God Loved You, As He Loved Jacob

Every week we find ourselves sitting in the office on a Friday morning, wanting to work, but instead, not being able to get last nights episode of Lost out of our heads long enough to do our employer’s evil bidding.  So, we think, and we write.  Well, this week I was given a link to a video that sheds quite a bit of light on the subject (Hat Tip: J-Clizz).  Check it out.

If that evil employer of yours also blocks YouTube videos I’ll quickly give you the nut of the story.  It’s another one of those old school training videos for yet another hatch.  During this video, a rabbit is duplicated, or sent through space/time, and the scientist—who is actually outed in this video as an actor—tries to hide the two rabbits from each other, alla Back to the Future.  This—like every week this season—furthers the time travelling theory even more (Last week it was the rocket launch and its 30 minute delay). 

The really interesting part of the video is caught in the subliminal flashes [again, Hat Tip: J-Clizz].  There’s a quick flash on the screen that reads — “God loved you as Jacob.”  That’s when the epiphany, no, when the vision came to me.  It was like I was sitting in Sunday School all over again.  Abraham begot Isaac, and Isaac begot Jacob.  Remember that song gang?  Father Abraham had many sons?  I didn’t think so, you heathens. 

If you were wondering whether or not J.J. Abrams has a God complex, well wonder no more.  Guess what Father Abraham’s original name was before the interpretation from Hebrew?  That’s right Lost fans followers — Abrams.  Damn you to hell for blasphemy J.J. Abrams. 

At any rate, it gets even more interesting (or creepy, depending on your personal theology) when you do a little research on Jacob.  You see, Jacob was not only Father Abraham’s grandson.  He was not only the man that begot the 12 tribes of Israel, those who formed the bedrock of Judaism.  He was also the guy who married a couple sisters by the name of Leah and Rachel.   

Stay with me folks!  Should I sing some hymns between the sermon?  So, Leah, the woman Jacob didn’t really love all that much, was more of a consolation prize given to him after he tried to win the heart of Rachel by working for their father for the better part of a decade.  He eventually married Rachel as well, but something went terribly awry.  You see, Rachel was what you would call barren.  For those of you living in Yulee, that means she couldn’t get pregnant or give birth.

All Lost fans know that there have been two major underlying themes throughout the Lost mythology.  One being the pregnancy issues, the other being the daddy issues.  Jacob and pregnancy issues — CHECK!  Everyone on the island has either killed their dad, wants to, or wanted to.  Low and behold, Jacob also had daddy issues.  As the story goes, he wanted to get his father Isaac’s blessing, but that was reserved for Jacobs twin brother Esau, who was born seconds before his twin brother.  By the way, blessing involved who got the family money. 

So, Jacob deceived his father into thinking he was Esau, and received the blessing necessary to become a great and wealthy man.  The name Jacob came to mean to deceive after these events transpired in the bible.  Speaking of daddy issues, Jacob’s father Isaac was the child of Abraham, the same Abraham that God (his father!) instructed to sacrifice his son, Isaac.  Jacob and daddy issues — DOUBLE CHECK!

So, now that we know who Jacob is, let’s figure out how he’s involved in this whole affair on the island.  This is where it gets a little weird, so bare with me.  Jacob, a very powerful and rich man during his time on Earth, so loved his wife Rachel, that he did something drastic.  He created a secret organization (such as the Knight’s Templar) with one sole purpose — to pass down detailed instructions to each subsequent generation and aggressively work towards a solution to his “love” problem. 

He assumed that one day mankind would devise a way to travel back in time.  He also knew that Rachel’s barren womb could one day be cured as well.  Once the obstacle of traversing time and infertility were overcome, they could come back and correct what God had failed to do.  The organization has the time machine figured out, but I’m guessing are still having issues with the infertility.

I’m thinking that maybe the organization has been hijacked or infiltrated by nefarious people, intent on stopping Jacob’s one true believer, Ben, from carrying out Jacob’s task.  Either that, or Ben’s dad was part of the plan and Ben’s mom was a guinea pig and now he’s attempting to stop the organization.  Not sure which way is which.  Regardless, no more need to watch Lost since I’ve figured it all out.  Thank God that’s over.  And by God, I mean J.J. Abrams. 

