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This write-up was delayed by silly adult things like moving into my new flat, and arranging to pay for bills and stuff. Crazy.

This episode opens with Sawyer making Tea for the injured Jin. We did wonder where he had been hiding, turns out he was playing nurse. Jins utter fear of being around when “they” arrive (they being Claire and Locke) could be attributed to the face that he recently watched Claire plunge an axe into a helpless mans chest, or because he knows she will not have found her baby with the others. Sawyers affirmation that he’s “with Locke” counters something he says later in the episode, but seems to serve a purpose at the moment – calming down Jin.

Sawyer seems quietly resigned as he greets Kate, I guess he’s used to the whims of the island now and the face that they keep being pushed together. He’s not excited like he was in earlier seasons, I’m happy to see that perhaps he’s completely over her.

The flash sideways tries to play an easy trick on us, but I think we’re all a bit too battlescarred these days, and guessed it before he called out “LaFleur”. Sure, it’s a role reversal but it’s not too big a leap of faith. In the flash sideways Sawyer’s still using his power to do what he wants to do, this time he’s just doing it a little differently. An interesting point is that he didn’t trick her, she even calls him a “lousy con-man”. As a cop he hasn’t had the practice, the life dedicated to fooling people, and he’s not got the skills we’re used to him having.

Fake-Locke certainly seems to be falling into his role as leader. Almost like he’s done this before.. But the unprompted question from Cindy (the flight attendant, turned temple-other) seems to show that they’re not following him blindly like a supposed earlier, she DOES want to know what happened to the people that stayed behind. Plus she says “we want to know”, as if she’s spoken to the others behind his back.

Interesting that Fake-Locke tells them that “The Black Smoke killed them”, taking absolutely no responsibility for it, but not lying. He promises to take care of the kid, and it seems like an honest promise.

I notice a teddy bear in the childs arms and think back to that scene from a long time ago, the barefoot people in the jungle. One of them carrying a teddy bear on some kind of wire. I wonder if that was them leading the kids back to the temple. Curious.

Kate asks Sawyer “so you’re with Locke now?” to which Sawyer replies after some thought “I ain’t with anybody Kate”. That’s not exactly what he told Jin earlier, and suggests two things to me. Firstly that he might well just be more likely to tell Kate the truth. They’ve shared a lot of honesty in the past and she’s the most likely to understand that he’s doing all this for himself. Secondly he might be referencing the fact that Juliet is dead, and that he’s still attracted to Kate.

Our flash sideways takes us to Sawyer calling up people by the name of Anthony Cooper. Anthony Cooper is Locke’s father, an accomplished con-artist who caused the deaths of our Sawyers parents, and is the reason he chose to live under that name and become a con-artist himself.

In the recent Locke-centric episode we learned that Locke seems to still be on good terms with his father – Anthony Cooper, or at least his soon-to-be wife thinks he is. This led us all to think that perhaps in the flash sideways he’s not a bad man, but left the question as to what happened to put Locke in a wheelchair if he wasn’t pushed out of the window by Cooper. Now this episode is telling us that Anthony Cooper did still cause the deaths of Sawyers parents. So who knows what exactly went on. But I have a thought which i’ll get to later on.

I found it very interesting that Fake-Locke seemed so utterly peeved when Sawyer interrupted him, asking when they were going to get off the island. Fake-Locke seems very composed, and even when events anger him he doesn’t seem to… Rise to it. On this occasion he takes Sawyer aside and calmly makes his annoyance clear. Interestingly he verbally forgives Sawyer, even though his apology is clearly sarcasm. This forgiveness is quite importance, seeing as judgement has been quite an important theme in our encounters with the smoke monster.

