"He is Evil Incarnate." Those were the words of Dogen concerning MiB, Flocke, Unlocke, Smokey, or whatever you want to call that "thing." It appears after last night's episode, The Candidate, that he was right. From an emotional standpoint, last night was a 50 on a scale of 10! I was literally on the edge of my seat the entire show. Darlton proved once again that their story telling is genius! Their story telling is something else...it is real. This is what I believe makes LOST so freaking appealing. Here is what I mean.
A few weeks ago we had an episode titled Happily Ever After. I found the title extremely ironic for it seems that "Happily Ever After" is the one thing that no one on LOST ever gets to experience. Before they get to the island, life sucked. When they got to the island, life sucked. Last night was evidence that...life still sucks.
Have you been there? I have. One of my hardest jobs serving as a spiritual counselor for so many people is dealing with the myth that if people "get religion" that their lives will somehow magically be better. Wrong. The hope of my Christian faith is not found in any expectation that I will have some "pie in the sky" right now, but that I have a life without pain waiting for me after this life. In other words, much of the time life sucks for me. This is because there really is evil in the world. Bad things happen everyday.
Last night on LOST, bad things happened. Sayid met his doom (granted he gave his life to save others). Jin and Sun are together again only so that they can die one of the saddest deaths I have ever witnessed on television. And let's not forget that it apparently would not have happened if Bonehead Sawyer (sorry Skaters) would have swallowed his pride and trusted Jack, who happens to be the one who seems to have finally figured out how this "game" works on the island.
LOST has not been a "happily ever after" show. I love LOST primarily because it is more real than reality TV. Evil is outside of us and many times the evil is right there in our own hearts. Who knows, maybe this game between Jacob and MiB is like Jumanji and when the game is over, everything resets...maybe.
Live together, die alone (or at least with your spouse or running away with a bomb).