*****

[Editor’s Update: Homer Nods!  Rachel eventually did have children after being barren almost her entire life.  She gave birth to two boys in her old age after Jacob cursed God for not giving him children with her (I guess it’s finally been proven that the Internet can be wrong, crazy I know).  Someone told me that Jacob fell mute for cursing God before having children.  Anyone know anything about that?   

So, thanks TWOTP for pointing that out, and the chapter in Genesis that it is found.  So, let’s look at Genesis 35:18 she’s referring to.

And when her soul was departing for pain, and death was now at hand, she called the name of her son Benoni, that is, The son of my pain: but his father called him Benjamin, that is, The son of the right hand.

So, Rachel finally gave birth to a son and then soon after gave birth to a final son, which she died giving birth to.  The name of this son?  Ben!!!!  Remember Ben’s mother?  You know, the one that died during childbirth. 

The plot thickens.]

One Day in the Life of the Bad Protagonist

Question: When will the new season seven of 24 begin? 

Well, while searching for some info on that very subject—now that the writers’ strike has ended—I came across an interesting Wall Street Journal article on torture.  And by interesting I mean apparently written by a 14-year-old or maybe a New York Times columnist (shame on you WSJ).  It tries to tie a strong correlation between the decline in the popularity of the TV show 24 and America’s decline in the popularity of the use of torture during the execution of the War On Terror. 

Before I get into the rant, I’d first like to say there is absolutely positively no correlation—not even a weak one—between these two events, and I will unequivocally prove this using the basic tenets of math and science.  I won’t spend the time working out the statistical Z-score just yet, but I will as soon as I get a free couple hours to spare.  If you’d first like to review some basic statistical concepts and definitions, checkout this stats 101 website and brush up for later.  

First of all, check out the numbers here in this graph.  The first thing you should notice (if you can read or you’re not Stevie Wonder) is the rough average number of viewers between season one and then season six.  Looks roughly like about 9 to 10 million viewers in season one and 13 to 14 million in season six (finger estimate).  I’m no genius, but that’s about a 40% increase in viewership over those two seasonal bookends.  Season six even has the average highest rated season ever for the show.  I’ll let you research what TV shows historically do around season four or five, but just trust me when I say they’d all kill for a 40% increase in viewership from season one to that point.  Hell, most just don’t want to be cancelled by their sixth season. 

Now, let’s study the season six numbers alone for a minute.  We’ll actually come up with a totally different hypothesis than the one assumed by the writer if we attempt to show a correlation between the content of the show and its viewership (which is what this bozo, who apparently never watches the show, was trying to do in the first place, only they got it backwards).  Season six—while being popular at first—shows the biggest and most consistent drop off in viewership between the first episode and last.  Almost every week it had less viewers than the week before, which had never happened in the shows history. 

Now, if this anomaly occurred in 2004 during the height of the Abu Ghraib kerfuffle, then maybe we could say it had something to do with torture, but alas, that didn’t happen.  Actually, the inverse occurred, with 24 increasing viewership by almost 2 million viewers in 2004 during that time-frame.  Season six started over two and half years after Abu Ghriab, with the second most watched episode in the shows history.  Only one other episode had been watched more before this point, and that was season five’s premiere, which by the way happened around two years after Abu Ghriab.   

During season six, and even during the “big event points” that occur on 24 about every six episodes and always midway through the season, the drop off still continues.  If you look at every other season you’ll see these spikes in viewership at these event points.  So, what happened in season six that caused 24 to consistently lose so many viewers as the season progressed?  Why did the bleeding begin and progressively get worse?  Well, I can tell you that the viewers “tired of the same old story” dropped off in season four, or at least my anecdotal data proves that to be the case.  A lot of the 24 fans I knew back then decided that Jack Bauer saving the world three times was enough.  So, why the highest rating to begin the season, followed by the bleeding? 

