No Place Like Home Part 1 ...uh part 1

We already know where almost everyone needs to "end up" by the close of this season’s finale. This episode was a necessity; a pre-finale and it was the best it could be, what with everyone zipping around the island (and ocean) in frenzied dashes. Knowing what’s coming next, this episode was like watching two great players setting up the pieces for a really kick ass chess game. One that we unfortunately have to wait two weeks to watch.



Ominous signs of impending doom abounded in part one of "No Place Like Home". There was flash forward Hurley's T-shirt, the one that said "Ace of Spades", which is the death card or the card of war. There were also his numbers taunting him from the speedometer of his Camaro, causing the soon-to-be loony-bin returnee to run like a proverbial madman. There was the Orchid, our newest Dharma station, also known as the greenhouse, perhaps the most foreboding omen of all. Operation Greenhouse was the code name for America's A-bomb testing program in the South Pacific during the 1950s, a terrifying allusion in an episode where we learned that the freighter is a ticking time bomb and that "moving the Island" could be a perilous, possibly catastrophic endeavor. "Doing it is both dangerous and unpredictable", said a cryptic Ben. "It's a measure of last resort." Whatever it is that the Orchid can do, it was enough to cause Faraday to make an I-think-I-just-peed-myself face: "We have to get off this island, right now!"



It's probably premature to be jumping to conclusions about what any of this could mean. We've only seen part 1 of No Place Like Home. Then again, since when have these recaps been governed by common sense? The title comes from The Wizard of Oz, of course, though the line is actually found in (Numbers alert!) chapter 4 of L. Frank Baum's book, not at the end as in the Judy Garland movie. The title of that chapter? The Road Through the Forest. Perfectly fitting for an episode that saw much jungle trekking and emphasized the importance of following carefully marked if treacherous paths, be it the route from freighter to beach or the scripted lines of the Oceanic 6 cover story. The episode ended with Ben getting knocked out in the greenhouse and whaddya know, if we continue to use the Numbers as a guide, chapter 8 of Oz, The Deadly Poppy Field, finds Dorothy passing out in a field of flowers. Perhaps the two-hour finale will correlate with chapter 15 (could The Discovery of Oz the Terrible = Jacob?), chapter 16 (could The Magic Art of the Great Humbug = Ben's tricky secret plan?), chapter 23 (could The Good Witch Grants Dorothy's Wish = Charlotte fulfilling her promise to Jin to make sure Sun gets away), and chapter 24, which is 42 backwards (Home Again is clearly a reference to reincarnation/eternal-recurrence theory. I mean, clearly, OK maybe forget about that last part). At this point I don't think I have to add any more LOST/Wizard of Oz connections but I will give you one more anyway: Thursday's date, May 15Th, when No Place Like Home aired is the birthday of L. Frank Baum. Yeah, the guy who wrote The Wonderful Wizard of Oz.



The episode began with the Oceanic 6's turbulent flight home. I'm not talking about the choppy air: I'm talking about the underlying tension aboard that Coast Guard rescue plane. From the jittery copilot rubbing his rabbit's foot (that must have come from a "white rabbit") because of his bad-luck passengers (the cargo back there...bad mojo) to antsy Jack almost conspiratorially coaching his fellow Oceanic 6 members on the press conference to come. Jack seemed desperately invested in the bundle of lies the Oceanic 6 was about to spew. Why? As for the others, they were admittedly shell-shocked by something. What? For a bunch of rescued castaways, their saggy body language screamed defeat instead of euphoria. There was also a slight whiff of disappointment with Jack. Did Jack's sweaty, desperate zeal to fulfill his exit-strategy oath lead to shocking choices that will cost him their respect? Aaron picked his nose and ate it. Right after the Oceanic chick says “see you on the ground”, she walks away in high heels on a grated floor? That’s when Aaron surreptitiously makes his move. It’s lightning-fast too, you got to be quick or you’ll miss it. So go back and watch carefully. I'll wait.

Regardless, these preoccupations were washed away when the plane reached Hawaii and the castaways met their families. The theme song could have been Paul Simon's Mother and Child Reunion, for it was the moms who got most of the love. Sun and her mom. Jack and his mom. Umm… Oedipus much? At the airport, Jack’s mom looks exactly like Kate. So much so, it’s just got to be intentional. Add this to the long list of look-a-like sightings peppered throughout the history of the show, and what does it mean? Who the hell knows, but after the Jack and Kate play house episode it’s kinda creepy. Hurley and his mom. Cheech got an affectionate pat, but Mr. Paik didn't even get a glance from Sun. Sayid was alone, though not for long; Hurley shared his family with him. But Kate and Aaron, the poser mother and orphan Island child stood alone. And awkward. The wink-wink of the Oceanic Airlines publicist's saying, "They're referring to you as the Oceanic 6. It's not the best branding as far as we're concerned, but it's catchy." was pretty good. For those of you who felt ABC didn't play fair with its O6 puzzle marketing meaning "Aaron wasn't technically an Oceanic 815 passenger!" you can consider this your apology.




