Who's Ben's Man on the Boat?So last night Ben said he has a man on the boat. One person commented here after reading my column and suggested it's Richard Alpert, which would be great. He comes and goes as Ben pleases, and has remained loyal to him until very recently. However, I'd heard in the fall that because the actor who plays him, Nestor Carbonell, was starring on Cane, he was unable to also appear on Lost, because CBS wouldn't let him jump networks. I'm not sure if Cane is still on or if it got cancelled (it's not clear with the writer's strike what's still here and what isn't... except for Journeyman, which I TOTALLY got into and was really upset they'd cancelled that and not stupid Bionic Woman), but even if it were cancelled, Carbonell would have been working on the show in the fall, when they were filming these episodes of Lost. Also, we last saw Richard in the woods only the day before, so I don't think he could have gotten any inside information to Ben in time. So I doubt it's him.
A couple of people just posted and suggested Michael. Could it be? I LOVE that theory... the last we saw of him, he was leaving on a boat that Ben had given him. What terrible thing befell him that put him back in the service of Ben, now as a spy on the boat? I mean, he proved himself worthy by integrating back into the Losties, killing two of them, letting Ben go, and then leading four of them over to the Others, so he's certainly capable of this. But how could he be there unnoticed?
Could it be George Minkowski? The guy's been on the phone, yet we've never seen him. The voice is that of Fisher Stevens, he of dubious 80s films fame (best known as being engaged to Michelle Pfeiffer for a while before they broke up), so we'll definitely see him. I found it REALLY strange that just as the mission is going down on the island, George is suddenly unavailable. What's that all about? No wonder Miles looked ticked.
Could it be Mikhail? Did the crazy one-eyed Russian let off the grenade and then continue swimming out to the boat? We saw him wearing a scuba mask, and the next time we saw one was in the box Jack was unpacking. I think it's unlikely... in the timeline, Charlie died only a few hours ago, so I don't think he could have gotten there. And besides, the producers are saying he's finally, really, truly dead. (Don't trust them.)
Or it could be someone we haven't seen yet. Who do you think it is?
Just to clarify, they didn't say Mikhail was REALLY dead, they just said "Mikail was dead." As in, "Pickett is dead, Tom is dead, Mikhail is dead..." in the context of them killing off the others this season.
ReplyDeleteYou keep saying Jack unpacked a scuba mask, but I'm pretty sure that was a gas mask. Just saying ...
ReplyDeleteIt looked a lot like the one Ben pulled on just before killing his father, or the one Kelvin used to head outside, and thus could indicate a connection to Dharma (because he knew the island was once gassed).
if it makes you feel any better, it sounds like Bionic Woman won't be coming back at all after the strike.
ReplyDeleteMichael makes a lot of sense. But Walt probably makes more sense:
ReplyDelete1) He was with the Others much longer than Michael was.
2) He was exposed to Room 23, which did god-knows-what to him.
3) He apparently has the ability to astral project himself onto the island, making it handy to relay messages back to Ben.
4) Since he warned Locke, we already know he possesses some amount of info about the freighter people.
Brian: Ah... so Crazy Mikki could be back? Cool.
ReplyDeleteEric: A gasmask would make a heck of a lot more sense. When I first watched it, I thought it was a gasmask, but it didn't look like there was anything over the mouth, and a gasmask would cover the entire face. It looked more like a scuba mask to me, so that's why I said it. But you're probably right. (The ones that Ben and Kelvin used, by the way, looked very different; they were army green and were a more traditional-looking gasmask.)
Teebore: YAY!!!
obscure: Walt would make perfect sense... except the actor who plays him is now almost 16, and Walt is 12. I think the only way they can use that actor is through flashforwards, and it would be tough to use him on the island (notice how little he spoke when he appeared in Looking-Glass). Good theory, though! :)
Walt does make a lot of sense. The big question would be why he's on the freighter from the crew's perspective. What use would they have for a teenager? Unless they brought him specifically because of his island knowledge, not knowing he'd be giving info to Ben?
ReplyDeleteThen again, I'd find it hard to believe we'll ever be able to see Walt w/o Michael at this point, after everything Michael did to get him back.
So maybe they're both on the boat, Michael hired on by the crew for his insider info, and Walt tagging along because Michael won't let him out of his sight, and Walt is feeding Ben info somehow, for whatever reason.
Did anybody catch in the 1st episode,when Charlie visits Hurley at the Hospital. While Charlie's pleading at the very last frame he looks different. Walt?
ReplyDeleteWe almost certainly will see Mikhail in flashbacks at least.
