Miles

To get a little meta, it seems to me like the Miles of Season 6 would enjoy watching Lost. The Miles who arrived on the Island in 2004...not so much.

Ken Leung has one of the most actorly blank faces that I've seen. When Bram--fine guy, I'm sure, but not really a master of strategy and subterfuge--attempts to woo Miles to his cause by reminding him of that darn old hole in his soul, Miles just stares blankly at him for a long beat. Could he be just a second away from tearing up and falling helplessly into the comforting embrace of Bram's ample bosom? Errr, no. Miles delivers that awesome, deadpan "It's sad. Isn't it?". But he precedes his reluctant lines to Sawyer when asked to 'talk' to dead Juliet with the exact same blank-face beat. Weirdly, he sells it in both situations! Two completely different emotions, and one blank face.

I also have Miles to thank for one of my top 5 flashback episodes of the whole series, 'Some like it Hoth'. At this point (a couple days away from 'The Candidate'), I think that the major reason for Miles joining Richard and Ben is the equal distribution of deadpan comedy among the Island factions. But besides this welcome function, what might be his purpose in the remainder of Season 6? In the premiere this season, I thought that Miles would eventually 'speak' to dead Jacob, and that would be a crucial event--but that's already happened and the revelations were fairly minor (though a question of mine was answered). Really, some of Miles's greatest contributions of past seasons have been the moments when his no-bullshit observations have slowed the steps of a group of characters hell-bent on some crazy mission. I cite his 'Has it occurred to any of you that your buddy's actually gonna cause the thing he says he's trying to prevent? Perhaps that little nuke is the incident? So maybe the best thing to do... is nothing?' speech as one of his finest moments.

I wouldn't mind a little more specificity on how Miles acquired his talents. At this point, the explanation is simply: he was on the Island as a baby. That will suffice, but...do all Island babies have secret powers? Why that particular ability? But really, I'm just hoping my man doesn't become cannon fodder before his time. As long as Claire gets to survive...Miles at least deserves to make it that far.

Also, I could go for a completely gonzo twist to Miles story--like he becomes the new Richard to Jack's new Jacob!

THE MILES DOSSIER: QUESTIONS:

1. Why and how, exactly did Miles acquire his abilities?

Team Ilana

Ilana and Bram know things. They know certainly know things that the audience doesn't know, and things that Ben (and even Richard) don't know about. At this point (after Dr. Linus) a few mysteries concerning them have been addressed, but several remain--enough that when Ben gets the drop on Ilana and has her at gunpoint, I coldly and calmly addressed the television and said "If you let Ben murder Ilana before we know anything about her, I will go smokey on your ass"...or something.


So...

THE ILANA DOSSIER: QUESTIONS:

1. What is the club that Ilana and Bram belong to? What is its purpose? How old is it?

2. To whom is its existence known? only Jacob? Richard? the Leader of the Others?

3. Now that Jacob is dead, is she simply playing it by ear or does she have an objective?

Now that 'Dr. Linus' has aired, we know a little more. Ilana has said that Jacob 'is the closest thing to a father she's ever had'. Wha? Didn't expect something like that. I was thinking that she was the leader of an organization not unlike the one that was trying to assassinate Indy when he was looking for clues to the Grail's location in the 3rd movie. If Jacob is the closest thing she's had to a father...what happened to her real father? PREDICTION: We will find out more about Ilana's real father.

Still, if foster-filial devotion is left as the only motivation for Ilana's actions, and if Bram and Co. were simply muscle that she had hired on, that would be, um, unsatisfying. Especially since its now clear that she knows elements of Jacob's grand design (i.e. candidates) that Richard is unaware of.

UPDATE AS OF THE DAY BEFORE 'THE LAST RECRUIT' AIRS... Aargghh!! She's dead?! Before she told us anything about where she came from and why? Her only role was as a clean-up plot device? Need Sayid to get on Ajira 316, but written yourself into a corner now that he's explicitly stated his opposition to the idea? Why just take your script and soak in our patented Ilana-bath--solves all your knottiest plot development problems with no sweat! Need Ben to stay with Team Jacob even after he's murdered Jacob? No problem? Ilana-bath can handle character motivation issues just as easily as character location issues!

The show's not over, dead's not really dead on 'Lost' anyway, I know, I know. I'm pissed, though. Impatient, whiny, and immature. But pissed.