LOST: Ji Yeon

But all lost things are in the angels' keeping, Love;
No past is dead for us, but only sleeping, Love...
-Helen Hunt Jackson

It's a girl! So Jin's was a flashback and Sun's was a flash forward? Tricky devils. I hate the flippin' future. Do they get Jin's body off the island then? Does he die after they get off or is that just a symbolic grave? Is he dead? In any case, as I am not really certain that Aaron or Ben (by whatever means) are Oceanic 6, and we don't know when Jin died, we have officially five: Jack, Kate, Hurley, Sayid and Sun. On the stand at Kate's trial Jack mentioned that there were eight and two died. Is Jin one of the eight then? Will Claire be the other of the eight and they thought it better that Kate keep Aaron instead of foster care so they pretended he is hers because they wouldn't let a fugitive have him otherwise? Did Juliette not read enough of their files to know that Jack and Claire are siblings? Tell them!

Sooooo sad, in hindsight of knowing that Jin was gone, that Sun was pleading for him to be there at the hospital. :( (PS, I was at first suspicious when the doctor came in and said her regular doctor was 'at a conference,' but then they didn't seem to go anywhere with that. Still...) Sweet 'ol Hurley. I guess that was before he started seeing Charlie and got tossed in the loony bin. I thought it was interesting that when Sun called for an ambulance she didn't say, 'I'm in labor,' or, 'my water just broke,' she said , 'I'm pregnant and I think there's something wrong.' Does the time difference speed up/affect pregnancy somehow? Will the child be 'special' somehow for being conceived on the island?

DON'T TRUST THE CAPTAIN - Really? That's all your going to give us?! Thanks, buddy. Michael is Johnson. Not a surprise at this point, but a nice confirmation of suspicion. Where is Walt? That is always what Ben has over Michael. Captain Gault sure looks like a younger version of Charles Whidmore to me. Relation? Is there any way that in some far fetched time warp he IS Charles? Unlikely, but could be fun! I was actually kid of disappointed with the captain. Not sure if I wanted him to be someone we knew or if I just didn't think the actors presence was great, but I don't know if he's the real captain. What 'errand' did the helicopter have to run, I'd like to know?! (Also, at this point, I am still thinking that Walt is the in between guy who is letting Ben communicate with his people and with the boat)

Who's freaky head blood is on the wall? Did somebody do that to themselves since everyone is literally going suicidally crazy on the boat or does it suggest torture/murder? Who was tapping on the pipes? Was Sayid deciphering Morse code?

Black Box from Oceanic 815. Captain suggesting that it was Ben who faked the plane crash. I don't think he did. I don't trust Ben at all of course, but I am leaning towards thinking that Ben and his folks didn't anticipate the plane crash. Don't trust the captain. They want you to help them get Ben or whatever they are after. I kind of like the theory of the plane crash being real because they were split into two different realities or versions of themselves or whatever. Although, when Frank saw the crash on the news he was automatically suspicious and he knew the pilot. Unless you were really positive about something being amiss, I don't think you would jump directly to foul play. Hmmm.

Favorite one-liner: Everyone loves a panda. Second favorite: I need the panda! Also, would you really get in a taxi with a big stuffed animal and not notice it and try to find out who's it is?

Wow Sun, way to just lay it out to Daniel and start making quick decisions. I guess that mother lioness instinct is kicking in. It is so refreshing how honest and straightforward Sun is compared to everyone else. Ummm, wow Juliette - do what you have to do to save the girls life, I guess! Wasn't her place and did deserve a slap, but Jin also deserved to know the truth. Who's the 'other woman' now?! (though technically, I guess Sun's affair was a matter of 'the other man')

Other thoughts:

Could the 324 bodies on the plane discovered in the ocean be the people Ben and the Others "purged" from the original Dharma initiative? Could Ben have had something to do with the staged crash?

