Lost List
Here's a question I don't think Lost will answer. Once the Island started flashing, how many redshirts were left? And have any survived since? Aside from Bernard and Doris, we don't really know any of them anyway.
Another thing. Every major character on and off the island has aged 3 years since they crashed in 2004--except Locke. While everyone else was off living their lives, he was gone for a while (how long we're not sure) and then came back. On the other hand, unlike the others, he died, which I suppose can take a lot out of you.
posted by LAGuy @ 12:32 AM
4 Comments:
They don't keep track of redshirt numbers very well. When Locke led the secessionists to the yellow houses in season four, there were exactly four redshirts in their party. But when Keamy attacked the barracks, he killed exactly three redshirts, and that was apparently all of them, since the escapees had no redshirts with them. After that, three redshirts got blown up on the freighter (these were the ones taken by Daniel in the first shuttle; the second shuttle contained five redshirts including Frogurt, and these all got back to the island safely). Anyway, if you add this all up, there should still be around twenty of them left alive, but on the beach in early season five it looked like under a dozen.
As far as I could tell, everyone subject to the time flashes went through the same sequence, even when they were separated. So Rose, Bernard, and the remaining redshirts from Flight 815 must have ended up in 1974, and must have been living on the island for three years after that. Yet Jin never found them in his sweeps of the island. I can see three explanations: (a) They hunkered down in a fixed spot, set up camp, and didn't wander around, and Jin hasn't come across them yet; (b) they were quickly captured by the Others, and have been living with them for three years.
Maybe they will end up merging the 815 redshirts with the Others -- or merging them with the 316 redshirts.
I'm sure we'll see Rose and Bernard again. My gauge of a happy ending to Lost is that (1) Rose and Bernard must survive and be together; (2) Penny and Desmond must survive and be togther; (3) Ben and Widmore must be dead or at least incapable of harming the good guys anymore.
Interesting point about Locke not aging compared to the others!
In 1954, three of the Others appeared to be major characters: Richard, Widmore, and the blond girl with the English accent ("Ellie"). Daniel said that Ellie looked familiar to him.
Why?
My theory is that she's the mother of Theresa Spencer, the woman whose mind Daniel destroyed (and who in 2008 is under the care of her sister Abigail). My brother thinks that Ellie is Eloise Hawking, Daniel's mom.
I think the common belief is "Ellie" is Eloise Hawking. The evidence: 1) The name similarity--quite a coincidence otherwise (or an intentional mislead). 2) Right age. 3) Ellie and Widmore knew each other and worked together on the island, and when Desmond met Widmore in "the present" they knew each other off the island. 4) Both Widmore and Eloise worked with Faraday. 5) Ellie and Eloise are both fairly headstrong.
But I've been wrong about these things before. I figured Daniel was Charlotte's father.
I find it almost impossible to believe any redshirts (that doesn't include Rose and Bernard) have survived on their own for three years without being noticed, a la Rousseau. Remember a number were killed in the 1950s, so I don't know how many were left. But either they're dead or were somehow taken in by the Others. (Perhaps they went into the Temple and got the "disease," which I believe means they'll have a fanatical devotion to protecting the Island and listening to Jacob, which all the Others seem to have.)
I bet somewhere someone has a countdown of redshirt deaths, which have come pretty regularly starting in season one. The first season, in fact, dealt a fair amount with how the redshirts are feeling, and Kate would often note to Jack how he must come through to keep up morale. (They also had Arzt make fun of how the big names huddle together in cliques like it's high school.) But once the show started focusing on dealing with the Others, the redshirts became less important and more expendable.
I'm sure we'll see Rose and Bernard again--this isn't Heroes. Many expect they are "Adam and Eve."
While the things you mention are important to the ending of Lost, the biggest character issues they have to deal with are the Fantastic Four--who will Kate end up with (though now that Sawyer and Juliet live together, maybe that's answered), and, above all, what are the proper places for Jack and Locke regarding the island?
[No spoilers for tonight's episode, which I have seen already being on the east coast! The only good thing about being on the east coast....]
Lostpedia actually has several articles keeping track of the redshirts, but they are so fanatical that they actually keep track of the faces. Of course, that's not canonical, because there were only about thirty redshirts ever, but there could easily be far more extras who have played them.
When they cast Paolo and Nikki, they actually found actors who looked a lot like two of the commonly used extras. When I rewatch seasons one and two, I often say "There's Paolo and Nikki!" But of course it's not really the same actors. Same with Frogurt: that's not really him in the boat in season four, it's someone else in a red shirt who is hiding his face.
According to the DVD extra features, there's a continuity guy in L.A. who keeps careful track of who has what items, especially guns. I suspect he's the one who told them that Alex had to give her gun to Karl for his boat ride, and he should give it to Jack's party. An implausible series of events, but the good guys only had two guns, and they needed a third to ambush Mr. Friendly.
Lost's attention to detail is staggering.
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