Thoughts on Episode 2x17: Lockdown – The Island Story
There were obviously many great new developments on the island in this episode. To make things easier, I’m going to divide this post into sections.
The Poker Game
The poker game between Jack and Sawyer gave a few interesting clues about Jack’s back-story. Jack said that he gained his surprising expertise in poker while in Thailand. The amount of time required to master the game suggest that he didn’t pick up the skill in his spare time while visiting the Malay peninsula on business.
Also in the Poker game, Sawyer questioned the origins of Jack’s tattoo. Granted, Jack was busy bluffing at the time, but he didn’t answer the question. Kate also questioned why Jack had a tattoo in episode 1x6 (a scene shown during the clips episode designed to help new viewers catch up to the plot) and Jack didn’t answer her either. Jack’s refusal to discuss why he got his tattoo indicates that he prefers to keep that time in his life secret.
In the flashback in episode 2x11, Jack is shown shirtless and sans tattoo. Sometime between his divorce and turning his father in for operating while intoxicated, Jack “got the art on his arm.” Assuming, as Sawyer did, that the tattoo is connected with Jack’s visit to Thailand raises the question of how Jack reacted to his divorce. Did he take a sabbatical in Thailand to recover from the loss and let his wild side loose? The poker game revealed that there is a darker side to Jack and I expect we’ll be seeing more of it in the coming episodes.
Henry Gale
Henry Gale (I will continue to call him that until we know another name for him) almost had the perfect opportunity to imbed himself among the castaways in this episode. Because the lockdown occurred when Henry and Locke were alone, Henry was able to gain Locke’s complete trust and oath of protection. Yet Henry did not have any actual control over the unusual happenings and he even requested that Locke go get Jack when he heard the lockdown warning. Did Henry do something to initiate the lockdown or did he simply take advantage of the situation?
Henry gave Anna Lucia perfect directions to the grave and the hot air balloon. Obviously, someone designed a complicated plan to infiltrate Henry among the castaways. He had all the details of his story memorized and he stuck to it through several questionings and a beating. The goal was obviously to have the castaways accept him as one of their own, as they had done with Ethan. What information did they hope to gain by infiltrating a spy into the castaways’ camp?
Henry Gale stole his identity from a real person. There are also several questions about the real Henry Gale. Was he really a marooned millionaire miner? How long was he on the island, what contact did he have with the Others (the obviously knew about him), how did he die, and who buried him? Did the Others simply use his identity as a cover story since there was a balloon and a grave to back it up? It will be interesting to see if we get more information about him in the coming episodes.
The Map
There has been a lot of great discussion about the map on the blast door. There are images of it here, here, and here and you can hear a great summary of it on this week’s LOSTcasts. I don’t have a lot to add to their discussion about what the map contains, but I do have some questions about how it got there.
This is what we know about the map so far. Someone painted the map onto the blast door with a special paint that is only visible by black light. The blast doors seem to have come down in this episode for a routine event—possibly connected with the food drop—and they were down for 45 minutes. The castaways have been inside the hatch for between three weeks and a month and this is the first time they have seen the blast doors close.
The Orientation video described the Swan Station assignment as isolated and instructed the worker not to use the computer for communications. The quarantine markers are further evidence that the Swan Station workers were not to explore the island or make contact with the other stations. The mapmaker, or more likely mapmakers (due to the variety of writing-styles found on the map) apparently wanted to keep the map a secret. Unlike the mural in the hallway, the blast door was a canvas that was hidden most of the time, and the invisible paint provided extra security. Whoever drew the map obviously had some knowledge of the island (there are references to the island’s intranet as well as dates that certain events occurred) but more importantly, they exhibited far more curiosity about their surroundings than the Oceanic 815 castaways have. Based on the efforts they took to hide the map, they had more curiosity than Dharma wanted them to have.
Painting the map on a retractable blast door helped conceal it, but it would also make it difficult for the Swan Station worker to have access to it. It is hard to imagine Desmond and Kelvin (or whoever) updating the detailed map during the 30 seconds of black light that is only available, at most, once a month. There must be a way to manually control the door and the lighting or the map would have been impossible to create.
The map also provides further evidence that someone on the island has a great affinity for dead languages. Egyptian hieroglyphics are in the computer counter and Latin is used sporadically throughout the map. The scientists associated with Dharma obviously have some linguistic training and a reason to use it. (I’d be on the lookout for Germanic Runes in future episodes.)
The Food Drop
The food drop proves that Dharma is still active and working on a large scale. It contained a large amount of prepared food as well as several boxes, each printed with the Dharma logo. However, if Dharma is still active, then why haven’t they sent replacements for Kelvin or Desmond? Why didn’t they stop the castaways from blowing open the hatch with dynamite and subsequently moving in? If they need to ensure that someone pushes the button, how can they trust the castaways—who have now twice nearly let the timer run out—to do the job? I can’t wait to find out the answers to some of these questions in the coming episodes.
