Lost In a Strange Land...

Another very nice recap here by J. Wood

Lost In a Strange Land...

February 22nd, 2007: Posted by J. Wood

"Stranger in a Strange Land," the ninth episode of the season (and third in the succession of new, uninterrupted episodes), is a strange, subtle tale of how Jack acquired his distinctive tattoo, and quite a bit more. This episode doesn't overtly point to the many useful references like past episodes have, but despite the seemingly closed narrative, there is plenty going on beneath the surface. In my book I warn against looking too deeply into something and finding references to it everywhere; Hurley does this on occasion, and certainly the Lost audience does. Generally, it's a good idea to try to find secondary evidence to back whatever theory one puts out; there seems to be plenty of secondary evidence for what follows.

The title of the episode echoes Robert Heinlein's 1961 novel Stranger in a Strange Land. Heinlein's science fiction narrative is about a man named Michael Smith who is raised by aliens on Mars, and returns to Earth as an adult. He can't understand human language, rules, sexual practices, property rights, and other cultural traits, and has superhuman abilities he picked up on Mars that appear magical to others, but are actually science. Of significance is the church Smith ends up establishing to repair the flaws he sees in humanity, the Fosterite Church of the New Revelation; repairing the flaws of humanity was also the Dharma Initiative's charge. The Fosterite church becomes a massive cultural power, not unlike today's Protestant megachurches, yet much of this church's proceedings are mysterious and esoteric; the faithful learn the Martian language, learn superhuman abilities, and are initiated in mystical ceremonies. This mystical side of Heinlein's novel bears a resemblance to a pre-Masonic cult called the Rosicrucian Order — more on this in a bit, since it becomes the hinge for this episode, or at least for this reading of the episode. Smith's teachings also echo, in a roundabout way, the idea found in both Buddhism and Gnostic Christian traditions that the divine/godhead is found everywhere and in everyone, it's just a matter of grokking it. (This is actually where grok comes from; in the Martian language, it means something like "to drink," and everything that groks has god in it; since plants, animals, and people all drink, they all grok god, whether they know it or not.) We often see Dharma Initiative members bowing in namaste to each other, which is a recognition of the divinity in the other person.

The title of the episode also recalls Exodus 2, when Moses meets the priest of Midian and has a son by one of the priest's daughters. They name the son Gershom, which means "stranger" or "alien," because as Moses says, "I have been a stranger in a strange land." Moses, of course, was the exiled leader of the Israelites, an angry individual, and was never quite one of them. When the Israelites complain of thirst, Moses gets miffed and goes to god with the complaints. God has Moses bang a rock with a rod and water flows from it, but because of his quick temper and disbelief that the Israelites would be provided for without Moses's intervention, Moses gets banned from the Promised Land. After all, the only person god says he loves in the bible is Jacob, another biblical figure referenced when Karl mutters a line from the overstimulation chamber, "God loves you as he loved Jacob." Jacob, the forefather of Moses, was among other things a trickster — god loves a joker, or maybe just a good joke.

With Moses we get an alienated leader with a quick temper, and that's Jack all over. (It's important to remember that at this point Jack has been imprisoned and angry only for about a week; after five months of seeing nothing but angry Jack, it can start to seem like he has one emotional level, but when taken in the context of about seven days of psychological mindgames and imprisonment, it makes more sense.) Jack and Moses also share another characteristic as resident aliens among their respective groups. Moses was raised as an Egyptian, but comes out as a Jew. He was never quite an Egyptian, and coming from Egypt as a leader, he was never quite one of the former-enslaved Jews. Sigmund Freud took this a step farther in his final book Moses and Monotheism, where he argues Moses was always an Egyptian, but of a select sect of Egyptian monotheists separate from the polytheists who operated as a governor of the Jews. Jack, likewise, was never at home with his own upbringing and station in life, and raged against his father. But when he leaves that world behind (and heads to Phuket, and later the island), he also cannot fully be part of the group he's joined.

