Lost Some More - Courtesy of Doc Jensen

Click here for a nice little interview conducted by Doc Jensen of Entertainment Weekly with Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse - the driving force behind my one and only true obsession, also known as Lost. In the interview they discuss the first couple episodes of the current season and also where the show is headed. There are no spoilers and a few nice teases. Looks like we will find out who is in the coffin this season. It is also nice to know that they are trying to avoid time paradoxes (such as those found in Heroes) and working under the premise that the future isn't going to change. It makes it much more feasible to invest my time in energy into the storyline that produces a completely wrecked Jack knowing that the "rug won't be pulled out from under my feet" at the last moment.

My favorite part of the interview was where they discussed the theme of this season:

DOC JENSEN: How would you describe the general structure of the season?

CARLTON CUSE: This year, it's all about the castaways' relationship to the Freighter folk. Since day one, their goal has been to get off the Island. Now our heroes will find themselves defending the very island they wanted to leave. The future hints at the fact that these folks have a deeper connection to the Island than they themselves realized.

DAMON LINDELOF: The big mystery looming over this season is, how did some people get off the Island and what happened to the people who didn't? That's the mystery that we owe the answer to at the end of the season, in addition to who's in the coffin. We could be winky about the coffin all the way through season 5. But that was one of the first things we talked about when we got back to work on the new episodes: We definitely have to show who was in the coffin. That's the primary super-structure of the season. As a result of that, certain thematic elements — the element of fate or supernatural elements as they relate to the monster and Jacob — are certainly in play but not as interesting to us this season as these questions: Why do some of the characters leave? How do they leave? What are the circumstances under which they leave? Why do some stay? Is it a choice? Is it an accident? Both?

CUSE: There are larger cosmic questions involved in that. Daniel Faraday's rocket experiment in the Sayid episode, which established a time differential on the Island, was a very important scene in that it sets the table for things that come into play in the future of the show. We've learned a lot about our characters' relationship to the Island, but now we're going to learn their relationship to the outside world once they've been on the Island. This is an important new idea to the show.

The idea of why some of the characters leave and why some stay really appeals to me. Did they choose? Is it fate? I really love the whole man of faith vs. man of science theme of the show and this plays into that excellently. Why do we make the choices we do? Do we really have agency or are we all subject to "fate"? Simply the perfect premise for me to get wrapped up in.