One other thing that surprisingly hasn't had much made of it on any of the Internet boards; right before little Miss Let's-Spin-Everything-So-As-To-Not-Make-Oceanic-Look-That-Bad talks to the O6 she nods and gives a smile to ... someone who we cannot make out in the shadows. To me it looked a little like Michael's profile and before you give me the "Then they should be called the Oceanic 7." argument, let's think about it for a minute. Michael is supposed to be Kevin Johnson. Look at Sayid's reaction last episode when he realizes that the freighter Captain gave Michael up to Keamy. Sayid is definitely feeling a little regret for outing the survivor trying to make good. So giving that Sayid has come around a little to Michael's side, there is obviously plenty of time to concoct stories. And just what is the story you may be wondering? Sayid let's the rest of the O6 in on Michael's attempt at redemption and convinces them to help get him back with them. He can't go as Michale Dawson he has to go as Kevin Johnson. There is obviously going to be a huge explosion from the freighter so possibly he will be joining the O6 as a survivor of the freighter which wouldn't call for all that much press coverage considering we have 815 survivors who come back after being thought dead for a hundred or so days. I can tell you absolutely that Michale is not the person in the coffin so it is definitely possible that in a future season 5 flash forward we will see Michael off the island and still working for Ben.



Whatever happened to separate the O6 from the island must have been disastrous. Sun should be grief-stricken and bleary-eyed from Jin’s death. Jack should be wracked by guilt for having let everyone down. None of them should really give a shit what the world thinks happened to them at this point. So what gives? The Big Lie is a propaganda conceit attributed to Hitler that argues that the bigger and more perverse the lie, the more people are likely to believe it. Yes, there is a reason for dragging Hitler into this; the Oceanic Airlines publicist, Mrs. Decker, shares her last name with Nazi flack Will Decker. But the Oceanic 6 spin strategy went the other way: presenting a credible substitute for their utterly incredible situation. Decker gave us the overview. Oceanic 815 crashed in the Indian Ocean south of Indonesia. Eight people survived and made it to an uninhabited island called Membata. According to one online dictionary, "membata-bata" in Indonesian means "ambivalent". As in the post-rescue demeanor of the Oceanic 6 with profoundly conflicted hearts divided is a compelling definition of ambivalence. On day 108, six of them made it to the inhabited island of Sumba. And that was that. Not one word of ghosts, polar bears, or smoke monsters. Interesting fact about the inhabitants of Sumba: They're known for their megalithic burials, in giant stone crypts. Megaliths usually bear symbols called "cup and ring marks", pervasive throughout prehistoric cultures; they resemble a series of concentric circles, just like the Oceanic Airways logo, or a spiral, just like the Orchid logo, spotted in Faraday's notebook. These symbols reflect the belief of earlier cultures that there is spirit inside earthly substance, that all is connected, that time is eternally recurring. I don't know what all of that points to but it sounds damn intelligent.

The Oceanic 6 had some curious things to share personally, too. Jack embellished the cover story with some survival-at-sea detail. Hurley defused a question about their healthy appearance by humorously accusing the reporter of commenting on his weight. He also boldly announced he was giving up his restored lotto winnings. Sayid flatly denied that any of the other castaways had survived. Sun seemed to struggle the most as she reluctantly, bitterly claimed that Jin never made it off the plane. “Was your husband one of the other two people who died on the island?” After Sun said no, how come no one else asked who those two people were? That did not make much sense, as that would seem to be monumentally more important than Hurley’s diet. Either way, this begs the question: Why would any of the O6 even mention that two other people survived the plane crash? Would that not make things more complicated? Unless of course, Oceanic found a pair of bodies. In that case, they’d have to make stuff up about people surviving the crash and subsequently dying prior to rescue. But Kate's lie had the most readily apparent implications. She claimed Aaron was her child and tacitly confirmed a reporter's conclusion that she was five or six months pregnant when she got on the plane. One would think that this claim could be easily disproved; time will tell if anyone investigates. Just as intriguing, Kate's story messes up a lot of fan theories that the Oceanic 6 would leave the Island by way of the anomaly and move forward in time. But who knows? Maybe when Locke reboots the space-time continuum with Orchid magic, we'll get a new timeline that helps Kate's yarn and saves those theories.

More tomorrow