Which brings us to Jack's funky tattoo. Narratively, we're still not privy to what the five stars are for, but they could refer to the five seconds Jack will allow fear to enter his life before he banishes it. However, Isabel claims the Chinese characters read "He walks among us, but he is not one of us." An enterprising person at Lostpedia who knows Chinese already translated the characters as a section from Chairman Mao Zedong's 1925 poem "Ch'ang-sha," which reads "Eagle high up, cleaving the space." Maybe Isabel's translation was a poetic interpretation, and Jack informs her that what she read isn't what the words mean. But the tattoo came with the actor; Matthew Fox was inked up when he joined the cast, and rather than cover the marks, the writers decided to work them into the storyline; Lost has always had a flexible narrative. Even though we don't have the full tattoo story, we know that they came from Achara, the artist in Phuket whose work "is not deprivation, it is definition." Achara, Jack's lover in Thailand, has a gift to see who a person really is, and she engraves that into the person's skin. In Hinduism, Achara is also the highest form of Dharma, which suggests the person Achara may be connected with the Dharma Initiative. As a tattoo artist, perhaps she inked up Tom, who has a tattoo on the left side of his chest near his shoulder. This hasn't really been shown, but in the final episode of season two, Tom's tattoo can be glimpsed as the wind blows his shirt about while he stands on the dock. At any rate, Jack is marked, not unlike Juliet and her seared brand.

Herein lies the larger, wilder connections: The brand Juliet is given on the small of her back looks more or less like an asterisk with an extended ray along the top and an extra ray bisecting the middle, for eight points all told (and eight is the second number in Valenzetti's sequence).

It almost resembles a Chi-Rho, but that lacks the extra ray and has that extra loop at the top. Juliet's mark doesn't seem to occur as a regular symbol in any particular religious system associated with the narrative, but it does resemble an upside-down Rosicrucian cross, which brings us back to Heinlein's novel and opens up the episode's referential characteristics.

The Rosicrucians were a mystical sect of occultists from 17th C. Europe who followed a 15th C. German seer named Christian Rosenkreuz. There are still sects around today, and one called the Golden Dawn included members like William Butler Yeats and Aleister Crowley. Yeats even based his book of esoteric wisdom A Vision on the knowledge he gained from that Rosicrucian society. Rosenkreuz is said to have traveled to the eastern lands and learned the secret wisdom of harmonic science from mystics in the Middle East and North Africa. When he returned, he founded the Fraternity of the Rose Cross, an order which incorporated teachings from Sufism, Kabbalah, Christian mysticism (Gnosticism), alchemy, astrology and numerology. The Rosicrucian order is believed to be a possible origin for Freemasonry as we know it today; in the Scottish Rite, an initiate who reaches the 18th degree is called a Knight of the Rose Cross. The Rosicrucians also figure into Umberto Eco's book Foucault's Pendulum; not only is Eco's name evocative of a certain Nigerian warlord, but the narrative is an exercise in complicated plots, credulous audiences, and esoteric knowledge. The book follows three publishers who decide to construct an alternative history based on secret societies, and find that their fake history becomes increasingly plausible to members of other secret societies. These others then go after the three in order to find out what more secret knowledge they have, including the secret treasure of the Knights Templar. Part of the book's game is that the reader is presented with both factual, historical knowledge and creative spin on that knowledge, so the reader, not unlike the audience of Lost, has to search for the hidden reality behind what's presented. It's an exercise in heuristics (D.H.A.R.M.A.: Department of Heuristics And Research on Material Applications).

The Rose Cross was not so much a Christian symbol as an occult tool. The Rosicrucian cross contains eight rays, with the bottom ray extended. One use was to cast sigils, a form of sympathetic magic. A rose-like mandala would be laid out with the eight-rayed rose cross in the center. The "petals" of the mandala would have letters on them. One would then start in an inner petal near the cross, and trace out a word, like a connect-the-dots game. The shape that emerged was the sigil, which would be used to try to affect some material change in the world (i.e. placed in something, focused on, etc.). Something similar occurs in Gnostic astrological charts, where depending on the input factors, a certain sigil-like pattern is traced out on the chart. A modern U.S. Rosicrucian order called the Rosicrucian Fellowship (1911) created the following chart when it first broke ground for its building in Oceanside, California:

Compare this chart to the blast door map:

The lines from the Rosicrucian chart and the blast door map are nearly identical (and, as it happens, resemble the shape of the Millennium Falcon).

Between Juliet's mark and the Rosicrucian astrological chart, there seems to be some link. But there's more: The Rosicrucians also were followers of the Greek mathematician Pythagoras, who also held to a very mystical cosmology. Pythagoras believed in the transmigration of souls, sacred geometry, and that concepts and matter could be represented numerically. At this point, the Valenzetti equation should come to mind, because that's exactly what each of the 4 8 15 16 23 and 42 numerals are meant to represent.