Best line in Lost so far might well be “I’m the smoke-thing”. But the rest of the dialogue is very important. Fake-Locke admits to killing the people that stayed in the temple, but i’m not quite sure why he did. Earlier I believed that it was his intention to occupy the temple – not so. I wondered if he was trying eliminate potential resistance, seeing as the temple seems to be a sanctuary. But he was able to enter it once, perhaps he was simply worried that a new “Dogan” would be tapped, and be able to prevent his entrance again. Maybe he just killed them all out of spite, this is almost inferred by his mention that they were trying to protect the island from Fake-Locke, even though all he wanted to do was leave. I’m wondering if they were protecting the island exactly by preventing him from leaving. Perhaps leaving is exactly what would destroy the island. He finishes off the conversation by saying that it was a kill or be killed situation, and he didn’t want to be killed. He’s definitely mortal then, even though Sayid couldn’t kill him. I restate my previous opinion that he could only be killed by someone who did so entirely out of free will.

I 100% do not buy Fake-Lockes suggestion that he wants to get on the plane and fly away. Sure it makes sense that the runway was built so the plane would land safely, but it didn’t. It front ended some trees, and I can’t see a plane flying with a smashed windscreen. The pilot would be decimated surely. Plane like that flies a good bit faster than an open top bi-plane.

I don’t think there’s anything behind Charlotte being in this episode, other than the fact that they wanted a bit more fan-service, and needed a female character for him to interact with who wasn’t Kate or Juliet. I think the Juliet moment will come later, and involve coffee (and going Dutch).

Sawyers reaction to Kate’s dress, still sitting in the cage, seems like more of a reinforcement that he is indeed pining for her. Bleh.

I spoke before about Sayid being resigned to his fate, rather than actually being “converted” to evil. He seems completely uncaring as Claire utterly fails to take out Kate. Got to wonder what’s going on in his head. But I’m more interested in what Fake-Locke is thinking about. He refers to Claire’s behaviour as “inappropriate”, fascinating. He was annoyed at Sawyer for interrupting him. Why is he so bothered about decorum? He’s acting like a parent, think back to his line upon leaving the statue foot – “I’m very disappointed in you all”, spoken like he was talking to all people. Like some god character, some great progenitor. Not that I believe this IS his backstory, just that he’s acting along those lines.

One thing worth noting is that on an island full of people with Daddy-issues, he’s going to be the one doing a damned good job of leading people. He gets Claire calmed down right away (okay, so a little corporal punishment was involved..), but he certainly seems to be doing something right here.

Don’t really understand the “drag marks” to the bodies. If they’re coming from where the bodies where, how were they killed? There’s no blood. Maybe it WAS Smokey.

Was anyone fooled by this “lone survivor” collecting wood? Yeah, collecting wood, heard that one before. The episode started with a woman who knew about cons, we were bound to see that again. Plus, she doesn’t really seem disheveled enough to have been dragging bodies around. I enjoyed Sawyers line “God’s got nothing to do with it”. Is that the writers talking directly to the fans again? Just like his “surprise” line near the beginning.

Fake-Locke apologises to Kate, again, doing the “right” thing. He takes responsibility for it and explains his actions. Says that he gave Claire “something to hate” to keep her driven. Got to wonder about this.. The truth would’ve driven her just as well, driven her to find a way off the island, or just keep surviving. But he chose to give her hate. Is that because he’s used to being driven by hate? Remember, if Fake-Locke and The Man In Black are the same person, then this is the individual we heard say “You have no idea how much I want to kill you” to Jacob. He certainly sounds like someone who’s driven by hate. Is this the only thing he knows?

This “survivor girl” asks way too many questions, and Sawyer isn’t buying it “we got plenty of guns”. This isn’t the first time we’ve seen someone being sent alone to pose as a survivor and find out things. Remember Ethan?

Interesting information from Fake-Locke. He’s not a dead man, he had a mother, his mother was crazy, she caused him some problems. Makes me think about Jacob and Esau again. The fascinating line is “now Aaron has a crazy mother too”. I’m guessing some people will jump on the “Fake-Locke must be Aaron!” thing, but I’m pretty certain that’s not the case. I guess he’s simply bothered by the fact that he may have been instrumental in this kids “mommy issues”, and wants Kate to do something about it. Somehow preventing this issue reminds me of the warnings Claire got in the early seasons, that her son couldn’t be raised by another. As if Fake-Locke had somehow sent this message to her, by proxy.

