Recap, ep 2

First of all, I want to thank ABC for making the "enhanced" versions of the shows part of the regular schedule. In case, you didn't hear, the enhanced versions of the previous week's show will run on hour before the new episode every week. The enhanced versions, if you haven't seen them, have a running commentary going on the bottom of the screen, this updates you on all the characters and their motives. It's kind of like the old VH-1 show "Pop Up Video".

Last night, LOST introduced four new characters to the show via flashbacks. I was just saying, "What LOST really needs is more characters! I love having to set up an excel spreadsheet in front of me every week to keep track!"

All four have "special" talents such as angry ghostbuster (complete with some sort of ectoplasmic scam going), pilot, archeologist, and space cadet airhead.

Why these talents are necessary are unclear to me, but the guy who plays the police chief on THE WIRE got together with Naomi and decided that this group of weirdos were the best choice to go pick up Ben off the island of the black smoke.

Ben needs to go somewhere soon, before Sawyer kills him. Ben got punched by our boy no fewer than seven times in two individual sessions. HOwever, he has yet to give Ben a nickname! Why is he exempt? (FYI -- Best nickname last night -- he called Locke "Colonel Kurtz" perfect! Shut up, you don't know who Col. Kurtz is? Search "Apocolypse Now" on the wikipedia, pronto!) Ben's face now looks like a piece of Boarman's sausage. Ben deserves it, though, what with his smarmy "I know more than you do" attitude. Not to mention his penchant for shooting people.

Ben knows the fantastic four are there for him because he has "someone on the boat". I assume he means the freighter they claim they came from, because Mike's boat left a long time ago, although Harold Perrineau's name keeps showing up in the credits, so that boat might be circling back soon so that Sawyer can see that Walt's big now, just like Locke said. Mainly because he's now 25 years old.

I guess the theory is that Locke is the "man of faith", if so, the whole "showing the wounds" thing is right in line, as that plot line was ripped whole from the Bible. (John 20:24). Keeping captives and kidnapping rescuers isn't very God-like, however, so Locke's motives remain very conflicted to me. He faced down Ben, but acts more and more like him every day. I still haven't figured out if he is good or bad. I only know he's made more bad choices than Bill Belichick at the Super Bowl.

Jack, then, is the "man of science", although he rarely acts logical or calculating. He's more governed by emotion than Locke, hoping that his cohorts pick up on subtle things like winks to communicate the fact that there are gun-wielding compadres hiding in the bush. I don't recall Einstein winking his theory of relativity hoping someone picked up on it.

My favorite characters remain Sayid and Hurley. Hurley, the confused observer, reminds me of me. I don't know what the hell I'm doing half the time, but I am bemused by the ongoing choas around me. Where was that cabin Hurley? Back there or up ahead? Did I say cabin? I meant the airplane cabin, that's it, the airplane cabin.

Sayid, the gun toting paramilitary figure, has no horse in this race but his own damn self.Years of being strafed by A-10 Warthogs in the first Persian Gulf War have left him wearisome of the bullcrap Jack and Locke are throwing at him. Don't look for him "thinking of growing a beard" or winding up in a nuthouse, comtemplating going back to the island when he gets back. No, sir, Sayid's going to be living the high life when he gets back, with a posse of women and a penchant for drink. Maybe his partying ends badly and he's in the coffin in flash forward land. After all, how many friends can an Iraqi have in LA?

So, let's look at this week's bullet points --

-- Clearly, Penny's dad has sent those folks to get Ben because he crashed the Dharma experiment. He could care less about anyone else on the island, crash victims or not.

-- I keep thinking that this whole thing might be in Hurley's imagination in the nut house, and that would suck big time.

-- The plane in the sea is a fake because the pilot was taken by the monster back in season one. Plus, a plane bound for LA from Sydney would not wind up south of Indonesia, would it? "Maxwell", the group that found the fake plane is part of the Widmark Corporation, I'm sure of it.

-- Miles Storm (the ghostbuster) sounds an awful lot like "maelstrom". Maelstrom is a Marvel comic character who's a brilliant genticist. Other names of the new characters: C.S. Lewis, and Farraday. Lewis wrote the Chronic (WHAT?) ticles of Narnia, and Farraday was a well known physicist, known for his experiments in electromagnetics. Are these fake names?

-- What was a Dharma polar bear doing in Tunisia? Was he on vacation? Or is global warming going to be worked into the plot. If this whole thing turns into an Al Gore lecture, I'm going to be bummed.

-- Call this number 1-888-548-0034. It flashed on the screen last night.

-- What was the deal with the cow? One of Mikhail's no doubt. Why don't the polar bears eat it?

-- Charlotte's from Essex, England, Dan's from Essex MA! Now that's SCARRRYYYYYY!!!!!

-- Where is Desmond?

Any and all of your takes are always accepted in the comments section...See you next week!!!