ReplyDeleteWill he be back alive again? Possibly, but I wouldn't bet on it.
Nikki: I think Lindelof has said they will explain at some point why Walt has aged so much since we last saw him (and it won't just be because the actor went through puberty). My take is that time moves differently on the island than it does off, which is why Walt has appeared to age rapidly after leaving while someone like, say, Aaron, ages normally on the island.
ReplyDeleteI don't really have a mind for science, but my understanding is that there's something called the twin paradox that might apply here. Basically, you have two twins. One stays on Earth and the other hops in a rocket and flies into space. When the twin in space returns, he will discover that he's aged less than the twin on Earth. I don't quite understand how this works, but the basic idea might be what's happening here.
I like the idea of George Minkowski being the spy on the boat. It would make the most sense and explain why he is unavailable when Miles calls him. Also, why does Miles have to talk to George and only George? Does he not trust Regina, who picked up the phone first? I can also see why people would suspect Michael of being the spy, but I can't really believe that Mike would betray his friends twice. That is of course unless the coordinates Ben gave him led to some type of "brainwashing station", and Michael is under employment of the Others. Either way, great episode, and this season is off to an exciting start!
ReplyDeleteA friend and I have a running joke about Walt's advancing age. By the time he appeared to Locke at the end of Season 3, we figure he was married with two kids, a pension and chronic back pain.
ReplyDelete(in a deep, gruff voice)"Get up John. You've got work to do. And I've got to pick up the kids from soccer practice and drop off the electric bill. Plus, this weather isn't very good for my back..."
Perhaps Abaddon is the grown-up Walt (he said just to stir things up)?
ReplyDeleteobscure: I'm with you on the "don't have a mind for science" thing, but I know Hawking touched on the idea in his book that I slogged through in the summer. I remember the section on two astronauts moving at different rates and one aging more. So that would be a good way to handle Walt.
ReplyDeleteBrandon: Interesting point about Miles only wanting to talk to George. There's definitely something to that...
Teebore: HAHAHAHA!!!
Chris: I LOVE this theory... I certainly wouldn't dismiss it (other than they don't look alike, but hey, that's never stopped speculation before!) ;)
obscure: You left out the key element--that twin in space has to be traveling at sublight speeds (well, in truth, there is an effect at slower speeds, but it is so small that it would be hardly noticable; like the twin wouldn't notice if he was 5 minutes younger when he returns, but I digress).
ReplyDeleteAnyway, one way to look at the weird physics is to remember that we live in only a small portion of the universe (a "snowglobe" if you will). We make many assumptions about our universe such as that we are dealing with items are macroscopic in size, where things move much slower than the speed of light, that there are only three spacial dimensions, and probably many more that we aren't even aware of. But when we venture beyond our world, when we travel at sublight speeds, when we look at microscopic objects, and so on, the natural rules that we take for granted may not hold there.
Maybe the man on the boat isn't on the boat anymore, but is one of the 4 new people. There are rumblings it might be Charlotte. She knew what, when and where to go looking for the polar bear and the DHARMA collar. Shooting her would be a great way of throwing people off the scent that they might be connected. She also talked to the Losties like the others talk. Maybe it's a stretch. But why didn't she say she was there for Ben? If she was one of them, the moment she saw Ben should have been telling.
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ReplyDeleteFor part of a day the previous post suggested the idea of Charlotte possibly being Annie. I thought it was a brilliant thought. We've never heard from Annie again and surely they wouldn't have made such a big deal of her as Ben's only friend to leave us haning about her survival. What if Ben sent her away before the purge and they've been in cahoots since. Even Ben shooting her could have been part of their plan to throw everyone (including the other people from the freighter) off.
ReplyDeleteI'm telling you, Annie will come back and she'll mean something to the story. Ben is very capable of having a huge long term plan like this.
Not sure why she deleted her comment, but I thought it was worth mentioning. I've not heard anyone, anywhere else associate Charlotte and Annie!
It is my opinion that Annie is dead. I think she and Ben had gotten together and she ended up pregnant and died and that's why he "adopted" Alex and that's also why he's so Hell-bent on finding out a way for women to bear children without dying.
ReplyDeleteI don't think it was Annie. I think she will show up in the show again, but it won't just be like she's one of the freighter people. She wasn't one of the Dharma people that died in the purge, otherwise Ben would have felt some remorse if she died considering she was his only friend.
ReplyDeleteEveryone with a geek card knows that what Fisher Stevens is REALLY famous for is being the bad guy in Hackers!!! ;)
ReplyDeleteJust dropping by to read your LOST spec and giggle like a maniac. Back to writing...