LOSTCasts 36: A Tale of Two Cities

Season 3 has begun, and so have the podcasts! In this first podcast for season 3, we discuss the season 3 premiere of LOST, A Tale of Two Cities. We discuss how this first episode stacks up to previous seasons, as well as some of the pressures on the creators, including the ratings that this first episode of LOST has garnered. In addition, we talk about what we've learned of the others, and discuss the different situations of Jack, Sawyer and Kate. We also explore some of the larger issues of different groups on the island, and speculations about what may happen next. As always, we finish off the podcast with some spoilers, and information about next week's episode.

Download podcast #36 here

Links related to the podcast:
Transcript - A Tale of Two Cities
Screen capture: Black Smoke?
Screen capture: Carrie
Wikipedia entry - Carrie
Screen capture: Othersville
Great map from listener "I Love Sayid"
Screen capture: Jack's crossword
Screen capture: Hydra logo on pipe
Screen capture: Closeup of Hydra logo
Wikipedia entry: Hydra (mythological)
Wikipedia entry: Hydra (organism)

LOST links:
Official LOST wiki
Official LOST Theories Forum
NY Times article on LOST
Official LOST video podcast

Join us next week... a new episode, and a new podcast!

Stay LOST.

Comments

[matt beale]

Thanks! can now put my feet up and enjoy my Sunday night !

Can't wait to listen to this one... Here's to a great Season 3!

[Art_Vandelei]

This are my thoughts about the episode. they are a little late, cause the podcast is already there, but I still want to share them, if they havn't been said already.
HI, here are a few things:
1. The opening song for this season premiere is not the same from the season 2 opening. It just sounds similar, in the same style.
2. Great episode!!
3. I've thought a lot about the recruiting theory.I really think the following two weeks that Tom mentions to kate are some kind of an insertion process, a recruitong process. I wouldn't discard sawyer and kate as candidates, just because they are not with jack. We must consider that th others have a lot of info on the three of them, so If I were them, and was trying to get them because they are for some reason "the good ones", i wouldn't necessearyly use the same approach. They are different and will respond to different things. Also the fact that sawyer and kate are just a few steps from each other, it doesn't mean the wil be under the same psicolgical process.

What do u guys think??

[rubycalaber]

May I just say that Lostpedia is far better than the official Lost wiki?

[Nash Borges]

Could someone put the "I Love Sayid" map on a different server? It's exceeded the bandwidth limit of freefileupload.net.

[connor clements]

Siobhan - Pronounced "shiv + awn"

Great podcast!

[I_Love_Sayid]

Hey all, glad you liked the map. I just redesigned it using a better program and will get it up onto the web later today. Sorry it was in such a crappy format but I had to get the thoughts out as quickly as I could so I could get feedback. :)

[Joop]

Ben is a bad bad man. There seems to be a real cult like atmosphere w/in othersville; evidenced by the cool-aid drinking Adam and the comment by Juliet, "I thought there was still free will on the ...."

I like the idea about the numbers being a big part of the plot. In the Sri Lanka video Alvar Hanzo talks about the vanzetti equation saving the world. Middlework says the Darma Inititive failed. Why?

I think a religious cult formed by some mad scientist, either Ben or the "great one" that Zeke and Henry,Fenry, Benry refer to. This cult may be as wide spread as keeping Alvar Hanzo prisoner in his own home.

There are way to many instances of the numbers appearing in seasons one and two that lead me to agree that the numbers are huge. the numbers are back and there pissed!

P.S. Am I high or is that Miss Clue at the book club meeting?

[Scott]

great podcast!! thanks for including my comment!

thought you all might want to know.... DESMOND IS JESUS!!!

check out his movie...
www.gospelofjohnthefilm.com

[AVDJ]

You guys have done it again! Nice work, as always. It was great to have your book club podcasts over the summer, but I have to admit that I am very happy that we are talking about actual episodes again.

I wonder about this hydra hatch. I think they are all in the same hatch area, since it is Juliette who catches Sawyer, unless we do not realize that we are being shown information out of chronological order. That would not be inconceivable with LOST.

I am not sure if the going thoery is that the smoke monster travles through the subterrainian conduit, but I had a few ideas about the monster. It seems like those who get a specific visitation from the smoke monster start to have visions for a while, and maybe they are under the spell of the smoke. I think it has "visited" the following people in this order:

Jack - in the first shot of the show (then saw his father)
Locke - in the woods (then saw the small plane crash)
Hurley - in the season 1 finale (then saw Dave)
Kate - in the season 1 finale (then saw the Horse)
Echo - in the clearing with Charlie (then saw postmordum Anna Lucia)
Charlie - in the clearing with Echo (then saw the Virgin Mary and child visions)

Maybe the smoke monster causes a temporary loss of control for those who it visits, and they are unwittingly forced to follow a path that they otherwise would not have followed. I am sure someone else out there has thought about this. Has anyone else on the island had a visitation?