The sonic fences scream “Dharma”, but we know it’s Whidmore in the sub. Is he Dharma, or did he just learn about the sonic fences before?

What’s in the locked door/cupboard on the sub? Something to use against Smokey? Someone? Desmond? Perhaps it’s number 108, the person Jacob said would find their own way to the island. We’re certainly supposed to be thinking about it, but we don’t have the information to make any kind of decision. Whidmore says to Sawyer “It’s sad really, how little you know” and I can’t help but think that this is the writers mocking us some more. But Sawyer has a point, Whidmore sent the freighter to the island, apparently to kill them all. We know they had a “greater purpose” but we also know that the Losties weren’t important to them. Whidmore could be insinuating that Sawyer doesn’t know the bigger picture, he doesn’t realise that their lives are trivial compared to whatever he’s trying to accomplish. He also says that his people didn’t murder the Ajira survivors, as I mentioned previously. Whidmore grins when Sawyer suggests leading Fake-Locke into a trap. Maybe he’s grinning because he likes the idea, or maybe he’s grinning at Sawyer’s attempt to fool him. He certainly knows a lot more than we do about the situation, so it’ll be interesting to see what develops.

Fake-Locke knows about Charles Whidmore, either because of Locke’s memories, or because he encountered him way back – which I suspect to be the case.

Sawyers revelation of his backstory to Miles leads me to the thought I mentioned earlier. If we remember back to the scene where Jacob visited young James Ford he found the child writing a letter. The letter. The “Dear Sawyer” letter which seems to be the basis of our Sawyers backstory. The young James Ford’s pen had run out of ink and he couldn’t continue the letter. But Jacob arrived just in time to hand him a new one. He gave him the ability to write the letter, keep the letter, base his life around the letter. He gave him HATE, just like Fake-Locke gave Claire hate. He sculpted him in a manner not too dissimilar to the way the Others built a runway for the Ajira plane to land on. Built something up for the future. In the flash sideways James Ford didn’t become “Sawyer”, maybe because he didn’t have that latter, maybe because Jacob never visited him. This might have something to do with the island sinking, or it might just be to do with Jacob dying – I don’t know, and we’re not in a position to guess. But it’s interesting food for thought, what if all of the flash sideways are the way our Losties would’ve lived if Jacob had never been around.

I knew going into this episode that it was a Sayid centric episode. Not something that really thrilled me, because although i think he’s an excellent character (played by a capable actor) – i also feel that his story ended at the end of the previous series. But this was an excellent episode.

The beginning of the episode plays with us a little. We see Sayid nervously approaching a house, we see Nadia answer the door, we think about The Substitute, Locke going home to his loving wife. But no, Sayid isn’t visiting his wife, or his fiancee, or his girlfriend. He’s visiting his brother and Nadia – husband and wife. It’s not even his brothers emergence that causes this realisation, it’s their children calling Sayid “Uncle”. They’ve been together long enough to have two kids, and clearly Sayid still has feelings for her. Painful.

At this moment I was wondering why Sayid was in Australia, and still feeling like he was possibly a hitman. We joked at the time that he and his brother might both be hitmen given the shady almost cruel vibes that his brother gives off (and the “dry-cleaning” mention, cleaning is a sinister profession). But i think we have a clear picture of Sayid’s brother from the childhood chicken killing scene from some time ago. The rest of this episode makes it clear that Sayid and his brother are two different kinds of men.

The most important part of this episode, in my opinion, is Dogan talking about the scale. This is fascinating. He’s suggesting that every person sits somewhere on this scale between good and evil. Now obviously everyone is inclined towards some kind of moral behaviour (just as everyone is either slightly more optimistic, or slightly more pessimistic), but the idea that there’s some kind of discernible, definitive way of measuring this (with a red hot piece of metal, electric shocks and some dust, no less) boggles the mind. It makes me think of alignments in Dungeons and Dragons. I think it’s key to understanding a lot of the mysteries in Lost.

