TVSquad

As the creeptastic Ben Linus on Lost, Michael Emerson has been the puppet master on the island. He spends his days murdering people, causing others to murder different people, playing mind games and just generally making life more difficult for the survivors of Oceanic flight 815 and everyone else whom he encounters.

Ever since he was going by the name, "Henry Gale," Ben has been a fan favorite on the series. Recently, I was able to grab a few minutes of his time to chat about this week's season finale of Lost and the evolution of Benjamin Linus. He even gives me some parenting advice!

The interview follows after the jump, and as we do discuss this week's finale, I should probably give you a spoiler warning right now. However, since it's Lost, he's not able to give too much away. FACT: The smoke monster is real, and is deployed against any actor who dares to speak too freely about the show-- so I got what I could.

(S03E06) Wow... where to begin. That was certainly an episode worthy of being called a mid-season finale. Good doesn't even begin to describe it. Definitely gives us plenty to talk about while we wait for the show to return in February for it's uninterrupted run though.

This episode focused on Kate's flashbacks and those have always been sort of 50-50 for me, but this one was great I thought. Even better than when she blew up her father. Of course I'm slightly biased because these flashbacks featured Nathan Fillion and the idea of having Mal Reynolds on Lost... it's making my head hurt. Fillion played Kate's husband (she was married!) Kevin. So I suppose rather than "what Kate did" you could call these flashbacks "who Kate did."

(S03E04) This was an interesting episode. I remember reading about how this season was being split into two parts. First we'd get six episodes and then a nice long hiatus before the return in 2007. I remember reading that article because it said the two parts of season three would have distinctly different feels and themes. Well this episode certainly set-up what's in store for us in the next two installments before the break.

A Sawyer-centric episode, "every man for himself" has become our favorite con man's new slogan. As much as he'd like to find and help Jack, his priority is to get himself and Kate to safety first. Funny how priorities change though right?

(S03E03) Wow, I don't even know where to begin... get comfortable, because I'm gonna end up writing a lot. Spectacular. Although, I suppose I shouldn't be surprised because this episode just continued the up and down trend established last season. A few so-so or mediocre episodes and then we get this. The other day, while writing this Dexter post, I said that there's no reason why Lost can't feed us viewers a whole ton of info and clues (you know, keep us entertained) while at the same time, leave us on a note that makes us want to do something wildly inappropriate like punch a child or at the very least, knock over your TV set. This was one of those episodes. It's over, it was good great, but we're still in the dark... so what did we learn?

(S03E02) Someone want to tell me why they had to call this episode "The Glass Ballerina?" It referred to one tiny thing at the very beginning! I don't know, I guess I just like my episode titles to actually tell me what's going on and not give me some vague reference to something that's ultimately not all that important. Alias used to be notorious for this. But in the end, what did we learn from the glass ballerina? We learned that Sun is a big ol' cheating liar.

Gee, you would think that there would be a finite amount of people on the island where Oceanic Flight 815 crash landed. Well, apparently not, as a new cast member will be added to the ever growing list of actors and actresses on ABC's Lost.

The newest to join is actress Elizabeth Mitchell. She will play a character named Juliet on the hit series. There's very little else known about the character (I'm surprised we were told her name); however, according to an article at Zap2it she may be a new love interest for Jack, played by Matthew Fox. Whether or not she'll be part of the crash survivors from the other side of the island still hasn't been revealed.

Mitchell, whose had previously worked on The Lyon's Den and ER, is the second cast member to be added to Lost in a week. ABC previously announced that Brazilian actor Rodrigo Santoro would become a regular next season as well.

When Bad Twin, the Lost tie-in novel supposedly written by an ill-fated passenger of Oceanic Flight 815, was published a few months ago, rumor and speculation ran wild. Some said that Lost fanatic Stephen King had written it, while others thought it was Jerry Seinfeld (huh, I never heard that one). But Hercules over at Ain't It Cool News points us to a Variety article that says the book was written by...Lawrence Shames!

Shames is a well-known mystery writer, with a series of books set in Florida, and also a ghostwriter who has helped pen books by various people. But it seems that the people behind Lost aren't entirely happy with his work on the book.

It would have been great if Seinfeld had written the book: "What's the deal with airline peanuts? You get this little package of peanuts, it's hard to open, and before you know it, some guy on an island doesn't punch a button in time, and an electromagnetic field causes the plane to crash. I mean, am I right people?"

Bad Twin, the novel "by" Gary Troupe (it's an anagram of "purgatory," but the Lost producers have already said that they're not in purgatory, damn it!), who was "on Oceanic Air Flight 815," is a hit. Lost fans are buying it in hopes of perhaps learning some more clues about what the hell is happening on the TV show. My guess is that it's just going to drive fans more crazy, though the family in the book is "Widmore."

Has anyone read it yet? Is it any good, as a novel, regardless of the Lost tie-in? There's a rumor going around that Stephen King actually wrote it, but publishers and Lost folks are keeping quiet.

If you're like me (and, why shouldn't you be?), and have never seen an episode of Lost, this is probably your first reaction when you watch a random episode:

'What the hell?"(Or something stronger)

Well toss your worries aside, Lost novices. In three simple steps, courtesy of Jake at Blogspot, you too can watch an episode and know everything that is going on, and then discuss it intelligently with strangers you encounter on the street.

Step one is to know your characters. Jake tells readers to watch the 'Previously on . . .'  scenes at the beginning of each episode. He then goes on to describe each character on the show and how to identify them. Step two is to know the basic plot up to this point. Jake writes up a deft summary of what has happened since the passengers of Oceanic flight 815 crash-landed on a tropical island that isn't all that it seems. In Step three, take your newfound knowledge and spout it to everyone so it seems like you have been an avid fan of the series since its premiere.

There, simple as simple can be. Next week on Blogspot: Jake tells you how to become a nuclear physicist in three easy steps.

 

Since being featured briefly in Lost earlier this season (I believe it was in the episode entitled "Orientation" but I could be wrong), Flann O'Brien's novel The Third Policeman has been selling like crazy.

The book's US distributor and publisher reported that after the episode aired, over 15,000 copies were sold in about three weeks. That was the same amount that had been sold in the previous six years. It was revealed early on that the book was picked for a very specific reason, so readers have been scouring every word to hopefully find a clue about the hit ABC show.

Who knows what they'll find but the publisher warned that it may be tough since O'Brien's work tends to be very humorous, satirical, and surreal all at the same time. So if you bought it, good luck and do me a favor - when you find the clue or whatever it is, leave it in the comments for this post.