What happened throughout the last season when the show saw such a drop off?  Jack came back from China and decided torture wasn’t the answer, that’s what.  He also came back and second guessed killing a bad guy for moral reason.  He also decided to negotiate with an obvious Bin Laden type character who saw the “light” and wanted to sign a treaty of peace with the “American scum”, only to be killed by an American and cabinet member who wanted to continue the war.  Jack also killed one of his best friends and a true patriot, Curtis Manning, to save the life of that Bin Laden character. 

So, the only real drop off that has occurred has been during a season filled with preaching about the ills of torture and a hero bent on appeasing terrorists to the point of killing his best friend (an allegory for the American left if there ever was one).  If you want to make a show people watch, please, make Jack a hero, not a politician.  Make him a man of action and quick in decision.  No woman wants a man who can’t make a decision, and no country wants a terrorist fighter with a moral compass.  Even if what a character like Jack does is wrong, that doesn’t make it ethically wrong to tell a story about it.  He does bad things to save good people.  There are consequences for his transgressions, like his wife being killed, his daughter hating him, his father and brother turning to the dark side and trying to kill him, and everyone he knows who isn’t dead—which is most of them—hating him.  Tony Soprano anyone?  Dexter anyone?  Hamlet anyone? 

So, the next time the author of this ridiculous article decides to dig deep into extremely tough subject matter such as math, statistics, morality, or literature, I hope they just stick with what they know — which appears to be close to nothing.  I also hope the producers of 24 have learned from their season six missteps.  From the looks of the 24 season 7 preview they have, but from the new cast of characters (Janine “Air America” Garofalo???), maybe not.  Still, can’t wait to see Red Forman from That 70’s Show as a dumb ass senator.  Well, I guess there’s always that show Dexter.  The show about a man who knows how to deal with evil, no matter what the cost.

Oh, and I almost forgot — still no word on when the new season of 24 begins.  Now that didn’t take long for me to get to, now did it?

Lostbusters!

More like Mythbusters at this point.

Yeah, the Asian Ghostbuster (aka, Uncle Juniors crazy buddy in the nut house on The Sopranos) is really starting to piss me off.  Why would an organization send in a bunch of idiots who are obviously not trained tactically to apprehend/extract someone such as Ben?

Do we assume the plane wreckage is a cover up plant or real?  Not sure what to think about that.  I’m leaning towards it being a cover up and not an alternative space/time line.

I’m sticking to my guns too — the Oceanic Six must include Sawyer (“I have to get back to him Jack!”) and I’m guessing the last two will be the dog and the baby (A dingo ate my baby).  At this point, I’m only concerned and emotionally invested in the dog getting off the island alive.  Actually, they may end the whole show with the dog sitting on a cold bathroom floor, slowly dying from old age and dreaming the whole thing as he ascends ever so closer to the heavens.  It’s really the only way this will all make any sense.

Also, the polar bear in Africa leads me further to believe in the time travel theory.  We all know (according to Albert Einstein and Hiro on Heroes) that time travel includes teleportation (the bending of space and time) and experimenting with animals would be an obvious route to take during QA, UAT, regression, and acceptance testing.

Anyone seen the movie The Prestige?  I’m waiting on Lost to mention Tesla in an upcoming episode.  In real-life, Tesla believed you could wirelessly transport electricity through the earth and to anywhere on the planet.  He also thought this could maybe lead to teleporting not only data but physical objects as well (the matter cannot be destroyed theory).  Funny how he was right concerning electricity and data about 100 years early.  Maybe Darma was experimenting with these theories and stumbled across the time traveling aspects by mistake.  When this accidentally happened either the company had to clean up the time travelling mess by finding the workers LOST in time, Ben being the companies “Public Enemy Number One”. 

Still doesn’t explain why they’re sending a bunch of rookies to apprehend him.  Unless of course, they’re connected to the island.  Obviously, the dude crying in his living room over the plane being found and not knowing why would lead us to this conclusion.  That and the ghostbuster powers.  Oh, and the pilots martini making powers.

