The Life and Death of Jeremy Bentham
A few quick points just to get discussion going:
The title I think points to the fact that it is "Jeremy Bentham" that lives and dies in this episode. John Locke is back to being alive as we saw. And symbolically I think Bentham here primarily represents utilitarianism in contrast to John Locke's ideas about the rights of the individual. Utilitarianism's philosophy often summarized as "the greatest good fro the greatest number." And then Bentham also associated with surveillance--of which there certainly is a lot in the episode--primarily the competing surveillance of Ben & Widmore, but many of Bentham's meetings with Losties also began with his own moment of surveillance--and then the wave. Kate and Jack were both exceptions. Bentham being watched in turn by Widmore and Ben--very like the way the whole Panopticon process in which the guard is also watched.
The Utilitarian allusion might help with answering one question in the ep for me, which is--if Ben knows that Locke is going to come back to life on the island (and why else would he be carting the body around), why go to the bother of killing him? (BTW, going to love to hear his explanation of that to Locke.) Possible answer: people's lives mean nothing to Ben--they are only pawns in some greater plan (Ben is very much a utilitarian). He's playing the game, but it may not be that he's only playing in his own interest (can't just dismiss him as the "bad guy"), but to serve some higher purpose. So why kill Bentham at that moment? Two things I can think of--Ben needs Sun to come back to the island and Bentham stands in the way (Ben registered an odd look when Bentham told him of the promise to Jin). But he still needs Bentham until Bentham mentions where Hawking is--then he can get him out of the way. Plus they need a body to return to the island.
My second big question from the ep had to do with Bentham/Locke materializing in Tunisia in front of Widmore's cameras (surveillance). Just one note--thought the scapegoat allusion here was strong--Locke staked out in the dessert as sacrifice, as shunned figure/scapegoat. Then there were the goats crossing the car's path.
But the question was--this is the same spot that Ben showed up in--where the other end of the island's portal is. Widmore when talking to Bentham indicates that he's known he was coming for a long time, and therefore one would think he's had this set up for a long time looking for someone to appear. Even if not waiting for Locke--if Widmore knows this is where the island spits people out--he'd surely have surveillance set up there. So why wasn't it there when Ben appeared? Hmmm, or maybe there was surveillance but not obvious--because those guys did show up shortly after and Ben went all James Bond on them.
I didn't catch where Caesar was at the beginning--whose office? Ben's or someone else's?
Hurley looked just as he did in Charlie's dream.
Locke was kind of playing the role Rose did--sitting apart from the group--someone comes to talk and find out what's going on.
Heh, Frank's a pretty good pilot, eh?
Locke's teenage son
Screencap, Locke=Jacob?
I was looking for a screencap of Locke standing at the water's edge 'cause my impression had been that he had one shoe off and one shoe on (diddle diddle dumpling, my friend John :-), but it turned out he just had one pant leg covering the foot on one side.
But I did stumble on a screencap which looks a lot like the picture of Jacob to me:
http://www.docarzt.com/nggallery/post/lost-screencaps-promo-507-the-life-and-death-of-jeremy-bentham/page/529
A Fisher of Men
Jaz, in addition to the fine points you make above, what struck me about this episode was the lack of a logical reason why any one of the O6 should want to go back to the island. Just as Jesus said "Come follow me, I will teach you to be fishers of men" - no reason - no incentive - so does Jeremy Bentham ask the O6 to follow him. Why? To save the people on the island. "How will our going back save them?" the disbelievers ask. JB has no answer other than he was told to. That really frustrated me that Bentham couldn't come up with a more compelling reason to go back. The closest thing was to Kate: "Everyone is going to die" which as we know is not the case.
The only thing that made sense is Benthem asked the O6 to follow him on faith.
And your questions. Ben seemed to do a 180 once he learned Eloise Hawking was the conduit to finding a way back to the island. So at the time, Ben didn't know they would need Locke to get back to the island - Eloise told him later. Doesn't matter whether Locke's dead or alive, they only need the body. The key was Eloise. Then when Ben learned Faraday was Hawking's son, things made sense to Ben that Widmore went after Faraday to find a way back to the island.
