Live Chat: LOST, s06e15, "Across The Sea"

^{Jacob, before he started playing cosmic backgammon with Smokey}

Last week, around 9:45 pm, the tubes of the internet reverberated with the blood-curdling shrieks of Lost fans everywhere, as episode 15 -- "The Candidate" -- let loose an almost unprecedented blitzkrieg of carnage. Our weekly chatjam was no exception -- one of our regular chatters, in a frenzy of agonized rage, punched right through his television screen and broke his hand.

So what exactly had us all in such a tizzy? Well, let's review, shall we? We're going to have to, uh, process all of this before we move on to tonight's episode, "Across the Sea," anyway. Oh, and if you haven't seen last week's ep, then for the love of Lapidus, don't read any further, because we're going to start unzipping every body bag right now.

Piles of corpses aside (for now), though, "The Candidate" was a maddening episode on many levels. The main event, of course, is when Sawyer and company steal Widmore's submarine, only to find that Jack is carrying a backpack bomb, which seems to rigged to detonate as many cliches as a pack of writers can cram into a single script. Slow-motion running and several acts of selfless martyrdom (plus one boffo explosion) ensue. The damage:

THE WOUNDED

So, Kate once again disappointed the world (and probably Evangeline Lilly herself, if this slightly scathing New York magazine interview is any indication), by taking a bullet to the chest but not dying. But since the ep closed with her gasping on the sand next to Hurley -- who is perhaps our last, best hope for this show to resolve into a satisfying ending -- might this be the end of Kate as well? Are her #sawyertears-provoking days numbered?

THE MISSING

Never one to spare Frank -- the captain of our hearts -- any supernatural misery, the Island has apparently doomed him to go down with his sub. But since we didn't actually see the man give his last death rattle, we can still hold out hope that he's washed up on shore somewhere, and not being devoured by poorly animated Dharma sharks on the ocean floor.

THE DEAD

Long ago, we gave up on any notion that Jin and Sun would evolve into the badasses that earlier plot lines seemed to promise. Instead of stabbing backs and slitting throats as a vengeful widow and crime-boss daughter, Sun has spent the entirety of Season 6 listlessly mewling "Where is my husband?" Finally, last week, the star-crossed pair were reunited after three years apart -- only to have the writers drown them in a fucking submarine. Look, we always knew that happy endings just weren't in the cards for the Kwons ... but was it really necessary to dispatch them with a stunt so shamelessly ripped off from Titanic?

But while the Jin-and-Sun slaughter was distressing, it was not as tragic as the untimely end meted out to Sayid, who was casually blown to bits by Flocke's backpack bomb. We've followed the Island's resident torture expert for six years now, as he wrestled with his crushingly weighty past and his ever-conflicted present. Always the question loomed: Is Sayid capable of true compassion? Or is he simply a natural-born killer? But that all kind of fell apart this season, as Sayid became a zombie (when it suited the plot), and finally, cannon fodder. After all the psychological build-up, his sudden death comes as a cheap shot -- instead of getting the cathartic ending his character deserves, the man was tossed aside for a bit of pyrotechnics. Or so it would seem.

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OK, deep breaths. I think we're ready for this, the third-to-last episode of Lost. Join us for smartass remarks and ALL-CAPS EMOTIONAL OUTBURSTS right here, tonight at 9pm.