We have two powerful men in this storyline, Jacob and the Man In Black. We’ve seen them portrayed as light and dark, and we’ve had the MIB referred to as pure evil. We’ve also seen both of them manipulate people. We now know that there’s some kind of alignment scale that is pivotal, and we know that Jacob has been manipulating people’s lives for his own purpose.

I’ve spoken previously about the Night Watch tetralogy by Sergei Lukyanenko. To quote wikipedia:

“The story revolves around a confrontation between two opposing supernatural groups (known as “Others”): the Night Watch, an organisation dedicated to policing the actions of the Dark Others—and the Day Watch, which polices the actions of the Light Others.”

In these stories a “truce” exists between the two factions, keeping balance. If one side acts outside the truce (i.e uses their powers for their own purposes) they effectively give permission to the other side to commit an act with the same kind of magnitude. An early example in the stories is one character influencing a drug dealer to give up his “dark” ways. If caught, he risks allowing the other side to influence someone to find their dark path.

When humans become “others”, the two factions aren’t allowed to directly recruit them, they must find their own path, but a situation that arises in the story is the notion that one side can influence a person subtly, by changing other things.

This notion doesn’t seem too dissimilar to occurrences in Lost. The Man In Black finds a loophole to kill Jacob. He influences another character, and causes that character to murder Jacob. It’s made entirely clear to us during the scene that Ben is killing Jacob out of his own free will. Jacob even makes sure that it’s Ben’s choice. Something that can’t be said of Sayid’s attempt to stab Fake-Locke in this episode. But we’ll get to that later.

Free will is the key, getting humans (and especially the candidates) to deviate and pick one side or the other.

Anyway, continuing with the episode.

Dogan realised that Sayid, a candidate, was straying towards the negative (because of some kind of influence, but more probably because of his obscure resurrection). He decides that Sayid should be eliminated instead of risking… something, something he might do? Something he might not do?

This is the second time Dogan tries to kill Sayid, but this time it’s a bit more direct. He doesn’t go through with it because he has a moment of clarity. He sees the baseball and decides to spare Sayid. Now, we have to wonder if this is because he remembers what the baseball means to him, or because he knows what will happen if he (directly) kills Sayid. We’ll touch on that some more later.

This next scene is also fascinating. Fake-Locke and Claire are standing at the edge of the ash ring (which we know keeps smokey at bay), he’s telling her to go inside. She asks why he can’t do it and he explains that he can’t. Why not? Why not ask Claire to kick the ashes away? There’s more to it than that. She says “If i go in there, i need to know that you’ll do what you said, i want my son back”. He replies “i always do what i say”, and i believe him. I believe he intends to get Aaron (wonder why she didn’t refer to him by name…) back to her. Perhaps Aaron IS this “Wallace” that’s coming to the island? The fathers name could well be Wallace.

I really got the feeling from Fake-Locke here that he doesn’t particularly want to go in there and hurt people, he just accepts that it has to happen. I think his intention is to collect followers, not punish innocents.

I love Sayid’s utter confusion at being exiled, then finding out that he wasn’t even resurrected by the temple others. He has no idea what’s going on. Nor do we Sayid, nor do we.

Dogan and Claires exchange reveals that Dogan would be killed if he left the temple. Claire suggests that he sends someone that “you know who” won’t kill. Dogan immediately wants to send Hurley or Jack, but upon discovering they’re no longer in the temple – decides to send Sayid. I don’t think this is primarily an attempt to get Sayid killed. Why give him the old dagger? Which, by the way, looks to be a Roman Pugio (so we’re talking 1st Centure AD). Trust me, this dagger is relevant. I think he’s sending Sayid because, resurrected or not, Sayid is a candidate. He knows that Fake-Locke can’t kill candidates.

Thing is, it’s not Sayid’s free choice to kill him. Dogan has convinced him to do it. I don’t think this is going to do it.

Having difficulty finding anything to comment on in the Sayid flash-sideways. It’s interesting, and entertaining, but so far they’re not adding anything to the plot.

