DJ Dan Second Podcast Postponed

For some unknown reason, as of this morning the DJ Dan Web site now says that the second podcast will be coming on June 1 instead of today—that's 6 days late. This seems odd considering that there's a hidden DJ Dan recording available already through sublymonal.com, as mentioned below. Will the June 1 podcast be a new one, or will they just post an MP3 of the recording currently available through sublymonal.com?

The 5/25 sublymonal.com message talks about Widmore Corporation coercing college students to build "electromagnetic super weapons." An unnamed student claimed that the project was designed to bring down "a space-borne body" from orbit—a space-borne body "like, the moon." This seems to tie in significantly with the Season 2 finale, in which we learned of the powerful effects of the Swan station's electromagnet. With this new information, it seems very likely that Widmore Corporation designed the technology and licensed it for use by the Dharma Initiative.

"Live Together, Die Alone" Commentary and Notes

If you haven't watched the season finale yet, I strongly recommend that you do so before you read the rest of this post.

Wow... what a crazy episode! While many season finale spoilers out there were proven to be accurate (e.g. Libby giving Desmond the boat), an awful lot of unexpected events occurred as well. There's so much in this episode to discuss that it will take fans weeks to sort everything out. Jay and Jack have gotten a good start in their latest podcast, posted early this morning [podcast links are in the sidebar].

Following are just a few of the things we learned from "Live Together, Die Alone." We now know a little more about Desmond; the woman in the photograph is his love, Penny Widmore, the daughter of Charles Widmore. Libby seems even more likely to have been participating in the Dharma Initiative before she was on Flight 815, as we see her assuming yet another identity in the Desmond flashback. We also see flashbacks involving Desmond's hatch-mate, Kelvin Inman, and we learn about Kelvin's former hatch-mate, Radzinsky, who seemed to know an awful lot about the Dharma Initiative, the hatch, and the island (he is apparently the one who started the blast door map). Tom is the real name of "Mr. Friendly" AKA "Zeke." The fake Henry Gale turns out be to some kind of leader to Tom's group of Others. "Pushing the Button" really did serve a purpose—repressing a massive amount of electromagnetic energy—and was more than just a psychological experiment as implied by The Pearl's orientation video. Desmond's failure to push the button on time caused Flight 815 to crash on the island.

Now for some LOST Experience notes. Last night, "Hugh McIntyre" of the Hanso Foundation was a guest on Jimmy Kimmel Live!, a late-night talk show on ABC. McIntyre confirmed that the Dharma Initiative was real, but claimed that it had been cancelled in 1987. He claimed that the events on LOST—including the hatches and the island—are purely fictional, merely creations of LOST's writers and producers, and not actually connected with the "real-life" Hanso Foundation. McIntyre also claimed that the reason Alvar Hanso allegedly hasn't been seen in years is that he's very busy (this contradicts DJ Dan's conspiracy theory that Hanso has been cryogenically frozen). The complete Hugh McIntyre interview can be watched online here.

Speaking of DJ Dan, a second "podcast" is supposed to be available sometime tomorrow. You can listen to it early, albeit not in MP3 format, by typing in the code "108" on sublymonal.com (note that eventually this may not work, as this site recently changed dramatically and may yet change again). After the MP3 has been posted, it will probably be available via a link at http://www.djdan.am/podcast.html.

Season 3 spoilers! (Or hints about what we can expect, anyway.) ABC has an interview with executive producers Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse in which they discuss Season 3. Damon says that there will be some new characters and that "we'll be getting some in-depth explanations of characters that we've already met." Carlton says that the Others will be a big part of Season 3: "who they are, where they come from, what they want, and their relationship with the island." We can expect to see the rest of Libby's story through flashbacks, according to Carlton. "[The] end scene [of the season finale] really does set up one of the important mysteries of Season 3," says Carlton, but Damon warns, "We would advocate patience in some ways." Damon clarified that we're going to find out at the beginning of Season 3 what the Others want with Jack, Kate, and Sawyer, "but you might have to wait a little while" to find out exactly how the last few minutes of the show are going to pay off in Season 3—"but they will, and in a very significant way." Carlton says that "there will be a lot of romance in Season 3," specifically talking about Claire and Charlie's relationship beginning to develop.

You can now preorder The Complete Second Season of LOST! Reserve your copy today: http://tinyurl.com/p3zrd

That's all for now! Check back soon for more LOST updates.

