1x19 Deus Ex Machina

[MM0602]

Lost Rewatch - Discuss episode "Deus Ex Machina" here

Wiki page: http://lostpedia.wikia.com/wiki/Deus_Ex_Machina

Another early Locke flashback. Both of his parents (Emily Locke and Anthony Cooper) are introduced and we see how manipulative they both are towards John.

I was surprised, on rewatching, how much detail the writers gave to the beechcraft plane. They had Nigerian priest/drug dealer skeletons, the Virgin Mary statues with heroin, Bernard talking with Boone through the radio... impressive.

And of course, the ending with Locke pounding on the hatch only to have Desmond shine a light up at him. Very nice way to end the episode after the tragedy of the flashbacks.

[faragay4faraday]

absolutely brilliant episode

stuff we won't see explained until season 2 are introduced
we get Locke at (two of the) lowest points in his life
amazing scene: Locke sees his mother, thinks - cut to the board game where the mouse trap closes with a snap

also: Locke's dream ... "Theresa falls up the stairs, Theresa falls down the stairs", Lockes mother pointing towards the sky, Boone covered in blood ...
probably one of the most disturbing (and absolutely best) moments on LOST ever ... EVER
goosebumps, even tho the foreshadowing of Boone's impending death made me pretty sad

I wish there would have been more dreams and visions in the later seasons

[kenmayhem]

when locke is banging on the hatch door he says. "i did everything you asked. why did you do this to me" which the wiki seems to have wrong for some reason.....
i think it is important the words he used, because i think he is being literal. he met with the smoke monster early on. we all know this. we know it went right up to his face and didn't kill him and he "looked into the eye of the island" and he has been behaving very mysteriously ever since. so all i am saying is that maybe all of the people locke helped get some peace of mind up to this point was possibly the "island"'s bidding. but who is the "island"?

[DharmaVan]

Great episode with lots of depth.

Interestingly enough it starts right off with the Mousetrap game. From the Lostpedia transcripts, here’s John’s response as to how the game is played:

Well, you start with all these parts off the board. And then, one by one, you build the trap - shoe, bucket, tub - piece by piece it all comes together. And then you wait 'til your opponent lands here on the old cheese wheel. And then if you set it up just right, you spring the trap.

While this game is a good symbol for Anthony Cooper’s long con of John to get his kidney, I think applies even better to Jacob’s nemesis long con of John, i.e., "...you have no idea what I've gone through to be here."

I also loved private investigator Frainey's prophetic warning to John when he says, "I've done this enough times to know this stuff isn't meant to be, even though it may feel that way. But this probably won't have a happy ending."

Emily Locke nicely sums up the key element of the long con (both applying to this episode and to the overall long con by nemesis) by saying, "He said that was the only way you would give it to him. It had to be your idea." Convince John it's his destiny, that it was meant to be, and then BAM! Spring the trap.

Finally, with wonderful duality, Locke get angry with Cooper AND the island. He doesn’t understand why they’ve betrayed him. Poor John Locke, amenable for coercion.

[CTS]

This is one of the all-time best LOST episodes ever. It's fantastic. Best Locke centric ever, by far. The end of it is absolutely brilliant. I loved the Beechcraft scene, too.

[kenmayhem]

And of course, the ending with Locke pounding on the hatch only to have Desmond shine a light up at him. Very nice way to end the episode after the tragedy of the flashbacks.

oh ya. and desmond was going to killhimself when john started banging up a storm. if he went through with it, button wouldn't have got pushed. world destroyed.

so boones death saved the world

[Mrs.locke]

So...Boones the savior, not Charlie!

[Miss4pt0]

Well, actually, John's banging stopped Desmond. John wasn't banging because Boone died, Boone wasn't even dead yet. He was banging out of frustration, John didn't give a flying fig about Boone or anything else other than getting into that hatch at this point. If anyone's the savior in this scenario, its John.

[Captain Bunny Killer]

A great Locke episode. We first meet Anthony Cooper and find out he's a bad guy. It's interesting to think how truly evil we will learn he is in the coming seasons.

Did anyone else notice that the "Previously on Lost" voiceover sounds different than the one we've come to know (and love)? Lostpedia makes note of this in the production notes of this episode but doesn't identify who's voice it is (then again, Lindelcuse have been mum about who does that part regularly). To me, it sounds like Terry O'Quinn. I find this change interesting because by this point it seemed that the recurring nuances of the show (the "Previously on Lost" part, the flashback woosh, the "dong" sound at the end") had been solidified in evry episode by this point.

I posted this in an earlier episode rewatch thread but how is it that Desmond couldn't hear the trebuchet hitting the Hatch door but yet could hear Locke (lightly) banging on the door and yelling? I don't recall any explanation for this in "Live Together, Die Alone."

I loved the little easter egg that Emily Locke spent time in the Santa Rosa Mental Health Institute, just as Hurley and Libby did.

Also, another appearance of the infamous gold Pontiac. According to Lostpedia, Lindelcuse have dismissed its many appearances as pure coincidence and joked "that it was actually Jacob, who could only take the form of a car when off the Island." Now that we know Jacob had interactions with all of the major Losties prior to Flight 815, it would be pretty cool if it turned out he was the one driving the car. What purpose that would have served is beyond me but I'm thoroughly convinced we'll be seeing more Jacob flashbacks in S6 that show his involvement in the Losties' lives. Hey, who knows? Maybe Jacob was the bus driver who ran ovr Edmund Burke.

Although we learn in this episode that Emily Locke is certifiably insane, her conversation with John in the restaurant is intriguing. She tells John that he's special, part of a design and that their meeting itself is a sign of things to come. Of course, Emily was only speaking to the con Anthony was pulling on him but the writers obviously had a grander vision in mind and "The Incident" reaffirmed just how big and far that design would go. Whether they had the idea of fLocke impersonating him after his death this early on is debatable but part of the fun of this rewatch is seeing how these little lines of dialogue and events have greater implications with what we know now about the Lost mythology.

Speaking of visions:

I wish there would have been more dreams and visions in the later seasons

Really? I can think of several throughout the series off the top of my head and a quick search of "dreams" or "visions" on Lostpedia shows that this motif has been consistently used throughout the series.

[kenmayhem]

john wasn't upset about the hatch tho. he was upset about boone. who was his closest buddy on the island. and got seriously hurt because of his vision. the island led him there and he thought he would find "hope" but instead he got boone killed. don't be fooled by the fact that boone dies an episode later. it jumps forward in the locke episode from morning to night, and the events of that day are shown in the next episode. locke probably spent the day crying. but simultaneously boone dies, aaron is born, and locke sees the light in the hatch. we know that from the s5 time flashes too.