The Poker Game
The poker game between Jack and Sawyer gave a few interesting clues about Jack’s back-story. Jack said that he gained his surprising expertise in poker while in Thailand. The amount of time required to master the game suggest that he didn’t pick up the skill in his spare time while visiting the Malay peninsula on business.
Also in the Poker game, Sawyer questioned the origins of Jack’s tattoo. Granted, Jack was busy bluffing at the time, but he didn’t answer the question. Kate also questioned why Jack had a tattoo in episode 1x6 (a scene shown during the clips episode designed to help new viewers catch up to the plot) and Jack didn’t answer her either. Jack’s refusal to discuss why he got his tattoo indicates that he prefers to keep that time in his life secret.
In the flashback in episode 2x11, Jack is shown shirtless and sans tattoo. Sometime between his divorce and turning his father in for operating while intoxicated, Jack “got the art on his arm.” Assuming, as Sawyer did, that the tattoo is connected with Jack’s visit to Thailand raises the question of how Jack reacted to his divorce. Did he take a sabbatical in Thailand to recover from the loss and let his wild side loose? The poker game revealed that there is a darker side to Jack and I expect we’ll be seeing more of it in the coming episodes.
Henry Gale
Henry Gale (I will continue to call him that until we know another name for him) almost had the perfect opportunity to imbed himself among the castaways in this episode. Because the lockdown occurred when Henry and Locke were alone, Henry was able to gain Locke’s complete trust and oath of protection. Yet Henry did not have any actual control over the unusual happenings and he even requested that Locke go get Jack when he heard the lockdown warning. Did Henry do something to initiate the lockdown or did he simply take advantage of the situation?
Henry gave Anna Lucia perfect directions to the grave and the hot air balloon. Obviously, someone designed a complicated plan to infiltrate Henry among the castaways. He had all the details of his story memorized and he stuck to it through several questionings and a beating. The goal was obviously to have the castaways accept him as one of their own, as they had done with Ethan. What information did they hope to gain by infiltrating a spy into the castaways’ camp?
Henry Gale stole his identity from a real person. There are also several questions about the real Henry Gale. Was he really a marooned millionaire miner? How long was he on the island, what contact did he have with the Others (the obviously knew about him), how did he die, and who buried him? Did the Others simply use his identity as a cover story since there was a balloon and a grave to back it up? It will be interesting to see if we get more information about him in the coming episodes.
The Map
There has been a lot of great discussion about the map on the blast door. There are images of it here, here, and here and you can hear a great summary of it on this week’s LOSTcasts. I don’t have a lot to add to their discussion about what the map contains, but I do have some questions about how it got there.
This is what we know about the map so far. Someone painted the map onto the blast door with a special paint that is only visible by black light. The blast doors seem to have come down in this episode for a routine event—possibly connected with the food drop—and they were down for 45 minutes. The castaways have been inside the hatch for between three weeks and a month and this is the first time they have seen the blast doors close.
The Orientation video described the Swan Station assignment as isolated and instructed the worker not to use the computer for communications. The quarantine markers are further evidence that the Swan Station workers were not to explore the island or make contact with the other stations. The mapmaker, or more likely mapmakers (due to the variety of writing-styles found on the map) apparently wanted to keep the map a secret. Unlike the mural in the hallway, the blast door was a canvas that was hidden most of the time, and the invisible paint provided extra security. Whoever drew the map obviously had some knowledge of the island (there are references to the island’s intranet as well as dates that certain events occurred) but more importantly, they exhibited far more curiosity about their surroundings than the Oceanic 815 castaways have. Based on the efforts they took to hide the map, they had more curiosity than Dharma wanted them to have.
Painting the map on a retractable blast door helped conceal it, but it would also make it difficult for the Swan Station worker to have access to it. It is hard to imagine Desmond and Kelvin (or whoever) updating the detailed map during the 30 seconds of black light that is only available, at most, once a month. There must be a way to manually control the door and the lighting or the map would have been impossible to create.
The map also provides further evidence that someone on the island has a great affinity for dead languages. Egyptian hieroglyphics are in the computer counter and Latin is used sporadically throughout the map. The scientists associated with Dharma obviously have some linguistic training and a reason to use it. (I’d be on the lookout for Germanic Runes in future episodes.)
The Food Drop
The food drop proves that Dharma is still active and working on a large scale. It contained a large amount of prepared food as well as several boxes, each printed with the Dharma logo. However, if Dharma is still active, then why haven’t they sent replacements for Kelvin or Desmond? Why didn’t they stop the castaways from blowing open the hatch with dynamite and subsequently moving in? If they need to ensure that someone pushes the button, how can they trust the castaways—who have now twice nearly let the timer run out—to do the job? I can’t wait to find out the answers to some of these questions in the coming episodes.
posted by Chris at 8:48 PM
1 Comments:
Good point about the door having the ability to be manually controlled. I thought the same thing about it. Looking forward to a great new episode!
Post a Comment
<< Home