The Mother and Child Reunion

LOST has always won my heart for its ability to simultaneously dish out heady sci-fi theory and intricate character-driven drama – like a lunch lady scooping mashed potatoes and peas into the remaining opening of your lunch tray. And yes, I made that analogy up myself.

The Variable – a companion piece to last season’s The Constant – was a microcosm of the show’s very philosophy. In it, we learned that this whole “scientific equation” of events we’ve seen over the past five years is subject to the actions and motivations of the people in the story. Or as Daniel referred to them, “variables.” Sci-fi and drama, working side-by-side. Or perhaps more appropriately, in direct opposition. Let’s take a look.

This Week, On A Very Special E.R.
Turns out Desmond’s grocery bag didn’t contain that bulletproof can of haggis (thanks Jeff Jensen), as the opening scene saw him rushed into an operating room, flanked by Penny and baby Charlie. As his family awaited his recovery, they were visited by everyone’s favorite terrifying precognitive octogenarian, Eloise Hawking. After some awkward introductions, Ellie tells Penny that it’s her son’s fault that Desmond has been shot. That son, of course, is Dan Faraday.

Für Eloise
As young Dan Faraday – making like a young yours truly on a mid-90s Tuesday afternoon – tickles the ivories, his mother enters with what looked to be this damning sense of worry on her face. What we have to remember about Eloise Hawking is that she has some sort of precognitive capacity (see: telling Desmond about the man in the red shoes who would die, and other examples). With that in mind, her speech to Daniel about his brilliant scientific/mathematical mind and its role in his “destiny” (which she defines as “a special gift that must be nurtured,”) takes on a darker meaning. “It’s my job to keep you on your path,” she says with a gulp. And we see the first look at a mother who’s torn between an inescapable destiny and the love for her son.

She tells him to quit the piano in order to focus on his true purpose. “I can do both,” pleads Daniel. “I can make time.” To which mom replies, “If only you could.” Choice words, there. If only he could “make” time, indeed.

I’d Fix It If I Could, and I’d Always Win
Back in 1977, Daniel Faraday is wasting no time ensuring that certain happenings, well, happen. First stop: Jack’s condo and an obligatory shirtless Dr. Shepherd shot for Maggie. Dan asks Jack how he got back to 1977, and when Jack explains that Dan’s mother told him it was his “destiny,” the younger Faraday laughs it off. “Well I got some bad news for you, Jack. You don’t belong here at all. She was wrong.” This is an important foreshadowing of Daniel’s new understanding of what can and can’t be changed in time travel. More on that later.


Next on Maury: “Mr. Chang, You ARE The Father!”
Faraday ventures with Miles to the Orchid Station, where we finally get some context for the cryptic Daniel-as-Dharma scene that opened this season. After confirming the existence of that doomed electromagnetic energy, Faraday comes clean to Dr. Chang about his purpose, complete with an “I’m from the future” revelation and a warning that this very energy (specifically the pocket located at the Swan Station site) endangers the lives of everyone on the Island. At least they’ve got some time, right? A couple months? Oh, six hours? Well shit.

Miles derides Faraday for his suddenly forthcoming nature, trying to shield Dan’s crazy from Dr. Chang. Dan jabs back by telling Dr. Chang that Miles is his grown-up son, also from the future. Awk. Ward. But Dr. Chang conveniently dismisses the notion, and Dan tells Miles he was just ensuring that Dr. Chang did what he was supposed to do. At this point, Faraday’s mission was becoming clear: to ensure that whatever happened, happens. With a few exceptions.

Gryffindor!
Looking like a Hogwarts grad with his very own Hermione Granger in tow, Daniel’s Oxford graduation is met with a chilly reception from mummy dearest, who even goes so far as to exclude Dan’s girl (Theresa, the unfortunate lass who would later become a victim of his experiments) from lunch. Eloise reiterates to Dan the importance of focusing on his work, against which her son pushes back on the way only a son who’s tired of being told what to do can. But apparently, what she didn’t see coming was the revelation that her son’s work would indeed continue, thanks to a generous grant from her old “friend,” Charles Widmore. And with both parties exhausted by passive-aggressive, strained mother-and-son relations, Eloise exits, leaving Daniel with a very important notebook as a graduation present.

Fun tangent: what if that notebook wasn’t blank, but partially filled-in by Ellie with bits of her precognitive knowledge? We never saw past the first page. Could she have planted a few necessary fate-adhering notes in the book? Nah. Okay maybe.


