‘Lost’: Even God’s Got Daddy Issues

Flight 815 crashed and all the passengers were killed?!? So says the injured polyglot parachutist, Naomi. Since Lost’s writers have repeatedly dismissed suggestions that the island is purgatory, what does it mean?

Theory # 1: Lost fanatics have been pushing the time-travel thing for a while, and now it looks like they could be right. Maybe Flight 815 fell into a wormhole, upending all the rules of the space-time continuum, which would explain why Desmond knows the future — it’s already happened.

Theory # 2: The name of the episode is “D.O.C.� (Date of Conception), which refers to Sun’s baby, who was indeed conceived on the island. But it may also refer to a larger sense of origins — this alternate universe has a certain Judeo-Christian vibe to it. Ben is obviously the devil, and fallen angel Juliet is Lucifer. Desmond is shaping up to be pretty Christ-like, what with his constantly saving Charlie’s life and letting sinners like the One-Eyed Russian (Mikhail) off the hook. Jack is Moses, coming down off the mountain in season one with his “live together or die alone� commandment. The expectant Sun and hubby Jin are Adam and Eve — Sun does spend an awful lot of time in the garden. Like John the Baptist, Locke thinks that he is the chosen one. Sawyer has Judas potential, Charlie and Hurley make decent apostles … well, okay, it remains to be seen if this can be fleshed out or if the writers are just cribbing characters from the best-selling book of all time.

Theory #3: Last night, it was also revealed that the men on the island have a sperm count five times higher than that of the average man. Ugh. Paternity is more and more of a theme now that so many of the survivors have daddy issues. Locke hates his father (understandably, because he threw Locke out a window). Jack struggled to escape the shadow of his alcoholic surgeon Dad. Kate killed her abusive boozehound father when she thought he was her stepdad. Hurley’s padre abandoned him. Claire never had a father until Jack’s dad announced his paternity. Jin pretends his pop is dead; Sun probably wishes her asshole father was dead. Desmond landed on the island while trying to prove himself to Penny’s father. Charlie is a surrogate father for Baby Aaron. Who’s next? Did the five-times-more-virile Sawyer impregnate Kate? We don’t recall them using protection.

Next week: Locke asks Sawyer to kill Ben. Rumor has it that Ben will have his first flashback episode — which will, of course, explain everything. We’re skeptical. — Phoebe Reilly