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He's Our You Recaps

Hi everyone!

No recap here today...just add your links into the linky!

And OMG Sayid shot kid Ben!!!!!

A Separate Reality

Season 5, episode 10 - "He's Our You" brings us a new book to add to the list: A Separate Reality by Carlos Castaneda. While Sayid is locked up in the Dharma jail cell, young Ben brings him a chicken salad sandwich and a book - how sweet of him!

Book Review: Of Mice and Men

I realize I may be one of the last people on earth that hasn't read Of Mice and Men as part of some literature class somewhere along the way....but I haven't. The book has long been on my list of "classics to read someday", but The LOST Books Challenge finally gave me the motivation to get to it.

Last year I read The Grapes of Wrath and didn't really enjoy it. Friends suggested that I should give Steinbeck another chance and read Of Mice and Men. I really liked the book and found it to be very fast and easy reading. No wonder it is a favorite of high school English teachers everywhere....except my school apparently. If you've read it before just skip the summary and head on down to the LOST connections.

Summary:

Of Mice and Men is the story of two drifters wandering aimlessly through life just trying to find a job on a farm or ranch....and keep it. George and Lenny will do any kind of manual labor there is in exchange for a bunkhouse, some chow and a few dollars. Their earnings they plan to save up in order to someday purchase their own little farm somewhere. They spend hours dreaming about their own piece of land.

Someday we're gonna get the jack together and we're gonna have a little house and a couple of acres an' a cow and some pigs and live off the fatta the land. We'll have a big vegetable patch and a rabbit hutch and chickens. And when it rains in the winter, we'll just say the hell with going to work and we'll build up a fire in the stove and set around and listen to the rain comin' down on the roof....

The biggest problem they face along the way is Lenny himself. He is mentally retarded and often over-reacts to small situations making them worse. He is a big, strong guy with the mind of a child. More than once the pair has had to leave a good job because Lenny has innocently and inadvertently scared, harmed or killed someone or something. George spends all of his time putting out Lenny's fires and smoothing things over.

George often gets fed up with Lenny and resents his presence. He knows that his life would be so much easier without Lenny. On his own, George would have no problem holding down a job and saving up the money he needs for his own little place. But without Lenny, George would have another problem altogether....loneliness.

Guys like us that work on ranches, are the loneliest guys in the world. They got no family. They don't belong no place. They come to a rand an' work up a stake and then they go into town and blow their stake, and the first thing you know they're poundin' their tail on some other ranch. They ain't got nothing to look ahead to. With us it ani't like that. We got a future. We got somebody to talk to that gives a damn about us. We don't have to sit in no bar room blowin' our jack jus' because we got no place else to go. If them other guys gets in jail they can rot for all anybody gives a damn. But not us. An' why? Because ....because I got you to look after me, and you got me to look after you, and that's why.

George and Lenny only have each other, and the truth is neither one could make it without the other. That fact become strikingly obvious at the end of the book. It is also what makes the book relevant to LOST.

The LOST Connection:

Besides the fact that rabbits play a minor role in both storylines, I think the loneliness factor is the biggest common denominator. It is the whole idea that no man is an island (pardon the pun). We all need community. The Hostiles. The Others. The Losties. The Tailies. Everybody has to band together to live. They argue, fight, disagree, and arrange for the mass murder of their entire village...and yet not a single character could make it on his own. Regardless of the inconveniences and drawbacks they need each other.

Sawyer, the ultimate loner, even struggles with loneliness. Remember the episode where Hurley tries to teach him how to be nice to people so they will like and accept him? Even though they are separated from their families and friends they have been able to form a new community on the island, and they are totally dependant on that community for their sanity as well as for their protection.

Really, I think this is the central message of LOST (aside from "time travel's not just for Star Trek anymore"). Community. Loneliness. The search for belonging, love and acceptance. All of these themes make LOST the moving show that it is, and Of Mice and Men the great novel that it is.

Episode Recap: "Namaste"

ABC.com says "When some old friends drop in unannounced, Sawyer is forced to further perpetuate his lie in order to protect them." Is it just me, or is that the lamest summary you've ever heard?

Well, a few questions were answered this week ...

• the baby IS Ethan
• Sun and Frank WERE the ones who stole the boat
• the plane did LAND on the other island (it didn't break up in the sky like Oceanic 816)

But more questions were raised ...

• why didn't Sun disappear from the plane with the rest of the O6?
• what are they going to do with Sayid?
• and did the preview hint that Sayid is planning to kill child-Ben?
• does Phil suspect something is going on with "LaFleur" and the "new recruits"?
• what happened to Faraday?
• how are Sun and Frank going to get back in time?

A few things I particularly liked ...

• Sawyer: "It's 1977." Hurley: "Oh ... what?"
• Sun whacking Ben with the oar - oh yeah!
• Dr. Change to Jack: "Based on your aptitude test you'll be doing janitorial work."

And did anyone else expect to see Faraday come of that door and not Christian in that scene at present-day Dharma with Sun and Frank?

Post the link to your recap/analysis in Mr. Linky below. I'm looking forward to everyone's opinions this week.

One question for you ... was this episode worth the two-week-wait?

Teasers for kid-Ben

On Monday SciFiWire.com posted excerpts from an interview with the actor who plays Benjamin Linus as a child. There aren't exactly "spoilers" about the next episode but there certainly are some "hints" ... check it out here.

Missing Lost ...

If this was a normal Thursday, I'd be happily reading all the show recaps and analysis. Alas, this was a LOST-free week ... how depressing.

