Tonight's LOST: musings about "The Brig"

Lisa usually turns in before Lost starts at 10 p.m., meaning that I watch it and then we see it together the following afternoon from the DVR. But tonight she got drawn in by the first few minutes of "The Brig" and couldn't let go. So we got to see it first-run together. It just finished a short while ago...

John Locke may be the greatest tragic figure to come out of television of the past twenty years. You know what I keep thinking about, after watching this episode? It's that as much as Locke has wanted to be unlike his father, he has now become too much like his father.

Sawyer has lately been turning into one of my favorite characters, because of how he has been changing and growing. We've been seeing a real seeking of redemption and want of a new life out of Sawyer. He's had that new life. And then Locke has to destroy that life, just as the original Sawyer (I'm trying hard not to spoil anything here) ruined young James Ford's life.

That scene where it all comes crashing down together... you know what I mean if you watched it... that was genuinely painful to watch. I sure didn't feel any satisfaction out of that scene. I felt like a very horrible thing had been made to happen and I really can't say that I blame either Locke or Sawyer for it.

If nobody had a good enough reason to hate Ben before tonight, there sure is now.

Lots of answers in this one. In true Lost style, almost as many new mysteries in "The Brig". And there's a real sense that everything is converging hard and fast and when they meet... it's not going to be pretty.

Three more episodes left in Season 3. Next week: Ben's flashback episode. The early days of the DHARMA Initiative. And at long last... Jacob. "The Man Behind the Curtain" airs in exactly 166.5 hours!

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Tonight's LOST goes out of "the box" and into "The Brig"

A few weeks ago in the episode "The Man from Tallahassee", Ben told Locke (Terry O'Quinn) that on the island there was "a box" that would produce anything you wanted. Locke laughed at the idea. And then at the end of the episode Ben told Locke that "I'm going to show you what came out of it."

What Locke saw when he opened the door and looked inside the room was probably the biggest shocker of the show's entire run.

We've only seen Locke very briefly after that, when he told Kate that he was leaving with the Others for... wherever it was that they were headed for. On tonight's Lost - titled "The Brig" - Locke returns and based on what little I'm hearing, this is going to be an episode as fine as any that we've seen lately... and those have been some of the best television ever produced in the past decade. Word on the street is that tonight's flashbacks show what Locke has been doing with the Others for the past several days. More intriguing still, "The Brig" might finally resolve a longstanding mystery from the first season involving Sawyer (if you watch the show then you know what I'm talking about).

Enjoy every minute of this while you can. After tonight there are only three more episodes and then Lost goes away until next January :-(

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