Also, it is always nice to see your expansions of your project, such as the alternate web pages you have set up, and the skypecast and the special appearences of our friends from other podcasts. In the end, I consider your show to be the definative source for all things LOST. Thanks.

[Sobaika]

Random note - it was said in the podcast that the food drops were still going on bcause the numbers were still being broadcast. I may be wrong, but I had gathered from the Lost Experience video and the show that the numbers used to be broadcast but Rousseau had changed it to her French SOS. She told Hurley the numbers were on a loop before she got there. It was a good theory, but I'm thinking that the food isn't still arriving because of the numbers.

[I_Love_Sayid]

Here's the new link to the map from yesterday. Tell me what you all think...and sorry in advance for any spelling errors and such.

http://www.geocities.com/colwildr/OthersvilleMap.html

[adam!]

for lack of anything better to do as i wait for my dial-up to download the latest LOSTcast, i tried to draw (yet another) version of the ISLAND MAP, based on a lot of screencaps and other fan-made maps, with only ONE MAJOR INCONSISTENCY (so far), but pretty much everything else is taken into account (and no, the "?" isn't there, as i think the "?" in the HATCH MAP is more pyschogeographical than cartographical, which is what the map i drew represents).

link for the map image -> http://static.flickr.com/92/264413070_d3709a3431_b.jpg

link for map image annotations (must have flickr account to annotate) -> http://flickr.com/photos/adamdavid/264413070/

comments, please, comments!

[adam!]

and, erm, in the map, when i said "MOUTH OF ISLAND VALLEY where majority of seasons 2 & 3 took place" i meant "seasons 1 & 2"!

[ursinha]

I think the other set of others (others2) is going to in someway help jack, kate, and sawyer escape thus introducing "the brazilian tom cruise." the others2 will bring in their own mysteries, etc. i can't think of any other way it will happen. the writers need to bring the others2 in, preserve the mystique of the original others, and get the losties out of the jam.

alright, alright, alright...light 'em up. this is my fav. line in all of the episodes. stay lost!

[jack+sayid=durtyislandluv]

Another great podcast.

I would totally love a php board or something on the site.

I'm over at the numbers now, but a board here would be more hardcore.

[Sarah]

Hey, great podcast! But yall had said that we won't find out who the father of Sun's baby is until the season finale. I read in a TV Guide magazine that the actor who plays Sun says we won't find that out until the show finale. It could be wrong because that same magazine said the October 11 episode is Locke-centric and features "a trippy dream sequence" so it could've been wrong... Has anybody else heard anything about that?

Sarah

P.S. Thanks for playing my comment! It was quite an experience to hear myself on there haha

[Matt Lafferty]

John, Robert, and Matt,
An honor and a privelidge to be mentioned in the podcast. Chattin' away on the comments section with the other fine posters is a reward in and of itself, but as always to be mentioned is a treat!

@ I Love Sayid,
Fantastic redesign of your map! I'm proud to have been mentioned in your awesome undertaking. The really interesting thing about your map is that it is so incredibly consistent; all the facts that you mention (including those of riverfr0zen) fit snugly into it--except for one thing, and I think I can explain that:

Your location of the Hydra is where the blast door map puts The Flame. Isn't it reasonable that the mapmakers could have misunderstood the Hydra symbol to be a flame? After all, the blast door map does say "ALLEGED location of the Flame." (I know from previous comments that the Hydra location might be best suited where you have it due to the reference to the "heavy water table, and I agree; I'll just point out though that an alternative locaton for the Hydra could be, possibly, the scratched out location, which your map has as Sc.)

Again, a fantastic job on your thought-provoking map!!

Adam,
I'm still pouring over YOUR map (goodness, I'm glad I teach social studies in addition to language arts, 'cause this map stuff is great!)! It too looks to be amazingly consistent, and I love that you've annotated WHY you put certain things where you did. I notice that the shape of your map isnt in the tidy Dharma shape, but I'm reminded of a listener comment on here that perhaps the blast door map is like a subway map--not a to-scale representation, but more of an overall visual representation.

I see that you put the Hydra to be northeast, or abouts where "C3?" is on the blast door map, so that would work too. Also, your inclusion of the "fake hatch" from the season 2 finale makes me wonder if it might be the scratched out hatch on the blast door (though, granted, the blast door has it on the opposite side of the Arrow from where you have it. But hey, at a certain point, the makers of the blast door map in the show, the creators version of the map somewhere, filming inconsistencies, etc, will lead to SOME errors that we need to be prepared to discard).