Back on the island Sayid bumps into Kate, who appears to be going back into the temple. Didn’t she say that she wasn’t going to the temple? I loved Miles explaining that he wanted to go after Sawyer. Reminding us that they were close. Spent three years together and apparently did become good friends. I enjoyed their dynamic even though we didn’t see much of it – he probably ended up being closer to Sawyer than any of our original Losties did, even Kate.

So, Sayid does as instructed and stabs Fake-Locke (after he’s spoken, which according to Dogan is too late). Love, love, love Terry O’Quinn as Fake-Locke. He’s so convincing.

Fake-Locke is a manipulator. I don’t believe him when he says that Dogan sent Sayid to his death. But i said that already. I believe that because Sayid is already inclined towards the evil side of things, he’s very easy for Fake-Locke to manipulate. It’s not that i believe Fake-Locke is actually especially evil (which is where things get complicated), but for the simple reason that someone who is off balance, is always easier to push over. If you get my meaning.

Sayid is no fool. He knows Fake-Locke is trying to talk him into something, but what he wasn’t prepared for is the offer. Anything he wanted. A go at the magic box that gives you whatever you want. Fake-Locke offers him the chance to see Nadia again, and it’s pretty obvious that Sayid is going to take him up on that. What does he have to lose? He already believes that he’s evil, he told us that at the end of season five! Dogan just pushed him over the edge.

So, Fake-Locke is saying that he can give Sayid the thing he wishes for most – Nadia, and of course we cut straight to the flash-sideways where he does indeed see Nadia. It’s almost like the flash-sideways were created by one of those evil movie genies, giving you what you asked for, but not in the way you wanted. You can see Nadia again, but she’s married to your brother. Oooh, nasty.

Sayid tells the temple others that there’s a man in the jungle. Again they’re telling us that Fake-Locke IS a man. He also says something very interesting. Jacob is dead now, and the temple others don’t have to stay there any more. He said the same thing to Bram etc in the statue foot. Is he just suggesting that their responsibilities have ended, or is it more sinister – like they were being held “captive” in the temple. Enthralled, indentured, whatever. He tells them that if they leave the temple they can join “the man” and leave the island, but if they don’t leave they’ll be killed. Dogan looks like he’s fairly sure things are not going to go his way.

Kate and Claire, we were sitting watching this scene going “nooooo”, Emilie de Ravin does a VERY good job of being evil. That facial expression is terrifying. Kate refers to “raising” Aaron. Reminding us of Claire being told that no one else could “raise” Aaron, “raised by another” etc. Sounds bad. We know that Claire said she’d kill Kate if this was true.

Loved seeing Omar and Keamey in the flash-sideways. But i love seeing Kevin Durand in things, seemed like a really decent guy when i was doing Robin Hood, huge in real life too – and i’m 6’2. But back to Lost. Interesting to see them back in the flash-sideways. Don’t know if this is just fan service, or if there’s a decent reason for it. No idea why they’re doing organised crime now instead of being mercenaries. Just another Lost co-incidence. But as much of a co-incidence as finding Jin. Whaaaat? Did Jin deliver the watch to them? Did they ambush him? Were they working for one of Jin’s company’s competitors who didn’t want Jin “sealing the deal” with the gift?

Okay, so, i’m eating humble pie. I would’ve bet a lot of money that Dogan was a WWII officer. But he worked in a bank. Could i have been more wrong? He explains that he drank too much, and got into an accident (another car accident?) with his son – who was very badly injured. Someone comes to him and offers him a deal – i’ll save your son, but you can never see him again, in exchange you’ll come to the island and get a new job. This is a very selfless act, perhaps something that would tip your “scale” over into the positive. We find out in a few moments that it was Dogan keeping Fake-Locke out, perhaps Dogan being very far over on the positive side of things kept Fake-Locke at bay, perhaps this is why he didn’t kill Sayid when he had the chance. Perhaps seeing the baseball reminded him of the sacrifice he made, and that he couldn’t risk his alignment by killing Sayid.