"Stranger in a Strange Land" didn't directly take us deeper into the mythology of the show, but it did offer some intriguing mazes to get lost in. These suppositions may be entirely wrong, but there are road signs pointing towards supporting evidence. And even if it is wrong, this is part of the fun of the Lost narrative — you fall down the rabbit hole and there's no telling where you'll end up.

Source: J.Wood

Ratings - Stranger in a Strange Land

Here are the latest ratings which appear to going in right direction.

"Lost" (10:00-11:00 p.m.)
At 10:00 p.m., ABC's "Lost" continued to deliver enormous increases from its lead-in, shooting up by 7.5 million viewers (12.9 million vs. 5.4 million) and by 159% in Adults 18-49 (5.7/15 vs. 2.2/5). Despite CBS' advantage coming into the hour from an original "Criminal Minds," "Lost" moved ABC into a dominant No. 1 position in the 10 o'clock hour across the key adult demos, beating CBS' time period veteran "C.S.I.: NY" by even wider margins this week: AD18-34 +93% (5.4/15 vs. 2.8/8), AD18-49 +39% (5.7/15 vs. 4.1/11) and AD25-54 +22% (6.2/15 vs. 5.1/12). ABC's younger appealing drama also led the hour by 100% among Teens 12-17 over its nearest competition (3.2/12 vs. 1.6/6 - CBS).

* "Lost" grew its overall Total Viewer count week to week (12.9 million vs. 12.8 million) and was also up among Adults 18-34 (+6% - 5.4/15 vs. 5.1/15), across the key men demos (+28% in M18-34 - 5.0/16 vs. 3.9/13, +8% in M18-49 - 5.2/15 vs. 4.8/13 and +4% in M25-54 - 5.4/14 vs. 5.2/13) and among Teens 12-17 (+19% - 3.2/12 vs. 2.7/10). The show delivered it best-yet Teen 12-17 number in its new time period.

* For the third straight week, ABC's "Lost" stood as Wednesday's No. 1 scripted TV program in the key Adult 18-49 demographic. It was also the night's top-rated scripted series for the third week in a row with Adults 25-54, Adults 18-34 and Teens 12-17.

* "Lost" is greatly improving its new time period for ABC over the same nights last year, growing the hour as a lead-in to Network affiliates' late-local news by 5.4 million viewers (13.4 million vs. 8.0 million), by 79% in Adults 18-49 (5.9/15 vs. 3.3/8) and by 68% in Adults 25-54 (6.4/15 vs. 3.8/9). In fact, "Lost" qualifies as ABC's most-watched series in the Wednesday 10 o'clock hour in 9 years and its top-rated among Adults 18-49 in 10 years - since the 1998-97 and 1996-97 TV Seasons, respectively.

Stranger in a Strange Land - Key Moments

Things I Noticed - "Stranger in a Strange Land" by Vozzek69

Stranger in a strange land was NOT one of my favorite episodes. Judging from the message board reaction, I'm pretty sure I'm not alone. The story was a bit weak and as a stand-alone episode it was boring, but at least we had one BIG revelation this week. More on that in a minute. Things I noticed:


Let Me Get You Some Stones

Funny line, coming from Mr. Friendly. Throwing aside the glass houses reference, we can see the irony of Zeke telling Jack he needs some balls. At this point however, Jack has finally exhibited some stones, while Friendly fades further back each week into the role of a clueless underling.


You're Not From Around Here, Are You?

This struck me immediately as a strange thing for a Thai woman to say to an obviously out-of-place caucasian man. The line is too obvious. I think it's more of a reference to Jack not exactly being from 'around here'- meaning he's special. Achara senses this, as per her gift, which is why she's drawn to him. I also remember something about a 'go fly a kite' reference in a previous episode, but I can't pin it down. The way Jack said 'Achara' sounded a lot like 'Other', by the way. He also seems to be wearing some sort of an infinity symbol around his neck, but I could be wrong.

Sawyer Has the Best Lines
Hands down. From the cool JAWS reference to 'You got a map you ain't showin' me Magellan?' And my favorite one so far: 'Like the steal a kid off the raft project?'. Hehehe...

Dragonfly, This is Wolf Den Six...