Anywho, I love these map discussions! Stay Lost!

[I_Love_Sayid]

@adam!
love your map...the graphics alone are great. I especially like where you have Danielle's Season 1 hideout. It makes alot of sense considering Sayid's orientation while traveling along the beach to her camp. I am hesitant to agree fully due to the confusion surrounding the treck to it from the Swan... On the way to it Sayid was captured and knocked out and on his way back he was disoriented. The Hurly led team followed a path fashioned with a rope bridge that Sayid felt "was there before", then they were chased to and fro by the monster and gun fire. lot's of confusion. But still, that location sounds right to me. Also, I'm very curios as to how you came up with Desmond's sailing path.

@matt
Thanks for the acknowledgement. Having your backing means alot. I tend to think your the rock god around here. Also, I agree that the Flame Station could've been a red herring. That's why I didn't hesitate to forget it and rename the station the Hydra. I also think that if the scribbled out station was the Hydra, then the Tailies would've come across the outer structures (large pipes and cages, etc). So would've Danielle. That's why I prefer to think as adam! does, that her camp resides on the other side of the island. Of course, this is only on the assumption that the Tailies crash site is where I assume it is.

[adam!]

@john k, robert s: just finished listening to the podcast, and your script rereading reminded me of the David Letterman segment that had a couple of his stagehands rereading highlights from Oprah Winfrey transcripts! you should do these things more often (although not too often!).

ethan down juliet's house "fixing the plumbing" sounds sexual to me more than anything else. maybe a subtle three-step joke, like ARRESTED DEVELOPMENT's "i don't want this boat to smell like fish!" SEAWARD yacht joke?

@matt l: what you said about the numbers being some magical construct reminded me of some of Alan Moore's (and most of Philip Dick's and Grant Morrison's, and Douglas Rushkoff's) "comic books as sigils" meant to hack reality, magic being "strings of information" a magician manipulates to bend reality, very much like Neo's "code-vision" in the Matrix movies. thinking obtusely along this vein, one could conclude that practitioners of hard maths and science (ie, the DHARMA scientists) can effectively be called "magicians", and the LOST number string as a sigil released throughout the world (like the hindu OM mantra) to call other like-minded individuals to it (the island, the research) and/or to hack reality, to lift the veil of illusion and see the world for the hologram that it is (a la WAKING LIFE).

i think DHARMA used to see the answer to the numbers problem via the De Groots' (and Alvar Hanso's) life enhancement of the entire human race, mimicking WATCHMEN's Adrian Veidt mimicking Alexander the Great untying the Gordian Knot, answering the human extinction problem laterally by helping evolve humans so high up the ladder that nature would deem them a new species, post-humans, and maybe not kill everyone out. DHARMA scientists as bodhisattvas? extremely likely, considering everything else we've seen in the De Groots' home videos.

but now, with Mittelwerk taking over the Hanso Foundation and the DHARMA Initiative, being (for me, at least) more on the western business mindset than in the eastern mystical mindset, strives to laterally answer the human extinction problem at the direct opposite of the De Groots' bodhisattva route: exterminate 30% of the world population, thus destroying the balance/value of the Valenzetti Equation's sequence (i have the impression that the numbers' values' escalating nature indicates a technological singularity spike of sorts somewhere in the horizon, only with population growth, so maybe LOST is about the End Of Days?).

fuzzy chaos math (and superstring sciences) being today's (and tomorrow's) magic, population growth planetary choke being today's (and tomorrow's) End Of Days... very possible!

@matt, again, and i love sayid (i do too, heterosexually): the LOST island being bagua-shaped is too... unnatural... to be possible. LOST takes great pains in showing us (the Black Rock, the Four-Toed Statue Foot) that even if it had DHARMA putting up installations around the island, they didn't effectively terraform it (to shape it into an octagon). i now see Locke's hatch map being more pyschogeographical (read up on Iain Sinclair and Alan Moore and Stewart Home in wiki, and various, regarding pyschogeography) than literal cartography.

i placed the hatches around the map where i thought they would be based on how (and where) the characters moved in the island, in relation to the main beach and the SWAN hatch, and from what elementary knowledge i have of cartography. for example, i (sort of assume, really) know that the STAFF was carved into a mountain face facing into the main island valley north of the SWAN, so i placed the STAFF along the eastern (inner valley) face of the mountain range west of the island.

i put the PALA FERRY where i think i see OTHERSVILLE (and the crater) should be (inside the northern crater) because logically people would build their encampments near/along waterways, and logically put the main pier near the established trade routes (mentioned by Arzt as being majorly northern (also Sayid mentioning to Jin & Sun that they'd be yachtrocking towards the northern tip of the island)), thus PALA FERRY being in the northern tip.