Find 815

For those of you who are big Lost fans out there (like me) that just can’t wait another 815 minutes for some quality Lost action on January 31, I present to you the Find 815 website.  Once you’re on the site, be sure to register first and start from chapter one.  The site will try to start you on the latest chapter, which you won’t notice until you’ve ruined some surprises in future chapters. 

So far, the site is just as confusing as the show, but it has its share of easter eggs and clues if you just look for them.  As an added bonus to the first 4,815,162,342 visitors, when you visit the site, J.J. Abrams personally adds a cookie to your computer that allows you to see the Cloverfield Spoiler video.  Oh wait, I was just told that it only puts more money in J.J.’s checking account.  Pity.

More to come this week on Lost and the upcoming Cloverfield (anagram?) theatrical release, so check back in soon. 

Ready to Get Lost Again?

The new Lost season begins Jan 31st and is moving to Thursday nights at 9:00pm.  I’m going to need a new DVR just for Thursday nights, damn it!  Some of the questions not yet answered are listed below, just in case you forgot details from last season, which ended approximately 4,815,162,342 short months ago.

• Question 1: Why do I watch this show?
• Question 2: No really, will you please tell me why I put myself through such things?
• Question 3: Will Hurley finally lose some of that weight after being stranded on an island for so long?  I mean come on, at least the Skipper on Gilligan’s Island started dropping some weight after a few seasons.  Granted, in real life he was dying of AIDS at the time… I kid, I kid.  It was herpes.
• Question 4:Will they kill off the latest real-life DUI character Jin-Soo Kwon?  When asked, the star was quoted as saying, “Whatever sugar tits” as he flipped off the camera.

Speaking of JJ Abrams, check out the latest on the Cloverfield pre-story by clicking here (password: jllovesth).  Not sure if you watched the first four videos yet, but interesting stuff if you can sit through the soap opera bullshit.  Watch the latest video and come back.  I’ll wait.  So, just do what your man says and freeze that shit girl!  Well, the way it’s looking, maybe she ends up being the monster after getting infected with the substance her man sent her and she refuses to freeze.  Why will it take almost a month for her to be infected?  Simple — she didn’t go ape shit until her first period hit.  “Look out, a giant menstruating woman who just had her boyfriend break up with her… RUN!!!!”

Great marketing scheme guys.  Why didn’t someone think of doing this pre-movie storyline crap before?  Oh, that’s right, no Internet.  The Internet is crawling with official subplots for the coming movie.  All kinds of Lost like company websites and stuff.  As the story goes, it looks like a Japanese company has been out in the Atlantic searching some deep sea crevasses and uncovered the monster/animal.  Or are they creating it through genetic research?  Regardless, it doesn’t get to the New York shores until 1-18-08.  I’m sure it was Greenpeace trying to just “save” the poor “innocent” creature or something.  They shutdown the power to the containment grid (just like in Ghostbusters, right?) and BAM, here comes trouble.  Yes it’s true Mr. Mayor, this man has no dick. 

Wait, screw that.  It’s not a giant mutated menstruating pissed off woman.  I did hear that the beast attempts to run ashore in Jersey, but the smell was unbearable and she decided to move North a bit (you and eight million New Yorkers my friend). 

So, here’s the story… The Japanese offshore oil drilling team searching for oil uncovered a large pocket below the sea floor.  The creature lives in oil, or on oil.  Prehistoric beast, millions of years old.  That would explain the oil tanker getting taken out on the way into Manhattan.  Wait, maybe it needs oil to survive and once the drill team depleted his cavern of his supply he decided to go find some more.  Holy shit, the U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserves in New Orleans.  This monster is after our 700 million barrels of oil reserves.  It just wants a place to sleep.  Call in the big guns… get me Dick Cheney on line one, now! 

Lost (Spoiler Alert!)

I have insider info on who will be the next character to get “killed off” on the coming season of Lost.  Remember, the past is prologue folks, and it appears J.J. has a policy — Get a DUI, get killed off.   

Lost

Well, some of the theories we’ve bounced around are officially official.  But, before we get to that I must say how much I loved this latest episode.  I hope you enjoyed it, because it’s the last until February 2008. 