Dogan realises that Sayid has made a similar deal with Fake-Locke. It’s worth noting that although he says that the man who visited him with his son was Jacob, we don’t know for sure that it was the Jacob we know. It could have been the man in black. Infact, the man in black could even be called Jacob, he could be Jacobs servant (remember the image we saw on a wall? the smoke and the egyptian god?) – or perhaps the man in black could even BE Jacob, a la Fight Club.

I have to wonder why Sayid throws Dogan in the water. He’s fought Dogan before and lost, why risk a physical struggle with him when you’ve got a big knife? Perhaps he was told to kill Dogan with the water. Perhaps Dogan will come back to life because of it, and the dark water will bring him back wrong, a la Sayid? There’s MUCH more to be revealed about that water, and water in general.

I was sure that Miles would die, i’m glad he didn’t, i like Miles. I also like Frank and Ben, and they’re both acting like they know a lot more now about what’s going on. Maybe Illana filled them in a little during the walk over? Interesting that Illana referred to Ben as Linus. They love surnames. She knows about candidates. She knows his name is crossed off.

Love this scene with Ben and Sayid. I’ve been a big fan of Ben since we first met him – i used to enthuse “he’s the good guy, you’ll see” and i still think we’ll see him do something amazing before the end of the series. I like that he’s genuinely trying to save Sayid here, and it makes me more sure that Illana must have explained what’s going on. He’s really trying to help Sayid, but then when he sees Sayid’s reaction he backs off in fear. He knows Sayid has shifted, gone wrong. But i’m not sure if this is some kind of “claiming” like Dogan said, or if Sayid has just accepted his fate.

Hated the eerie “catch a falling star” playing while Sayid, Clair and Kate walked through the temple. Why is it playing? Is it Claire’s voice? Why did Smokey let Kate survive it?

My real question is why did all the temple others decide to follow Locke? Is it fear? Respect? Or does this go back to what i said before about the non-candidates being easily swayed? I talked before about whats-her-name the air hostess acting like she was never really a normal off-island person.

Fake-Locke’s staring at Kate when she walks out is interesting. Like he’s trying to gauge what she’ll do. Whether she’s one of “them” or not. Remember, her name WAS on the wheel.

Couldn’t help wondering where Sawyer was in this scene. With Jin?

Good episode.

Half way through “The Substitute” I knew I wasn’t paying enough attention to the episode. It’s not that I was paying less attention than usual, simply that you can’t really do this episode justice without sitting there taking notes – they just gave us so much to think about.

I went into this episode with a couple of thoughts. I was pretty sure it’d be Locke centric, the preview showed a conversation between Locke and Randy Nations, if memory serves. I also knew the title – “The Substitute”. This made me think about the conversation between Eloise Hawking and Jack in the Lamp Post station. She explained to Jack that they needed to take Locke’s body with them, as a “proxy” for Christian’s body. “Proxy” and “substitute” – it wasn’t too big a leap of faith to assume that the episode would tackle something to do with Locke’s body on the Ajira flight. That was about as far as my thoughts for this episode went.

We spend a good amount of this episode accompanying divergent timeline Locke. We see his suburban home – living the “American Dream” by the look of it.

This leads me to something I personally thought was very interesting. Stubborn as always, Locke tries to wheelie off his broken wheelchair lift, instead of calling for help. Not sure I blame him personally. He ends up sprawled on the grass, his wheelchair folded beside him to add insult to injury. His body language says “well that sucked, but I will persevere” and then the sprinklers click on. I swear his reaction here is one of good humour. He seems to be laughing at the situation! Especially while talking to Helen (nice to see her alive!). Other people have mentioned to me that he seems upset, hurt, but I really didn’t see it that way. To see him finding amusement in the situation made me think that this is a happier Locke, a Locke that is less angry at his situation. Less stubborn, but still trying to look after himself.

We find out that John and Helen are getting married, and appear to be very much in love. Helens comments about “destiny” are very reflective of the Locke we know. What ARE the chances of him running into a spinal surgeon? Well, fairly good in Lost!