the headstone - it has his date of death as 9/22/2004 - so maybe he's not really dead - maybe he's still on the island, but "dead" to the world because he's not one of the oceanic six. OK, so is that the date Lost premiered, and thus the date he would have died in the plane crash (had he died)? Since the Oceanic Six are telling people that only a few of them survived initially...Sun said she missed him, didn't say he was dead and was looking for him while in labor.

you've really got to assume (pray?) that jin is alive on the island. the gravestone says the date of the crash, meaning it was probably created when the fake wreckage was found (as it probably was for many of the losties--kind of cool). the writing very carefully avoids language of death. (Ooooh, good thought!)
I have two thoughts regarding Jin: (1) he is being presumed dead possibly so Sun and baby can have life insurance and otherwise be taken care of (Oceanic settlement) and visiting the grave was a public gesture, or (2) he's in the biz with Sayid and Ben. I'm not convinced that Jin's scenes were flashbacks, but rather flash forwards.

I think Jin is alive also because I think it's going to be vital that everybody have somebody on the island that they want to go back for - Sun for Jin, Kate for Sawyer, Jack for Juliet, etc.

The "reveal" of Micheal on the boat in no way answers the question of whether or not he is Ben's man on the boat. To me, it looked like Micheal didn't even know he was Micheal. So my guess is, Ben's man is someone else and the Micheal story is a whole different can of very juicy worms.

* Why did Hurley say "good" when Sun said no one else was coming?

If all 324 passengers of the plane were supposedly in the faked wreckage, how do they justify the Oceanic Six and their return? Wouldn't their survival suggest that the bodies on the plane were someone other than who they were supposed to be considering who they were supposed to be is alive and well?
Regina chained herself and jumped overboard. Anyone think it's all a put on for Sayid and Desmond? That along with the giant blood stain on the wall in the room they were going to stay in? I think it's all a set up to freak them out and throw them off of the trail of the real motivations of the captain and crew (and Charles Whidmore).

This whole "Who should I trust" triangle is as bad as one of Zach's love triangles on Saved by the Bell. (Ha!)