Questions to Ponder and Spoilers, 23 May 2006

Last week's episode, "Three Minutes," brings up a lot of questions.

I think the biggest question is why were those four people—and only those four—on the list that Ms. Klugh gave to Michael? It makes sense that the Others would want to capture the leader types, which at the very least would include Jack. Sawyer, Kate, and Hurley have not proven themselves to be leaders, however. If they want Jack and Sawyer, it only makes sense for them to want Kate because she's the perfect bartering chip for both of them, like Walt is for Michael. So why Sawyer and Hurley? Why not Locke? If the fake Henry Gale was telling the truth (which is difficult to determine), his mission was to retrieve Locke, so why wasn't Locke on Michael's list? On the LOSTCasts podcast [links to podcasts can be found in the sidebar] and again on Jay and Jack's Monday podcast, it was suggested that Jack, Kate, Sawyer, and Hurley were on the list because they're the only ones who have seen visions on the island (not counting dreams—that is, these four have all "seen things that shouldn't have been there" during the day). This makes sense at first; Jack saw his dead father running through the jungle, Sawyer and Kate both saw the black horse that Kate knew from before the island, and Hurley saw his imaginary friend Dave. However, the puzzle piece that doesn't fit with this theory is Sayid. Both Shannon and Sayid saw Walt in the jungle just before Shannon was shot. So if that theory is correct, then why wouldn't the Others want Sayid? So far I haven't come across any theories that adequately explain why only those four and none of the other survivors were on the list.

Another mystery: how in the world did "Walt" (or whoever was communicating with Michael via the terminal) type so darn fast? That didn't seem to make much sense. One theory is that Walt was sending the message using his mind rather than typing it. However, if it really was Walt who wrote the message, why would he have insisted that Michael come alone? It seems a lot more likely that one of the Others was writing the message in order to lure Michael in, "compromise" him, and use him as bait for the other survivors. On the other hand, wouldn't it have been a lot easier to just get Michael to bring the people on the list in the first place, rather than having to take a second trip?

What in the world made Vincent bring a heroin statue to Charlie? That seemed more than a little bit strange to have been a mere coincidence... but then again, the strange and unexplained seems to be a popular theme on this show. =)

Where did Locke go at the end of the episode? Some have speculated that he went back to The Pearl to check the printout to see whether the fake Henry really pushed the Button. This would certainly fit with the official synopsis of next episode, which says that Locke and Eko "come to blows as Locke makes a potentially cataclysmic decision regarding the 'button' and the hatch." We can expect to find out where Locke went at the end of "Three Minutes" during this week's season finale.

What's up with the boat? My theory is that it's Desmond's boat. We know from the official ABC synopsis of "Live Together, Die Alone" that Desmond is returning for the season finale, and apparently there will be Desmond flashbacks, so it makes sense for Desmond to come back at the beginning of the episode.

On another note, The LOST Experience alternate reality game continues to go strong. See the Lostpedia timeline and clues pages for details. The most interesting thing is that "Hugh McIntyre," a Hanso Foundation employee, is scheduled to be on Jimmy Kimmel Live! tomorrow night after the season finale airs. Did ABC hire an actor to play Hugh McIntyre on the show? I'm interested in seeing what ABC has up its sleeve, so I'm planning to record it.

**SPOILER ALERT!** Here are some interesting spoilers about the season finale. According to the LOSTCasts podcast, executive producer Carlton Cuse told Newsweek that the season finale is going to explain why the plane crashed, show what happens when the button doesn't get pressed, and resolve the Michael and Walt story. Desmond (the hatch's previous occupant) reappears and isn't in good shape, "though he gives the survivors fresh hope for escape." We'll also start to understand that what happens on the island has a significant effect on what's happening in the rest of the world. Newsweek also reveals that another character might die in the season finale; they had previously interviewed Michelle Rodriguez ("Ana Lucia") and asked her to guess who would die next after Libby, but she said she couldn't guess because she already knew. On the Official LOST Podcast for May 19th, the executive producers hinted that Kelvin (who, as I've mentioned previously, was Desmond's former hatch-mate and will be appearing in this week's episode) might have been the one who created the blast door map. Thus, it was implied that we might find out more about the mysterious map in the season finale.

