See, I LOST My Money and I LOST My Wife, Them Things Don't Seem to Matter Much to Me Now

(Bruce Springsteen, Darkness on the Edge of Town)

Wow, so, it feels good to have Lost back in my life, if only for a few more weeks. This season has been so good that I don't want it to end, and January 2009 seems so far away. Last night's episode was awesome, I thought. A few questions answered, a few new ones to ask. Par for the course, I guess.

1. Everybody saw the code on the invisible sonic fence, right? 1623. THE NUMBERS!! I love the numbers, and while I've sort of resigned myself to the fact that they probably don't have some sort of overarching importance to unlocking any of the show's secrets, I still get all giddy when they show up.

2. The look on Locke's face when the phone rang was priceless. He was like the Unfrozen Caveman Lawyer. "Your ringing voice-transmittal machines scare and confuse me!"

3. The jury's still out on Ben, though I guess it's entirely possible that he's a good guy who is also an enormous douchebag. Sort of like Bill Clinton. I mean, really? Using the "she's not really my daughter, so go ahead and shoot her" angle? The scene when he went to "say goodbye" to her before leaving the barracks was a little forced, but the closeup on Ben's face right after Meaney shot Alex showed, I thought, really excellent acting. The guy's facial expressions are money. (Say what you will about Godfather Part III, but this is how you grieve a daughter who's just been shot in front of you. This gets me every time. The silent weeping of Pacino, man, that's just powerful.)

4. Aside from the Nikki/Paulo debacle of season three, has there been a semi-regular character on this show who contributes less than Charlotte Staples Lewis? All she does is stand around looking surprised and pissed, like somebody crapped in her shoes but she didn't realize it until after she put them on. The other helicopter people are working overtime, man, earning their money. The pilot (the Nick Nolte lookalike), he's a likeable guy who hung out on the boat with Sayid and Desmond until being sent on a run to Costco for more lima beans, Miles has already been imprisoned and released by now, and Daniel Faraday actually seems to be one of the more important characters in the overall explanation of the time/space thing. But Charlotte, man. Do something, already!

5. Ben's flashforward was pretty solid, and opens up a whole new can of worms. October 25, 2005, he checks into a hotel in Tikrit under the name Dean Moriarty, which was the name on the passport that Locke (or Sayid?) found in Ben's little hidden closet earlier in the season, and also happens to be the name of the character in Jack Kerouac's "On The Road." Interesting book. Lots of heroin. Ah, the 60s. Good times. I like how Ben basically manipulated Sayid into practically begging him to give him more people to kill. You can take the torturer out of the Republican Guard, I guess, but you can't take the Republican Guard out of the torturer. That sly smile as Ben was leaving that alley was great. (see: facial expressions, Bens = awesome)

5a. I loved how, when he was in the Sahara and was found by the two dudes patrolling what looks like the worst patrol beat possible, he dispatched of them rather handily with that asp baton. I played with one of those things before, a number of years ago. I was told that they were illegal for personal ownership, but whatever, a friend of mine who will remain nameless (but has lots of weapons, and may or may not be very tall) had one, and I was messing around with it. Trust me when I say that you do NOT want to hit yourself in the head with one of those things. Not even lightly. Please.

5b1. So Ben goes to visit Widmore (the artist formerly known as Caleb Nichol) in the middle of the night, not to kill him, but just to talk a little smack about how he's going to kill Penny (which, btw, I called as soon as they showed "London, England" on the screen at the beginning of the scene), oh, and by the way, Charles, you really shouldn't drink so much scotch. I wonder if he ever considered the fact that these nightmares of his might be scotch-induced? I bet he tried Ambien already but didn't enjoy the side effects. Anyway, here's point number one: He asks "Are you here to kill me?" to which Ben replies, "We both know I can't do that." Why can't Ben kill him? And if we are to believe that Ben really can't kill him (which would also likely mean that Ben also can't arrange for his death or have anyone kill him), then Charles Widmore cannot be the boss of the woman that shot Sayid in the "The Economist" episode earlier in the season, because Sayid was clearly under Ben's orders to kill that man, whenever he finally showed up. So who was that man Sayid was supposed to kill?

5b2. Ben's going to kill Penny, because Widmore "changed the rules" and his men killed Alex. I wonder how Desmond is going to feel about that. And since Sayid is now Ben's angel of death, is he going to send Sayid after Penny? And if he does, will Sayid really kill Penny, especially since he knows who she is after spending time with Desmond on the boat?? And is Desmond going to be there to try to protect her?

I'd have more to say about the smoke monster, Sawyer's new paternalistic sensibilities, or Bernard's convenient Morse Code knowledge, but I need to get some work done.

Update (10:55 am): OH. MY. GOD. I think I just realized why Ben can't kill Charles Widmore. It has been brought to my attention that Ben's flashforward might not have been a flashforward, that it might have been him travelling through time (based on his sickness after waking up in the desert, and asking what year it was at the hotel). If that is the case, he needs a constant, someone who he has a strong emotional connection to. His daughter, Alex, whom he clearly loved (almost enough to save from execution), is dead, so she can't be it. Ben's constant has to be Widmore! He doesn't have to love him, it just has to be a strong connection, and I'd say hate is a pretty strong emotion to attach to someone. And if Ben's constant is Widmore, he can't kill him!! Otherwise, Ben wouldn't be able to time-jump and do his nefarious deeds!!