The island needs to get its mojo back and start threatening and/or killing again. May I suggest "freighties meet smokey!" The smoke monster finds Charlotte, grabs her off the beach, pulls some Eko moves on her, and leave her bloodied body for all to see. Maybe then the freighties would know what they're up against and remind the losties why they want off the island. Come on island; reestablish who's really in charge. The island rules!
(This next one is long, but pretty awesome...)
I was trying to find out more about the literary character Captain Gault and ended up stumbling upon a bunch of papers presented at a conference sponsored by the British Society for the History of Science (BSHS) on science and literature in 19th-century Britain. I didn't' find out much about Captain Gault, but I did find this. It absolutely BLEW my mind. Read this description (which I've heavily clipped) of the novel "The Coming Race" and its links to Michael Faraday, Jurassic animals, and maybe even the smoke monster! If the writers did not have this novel (and especially the scientific interpretation given below) in mind when they created "Lost," then I give up! Here it is (I know it's long, but try to wade through. Everything fits!):
"The purpose of my paper is to discuss E. Bulwer-Lytton's "The Coming Race" (1871) in the context of the 'scientific bent' of Victorian Utopian fiction. Universally regarded as the first post-Darwinian prognostic utopia, it is characterized by the heavy stress on biological and social evolutionism, but also hints at a wide range of contemporary interests. Its scientific as well as pseudoscientific material includes suggestions from geology, electromagnetism, linguistics, phrenology and psychology. The subterranean world where 'the coming race' lives has a markedly oxymoronic quality, with its display of Jurassic animals and plants and its futuristic mechanical inventions. Likewise, the inhabitants combine animism and use of radioactivity. Philogenetically, however, they are several mutations ahead of ordinary mankind. Their touch provokes a sort of electric shock, of variable intensity. It can heal or kill, induce sleep, communicate thoughts, but also erase all information from the brain of the receiver. The origin of this power is a mysterious agent, Vril, that gives the name to the Utopian race, the Vril-ya. Vril is declaredly the fictional interpretation of Michael Faraday's discovery of electromagnetic induction. 'VR' is the transliteration of the Sanskrit word-root indicating the life force. It is the life principle in the Vedas, the equivalent of the Stoics' pneuma, both merged in the concept of the magnetic field. Vril is the modern version the philosophers' stone, the life principle that Bulwer-Lytton claimed Faraday had revealed. The mythical pattern of the descent into the underworld is here employed to convey a message for contemporaries and posterity. It is a strongly self-protecting message, in keeping with the Utopian fixations (all Utopian communities are exceedingly exclusive and self-protective). Will a superior race have the upper hand? The novel voices the fear of some imminent danger, a theme in Victorian scientific plots: extinction is at hand, possibly self-inflicted through the abnormal development of technology."I haven't had a chance to read any of "The Coming Race" yet, but I was really struck by the fact that the author used Michael Faraday's scientific findings/theories to construct an exclusive, self-protected Utopian society that combines the highest technology with the basest forms of spiritualism. And Vril, the mysterious agent derived from electromagnetic induction with the power both to kill and to cure? Is that the smoke monster?There is a lot of info on Wiki about VRIL, the fictionalized life force based on Michael Faraday's electromagnetic findings (mentioned in my previous post and based on the 1871 novel, "The Coming Race"). The potential connections to "Lost" are amazing: Eko's stick? Richard's youthfulness? Walt's telekinetic powers?Here are some highlights:- Vril, a latent source of energy which the spiritually elevated hosts are able to master through training of their will, to a degree which depends upon their hereditary constitution, giving them access to an extraordinary force that can be controlled at will.- The powers include the ability to heal, change, and destroy beings and things--the destructive powers in particular are awesomely powerful, allowing a few young Vril-ya children to wipe out entire cities if necessary.-Vril can be changed into the mightiest agency over all types of matter, both animate and inanimate. It can destroy like lightning or replenish life, heal, or cure.-Vril can be harnessed by use of the Vril staff or mental concentration. A Vril staff is an object in the shape of a wand or a staff which is used as a channel for Vril (to heal or destroy). The staff is about the size of a walking stick but can be lengthened or shortened according to the user's preferences.-The destructive force is so great that the fire lodged in the hollow of a rod directed by the hand of a child could cleave the strongest fortress. It is also said that if army met army and both had command of the vril-force, both sides would be annihilated.- They use Vril to take baths: It is their custom also, perhaps four times a-year when in health, to use a bath charged with vril. They consider that this fluid is a great sustainer of life; but used in excess, when in the normal state of health, rather tends to reaction and exhausted vitality.
My theory: Ben is part of the Hanso Foundataion and this all comes down to Hanso versus Widmore! The Hanso Foundataion was behind the fake wreckage. Hanso purchased Oceanic Airlines (http://www.hansoair.org/), took one of their planes, filled it with bodies, and dropped it in the Indian Ocean. (Where did they get the bodies?) They give false info / forged documents to the salvage vessel looking for the Black Rock as to its location. This did two things: First, the salvage team would be looking for the Black Rock in the wrong ocean, and second, by finding 815, no more searching in the Pacific or questions about its whereabouts. Meanwhile, Charles Widmore buys Hanso's old Black Rock log and learns the island's power and its approximate location. Whitmore hires Matthew Abbadon to find Ben and the remains of Hanso's Dharma initiative. Anyway, Penny (being part of team Widmore) is also looking for the island for all the right reasons; and her team enables the Oceanic 6 to escape. Hanso's fake wreckage story is revealed. And Charles Widmore gains control of the island and its secrets. The 6 concoct an elaborate story about being the only survivors in order to protect those that were left behind. And Ben, Syid, and team Hanso goes after the Widmore's to regain control…