has thrown years of nonsense at us, yet the fact that Locke is Smoky, though he's dead, is somehow too beyond the pale? Re: "Katers" , I love Kate, she's foxy and she's.......hecka foxy. Her episodes to seem to be the most dull though, maybe she should just wear panties and a bra in every episode! Seems reasonable.
A.J. good to have you on board, hope you party as hard as yr namesake!!

Carla said...

You totally missed some major questions, yo. Like, why is alternate reality Locke still in contact with his dad? Did he get paralyzed some other way?
And why are alternate reality Ben's glasses so teeny tiny?

DB said...

You have to consider all the elements, that's my point. She could have worn a fanny pack or a backpack or pulled a wagon or pushed a shopping cart, but instead she always slings a strap between her hooters, thus saving the show.

FamousMortimer said...

i think sawyer's the next to die.

Anonymous said...

I actually shouted, "Walt!" when Lock grabbed the kid at the school. I was so hoping that they got another kid to play Walt.

By the way, they should get another kid to play Walt.

-Grandpa Al

PS I'm not a Kater. I do, however, hate juicebox.

Anonymous said...

David Paul. I'd like to point out that this episode is called The Substitute. As in that's not real John Locke. But a substitute.

Also, no Kate = no girls = patriarchy? Is this a Jacob/Esau thing?

I'm a proud Kater.

I saw some screen grabs today that had some other names crossed out. Like:
Littleton (Claire or Aaron)
Goodspeed (Ethan or Horace?)
Straume (Miles)
Lewis (Charlotte? or her dad?)
Mattingly
Cunningham (Mike C?)

How do they get these screen grabs? Is it because I don't have a fancy tv? Cuz we went back and looked!

Anonymous said...

thanks, Armeniac and Cody, for the welcome. i've added this site to my bookmarks so i'll be joining in your conversations to add my p.o.v from over here in minneapolis. i don't know how often you guys update this site, but till then i'll make sure to stock up on all the "katerade" that i can drink.
oh, by the way, Kate is not hot, her boobies are a trifle in comparison to her character's uselessness. you say Sun-Hwa Kwon though and you've got me standing at FULL attention.

Andrew Jackson

Anonymous said...

I like Sun better than Kate, but her character is beyond useless by this point. She gets about 15 seconds an episode, says something vague, asks someone about Jin, and that's that. Not a blue bikini to be found.

-DB

P.S.: Boobs are not to be trifled with!

Anonymous said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
nortagemdar said...

Welcome, AJ.

I was hoping it would be Walt, too. That whole deal from whatever season with the birds flying into windows was crazy/interesting/unresolved.

Kate "drink your juice" Austin is too great for hate. I mean, she's smokin'. She dumped a hobbit, you guys. That's cred right there. Also if she ends up being the variable in the Valenzetti equation I sure hope she's 69. ho ho!

Excellent episode. But I think I'm going to spend the remainder of the season looking for Rob McElhenney.

michele h said...

Kate's great. That kid was totally Aaron -- if we look at the mirror image of season one and if Clair is Rousseau, then that kid was totally like a mirror of Alex.

-m

captcha: "scussion" as in Kate's great, end of 'scussion.