i placed ROUSSEAU's CAMP near the craggy eastern mountain face exactly because of the hazy daisy nature of Sayid's recollection of the trek, encountering the bridge where they did, Sayid's reaction to it, and just the absence of big jungle trees (and Rousseau being stragetically-minded) told me that ROUSSEAU's CAMP would logically be along a mountain range, a few miles above sea level, between cliffs and crags and whatnot.

also, DESMOND'S YACHT'S trajectory was more informed by what he said in the two-part season finale (traveling north to the fiji islands) and the Island being largely magnetic always attracting DESMOND's compass' NORTH back towards it would mean him travelling along a half-circle towards the southern tip of the Island, to where our LOSTies are. the western trajectory was arbitrary, more out of the Left-to-Right readability than anything scientific (or nautical). and i put the yacht in a cove along the island's east coast because *SPOILER!!* (as far as next episode's previews are concerned) the Others seem to be clueless about where Sayid (et al) managed to comandeer a yacht, meaning Ben (and others) had no idea about DESMOND'S YACHT stashed away somewhere in the Island, and logically, that means that KELVIN (and later DESMOND) docked it where the Others wouldn't be able to see it or find it accidentally (unless of course they look for it).

wow. LOST map geek overload!

[adam!]

re: DESMOND'S YACHT TRAJECTORY, now that i think about it, it'd logically do the NW-W-SW-S route because as DESMOND sailed towards the NORTHEAST (where i believe the FIJI ISLANDS are in relation to the Island (pull out a world atlas and see), he kept the Island SOUTHWEST of the boat.

if the strong magnetic field did attract DESMOND'S COMPASS (and i believe it did), that would mean that the COMPASS ALWAYS POINTED TOWARDS THE ISLAND, FIRST GRADUALLY SOUTHWEST OF THE BOAT, THE NEEDLE MOVING SLOWLY TOWARDS THE EAST WHEN THE BOAT PASSES THE NORTHWEST TIP, AND THEN NORTH AGAIN WHEN THE BOAT REACHES THE SOUTHERN BEACH, which would lead DESMOND to go around in a half-circle WEST of the Island.

[Nilesh]

I live in Switzerland and thus cannot see the episode on the ABC website. This time, even with the proxy, the website managed to keep me out. Anyone outside USA succeded in watching the episode?

I heard the podcast and saw the screencaps... Just wondering... Is it possible that this really isn't an island? but extension of the South American continent? The landscape looks a bit Amazonian and the place is huuuuge. Food for thought? Let me know what you think.

Cheers

[James Wicks]

A couple of comments for you guys

1) Siobhan is pronounced Shiv-orn

2) You discussed the food drops, in the Lost experience Alvar Hanso said that they would continue "in perpetuity" which means forever. Whether that means even after Dharma may be defunct or not, I guess we don't know, but my feeling was that they'd made arrangements for it to happen no matter what.

Great pocast this week, much MUCH better than the Skypecast! :)

James

[Tom Molyneux]

Ok, I have just come up with a thought! (which if you knew me you would know thats not normal)

right so from what i have gathered from watching Lost is that when the Others capture someone they experiment with them, such as Walt, Jack, Kate, Mike and so on.

soooo what the hell happened with Charlie when Ethin took him in season 1??

Why hang Charlie but test and kidnap everyone else they see?

I need answers, i know it sounds silly bt i cant stop thinking about it

[Vaibhav]

Guys,
One absolutely great theory... that the Others/DHARMA/Hanso are actually fighting a natural phenomenon and the phenonmenon is trying to balance itself out by throwing in the castaways.... absolutely brilliant!

Kinda dissapointed with some of the overanalysis here and there... too much "Maybe this or maybe not this"...
Just my own taste, but I'd say if something is based on too many unknowns (which are themselves based on other unknowns) at the time, just mention it for future reference and move along to stuff that can be discussed using known facts...

I realise everything is suspect in Lost so "facts" may turn out to be fake... but i'd say go with the most reasonable /simple theory for an occurence rather than questioning everything!

ref: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occam's_razor

Just my tastes.. upto u chaps!

[Mark B]

One thing about Sarah leaving Jack for someone else. Which I don't think is central to the Lost story in anyway just a bit of character backstory building material for Jack.

Could it be that she left Jack and went back to the man she was going to marry just before Jack met her ?

Clearly she married Jack not out of love but some kind of misplaced devotion to the man who made her walk again. There is some syndrome name for when this happens but I forget, (like Stockholm syndrome for captives who end up associating with kidnappers -- insert thoughts on Jack and Juliet here), perhaps it's called Nightingale syndrome ? After a few years of living with Jack Sarah realised she didn't love him so left. There may be no-one else involved.