I've been told by several people that the Purgatorio hypothesis that I proposed last week had been quashed by the writers and producers long ago. Maybe I'm wrong, maybe not. The producers can't confirm that all the survivors are really dead because it would be the same as letting it be known before the movie's release that Bruce Willis was dead in "Sixth Sense." It's ok for people like me to speculate; but all speculation ends as soon as they confirm one theory or another. They have an interest in keeping us guessing.
But this week's episode reinforced my idea about the Others being agents of a higher justice while at the same time being made to appear malevolent. In the story Michael, gun in hand, goes off to find Walt. Jack sets off to bring him back because he's convinced that if he doesn't, that they'll never see him again. Locke asks, rightly, what right Jack has to prevent Michael from doing what he wants to do? Why does Jack always think he knows better? Anyway, the search for Michael leads to a campfire confrontation between Jack and Zeke(?), the "pirate" who kidnapped Walt and shot Sawyer on the raft, and who now presents himself as the spokesperson for the Others .
In this confrontatation we get some important information about the Others: they control the island; they seem to know everything about the survivors, they control whether the survivors live or die on the island, they have Walt who is doing fine, and in Zeke's opinion is a special boy, and Michael will fail to find the Others (and Walt).
This is all information that can be taken either positively or negatively. My bias leads me to see Zeke, despite his rough manners, as fundamentally good, and it's clear that Jack's bias leads him to see Zeke and the Others as evil. In the closing scene Jack speaks to Ana Lucia--the other violence-prone control freak in the group--about training an army. "Evil," in Jack's mental universe, must be defeated by force of arms.
Jack is a case study in the kind of mentality which is inclined to become a neoconservative. He's the kind of person who fights desperately to be in control lest someone else be. To trust others or to work multilaterally is simply not in the realm of possibility for him. He's got to be giving the orders, and it absolutely galls him that the Others are in control, and he's going to do everything in his power to change that--or die trying.
Locke understands his foolishness, and my guess is that a bigtime conflict between a Locke party and a Jack party will develop that will split the island. It's a split that in large part will reflect our current political situation in the U.S. today. The doves who side with with Locke will be branded as soft and cowardly, and the doves will see the hawks as powermad nutcases.
Whose side are you on? I'm sure lots of viewers feel a strong link to the kind of strength and leadership that Jack and Ana Lucia represent. They are in many ways attractive, complex, sympathetic characters. And it's a tough world, and you don't surivive unless tough leaders emerge to keep you safe. To me they're fools. It will be interesting to see which side Eko chooses.
This brings to mind a theme I want to address that is very nicely developed in Walter Wink's book, The Powers That Be, in which he talks about the Myth of Redemptive Violence. Thanks to MC for putting me onto it. But more on that later.