Lost Favorites - Walkabout

Walkabout is my favorite episode of Lost, and while it lacks the structural
daring of The Constant, the epic scope of The Shape of Things to Come,
 or the insightful moral inquiry of One of Them, it more then makes up for it
 in it's devastating evocation of a life wasted and regained.
Walkabout was only the forth  episode it what then amounted to a entertaining
series which had it's share  of promise and a few great scenes like the JJ Abrams
directed pilot opening scene. But in Walkabout the creators revealed it's dramatic
ambitions to be far larger then those initial episodes would have led viewers to
believe.  While the show later managed to achieve  similar emotional gravitas as
 in the above mentioned works and others, none quite opened up the mystery and
potential of the island itself, or the possibility that all of it's current
 inhabitants were broken emotionally and in Lockes case physically.

It's the first John Locke episode, a character considered by many to be the series
finest (although Desmond and Ben have rights on that spot) one whose episodes would
 continue to portray a tragic spiral of missed moments and failed occasions(from
Lock down, The Man from Tallahassee to The Life and Death of Jeremy Bentham to this
 season's The Substitute)  a life left unfulfilled even for the temporary reprieve
offered in those 4 months on the island. Locke is the shows most compelling symbol
of it's fate vs free will push and pull, and here the source of his own faith comes
not in the form of a pure WTF twist but a transcendent reveal of suffering,  grace
and the will to push forward to whatever destiny had laid out. while Terry O Quin
had certainly created an interesting character in those initial episodes, here he
gave great weight with each reveal as to his circumstance. Each flashback becomes
more devastating then the next, ending on inter-cutting of 3 moments in time where
director Jack Bender uses the Lost  flashback format to create scenes which chart
 the depths of human despair to the instance where a man and group decided to press
 on in the face of the unknown.

Of course an episode of Lost is ultimately as good as it's sub plots, and
the one involving the burning of  the plane wreckage complements the A story's
theme of rebirth/ starting over, the conversation with Rose and Jack which revolves
 largely around a characters need to be tied to her faith and not the grim realities
 and in a haunting touch Jack seeing the body of his deceased father Christian
 (although we don't know the significance for him at the time), all points which
underlying how far they may be from their real lives their damages
selves will always reflect the sad realities of who they were(and ultimately will be).

Walkabout in it's on island action charts the ambiguity of the mysterious
character of John Locke who is at once stoic and resourceful, yet other times
helpless and emotionally frustrated. When he comes face to face with the smoke
monster, Locke feels he has been graced with the true spirit  of the island and
in retrospect after the events of Season 5 this encounter becomes more sad  and
tragic. Locke was the islands greatest patsy, and the unknowing agent of what may turn
 out to be it's greatest threat, and while  throughout the series we had a powerful idea
 of how destructive his belief in his destiny could be, it was made compelling and
understandable  by this extraordinary glimpse into a middle aged man's temporary realization of self.

Favorite Lost Episodes 10-6

In honor of the sixth and final season of Lost, I'll be listing off my ten favorite Lost episodes starting with 10-6

Confirmed Dead - Season 4's second episode immediately put an infusion of new blood into the on island action with four new players, with three actually being notable. Unstable physicist Daniel Faraday(that great American eccentric Jeremy Davies) physic Miles(Ken Leung becoming the shows most effective procurer of sarcasm) and that old grizzly bear pilot Frank Lapidus (played by the criminally underrated Jeff Fahey) Not only does this episode give a greater idea of how the rest of the world reacted(and were misled) to Oceanic 815, we get fascinating teases on why the boats crew is really there.

The Man From Tallahassee - One of the best John Locke episodes revolves largely around the great interplay between Locke and Ben Linus as both duel with each other(which was the focal point of other strong Locke based ep's like Lockdown and Cabin Fever), with Linus outsmarting Locke by episodes end to his purpose. But it's the flashback where we learned the cause of Locke's paralysis and it was much worse then the viewer could ever have guessed, further securing Locke as one of the great tragic characters in tv history.

One of Them - It was a toss between this and The Economist as the best Sayid episode (and therefore one of the series best), but while The Economist has a truly awesome flashfoward story, One of Them, is one of the best episodes of Lost in showing how morality on this island (as in real life) is completely relative. It's filled with the great mysteries that were only answered until later in the series such as Rousseau's knowledge of Ben (here Henry Gale) and of course the introduction of Linus himself whose pleas of innocence become more fascinating in retrospect given what we later know of his character (and Emerson nailed it out of the park from the first).

LaFleur - The episode where Sawyer truly became the James Ford (or in this case Jim LaFleur) that should have been had the tragic event of 1976 not come to pass. The
episode jumps from 1974 to 77 showing how Ford, Juliet, Miles, Jin and Daniel hooked up with the Dharma Initiative. The inter cutting compellingly shows how deeply this band of time travelers have become involved with the island community. It's Lost at it's communal loving best (something the show hadn't been as strong on since the first season), as well as introducing what arguably became Lost's best romance between James and Juliet (ok after Desmond and Penny), but also providing one of those classic Lost reunions at episodes end which hit the right amount of sentiment and classic romanticism.

Flashes Before Your Eyes - If isn't wasn't for the season 4 masterpiece The Constant this would be Desmond's best episode, still Flashes is probably just as representative, not only to the special place Desmond has in the Lost universe, but also to that classic Lost theme of freewill vs fate and provided the series with it's first major dip into the time travel waters it would consistently wade in. It also provides a deeper look at both Charles Widmore and an introduction to Eloise Hawking who would play a much larger role by the fifth season. But as much as anything it's the Desmond and Penny relationship that resonates above all else, providing the series with it's true heart and soul.