Did anyone else notice the interrogation room Jack was led into by Isabelle looked straight out of Rambo First Blood part II? Military style footlockers. Computer gadgetry the size of an engine block. And that microphone??? Oh man. RIGHT out of Rambo. Yet I think the most important aspect of that scene was the row of 3-ring binders behind Isabelle. They were all black and white... except for the bright red one - the one you saw just as Jack was lying (badly) through his teeth. Which leads me to:

Sixth Sense Red
It's more and more obvious that certain episodes have colors. Eko's last episode was 99% green. This one was red, and there was a lot of it. Maybe red is Jack's color? Maybe that binder behind Isabelle represented Jack's binder - the one where they knew everything about him? When Jack followed Bai Ling through the reddish-hued streets, she wore a bright red dress. And one of the guys who beat the snot out of him at the end of the episode wore a very red shirt. Not sure of the total significance, but it seems intentional.

Bad Choice of Cage
I'm pretty sure Jack wasn't too happy about getting put into the cage where Sawyer nailed Kate. Ouch. Notice how Jack pushes the food button twice, but then stops short before he shocks himself. This is to show us how different Jack is from Sawyer. He thinks things through. Jack's all about finesse; Sawyer's brute force. Jack rocks the candy machine gently back and forth; Sawyer knocks it over.

Okay, Then I Get To Ask One Question...
Where's Juliet? Jack gets to ask a free question, and the BEST he can come up with is where's Juliet?!?!? I think anyone watching that scene wanted to punch him in the sternum as hard as possible.

Say it. Go on... Say it...
Watching Jack shake the crap out of Bai Ling just because he didn't know where she worked seemed very out of place. He's been on a beautiful relaxing island for at least a month and getting no-strings midnight sex on a regular basis without even having to shave. What's he got to be so pissed about?



"Do you see who I am? Who AM I?" This seemed pretty important. During this scene Jack didn't seem like Jack at all, but rather someone else entirely. He himself wasn't even sure who he was. It was a little bit Fight Club to me. A leader? A great man? Is Jack Tyler Durden? Is Jack HIM???

When Achara told him there would be consequences for marking him, Jack seemed almost ready for her answer. I don't think she was referring to the beating he took later on, either... I think the consequences she saw were a lot more far-reaching than that. After tattooing him, Jack was marked on a non-visual level. The drink-selling kid ran from him without Jack even rolling up his sleeve. Maybe the Others didn't realize they needed Jack (i.e. him not being on Jacob's original list) until they saw his tattoo? Is this why Jack's been sleeveless for two and a half seasons (a lucky accident)?



"He walks amongst us, but he is not one of us" - Jack's an outsider. This is why he never fits in. This is why his marriage didn't work, his relationship with his father blew up, and why he can't close the deal with Kate. There's something not quite right about Jack that no one can put their finger on. Inwardly, he will constantly be at war with himself.

Juliet's Brand

Maybe we'll eventually find out the meaning of the mark the Others burned into Juliet's back, but the point of it was simple: she's been excommunicated from her people. Knowing she's now alone she actually shed a tear, but Jack's whole 'live together die alone' attitude seemed to give her some hope. The aloe scene was her transition from Other character to possible induction into the 815'ers camp. Putting the mark on her back was a way of showing that it doesn't matter if it's visible or not - everyone will still somehow know she's marked.

Sawyer/Kate/Jack
The show's obligatory love triangle is back on. Not sure many of us care at this point, but it was pretty predictable that Sawyer would 'mess it up'. It was painfully intentional too - the way he did it, pushing Kate away (even though he loves her) like everyone else in his life. I still think Kate's going to end up with Jack. It just might take until the end of the series.

Well, Ben Calls It Home
When Juliet says this, we already know she doesn't consider the perfect little book-club community to be her home. But the way she says it, it's almost like she's speaking for the other Others too. I'm thinking that all of Mr. Roger's neighborhood was by Ben's design - whether you believe it was built by Dharma or whether (like me) you think it was manifested from the memories/imagination of those on the island. Ben's idea of home is everyone's home.



Looks like the dirty boat is back, too (was that the same boat?) which would explain why Ben so willingly let Michael and Walt drive off with such a useful piece of hardware.

Okay, on to the good stuff.

"We Give Them a Better Life. Better Than Yours."

