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Lost
Flashes Before Your Eyes
Airdate: 02.14.2007

If we’re to believe the axioms of mainstream entertainment, then the good guy always comes out on top, the bad guy is always punished, and you only get one shot in life, so live it up. That is, of course, unless your last name is McFly and you’re best friends with Doc Brown.

Whatever. The point is, it’s uncommon that anyone is ever given a second chance to undo mistakes they’ve already made, but in “Flashes Before Your Eyes,” our man Desmond is given just that. The stinging irony is that despite his second shot at making things right with his beloved Penelope, he willingly repeats his previous mistakes for the greater good of humankind.

So it seems that Desmond is becoming the Lost equivalent of Odysseus, forever lost at sea (in this case the island), and eternally pining after his long lost love. But is that all there is to everyone’s beloved Scotsman?

Unlike the Homeric hero, Desmond is plagued with premonitions, or flashes as he calls them. These appear to stem from his brief stint traveling back in time prior to turning the failsafe key inside the Swan Station. As anyone whose watched the episode knows, Desmond jumped back in time to re-live a series of events involving his beloved Penny, her father Charles Widmore, and of course, Charlie from Des’ inevitable future on the island.

An examination of the recurrence of the color red led me to dive deeper into Charles Widmore’s whiskey of choice, MacCutcheon’s. It features a distinct red label, and Widmore uses it to insult Desmond in response to his request for permission to marry Penny. Charlie also uses the whiskey in an attempt to pry the truth about Desmond’s premonitions from the Scotsman.

The word MacCutcheon ties back into the numbers in an odd way. In chess, the MacCutcheon defense is a variation on the French defense. This variation is unique in that it weakens the kingside dark squares while affording the opportunity to still castle your opponent on the queenside.

Not a chess player? Me, neither, although I’m fairly certain that the references to king and queen may be intentional. After all, Widmore is portrayed with regal stature, in a corporately domineering way. Of even greater significance is the method in which one executes the MacCutcheon defense. Here is a hint: it involves counterattacks using both 4 and 8.

The use of MacCutcheon’s whiskey as an insult immediately follows a scene in which Desmond witnesses a parcel being delivered to Widmore Industries “for 815.” This could be extrapolated into “4, 8, 15,” and given the peculiar look the delivery man gave Desmond I’m betting there is something to this.

Alas, this column wouldn’t be called “Lost…in Deconstruction” if we didn’t do just that. During Desmond’s run-in with Ms. Hawking, we learn that Desmond’s full name is Desmond David Hume – no doubt in reference to 18th century Scottish philosopher David Home.

David Home, who changed his surname to Hume, is notable for being heavily influenced by John Locke, and for his somewhat flawed musings on sensory perception and causality.

Many question whether or not Hume was actually a great philosopher, or merely a shrewd thinker, and this reputation brings to mind Desmond’s own run-ins with the word “great.” Widmore informs him that he will never be a great man, and Ms. Hawking expresses that pushing the button in the hatch is the only truly great thing he will ever achieve.

In addition, Hume’s approach to causality, while flawed, is strikingly familiar to Desmond’s attempts to save Charlie from his fate. Hume believed that while “x may cause y,” what is more true is that “x happened, then y happened,” and that they must occur in this order.

Desmond exemplifies this belief system when he attempts to predict the outcome of the soccer match in the pub. He assumes that because the same song comes on the jukebox, that the next outcome will be a come-from-behind victory that he recalls from his previous trip through time. This fails to prove true, as just because x happened does not mean that y is about to happen.

Ms. Hawking, a mysteriously prescient woman who attempts to steer Desmond down his fated path, touches on this very point. During their debate over Desmond’s intent to propose there is a sequence involving a man in red shoes who suffers a horrible fate.

His death is reminiscent of The Wizard of Oz, another film involving time travel or spatial displacement depending on your interpretation. Ms. Hawking insists that no matter what she could have said or done, the universe would have found a way to course correct by killing the man in the red shoes in some other fashion.

While much of this is likely background inspiration for the character, I still question how, or if, our Desmond Hume will follow in the footsteps of David Hume and actually become influenced by our very own John Locke? Also, how much longer will we wait to learn more about Ms. Hawking?

Only time will tell.

Mario Anima

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