She mentions his father here, this is a funny little rabbithole to climb down. If he and his father are on good terms, then perhaps his father isn’t a con man, perhaps he never got pushed out of the window. So why’s he in a wheelchair, and are Sawyers parents still alive?

We see Smokey zooming around the island, appearing to manifest himself as Locke to pick up a machete and cut Richard down. Richard is quite the contrast to Ben, looking quite surprised at his hurt, abused state. We’re used to seeing a bloodied up Ben Linus. But Richard is usually looking handsome and well dressed. Does this count as proof that Locke is definitely inhabited by Smokey? I’d say so, we’re not going to see CGI morphing between Locke and Smokey anytime soon.

Turns out that the divergent timeline hasn’t done anything to make Randy Nations any less of a “douche”. He comments on Locke’s Australia-tan and tortures him for a while instead of straight out asking where Locke was. Thing is, I would’ve liked an answer to this question myself. In our timeline Locke was turned away, but the walkabout company bought him an early flight home. But in this timeline things seem a bit different. Locke says “why don’t we just call it my vacation week” – inferring he was away for a week. If he intended to go on walkabout it’s safe to say that he went to the tour company as soon as he arrived in Australia. Assuming they turned him away then, he’d still have the rest of the week to kill. Randy comments on his tan – I doubt you’d be getting much of a tan if you few straight back home, and I doubt he’d have been sitting at home all that time. So did this Locke stay in Australia? If i’m right about this version of Locke being less stubborn he may well not have got quite as angry in the tour place, and may not have been bought an early flight home. So I say again, what did he do with the week? Why didn’t he just go to the conference? Maybe he went to see Isaac the healer.

“Richard, I’m sorry I hit you in the throat and dragged you off the beach”. Now there’s a hell of a line. The dialogue between Richard and “Locke” was very interesting. Let me break something down.. Richard told actual-Locke that he had to die. He told him this because fake-Locke told him to say it. So does that mean that fake-Locke manipulated Ben into killing Locke (a candidate) so he could take on Locke’s body and use it to manipulate Richard into letting he and Ben near Jacob and manipulate Ben into killing Jacob? If this is the case then MY GOD fake-locke has game.

Add Richard to the list of people who seem to know who fake-Locke actually is, a list which does not include us. People think that fake-Locke is the Man In Black, and also Smokey. I think the latter is definitely true, and the former is probably true – but till we find out for sure I’m not placing money on anything. Richard and fake-Locke have a history, seems that fake-Locke has tried to recruit him before! He plays the “Jacob didn’t tell you anything” card, I guess now Richard knows what Ben was going through.

Then the boy appears. The sound you can hear at this point is thousands of people rewinding their Tivos. What’s with the Jesus stance and the bloody hands? Why does fake-Locke look so disturbed by this? Isn’t he supposed to know what’s happening?! I mean, sure, you see a kid standing in a beam of light with bloody hands, you’re going to be taken aback – but if you happen to be a dude who can turn into smoke, shouldn’t you be a bit less shocked?

The kid’s gone before Richard see’s him, but I doubt Richard would’ve had a clue anyway. I’m not sure if the kid turning up is why fake-Locke decides to let Richard go, or if he was going to do that anyway.

Illana knows what’s going on. I bet. She’s got a close relationship to Jacob, we’ve seen him come to her and ask for help. I think she leads this… “force” that were trying to protect him. She takes his ashes, we know ashes have significance. Maybe she’s going to try to bring him back, or maybe she’s going to use them against Jacob’s enemy.

If I was fake-Locke, and I was recruiting, I think I’d go for Sawyer first. “This isn’t your house… You just lived here for a while”. Reminds me of divergent timeline Locke’s conversation with divergent timeline Jack about his fathers body not being his father. His reaction to Sawyers accusation of “not being Locke” was interesting too. He doesn’t say he’s not Locke, perhaps because Locke IS still part of him?

Nice to see that Hurley still has his yellow Hummer. Also nice that he’s lucky enough not to get it scratched by Locke’s lift. I love happy Hugo. Then again I think he’s fantastic in every part of this show, and I’m sure he’s the key to the whole mystery. The way he interacts with John here is almost on par with Jacob visiting the candidates.