No More Sporadic Episode Schedule in Season 3?

I know a lot of people who have complained about ABC's scheduling of LOST with a couple new episodes at a time with repeats in between. Well, at least according to this article, we can expect next season to be a lot better. It sounds like we'll have a couple of large blocks of repeat-free LOST instead of sporadic new episodes mixed with reruns.

LOST Experience Update, 16 May 2006

For those following The LOST Experience, a multimedia "alternate reality game" created by ABC as a tie-in with LOST, here are some recent updates. (Note that most of this won't make much sense without first catching up on what's happened so far. I recommend Lostpedia's coverage.)

As of today, there's a fourth video clip from the Gary Troup interview available here. In it, Troup reveals that Alvar Hanso allegedly purchased every available copy of Troup's nonfiction book, The Valenzetti Equation—and the reprinting rights to it. So far we know little about Valenzetti, other than the fact that the blast door map makes a brief reference to "Valenzetti-related research activity." There was also a Wikipedia article for a short time that allegedly may have been written by Javier Grillo-Marxuach, a LOST writer/producer (this article is no longer available on Wikipedia, but it has been mirrored in Lostpedia's Valenzetti article).

Also new today: another Web site that has been officially connected with The LOST Experience! http://djdan.am/ The site is that of a (fictional) DJ with a podcast about conspiracies. This month he's focusing on none other than The Hanso Foundation. The site includes an alleged photograph of a shark with a Dharma Initiative logo (which is interesting because the shark that was swimming near Sawyer and Michael after the Others destroyed the raft had a similar marking). I plan to listen to DJ Dan's short podcast tomorrow. A second DJ Dan podcast is due on the 26th of May, according to the site. One more thing: this is almost certainly nothing more than a crackpot theory (or more likely the result of having recently studied the subject), but the image on DJ Dan's site when you click on "Mythic Beastie Sighting!" looks an awful lot like it might contain steganographic clues. Would anyone versed in steganalysis care to test this theory? I did some digging with Google Image Search and found this image, which by all appearances is the original, so it might be helpful to compare the two to see if they're identical. If not, the DJ Dan version could possibly contain a hidden clue.

Notes from The Official LOST Podcast, 15 May 2006

In the latest Official LOST Podcast, executive producers Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse hint at a couple of things we can expect to see addressed on the show. Damon said that if he was a fan of the show, he would be interested in what the printed log from The Pearl says. Several people have suggested that the log appears to be a record of when the button was pushed, and therefore it should be possible to discover whether or not the fake Henry Gale pushed the button. We're also going to find out very soon (presumably in tomorrow night's episode) what drove Michael to kill Ana Lucia.

There's also the issue of Walt's aging. We haven't seen much of Walt at all for the past year, and the actor who plays Walt is at an age where his rate of growth over that length of time is noticeable. Keeping in mind that the survivors have only been on the island for a little over two months so far, it's not terribly surprising that the issue of Walt's aging will be addressed somehow in the show.

Is Christian Shephard Alive?

Many people have theorized that Jack's dad, Christian Shephard, may yet be alive. In spite of the fact that Jack identified his father's body at the morgue, this theory is plausible because Jack found his father's coffin to be empty in the episode "White Rabbit." If the theory about Jack's dad being alive is true, this may explain why we were shown the story of Charlotte Malkin—as an allusion that Christian Shephard may yet be alive. This would also seem to explain why we keep seeing Christian in so many people's flashbacks; perhaps he has a more important role than we now know.

Spoilers, 12 May 2006

Ryan from The Transmission posted a great spoiler earlier this week: several photographs of an upcoming LOST set. In the sneak peek for next week's episode, "Three Minutes," we saw a tiny, brief glimpse of what's to come, but Ryan's pictures of the set get up close and personal.

Walt, "Mr. Friendly" (AKA "Zeke"), and Alex (Danielle Rousseau's daughter) will all allegedly appear in next week's episode. Also slated is a new character named Ms. Klugh, who will be in the season finale as well. There will be Michael flashbacks in "Three Minutes." The official synopsis is "A determined Michael convinces Jack and several castaways to help him rescue Walt from 'The Others.' Meanwhile, Charlie struggles with Eko's decision to discontinue building the church."

