Lost about Lost
Okay, I admit it. I'm an addict. ABC's hit show Lost has me by the larynx and it's squeezing. I love the show. And I'm dying to talk about it with someone, but I can't find a good discussion board. So if you know of one, let me know. Secondly, if you know, or think you know, the answers to any of the following questions, please chime in:
Question 1. Where the heck did Desmond, the guy in the bunker go? Did he just run off into the jungle and decide to live in a tree and eat mangos?
Question 2. What about Danielle, the french chick? Where did she disappear to? After being alone for 17 years, you'd think she'd welcome the human interaction.
Question 3. Is it my imagination, or did Sawyer shoot at Zeke last night, and did the bullet somehow ricochet off? Zeke must have some electromagnetic force field, or something. He looked awfully West Virginia to be able to come up with that kind of technology, if you know what I mean.
Question 4. Why aren't people constantly discussing what they know. You'd think they'd be having weekly pow-wows to share info, especially the new folks, like Ana Lucia and Mr. Eko. Sawyer, Locke and Jack go into the jungle, get shot at by some weird Hillbilly, don't find Michael, learn that there are other inhabitants, perhaps dozens of them, who threaten to kill both Kate and you. And then they return, and just go to the beach, sit down and sip some water. What? Why isn't everyone running up to them asking what they saw/found? It makes no sense. Is hanging up tarps on tree branches really taking that much of their time?
Question 5. Jack wants to train an army. There's a metaphor in this, I suppose. Kind of like in The Iliad. Troy was a center of learning, religion and peace, and then the Mycenaens showed up with lots of boats and lots of spears, and because Troy didn't have a big enough military, they were completely destroyed, culminating in the great statesman's Hector's infant son being tossed off the city walls and Cassandra being raped in the temple. I'm not a big fan of wars, but I understand that evil is a fact of life, and sometimes it's best to walk with a big stick. But still, this is turning a bit into Lord of the Flies. I just hope this time, Piggy doesn't die.
Question 6. How many people do you know who have killed someone? Right. Probably not a lot. But on Lost, like 8 out of 13 people have purposely, directly killed someone. That seems a bit extreme, even for TV. It's an island of murderers. Ana Lucia leads the pack with three murders thus far, though Eko probably has a higher tally from his former life as a Nigerian Drug Lord. And you could say that Jack's hubris killed the Old Italian Tumor Guy. You could. It might not be fair, but you could say it.
and finally...
Question 7. What's the deal with the black, swirling smoke. Did you see pictures inside it, or was that just me? Is this some sort of miliary technology? Smoke reconnaissance? Weird.
posted by David Tieche at 6:36 AM
4 Comments:
OK, I am obsessed with this show.
One more thought. The fictional world of Lost allows several of the main characters to tap into the key elements of manhood as expressed by John Eldredge: Battle to fight, adventure to live, beauty to rescue.
I think this makes the show massively appealing to men. I know I live vicariously through Jack, John, Jin, Michael and Sawyer. Who doesn't want to grab a gun and a machete, pack up a small backpack of essentials, and race off into the jungle on an adventure? I mean, life doesn't get much better than that.
I have no idea what the correlating themes are for women. My wife is reading the book Captivating right now so I'll have to ask her.
1:37 PM
Interesting thoughts about Lost as an expression, though probably accidental, that encapsulates those deep, innate desires of men. It's so true.
BTW - Eldredge says that the central drive of a woman is to be "captivating." To have someone stand in awe of their beauty and, like Jacob at the well, do something all-out and maybe even a bit extreme to show that they're willing to do ANYTHING to "win" them. In the words of Bethany Dillion, "Take me by the hand/let me know you'd fight/thousands for my love." One way he put it is that men need to be "dangerous - for good" and women need to be "scandelous - for good."
He'd also probably add that it's a bit deeper for women- it's also about being invited to participate in the adventure. Like Princess Leia, running around looking cute and shooting storm troopers while hanging onto your man as he swings over precipices in the Death Star. Or something like that. I'm just recapitulating what Eldrege and his wife say - so I'm interested to see what women-folk think.
6:05 AM
So, I hear what you're saying about Jack losing it. The flashbacks seem to imply he's got a bit of that typical Doctor Meglomania thing going on, because he thought he had the power of life and death. So there is probably something a bit unhealthy going on there, which is ironic that Jack's a doctor.
BUT...that being said, his actions aren't crazy. I mean, from a strictly rational standpoint, some crazy people have been killing his group, blew up a rescue raft, took Walt (and probably other kids too), attempted to kill several of them, and threatened to kill Kate whilst issuing ultimatums. It's not like those are neighbors you can peaceably co-exist with.
Some reasons:
1. These people are not afriad to use force to kill people (Ethan, dude on boat who shot Sawyer)
2. These people are kidnappers
3. These people are ruthless (leaving Sawyer, Michael and Jin out to die in the Ocean.
4. These people are not rational (taking other people's kids, not recognizing that these people on the island are just trying to survive)
5. These people are powerful.
So Jack's reasons are fairly justifiable - and the fact that I'm sitting here typing about why "war" in this case is necessary, is a bit unnerving. But is someone started kidnapping the kids in my caul-de-sac, I'd probably go around and make sure there were lots of people with guns, too.
Sometimes, to paraphrase the words of Bonhoeffer (who was killed for his part in an assination attempt on Hitler), if there's a maniac driving a car out of control toward a bunch of kids, the most moral thing to do is jump in the car and wrestle the wheel from them. Or, to paraphrase Beuchner, if someone's beating a child senseless, you gotta make them stop. And if words don't work, maybe a baseball bat will.
I'm not sure how this all fits into the teachings of Christ, though. I'm just saying I'm not convinced it's bad leadership. It's probably bad leadership not to have a big pow-wow and talk it out, though. Maybe not with everyone, but get Eko, Locke, Sayid, Sawyer, Ana Lucia, Kate together and talk it out.
Not not do that and just form your own Army - now that's bad leadership.
6:20 AM
Not to get all political, but it's easy to draw some strange parallels between Jack and the castaways vs. the others and our situation with radical Muslims. By radical I mean want to kill all of us at any cost crazy people, not peace loving Muslims who feel misrepresented by extremist who corrupt their faith.
11:52 PM
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