Last comment: You betcha Lapidus is one damn good pilot. "We're not going to Guam, are we?" - Frank to Jack - best line of episode "316". Its always good to have someone like that on your side - and Jack knows it. So who was "the woman" that took one of the boats and ran off with Frank into the night? Sun? She's not with Jack, Hurly & Kate when they return. The flight attendant (maybe she and Frank are not so coincidentally part of the flight crew of Ajira flight 316.
And YES, YES, YES, flight 316 is so blatantly a reference to John's bible verse that its almost not to be trusted. But there he is, resurrected on the beach, remembering his decent into hell (down the well?) and then rising again - to save his people.
Interesting that only the O6 disappeared from sight in front of Caesar - not Ben - Ben crashed like a "normal" human. But why didn't Locke disappear to the 1970's with the rest of the O6? Only difference is he's dead.
So where does that leave us: Jack, Kate, Hurly, Sayid & Sun are on island in Dharma days of the 1970's. Locke & Ben are on island with ANOTHER plane wreck in...2007?
Next week should make for a VERY interesting reunion as we follow two different groups during different time periods. I can't wait to find out where Sayid and Sun landed.
christian sacrifice
stip when ben said to bentham, prior to strangling him, re hawking "yes, yes I know her" I read that as yes I know her and this is what she wants me to do to you.
with regard to bentham's pathetic attempts at persuasion capped by his only love's (kate drug this confession out of him) tombstone and abbadon's "death" and the "probability" (jack's words) that he would be taken to st. sebastian (the quintessential martyr, ie jack) hospital, its almost as if abbadon was leading him on a whirlwind tour of his personal weakness as a leader and as a psychologically crippled man (sayid: come here and do some "real good"; i.e., you john are a complete waste of time), almost like widmore/abbadon were pushing him towards suicide
id say that ben saved him from suicide
Ben, Dharma's hit man
That was a brilliant read of what Widmore/Abaddon are doing to Locke, RM--his being in the wheelchair the whole time too. And explains the interactions between Locke and Abaddon--the way Locke finds his questions upsetting.
So reading this into a story using Karma/Dharma--isn't it like Locke/Bentham as you said got a microcosm version of the Karmic errors in his life and then back to the island reincarnated to see if he can get on the true path this time? His demeanor seemed to have changed--it'll be interesting to see how he reacts to Ben. Also, did anyone catch whether he was wearing shoes?
Made me think about Ben as the island's or Dharma's enforcer (somewhat akin to Smokie?). When the island was done with Michael, Ben was the one who killed him. And this makes me think that Ben has killed Penny (and possible Charlie?), because the island isn't done with Desmond.
Oh--and a thought about Christian--there's a kind of similarity there in a man's life being a failure. He dies, his body brought to the island (plus all the exchange of footwear connecting them). I think people have suspected that Christian was murdered and the parallel with Locke would lead me to believe he was. Then I had a question--has Christian's appearance on the island been shown to be ghostly--that is intangible--at any time? Or could he be just as solid as Locke appears to be now?
I'm thinking one simple reading of the shoe symbolism is about transitioning from one life to another--journeying--that stuff I posted elsewhere about how they were thrown at ships, or are tied to cars/carriages of the newly married.
And to add on to your point about suicide--so it wouldn't be a sacrifice if he committed suicide. He has to want to live for the sacrifice to be meaningful.
When everyone is
That 70's show
I just assumed that everyone that "vanished" before Caesar went back to the 70's with Jin and everyone else on the plane crashed some other time - otherwise all of Dharma and Sawyer's gang would have seen the plane wreck and come runnin' - right?
But if Prof is right and they crashed over at the Hydra, then they would be on the other island (explains Locke looking longingly at another island in the distance) and everybody could be back in the 70's - and no one has had a chance to launch a search and investigate mission.
So scrach my post about them being in two separate time zones.
Except, Stip...
... if they were at the Hydra during the 70's, it would be a very busy place... you know... with Dharma folk. The way it's presented, it looks as though it's very old and has had some very recent light use, as when Ben and his people were using it to mess with Jack, Kate, and Sawyer three years ago.