The season finale will be a special two-hour episode, and it is titled "Live Together, Die Alone". (The title is in reference to something Jack said in "White Rabbit" to the effect that if the survivors couldn't live together they would die alone. In "Man of Science, Man of Faith," Kate paraphrased Jack: "Live together/die alone, right?") In the season finale, Clancy Brown—the same actor who played Joe Inman (the American who persuaded Sayid to become a torturer in the Gulf War)—will allegedly play the role of Kelvin Inman (whose first name was mentioned by Desmond at the beginning of season two). Desmond said that Kelvin was dead, but apparently he isn't. The really strange thing is that Kelvin is apparently either someone Sayid knew before the island, or perhaps a twin of that person.

Other notable characters in the season finale will reportedly be Walt, Desmond (with multiple flashbacks), "Mr. Friendly," the fake Henry Gale, Kelvin Inman, Alex, and new characters Ms. Klugh and Charles Widmore. The official synopsis for the two-hour season finale is "After discovering something odd just offshore, Jack and Sayid come up with a plan to confront 'The Others' and hopefully get Walt back. Meanwhile, Eko and Locke come to blows as Locke makes a potentially cataclysmic decision regarding the 'button' and the hatch."

Recap of "?"

Wednesday night was a new episode, "?". There were many new revelations in this episode, but I'd like to focus on just a few.

• We now know for certain that the "?" in the center of the blast door map (as seen in "Lockdown") is the location of the hatch known as The Pearl.
  
  
• The blast door map's cartographer (perhaps Desmond) obviously didn't know this, because next to the question mark is written "Designation [hatch name] Unknown" and "Purpose Unknown." Also, we see "The Pearl?" off to the right side of the map, which indicates that the cartographer thought The Pearl might be located elsewhere.
  
  
• The Pearl is apparently a remote viewing facility from which the goings on inside The Swan can be observed.
  
  
• In The Pearl's orientation video, which has a copyright date of 1980 (the same as the film in The Swan), the orientator states his name as Dr. Mark Wickman, while apparently the same person introduced himself in The Swan's orientation film as Dr. Marvin Candle. Is this the same person using two pseudonyms? Perhaps one or both of them are "bad twins" or clones? It doesn't seem likely that they could be identical twins because they would have the same last name.
  
  
• Richard Malkin—better known as Claire's psychic—is seen in Eko's flashback. Malkin admitted to Eko that he is a fraud, meaning that the "readings" he gave Claire were false. Malkin pretended to not be interested in Claire's money, but this is probably because the Dharma Initiative offered him a much larger sum because they wanted Claire and her yet-unborn baby to come to the island. It is possible that Claire's boyfriend Thomas may have been in on this, too, since it seemed as though he changed his mind about becoming a father rather quickly, and since he bears a striking resemblance to the fake Henry Gale he may possibly be related to him. (This still doesn't explain why Claire and her baby are so important to the Dharma Initiative. On top of Richard Malkin and possibly Thomas being a part of the plot, the woman who tried to adopt Claire's baby was seen in a photograph with Desmond, and stranger still, the mobile in the medical hatch played "Catch a Falling Star," the song that Claire asked the potential adoptive mother to sing to her baby. There seems to be a pretty vast conspiracy against Claire and Aaron.)
  
  
• We saw Libby in Eko's airport flashback. Some LOST fans (myself included) wondered whether she was really on the plane since we never actually saw her on it, but this brief flashback confirms that Libby must have been on Oceanic Flight 815.
  
  We still do not know why Libby was on that flight, however. Had she been secretly following Hurley? My theory is that Libby had been working for the Dharma Initiative, pretending to be a patient at Santa Rosa Mental Institute to keep an eye on Hurley's friend Leonard, who constantly repeated the numbers "4, 8, 15, 16, 23, 42" ad infinitum. When Hurley left the institution and won the Lottery using the numbers, it became much more important for the Dharma Initiative to keep an eye on Hurley. Libby began to follow Hurley at this point, ending up in Australia and then taking the same flight that Hurley was taking back to Los Angeles.

Welcome to the JoshMeister's LOST Blog!

Since I already write articles about recent or upcoming LOST episodes for family members and former coworkers, I figured I might as well have someplace to post the latest theories, rumors, and spoilers for the public to see. Bookmark this site (or better yet, the RSS feed—see instructions for Safari, Firefox, Internet Explorer 7, or use a feed reader) and check back regularly to get your LOST fix!