It’s Alright, Cuz I’m Saved by the Bell
Continuing his penchant for after-school-special style pep talks (remember his backwoods man-to-man with Karl two years ago?), Sawyer makes like A.C. Slater, flipping a chair around and hatching a plan. He spells out two options: hijack the sub back to the mainland or retreat to the jungle. After a few votes for “jungle,” the meeting is interrupted by Miles and “Twitchy,” who proposes a third option: let’s go meet the Hostiles so I can talk to my mother about “getting us back to where we belong.”

As Dan hurriedly tries to explain his M.O. to his fellow castaways, Jack interrupts with a part-and-parcel purchase of Daniel’s plan. Why? Because what’s Jack got left to lose. He tried the jungle for three months, and that didn’t work out so well. He tried living off the Island for three years and nearly killed himself. Newly-purposeful Jack is eschewing empirical, rational decisions in favor of any path that might prove enlightening. And the transformation from Man of Science to Man of (Blind) Faith continues. With a little help from Juliet, Daniel’s mission is set forth, with Jack and Kate on his side. Because if Kate loves one thing, it’s trips to the jungle. And if she loves two things, it’s trips to the jungle and lanky Midwestern LOST bloggers. Shut up, it could happen.

HOLY SHIT! SWINE FLU!
Okay, I’m more inclined to believe that the illness that requires in-home hospice care for Daniel is some sort of recurring short-term amnesia (presumably due to some serious exposure to electromagnetic and/or radioactive elements). But I’m not ruling out Swine Flu, because the news tells me I should be afraid of it.

The Variable gave us context to another long-lost scene, as we learned the circumstances around Daniel’s tearful reception of the news about Oceanic 815. Here we learn that Daniel’s marbles aren’t so much in tact, thanks to this illness. And the arrival of Charles Widmore doesn’t exactly help. Widmore offers Dan a trip to the science lab to end all science labs, a place with unique properties that can further his research, show him things he’d “only dream of,” and, most importantly, “heal” the troubled scientist’s warped memory. Interesting, I didn’t see Dan as someone who had been cured (like Locke or Rose), but apparently the Island had some effect on him.

Widmore also confirms that he planted the fake 815 wreckage, thus settling a long-held debate among those of us in LOST la-la-land.

Yeah, You Should Go to the Island. It’s. Ummm. Great.
I used to get mad at my mom for suggesting words when we played Scrabble. Mom, I apologize. You are nowhere near as pushy as Eloise Hawking, and I love you.

Ellie interrupts and derails Dan’s etude – apparently even adult Dan is easily shattered by his mother – to once more hammer home the importance of his “purpose.” Eloise delivers a stirring, yet conflicted plea for Daniel to take up Mr. Widmore on his job offer. She quivers with a graver sense of importance than she lets on, begrudgingly encouraging her son that he is capable of what the job requires, and playing the same “This Island can heal you” card that Widmore laid. She appeals to his need for her approval, and when he asks, “Will it make you proud of me?” we see Eloise Hawking deliver one of her finest moments to date. “Yes, Daniel, it will.” In the seconds that follow her reassurance, her face jumps from proud to terrified to withholding to torn. Yes, she accomplished her mission of ensuring Daniel got his “job” done. But she knows the price.

I Like It When We Call Him Big Poppa
We pick up Penny and Eloise’s conversation, where Eloise refers to Desmond as a “casualty” of this cosmic war we’re learning about. And more importantly, Eloise admits that for the first time in a long time, she doesn’t know what’s going to happen next.

Here’s what happened next: I got to say I told you so. A long-awaited meeting of Charles and Ellie spawned the revelation that Charles Widmore is, indeed, Daniel Faraday’s father. But the bigger message of this conversation was that of sacrifice. Eloise one-upped Charles when he claimed he sacrificed his relationship Penny for the Island by reminding him what she had sacrificed for it: her son. And after Widmore reminded Eloise who Dan’s daddy was (him!), she slapped him and hailed the cab.


You’re Alive, and You’re a Terrible Shot!
Before Jack, Kate and Dan can trek off to Hostile-ville, Dan detours to the jungle gym from hell for a visit with quintessential Ginger, Charlotte. That memory she gained right before her death, of a scary man telling her to leave the Island? Here’s where it came from, right alongside the now-understandable, “I’m not allowed to have chocolate before dinner,” line. Faraday seems torn on this one. I think he knows that scaring Charlotte into leaving the Island will eventually intrigue her into returning, waltzing into her grave. But he knows that he has to preserve the events of 1977, and so reluctantly and tearfully he warns her to leave. “I tried to avoid telling you this,” he stammers, “I didn’t think I could change things. But maybe I can.” Maybe he can. But not yet.

After busting caps in Razinsky and his Black Swan Jumpsuit cronies, our heroes escape Dharmaville and venture into Hostile territory.


