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For all of the following, please forgive my horrifying recollection of character names (except for Locke, because Terry O'Quinn DEMANDS that you remember his character's name).
I've been thinking lately that some of the characters are the "creators": Main-character-guy, who is the physical healer and therefore, in a sense, the creator of the physical. He's also the one who lead the move to the caves and the creation of a "new world". Locke, who has shamanistic quality and is therefore the creator of the mental. He seems to be able to change people's outlooks by administering pithy insights and the occassional blow to the head.
They will be set against the "destroyers". The most obvious candidate (up until last night) was Sawyer, but I think they've laid the groundwork for two "unintentional" destroyers: "freckles", who "killed the man she loved". I read this as a note that she destroys whatever she touches, even if she doesn't intend to. Kind of like she is indirectly responsible for the death of the marshall who caught her (because if she hadn't gone to Australia, he wouldn't have had to go there..., she almost got her farmer friend in Australia killed, etc.). So she destroys without desire to do so: bad results out of good/neutral intentions (by the by, that's a decent capsule description of the anti-Christ).
The little kid, who they seem to be intimating is capable of conjuring, is the other. In his case, he might have the intention of destruction (I think the bird thing was a pretty clear sign of that) but not the knowledge that he's actually capable of it. That's why he's a kid - kids lack impulse control and, if they had the power, we'd all be dead at some point. What makes them largely manageable is that they don't have means to follow through. But you give a kid the latent ability to form up whatever stuff he wants, and you've got trouble. So he has intent to destroy but not the knowledge that he's doing so.
Additionally, I think there's something to be said for the fact that both "creators" (Locke and main-character-guy) moved to the caves: creating their world. Meanwhile freckles stayed on the beach, rejecting the "new world" and preferring, instead, a locale related to death, etc. Didn't the kid want to stay on the beach but his dad moved them to the caves?
If that kind of sorry-ass metaphysical idea is grafted onto it, it makes sense that Main-character-guy and freckles have gotten close because their creator/destroyer castes are are opposing (good intentions/good results v. good intentions/bad results) and that Locke and the kid would pair up because they have opposing dictates as well (Locke's abilty to create "productive hallucinations/realities" v. the kid's ability to create "destructive hallucinations/realities".
All the other characters are beginning to act as followers to one of the four - we can already see that Locke is developing a little cult and freckles has Sawyer. I would expect that this teaming up will continue throughout season 1, possibly with some wildcard characters who will rebel against both sides (Samir and Sawyer, my guess). Then maybe in season 2 we start to see a little "Lord of the Flies" type of conflict emerging.
At the very least, it's interesting the way each character seems to have a foil in some other character, for example Samir and Sawyer are both criminals, but Samir's criminal acts were "legal". Contrastingly, Samir is ashamed over his "legal" crimes while Sawyer is basically unrepentant for his illegal crimes.
But then again, maybe the air ducts are pumping in hallucinogens today and I'm super wasted.
Anyway, "Lost" is my new favorite show because all the different interpretations seem legit and yet...not quite right. I just hope it doesn't devolve into ridiculous plot-spaghetti like my beloved X-Files eventually did. I will be forever pissed if this series slides quietly into cancellation without a chance to resolve itself.
Mostly
PS Anybody down with the interpretation that only half of the characters are actually real - like maybe the survivors "lost" some part of themselves, and now their spiritual selves are roaming the island while their corporeal selves are elsewhere on the island? Lime maybe half - the weird half - of what we're watching is a dream-state or consciousness projection while the "real" survivors are asleep on the beach. So many cool possibilities.
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