The two groups appear to be in different time-frames to me.
Life Magazine
I found the cover of the Life Magazine from 1954 shown in the episode. http://www.coverbrowser.com/covers/life/19
I agree with you as to as to separate time periods - I just wish they had made that clearer.
I believe...
... the office was in the Hydra. Abandoned, but not so long ago. Like, oh, maybe say... three years ago? At least that's the way it appeared to me.
So, yeah... everyone who didn't "vanish" seems to be in today's time-frame.
If Sun is the woman who is with Frank, that means she didn't vanish. If she didn't vanish, it may mean her "condition" wasn't close enough to what it was when she was on flight 815. Meaning... she was pregnant on flight 815?
dum Dum DUUUUUUUUUM!
(Obviously I have NO idea what I'm talking about...)
did anybody see a notebook?
The Notebook
I did not see Dan's notebook. The blue folder Cesar scanned had the logo of the Hydra on the cover. Inside he found mostly maps, but then the camera focused on some time-space diagram that looked a lot like the blackboard and floor of the Lampost in Los Angeles, but could have been notes/extracts from Dan's journal/notebook.
Hell, for all we know the blue folder WAS Dan's.
Sun, Rose
Except that I thought Sun was being Rose this time out :-) (And Kate, Sun)--of course to expect logical consistency here would probably be a crazy dream on my part :-)
Just tangenting on Kate for a second--what was up with her in this episode? Telling Locke she doesn't care if everyone on the island dies?
Oooooo, wait...following on retro's suggestion that Widmore is leading Locke to suicide--Kate's actions make more sense if she's working for him (like telling Locke he has no one).
Alcatraz island
The Hydra - that's also what I thought.
And we didn't actually see any plane wreckage right? Could the runway the Others (and Sawyer and Kate) were building have been for Flight 316?
And Prof... stop shaping Sun's pregnancy into something it's not!! It's over man!!! : )
Dude, where's my wrecked plane?
Lapidus is probably laughing his ass off finding a runway in the jungle. Or he's on Widmore or Ben's payroll and knew it would be there... but if they landed in the 70's the runway hasn't been built yet.
I didn't see a wreckage, but Caeser and the babe Marshall did walk by a plane - I took that to be Ajira 316.
Next week should be fun.
La strangler
I think Bentham needed to be killed rather than kill himself because of what this would mean to Locke. That's really vague but the difference is that now locke has been crucified and maybe this makes a world of difference for his psyche?
Live alone, die together
retro I was thinking along the same lines - that Locke, sorry Bentham, needed to be murdered rather than suicide. There are a lot of religious overtones to the show so the idea of a mortal sin at this stage of Locke's development may be something that prevents his return. I had considered the fact that Kate, Sayid, Sawyer etc had all murdered people before arriving on the island but those sins were committed prior to their "islandlives". Since that time there have been a number of murders they have committed but they all seem to be in defense of the island so that may be an acceptable event. Suicide though may not be.
This show continues to twist my brain in directions that often make me think it's sprained. Trust me, a sprained brain hurts!
You guys slay me :-)
Great post titles!
I agree with both of you--that's an excellent answer. And weirdly, John is let off the hook of committing a sin once more--let off the hook by being murdered--yeah that's twisty. So does that mean that he or Ben is the scapegoat?
The Camus refererence just makes me think that Locke gets away with acts of "bad faith." If you can call getting murdered "getting away" with something.
Are these clues or
Are these clues or production liberties? I was thinking the other day about the obituary for Bentham and how what we now know might play into it. The obit said that the doorman heard noises and entered the room to find the body. If that was true how did Ben have enough time to clean up the room and (presumably working alone) lift Locke's body and place it in the noose? This would have taken a lot of effort and time. OF course that could be the noises the doorman heard, but that's a little too convenient.
Also his obit said that he had a teenage son (which started all the Michael speculation). This could easily have been made up as part of Locke's cover story but I'd think the police would have tracked down the next of kin if they thought there was a son surviving him. This is starting to knaw at me!