I was expecting the person in the car at the end to be Locke and that it was before the crash, so both were a pleasant surprise.  After several minutes of trying to pause the DVR to read who in the hell was in the obit Jack was holding and subsequently who’s in that casket, I’ve decided that it was Walt.  Smaller casket, not a friend or family, and in a black part of town.  This would mean his father Michael is dead, or soon will be.  Who knows.  Anyone find a better screen shot of the obituary clipping?  And by anyone, I mean Tenoso.

I did notice that Jack mentioned to the doctor in the hospital that if his father was less drunk that he would quit, or something like that.  Point being, Jack’s dad is alive in the future.  So, where are we in the future?  Which future?  Or, was that in the future at all?  They didn’t do any “real” flashbacks, but what’s to say it’s not still in the past?  Maybe like we’ve said from the start that this is one of a multiple iterations of the same event???  We now know Desmond was indeed there for the deja vu event of Charlies death, further cementing the time travelling theory.  They ended another season with Desmond’s chick in the picture too.  Hmmm, I wonder where she was (or when she was)?     

 Not much more to report for a two hour season finale, at least nothing I could see.  Anyone else notice anything?  Besides the fact that they tried to use a pistol as a rifle.  IDIOTS! 

 I… Must… Sleep! 

   

FUCBS

For those of you who love the show Jericho like me, I have some good news and I have some bad news.  The good news is you’ll finally be able to devote more time to finish knitting that blanket on Wednesday nights.  The bad news is Jericho has been cancelled.  But it’s not like CBS didn’t replace it with a much better show, right?  No, it’s not one of those gay ass girlie shows like Gay Dancing With The Stars or Gays Anatomy.  They took it to a WHOLE… NUTHER… LEVEL.  Prepare to really hate TV, and not just because Three and a Half Men and a Baby is the number one comedy on the air.

They’re replacing it with the new reality TV show called Kid Nation.  Just another reason to despise reality TV with the hate that all your heart and soul can muster.  I would recommend not looking at this new shows preview unless you can afford to buy a new computer after you destroy the one you’re using now.  Look on the bright side, instead of replacing good shows like Fraiser and Seinfeld with bad chick shows like Desperate Housewives and The Ghost Whisper, they’re going to replace them with bad kid shows like this Kid Nation.  Bad reality kid shows to boot. 

It’s bad enough I have to eat diner in a restaurant with snot-nosed kids in earshot, but now I have to watch over-privileged kids crying on TV?  At least Michael Jackson will be happy this fall.  The DVR and lube dispenser in his living room will be broken by November.  Oh and don’t worry, that great shit-fest that is CSI: Miami is coming back next season.  R.I.P. Jericho.  FUCBS!

The Mad Hater

Yes, that would be me, the Mad Hater.  I know, I know, don’t hate the player, hate the game… or in this case, don’t hate the Charlie, hate the show.  Brad came up with the Alice in Wonderland references which scares me since we never took notice.  Apparently we need to all take his lead from now on and start getting stoned before each show. 

Actually, that may seriously help us understand Lost a lot more.  Sorry, I do not have time to read Alice in Wonderland today at work; believe it or not I do have some work to do and can’t read an entire novel at my desk.  So, I did the next best thing – I watched the Don’t Come Around Here No More video by Tom Petty.

Talk about answering all your Lost questions.  Too bad Mother Merrill blocks it.  It’s so beautiful.  The answers are like a light with Jesus waiting at the other side with a really big bright flashlight.  Walk towards the light Carol Ann.  Oddly enough, the video also answered a lot of the Grey’s Anatomy questions too.  You ML guys will have to do lunch at the Mellow Mushroom today and report back anything new you may come up with from the walls there.  I say we all go to Brad’s tonight and watch this video and Lost with a little more help from the MarlBRO 100’s.

Okay, all joking aside; the only thing I can come up with is the 10/6 on the Mad Hatter’s hat.  I was never good with fractions or even addition for that matter, but according to the crappy calculator on my PC, it comes to 1.66666667.  Think about it, when you combine this with “the” numbers and if we were really really really really really really stoned we’d know what that means too.  

