“My Mother Taught Me” – Lost 5×6 “316″

Spoiler Alert: The following post contains spoilers only for the latest episode of Lost. If you didn’t watch it yet, you really should not read this post. I do not know or care to know spoilers for anything beyond what has already aired, please refrain from inadvertently posting them here. Thanks!

Screencap from Lost Media. Link can also be found in Blogroll.

My God, that was a good episode! There’s so much to talk about, let’s go right into highlights:

General:

• The Lamppost is how Dharma originally found the island but how did they know it existed in the first place? Ms. Hawking for the win in that scene. I found her excitement and pleasantness very engaging and it was easy to understand what she was saying. Plus, we got an answer to a big mystery: Why is Tunisia so important? It must be another one of those pockets of electromagnetism scattered throughout the world, ie wormholes.
• I told you the island wasn’t moving at random. How much you wanna bet the numbers play into that. CRAZY THEORY #1: What if punching the numbers into the computer in Season 2 somehow made the island stay put? Seems to me that would behoove Dharma’s experiments on the island.
• I will admit to something. I knew they were going back to the island around this time in the season and I’ve known for a long time. I read some interview with Darlton where they revealed that the entire season would not be about them getting back. Plus, if any of you read Entertainment Weekly, they pretty much out and out told you this was happening soon. I promise I don’t know anything more than that, like nothing. I have no idea what happens from here on out.
• Frank! Jin! Total shocks for both which is why I’m glad I don’t read specific spoilers. I figure official sneak peeks and promo photos don’t count. I can’t believe I’m saying this but Frank needs his beard back.
• Locke’s “suicide” note was really striking. Did it say “I wish you’d have believed me” or “I wish you’ll believe me”?
• LOL at Jack changing Locke’s shoes. I would love to see outtakes from that. He even acknowledges how silly it is.
• What about Ben? Read on, I’ll come to him last.
• You know, all this time we’ve been theorizing that Ms. Hawking was Daniel Faraday’s mother but what if we’re wrong about that? We actually haven’t had confirmation. Widmore did not say her name, Ben looked a bit puzzled when Desmond said it and Ms. Hawking did not confirm it. Be a good twist.
• Are we supposed to know/care about Jack’s grandpa, Ray?
• Jill the Butcher is so snarky. I hope we see her again.
• I guess I really do need to read Chronicles of Narnia huh?
• Who the hell is the guy on the plane? How much you wanna bet we haven’t seen the last of him.
• Sure was easy getting Locke on the plane to Guam, much easier than getting Christian on the plane to L.A. (his hometown). Was that weird to anyone else?
• Holy hell, what happened to Kate and Aaron? It was only a few hours later that Kate shows up on Jack’s bed so what changed her mind so drastically? If I had to guess, Kate realizes she has to go back so gives Aaron to Claire’s mom and tells her the truth. Kate’s devastated because she truly did think of Aaron as her own.
• Was Kate Jack’s leap of faith? If so, that’s really sad for Jack as Kate seems to have moved on.
• How come Walt wasn’t on the plane? Or was he? Shouldn’t there have been a dog also?
• You need to give me proof that that plane actually crashed. All I’ll say for now.

Ok, you’ve been waiting for it. This blog is called Regarding Benry after all:

Ben

• What the fuck?
• He got the best lines of the night: “How can you read? My mother taught me”, “What’s going to happen to the people on this plane? Who cares?”, about Ben “Is he lying? Probably.” Classics.
• What’s the deal with all the Catholic stuff? Lost deals a lot with faith but this seems very pointed. The image of Ben praying was one of the creepiest we’ve seen of him. Just because we know how Ben can be, to see him humbled like that was really weird (and cute!). Thanks for the lesson about Doubting Thomas, Ben. That’s one I actually knew already. Is Jack supposed to be Thomas? Ben? Locke? ETA: Although, looking at the picture above, perhaps he’s not praying? Do people pray with fingers interlocked?
• Once again, the dynamic between Ben and Ms. Hawking was very strange. She obviously knows about him, that he’s a manipulator which is why, I assume, she singled Jack out and talked to him alone (of course, he’s so oblivious that he goes and tells Ben anyway). But Ben didn’t like Ms. H’s snide comments about him and he too seemed pretty puzzled and shocked by that Dharma station. Interesting. I bet we have more to learn about their history.  Maybe she’s Annie! hehehe
• I have 3 very large questions concerning Ben in this episode that will require a second post.

1. What the hell happened to Ben before he got to the plane? I gotta assume he went after Penny to make good on his promise to Widmore from last season. I know I’m in the minority on this, but I hope he succeeded. I have my reasons. Come back to hear them. I will say that while I enjoyed seeing Michael Emerson clean faced it’s nice to see him back in some scars as that’s the way we’ve grown accustomed to seeing him pretty much since he started on the show.

• ETA: I’m reading some reaction to the episode and a lot of people are saying that Ben got banged up but good by Desmond as Ben was trying to kill Penny. Doesn’t make sense. Desmond would have killed Ben or at least left him not able to move, especially if he had succeeded in killing Penny. There’s no reason to think that Penny could not have done that to Ben herself. Or this could have nothing to do with that story and the marina is just a decoy to us viewers. Ok, more on this later.

1. “I’ll give you some privacy.” Ben gets up and moves to the front of the cabin on the plane. Jack reads the note. There’s turbelence and big flash of light and they are on the island. Um, where did Ben go? Did he “crash” the plane? Did he make it to the island? I was so effing scared that he was gonna die in that plane crash. I keep waiting for them to off Ben and I’ll be so sad when they finally do, even though I’m sure we’ll continue to see him.
2. Biggest question concerning Ben: Why does he get to be on the plane? Why does Ben get to go back to the island or why does he want to? He doesn’t have power there anymore, that we know of. So why go back and why is Ms. Hawking ok with that, especially since Ben wasn’t on Flight 815?

Like I said, those questions deserve their own post which I’ll try to get to later today. Until then, thanks for reading. I hope you enjoyed this one as much as I did. I also hope you got to watch it earlier than I did. It’s very hard to watch a show like this at 11:45 at night.