Illana points out that she knows who Jin is. How does she know that? Maybe Ben told her, maybe Jacob told her, maybe she’s researched all the “candidates”. Burying Locke is a good idea. But I’ve talked about burying too many times.

The kid appears again, great, as if we haven’t been creeped out enough already! fake-Locke is surprised that Sawyer can see him. Lets talk about that. Hurley can see people that other people can’t. They’re either in his imagination, or they’re dead. Perhaps this is also true here. fake-Locke assumes this boy is a manifestation of the dead, but as soon as he finds out that Sawyer can see him he realises the kid is real – hence the chase.

“You know the rules, you can’t kill him”. Seems obvious that he’s talking about Sawyer here. Sawyer is a candidate, you can’t kill candidates. As I mentioned previously it seems that fake-Locke had to work pretty hard to get Ben to kill Locke (a candidate) so perhaps the kid is just reminding fake-Locke that he can’t simply do away with Sawyer himself.

I want to talk about something here, a series of books close to my heart. Written by a Russian author called Sergei Lukyanenko they follow the struggle between two sides – light and dark, who have sworn to uphold a balance between them. The members of these two sides are abnormal humans with certain abilities. Whenever a new person of this kind is “tapped” he is unaligned, somewhere between the two sides. Neither side is allowed to directly force the person to join, but instead can try to guide them to find their own path – select their own side.

This scene reminded me of the books. We’re talking about two sides, who have rules, and are portrayed as light and dark. Perhaps Jacob and Man In Black have spent all this time maintaining balance, influencing people to join their respective sides. Jacob kept bringing people to the island to try to tip the balance into his favour, but Man In Black thought the whole thing was a waste of time. He’s sick of it, he just wants to end it all. He’s playing dirty now, killing people. Perhaps this kid is just reminding fake-Locke that, if he wants to do something, the most he can do is influence Sawyer, not just kill him. Or maybe not.

A great moment here is fake-Locke screaming John-Locke’s catchphrase. “Don’t tell me what I can’t do”. Is some of Locke still in there? Perhaps fake-Locke just has enough of John’s personality and memory absorbed that it felt like the right thing to say.

Rose gives a little speech about getting over her cancer depression. Living her life. Didn’t she just get back from seeing the Australian healer? Probably not!

I like hearing fake-Locke say that he used to be a man. I believe this. But I’m not sure if he’s talking about Locke’s experience, or from his own. Either could be the case.

Mr Eko’s church appeared again. I miss Eko. How would things be different if he was still in the show? I’m sure they had big plans for him.

I think Ben is telling the truth when he says he thinks Locke was a better man than him, and that he’s sorry for the murder. I do honestly believe he means it.

John talks about there being no such thing as a miracle. Maybe my previous idea about the faith healer wasn’t so far off the mark. Maybe he went to see the healer and had a bad experience.

I’m not sure about this scene with fake-Locke and Sawyer on the ladders. If fake-Locke wanted Sawyer dead he could have just let him fall. Maybe he IS recruiting, or tying to influence Sawyer. The white and black stones on the scales are fun. I don’t understand using the ceiling as a place to write.. But then again, I have enough time getting cogent thoughts down on a piece of paper.

John as a substitute teacher, delightful. Ben as a teacher, wondrous. This moment really bothered me though. Seeing Johns face when he refers to himself as a “substitute”, and the cut straight to fake-Locke’s smug face. Uh oh.

Jacob had a “thing for numbers” but apparently not for names – Shepherd’s name on the wall. But doesn’t specifically say “Jack”. Same with “Kwon”. He does imply that it DOES mean Jack, but didn’t Mr Friendly say that Jack wasn’t on Jacob’s list? fake-Locke points out that Jacob really did manipulate all of the candidates, manipulated them on key points in their lives. We all assumed this, and apparently it was true.

Sawyer listens to fake-Locke suggest that Jacob manipulated him, pushed him to the island, but seems happy to accept fake-Lockes suggestion that they leave – without worry. Silly.