Goin’ Nuclear
Before he goes to speak with his mother, Daniel Faraday delivers his last lecture to Jack and Kate, imparting some essential knowledge along the way. First off, he echoes Miles’ declaration that this moment is “our present,” and that anything can happen, to any one of them.

Second, Faraday finally comes clean about his battle plan. Turns out, he came back to the Island to stop himself from ever coming to the Island. Daniel’s theory goes as follows: if he can stop the Incident, he can prevent the entire story we know as LOST. The Incident is the explosion of electromagnetic energy at the Swan Station. It leads to the cement fortification of the Swan Station, and the initiation of the button-pushing protocol. That leads to Desmond pushing the button for three years, before failing to push it and sucking Oceanic 815 down to the Island. That leads to the Widmore-financed search party that brought Dan and Charlotte, et al., to the Island. And eventually it leads to the time-leaping, Ajira-crashing set of circumstances that brought them to this very point.

So what’s he going to do?

Enter Jughead. Dan wants to use the hydrogen bomb he encouraged the Hostiles to bury in 1954 to “negate” the electromagnetic energy at the Swan Station, thus negating all the events that ensued because of that energy. Heavy.

There Goes Rhymin' Simon
No I would not give you false hope
On this strange and mournful day
But the mother and child reunion
Is only a motion away.
- Mother & Child Reunion, by Paul Simon.

Daniel storms into Camp Hostile much like Locke had done 23 years earlier. He demands an audience with Eloise and the location of the hydrogen bomb. But before Richard can reason with him, Daniel escalates the conflict by beginning a three-count. He never gets past “two.” A bullet pierces his torso, and we look back to see the shooter is none other than the victim’s mother, Eloise Faraday.

“Oh Eloise. You knew, you knew this was gonna happen. You sent me here anyway,” says Daniel.
“Who are you?” asked Eloise suspiciously.
“Your son.”

Don’t Call it a Constant
Before I get to the moral of the story, a quick bonus theory for you.

Let’s just assume that Eloise’s meeting with Penny in the hospital and Daniel’s intrusion into the Hostile Camp happened on the same exact day. On that one day in 2008(ish), Eloise was talking to Penny while her son had traveled back to 1977 to meet a younger version of herself. Got that?

Good. Because it was this day that Eloise that told Penny that, for the first time in a long time, she didn’t know what was going to happen next. “First time in a long time.” So Ellie hasn’t always had this precognitive knowledge. Why did she suddenly lose it? I think it’s because she’s now without a constant: her son. My theory is that the birth of Daniel provided Eloise a constant through which she could travel through time and retain – much like Desmond – precognitive flashes of the future yet to unfold. But when 1977 Eloise killed Daniel (and remember, if what we were seeing was Daniel’s “present,” as he said it was, this actually happened at the same time Eloise was talking to Penny in the hospital in 2008), she killed her constant. And her ability to see flashes of the future.

Taking One for the Team
A mother shooting her time-traveling son? That’s heavy, even for LOST. So what did it all mean? Here’s my take.

I believe Daniel knew that by dying, he could convince Jack’s people and/or Eloise’s people to carry out his mission. That’s why he told Jack about the plan right before he went down there. I’m not sure he had precognitive knowledge of his death, but he had to know it was a possibility, so he made sure Jack knew the plan. And I think Daniel’s mind is reasoning that he needs to do something drastic to push the Hostiles to prevent the Incident.

What Daniel Faraday learned in his time in Ann Arbor was this. Fate’s “supposed-to-happen” course of events is like an equation. While constants allow individuals to bounce back and forth on different sides of the equation, it’s the variables that matter most. Those variables – defined as individuals and their rationalizing, random, freedom of through – can alter the equation. They can alter the way things are “supposed” to go.

And in Daniel’s mind, every bad thing that ever happened to him, the woman he loved and the only friends he ever really knew was a direct result of the Incident. So by preventing the Incident itself – or guiding others to – he could prevent a lifetime of pain and suffering for everyone he loved.

Ironically, it was Daniel Faraday’s own internal “variables” that led to this decision. His free thoughts, rationalizations and free will led him to ultimately ditch his mother’s long-held concept of destiny and his long-held theory that “whatever happened, happened.” He became, in a way, a man of faith, believing that he could utilize the free will granted to him as a human being to do the most good for the most people.

But what we’re yet to find out is whether Daniel’s idea of “the most good” is actually that. Maybe his meddling in fate alters the course of history in a way that negatively impacts the people he loved. Or maybe, with one selfless act, he just took a huge step toward saving them all.

Of course, that would depend on your definition of “saved.”

Namaste.
Charlie