Cindy and the kids are back. They come strolling right up to the edge of Jack's cage like they're out for a casual walk in the jungle. It's no coincidence they show up just as Jack's 'waking up' in his cage, leaving the producers that eternal LOST escape hatch that hints to the fact Jack could be dreaming. But in this case, I don't think he is. He may still be unconscious, but he's definitely not dreaming.



Cindy and the kids aren't what's important. Look at the people behind Cindy. These are not the Others... they're the 815 survivors that were dragged into the jungle. They're dressed for a air-conditioned plane ride, not for a walk in the sweltering heat. They're placid and curious, yet silent and observant. They "came to watch".

As Jack asks Cindy "What are you doing here with THEM?" (meaning the Others) Cindy responds with "They're not... ummm..." and then stops herself. She can't explain to Jack that these people are not the Others. "It's complicated". Yeah Cindy, it sure is.

These are the WATCHERS. We're going to see a lot more of them. I'm pretty sure we may have seen some of them already. I don't think they're really on the island, but I don't think they're NOT on the island either. These people are disconnected from everyone else. They're in a better place - another place (another life?). And I think they're probably responsible for the whispers, too.

Needless to say, this is a BIG revelation. Want some proof? Check out the two photos below:



I noticed the creepy guy in the yellow shirt staring through that window and thought it was pretty strange, the way he seemed to be ignored. Yet he shows up with Cindy and company. He's not an Other... he's not really there. He's a watcher, and he's doing what the watchers do: he's watching. I'm reminded of an early whisper from season one: "Should we help them"? No help. Just a bunch of watching.

Another really cool possible 'watcher' sighting was pointed out on DarkUFO's site this week:

http://losteastereggs.blogspot.com/2007/02/poster-blink-girl.html

And hey, remember the deleted ABC photo of the little girl standing in the room during one of the earlier episodes this season? Was she a set accident or a watcher? Did the producers choose not to reveal her yet, and cut that scene intentionally?



While we're looking at photos, here's something else I noticed: Emma's dress seems very similar to Bai Ling's shirt just as she turns away from Jack for the last time. I grabbed some screencaps of that too:



I know they're not exactly the same pattern, but they're very close. I'm pretty sure it's related to my idea that the island is just recycling (and limited to) everyone's memories over and over to paint certain things within the 'flashbacks'. And I'll tell you right now I put the word flashbacks in quotation marks intentionally.

Here's hoping next week we're back to Locke and Sayid kicking some ass.

Lost's Future is Bright, Despite Ratings Decline

Great Article on the ratings by my friends over at BuddyTV.

After a week of zealous skewering at the hands of the press, LOST is finally seeing relief in the shape of rational observations. Are fans buying the spin, or is LOST's dip last week easily explainable? This weeks episode of LOST will tell for sure, but at least a few corners of the internet think they have it figured out.
There isn't a television show on this planet that doesn't have at least a few die-hard fans, LOST is certainly no exception. Even at its lowest ratings ever, LOST carries with it 12-million die hard, vocal fans willing to rationalize away the doomsy prognosticating of even the most cynical of journalists.

The defense to LOST's dip in th ratings that makes the most sense is that there was a universal decline due to Valentines Day festivities. What reinforces this defense is that all shows from 9:00pm on suffered a pretty proportionally lateral decline in ratings on heart day.

The other saving grace is that ABC is heralding LOST as bringing an unheard of share of the coveted 18-49 demographic to 10pm. Again, citing numbers that can be backed up across the board against any other show in the slot, any day of the week.

Tie this into the multi-platform and international success of the series and you walk away with little doubt that nothing drastic is going to change in the land of the LOST.

A couple of factors that aren't so widely discussed is the fact that the two episodes since the return focused on characters who were not central to the LOST core. 'Not in Portland' focused heavily on Juliet's back story, while 'Flashes Before Your eyes' was dominated by Henry Ian Cusick's Desmond character.

While Desmond and Juliet are fan favorites with fair followings, LOST fans know all too well how severely their own can react to new characters taking center stage. Take, for example, the volatile addition of Michelle Rodriguez's Ana Lucia in season two. Ana was almost universally reviled by fans. This seasons Nikki and Paulo have the fans in protest over having new faces thrust rudely into the mix.

February 21st's episode 'Stranger in a Strange land' features LOST fan favorite, and arguable lead, Jack in a revealing episode that threatens to reveal sordid details from the doctors past. Will the shift back to LOST's core characters bring the numbers up for ABC? Tune in February 22nd to find out.
Source: BuddyTV