Since there is usually so much activity here on Thursdays I felt like I should pop in and at least say hello. And then I figured I'd post some miscellaneous LOST videos - so enjoy!

Talking with Terry Quinn, aka John Locke:


The action-figure-LOST-recap of "The Little Prince":

Have any of you been watching those odd little action-figure recaps? I saw the first one ... odd, that's all I can say. Odd.

Recap of the polar bear incident:

Once you get past the Season 5 preview, there is a recap of the polar bear scene. We have a good idea how the polar bear got into the desert now, but do we have any idea WHY? Was is a Dharma test, an Others test, an accident, or something else entirely?

Interesting analysis:

This was actually quite good - I may have to look up the rest of his recaps.


That's all I have for now. It isn't enough to take the place on a missing episode of LOST but it will have to do.

Book Review: Moby Dick, by Herman Melville

Here is an excerpt from my review of MOBY DICK:

I've been going over the book in my mind, trying to figure out how it relates to the show LOST. I don't see any direct parallels, but I did come up with something ...

Ben is a lot like Capt. Ahab. Both have a specific goal in mind (Ben wants to get back to the island and be in charge, Ahab wants to kill this particular whale) and they will do absolutely anything to achieve that goal. Their own ambitions seem to be the only important thing. They are both willing to allow other people to die (or in Ben's case, to actually kill people) in order to achieve their goal.

Was my theory correct? Find out when you read my complete review - and see some pictures of whales - on my blog here.

Episode Recap: "LaFluer"

ABC.com says .... Sawyer perpetuates a lie with some of the other island survivors in order to protect themselves from mistakes of the past.

~~~~~~~~~

Well, talk about introducing a whole host of new characters! Ok, ok, so we've met some of them before ... Horace was the dead guy Locke met, and we've seen the dark-haired guy from the first scene before, right? Amy IS new though. And her baby boy ... I wonder who he grows up to be, and do we know him?!

I loved this episode but I must admit, the previews were misleading. I thought we'd at least get to see Sawyer's reaction to the 06's arrival, but no - we get the same staring look that we saw in the previews.

And now have to wait TWO WEEKS to find out what they all say when they see each other?!?! Not fair ABC, not fair at all.

Soooo ... what did you all think of this week's episode? Comments, questions, theories? The comment section is officially open for your input. Here are a few quetions to get you going ...

• What do you think of the new, kinder, gentler Sawyer?
  
  
• And speaking of Sawyer, will he drop Juliet for Kate? Will Kate expect him to? And will Juliet want Jack back? Which match-up do you prefer?


• What is Jin going to do once he realizes Sun is back ... without the baby?! And what will he think of her new "scary" persona?


• Are the Ajira 316 people and Locke in the same time period as the O6? If not, is there more time travel in store?


• Does anyone remember when the Dharma Purge happened? Is it coming up soon in the original timeline?


• Is Ben at Dharma yet?! You'd think that would have come up if he was, but you never know ...
  
  
• And did anyone notice which book(s) Sawyer was reading this time around?
  

Please discuss!

As always, if you've recapped on your blog, add your link to Mr. Linky below.

Book Review: The Invention of Morel by Adolfo Biory Casares

About the Book: Set on a mysterious island, Bioy's novella is a story of suspense and exploration, as well as a wonderfully unlikely romance, in which every detail is at once crystal clear and deeply mysterious. (Appears in the season four episode Eggtown of LOST)

My Review: I love that summary because it pretty much tells you nothing about the book! :) Or rather the novella. But let me tell you this is a very enjoyable little read. Enough so that even though I finished it rather quickly, I've still been thinking about it afterwards. It's the kind of read that's slightly unsettling and not with a lot of closure.

Our narrator is on an island by himself, hiding from the police. He isn't totally clear about where the island is, it seems there were people there previously who built some things on the island and then either disappeared or were killed by a sickness. He is trying to stay alive on the island and not succumb to any illnesses, when out of nowhere some people show up.

About the same time these people show up, our narrator observes other changes taking place on the island. For example, there are two suns. (he sometimes feels all the strange things he is experiencing is a result of his brain being fried) He also notices there is a very beautiful woman in the group and he falls in love with her even though they never speak.

What's going on on the island? Who are these people? Are they part of a plot from the police? Are they all really in an insane asylum? Maybe the island is actually purgatory. These are the theories considered before the very interesting revelation about what is truly going on on the island is revealed. I really enjoyed this little mysterious novella...I kept turning the pages wondering what was going on and as I said before I've been pondering it since.


Relationship to LOST
Where do I start? First of all with the obvious....the setting is a mysterious island in an unknown location. While our narrator is there, mysterious people show up. There is evidence of others having lived on the island before (the museum, swimming pool etc. like the Dharma stations) When pondering what is going on on the island he considers many theories fans have considered for LOST (insane asylum, purgatory, and aliens.) There's a huge collection of books left on the island. There is also a time element but I don't want to go too much into that for fear of spoiling the book. But perhaps what struck me more than anything was the following quote. I heard Darlton say that this year, instead of asking who is dead? We should be asking what does dead mean?

"I believe we lose immortality because we have not conquered our opposition to death; we keep insisting on the primary, rudimentary idea: that the whole body should be kept alive. We should seek to preserve only the part that has to do with consciousness."

I never would have heard of The Invention of Morel if I didn't watch LOST. So the goal of exposing people to cool books has been successful. I really enjoyed this one. You can buy it here.
Rating: 4/5
(Originally posted at My Friend Amy)