Okay, now I finally caught up with you, folks and gotta say that the last two episodes were fantastic. First the face-off between Sawyer and Anthony Cooper - intense and well played-out and the whole Ben episode. The flashbacks were sadly not AS informative as I had hoped, but I really expect more to come on Hanzo and Dharma.

Now Jacob..I really don't know what to think about him. It seems like the show has crossed over from sci-fi to Twin Peaks-style bona fide mystery. Really no idea what to think about Jacob, but as some have said, I do see a connection to the Monster.

And like Archie has said, Locke is quite certainly not dead. They would have shown that clearly if he had died. I mean, Ben did not shoot him again, despite the theats and the healing powers of the island that already helped Locke once will kick in again probably. Next episode, someone's likely gonna die, though (probably Charlie).

And yeah, the never-aging Richard creeps me out. I am just wondering if that was deliberate or whether their make-up department simply sucks.

In any case, the last episode was pretty much as good as ever and qualifies as the best episode of the season. Bring on the finale!

No. He just got grazed.

Go watch DVD

dude I'm only joking

I can't tell!

Yeah ditto to the above post, about the backstory and Jack.

What's the title of the season finale episode if it's known yet?

What's the non-spoilery take on the spoilers - good, bad, about what you expected?

I wish I didnt just highlight that.

Oh, and I'm pretty sure:

* A long-absent regular returns. And that regular is not listed among ABC’s cast list.

Means the return of Michael or Walt. Probably not both.

A couple issues here...

1. Richard is clearly shown not to have aged very much.
2. It's TV, and sometimes that's all make-up can do all.

If part of the island is life-elongation, then I see no reason why this purge wouldn't have happened back in oh... say the 1980s.

the life elongation doesn't make sense because

a) Ben aged perfectly through adulthood (one may argue now that once you reach a level of maturity, you stop)
b) Ben's father aged as well (which dismisses the above theory)

big spoilers. huge if true

EP 321 CHARLIE'S FLASHBACKS Basically, this is another show where they make you think that Charlie's going to die, but then it doesn't happen. Desmond tells Charlie that he's seen a vision of Charlie's death and that this time it HAS to happen because it's going to cause another of his visions to come true -- one of Claire and her baby being rescued from the island by a helicopter. He tells Charlie that he's going to drown after turning a switch next to a yellow light in a new underwater hatch. At the same time, Sayid tells Jack that he can't get a rescue signal out on Naomi's phone because Rousseau's old distress call is blocking the signal. He tells Jack that they need to go to a radio tower to turn it off. Juliet, though, tells them that still won't get the signal out because Ben has been blocking all transmissions from the island by a jamming device on an underwater hatch called THE LOOKING GLASS. They know from Sayid's maps that the hatch is flooded. Charlie volunteers for the suicide missions to swim down there and turn off the signal. After what Desmond's told him, he now knows that this is his destiny. He swims down to the udnerwater hatch -- but it isn't flooded! He comes up in a pressurized chamber. He's overjoyed that he doesn't have to die....but discovers that there's TWO CHICKS down there (probably Others) pointing guns at him. The FLASHBACKS are the five greatest moments in Charlie's life. He saves a stranger being beaten on the street (the stranger is Nadia, Sayid's long-lost love), he shows his Dad he can swim when he's a young kid, he hears YOU ALL EVERYBODY on the radio for the first time, and his brother Liam gives him the DS ring. But his greatest moment is when he met Claire on the beach the first night after the plane crashed on the island. (He writes down these five memories and asks Desmond to give them to Claire after he's gone). The episode is just okay. Not as good as the last two, it's basically setting things up for the finale. It woudl've been better if they'd have killed Charlie in it. Now onto the finale... episode 322 FINALE "THROUGH THE LOOKING GLASS" The finale is full of action, a few deaths -- and that huge twist I mentioned earlier. First, the deaths. A bunch of Others get killed when they try to raid the camp. This includes Friendly, who Sawyer shoots in cold blood -- and also the other new tough guy Other (I think his name is Price) who gets run over by Hurley in the van. And Charlie FINALLY dies. Thank god. I've always thought he was one of the weaker characters and his death has been threated in so many episodes its about time it finally happened. He unblocks the jamming signal in the underwater station but drowns when Mikhail uses a grenade to blow it up, killing them both. It's a cool death for Charlie. Maybe cooler than he deserves. Another big moment is when an old favorite of the show returns. Locke is just about to kill himself in the Dharma grave pit that he fell into after Ben shot him when he hears a voice telling him not to. He looks up to see...WALT!! Walt helps him out of the pit and then disappears. No sign of Michael, and there's no explanation about where Walt has been or what happened to him or Michael. Locke then makes it to the Radio Tower -- and gets there in time to kill Naomi just before she makes the rescue call. He throws a knife straight into her back. Jack can't understand what Locke is doing and tells him that he'll have to shoot him to stop him from making the call himself. Locke threatens to kill Jack, but then backs down. Jack makes the rescue call -- and someone on the other end answers. The story on the island ends with help on the way. Or maybe not. Ben has told Jack that Naomi and her people aren't who they say they are -- and just before he dies, Charlie sees a transmission in the underwater hatch from Desmond's Penny -- who, contrary to what Naomi has said, denies that she knows Naomi at all!! But the HUGE TWIST of the episode -- in fact, probably the huge twist of the entire series -- happens in the flashback. They start by showing that Jack is totally ****ed up. He's popping pills and suicidal. The first flashback shows him about to kill himself by jumping off a bridge -- only a car accident nearby causes him to stop, and instead of killing himself he fins himself helping the accident victims. But he keeps spiraling. He sees his ex-wife at the hospital -- she's pregnant with another man's child. He goes to a funeral of a person that we never discover, but whoever it is, his (or her) death rocks Jack hard. He steals drugs from the hospital and is caught by the new doctor in charge. And all the time, he's constantly on the phone desperately trying to contact somebody. And the last scene shows us who...he goes to meet the mystery person, and it's the last person on earth we would think...it's KATE! And it's now that we realize that for the first time in Lost history, we haven't been watching a flashback. We've been watching a FLASH-FORWARD! Yep, that's right. THEY ACTUALLY SHOW THAT JACK AND KATE MAKE IT OFF THE ISLAND. For some reason, this has been the cause of Jack's spiral. He tells Kate they have to go back to the island. She refuses and drives away. The show finishes with Jack screaming "We have to go back!!"