The Bernard part is the easiest - Sawyer mentions his name in the present tense. Presumably Rose is with him. They're not the most major characters on the show, but I was glad.
As for Desmond, he does apparently have the capacity to see the future - imperfectly, in part because his very knowledge of the future causes him to behave in ways he might not have (to either make that future happen, or prevent it), and this in turn can change the future. This puts Demond in the company of a long line of visionaries in science fiction and other genres, my favorite of whom is Paul Muad'dib from Frank Herbert's Dune.
There has been a lot of speculation that Desmond not only sees the future in his mind, but travels to and from it - as in time travel. No evidence of that tonight, but I guess it's still a possibility.
Desmond did prove that he's more than just single-mindedly selfish tonight, by not letting Charlie die to help fulfill his vision, and in that unselfish act he joins Sawyer and others who seem to be behaving a bit better on the island than in their earlier lives.
But the woman who falls from the sky, the woman Desmond has worked so hard to get to the island, turns out ... not to be Penny, though she does say Desmond's name.
Is this because Desmond saved Charlie, and thereby changed the ingredients necessary to insure Penny's delivery? Or was Penny never supposed to get to the island in the first place, and it was Desmond's wishful thinking that was blurry all along?
Enjoyable questions - and I'd still like to know how that coincidence of Jack running into Desmond in the stadium came about...
Useful links:
The Enjoyable Trouble with Time Travel my blog post
listen to 3-min free podcast of this review at Levinson news clips
Dune David Lynch's movie of Frank Herbert's novel
The Plot to Save Socrates
"a Da Vinci-esque thriller" - New York Daily News
"Sierra Waters is sexy as hell" - curled up with a good book
5 comments:
We can positively say Desmond's actions in this episode affected the outcome of his predictions based on the physical evidence in the latest episode of Lost.
The shoes of the "Woman Who Fell from the Sky" were different in the vision and the reality (both words used loosely). The producers even point to this distinction in a shot which displays them closely.
It probably would have been Penny, but Desmond saved Charlie.
Good point about the shoes, roshan.
I think the most metaphysically satisfying explanation is indeed as you put it - the woman from the sky would have been Penny, had Desmond stayed true to his vision, and not saved Charlie.
Of course, this then leads to the question of what kind of powers Desmond has. For the above explanation to work, we have to assume that Desmond has the power to create the future, as he goes along, based on his visions.
And with Charlie saved, the emotion energy and tableau of that moment changed, thereby changing Desmond's power - or making it incapable of getting what he wanted.
What other explanation could there be?
Hello Paul,
I'm linking in via your reply comment on Technorati and I am so glad I stopped by.
Nicely written recap on last week's episode... I wish I knew the answers to your questions. I lean toward the theory that the outcome of Desmond's visions were somehow altered by his choice to save Charlie.
Looking forward to the final episodes (but not looking forward to the long hiatus until next season)!
jenn - great to have you here - you have an excellent blog!
yeah, I certainly the Desmond-altered-the-future explanation the most ... it would also be consistent with some of the other incredible occurrences on the island to have someone with that kind of power on hand...
The hiatus will be tough - but I'm guessing we'll be able to talk about the ending of this season all through the summer...
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