Okay, just kidding.  For real this time, no more jokes, I promise.  The Looking Glass station is very intriguing, besides the fact that it’s full of hot gun totting chicks as Don Juan Tenoso pointed out.  I too cannot figure out why they wouldn’t have blown the cable on like day one, or why the others didn’t feel the need to hide it a bit more than with a few grains of sand, or how the cable went from a mile or two down the beachto right on top of them where even Hurley can walk to it with some breath left in him.  Again, I did not watch the previews for next week so I have no idea what to expect and may be speaking out of my Dickies, but I would assume the image Desmond saw with the station full of water and “You’re Going To Die” Charlie being dead will still happen.  The question is this, if Desmond is experiencing deja vu from time travel, and not just a vision, then shouldn’t he have to be there to see it?  Maybe he is?  I have a sneaky feeling we’re not getting anymore from the Looking Glass this season.  If this show ends with a retarded kid shaking a snow globe, I swear to the beard of Zeus,I will track this JJ Abrams down like the dog that he is and throw him on a deserted island… forever!  Who’s with me?   

And don’t forget about the little dictator Ben and his daughter.  She mentioned that he was in fact not his daughter.  So, I’m guessing we’re going to soon find out that Jack’s Dad was “away” from home about 25 years ago and maybe helping Team Darma.  If I was Kate, I’d stop doing anybody except maybe Jin and Sayid, because it appears everyone is related on this island.  No wonder the babies die.  Besides that, not much more to report on Lost this week.  Except the greatest moment EVER in the history of the show.  That’s right, the islands hottest and most favoritist interracial couple is back!  As soon as I saw them I knew Tenoso and Brad were so happy that they wanted to dig up the diamond thieves, hang them by their feet in a tree, and hit them with Eko’s stick until candy came out for all the kids to eat.  Speaking of that, am I the only one wondering why they’re not eating people after they die?  Seems like a waste of perfectly good meat to me.  Okay, I seriously need to shut up and get back to work.  A good psychiatric evaluation wouldn’t hurt either.             

   

Ben Caught Stealing

LOST 

Maybe Ben is the one “infecting” the women on the island before they get pregnant????  This is why the ones already pregnant make it full term.  He brings in all of these doctors to research and cure whatever was ailing his mother, using everyone on the island to experiment on for all his guinea pig needs.  Once he’s discovered the cure he can… wait for it, here it comes… you know what I’m going to say people… that’s right – travel back in time and save his mother at his own birth. 

You knew I had to cling to the time travelling theory folks… that’s my baby (there, there, little one; here’s a bottle). 

Was it me, or did the dude with the black hair (from soap operas I think) in the jungle look the same age 40 years ago with little Ben?  Was that just bad film making, or was he not aging?  I have a feeling the hostiles were the ones doing the time travelling, not the Darma hippie freaks.  It appears they were just a bunch of cult members maybe.  I know, the fence seems pretty technicial for a group of stoners, but what if that fence wasn’t there to keep out the hostiles but rather to keep in the Darma folks.  We know Ben’s mother was coming to him in the middle of the night and maybe was the one who gave him the passcode to the fence.  Okay, I’m rambling for sure now.  

Ben also requires anyone he trusts enough to let into his circle of (cult) friends to kill their fathers.  Maybe because he hates his father so much that he’s just a d|ck like that, but more likely it’s that the fathers have proven to be fertile enough to reproduce by the simple fact of siring a child.  This may introduce something into the control group of the experiment that is not acceptable.  We know the ole kung-fu master is shooting blanks, but what about the rest of the island?  Any of them have kids?  Micheal has Walt, but they were promptly asked to leave the island more or less.  Ben certainly couldn’t have a fertile brother roaming the island full of hot white chicks (oh we, oh we, oh).  Any other dudes sowing their seeds of love yet?  We all know if this was a real world situation they’d be having a nightly beach orgy, and I’m assuming Kate hasn’t filled her birth control pills at the local island Walgreens on the corner of coconut tree and sand dune.

Oh crap, here comes my boss!!!!