Underpants On The Outside

Lost has a habit of setting up dozens of mind-boggling mysteries and solving NONE of them. My friend Jordan, whose use of imagery is nothing short of genius, describes the experience of watching the show as frustrating as “Dry Humping a Supermodel”.

Today’s Supermodel: The Zoo

Holy moley, that was one hell of an episode.  At the end of last season, Jack, Sawyer, and Kate, were all captured by the mysterious “Others”, who inhabit the other side of the island and seem to know what’s going on.  We also saw that the Others have a boat and know how to get off the island, so the only reason they stick around kidnapping people must be because they get a kick out of it.  Who can blame them?

Now as far as Supermodels go, the Others are nothing new.  We’ve danced this particular Blue Ball Waltz before.  It’s got to the point where the metaphor of the Dry-Humped Supermodel has broken down – this particular supermodel has a name.  Lena.  She was this chick I used to take out.  At the end of every night we’d make out for like a half hour.  Then I’d start arguing that it was time she and I did some Grade-A hot-railing, she’d say no, and I’d drive home with a semi while my buddies would call me and laugh.  I did this for like a year.  At some point her vagina had become my very own White Whale; I was doomed to chase it all the while knowing it would be my downfall. 

What makes “The Others” so much worse is that they keep introducing more and more conundrums. (Honestly, if I keep saying mysteries I’m going to go insane.  Enter: Thesaurus.com)   It is like if Lena had introduced me to a constant stream of really hot roommates, sisters, cousins, co-workers, and best friends, etc., all of whom weren’t about to touch me because they thought me and Lena were hooking up, but felt safe enough around me to wear nothing more than lacey panties and a bra.  Even the real Lena had too much decency for that, though not enough for a measly handjob.

Case in point: When they wake up, Jack and Sawyer find themselves in separate holding cells.  Sawyer is in a large outdoor cage. At different corners of the cage are a foot-pedal, a lever, and a large box connected to an adjoining building.  The box has a very large red button with a fork and a knife painted on in white.  Sawyer pushes the button, and a electronic voice says “Warning”.  He pushes it again: same thing.  Third time he gets an electric shock.  As bad as dry-humping a supermodel is, I really have to believe that getting tasered by one is worse.

Jack, meanwhile, is in a room with thick concrete walls and chains hanging from the ceiling.  His room connects with another, but when he tries to walk over he does the hilarious “bang forehead into plexiglass wall” bit.  I giggled, but that’s because I hadn’t drawn the plexiglass wall/supermodel chastity belt connections yet.  Dang.  Luckily for me, running into a metaphoric chastity belt with a metaphoric erection is significantly less painful than running into a real wall with a real nose.

Elsewhere, Kate is unfairly given a private shower, and while her clothes are gone when she finishes, The Others have replaced them with a nice sundress.  She’s led to an ocean-side breakfast in a beach gazebo with Kevin Spacey’s Cousin.  (That’s my name for the head of The Others, due to his vague physical resemblance and strikingly similar acting talent to Kevin Spacey.)  They’ve got all sorts of goodies, including a French press of coffee, bacon, eggs, and a pair of handcuffs.  I’m cool with that; when a supermodel tells you she’s into pain, it doesn’t matter if you are a hemophiliac; you say okay.

Naturally, Kate’s a little curious as to what the hell is going on.  Get in line, lady.  Kevin Spacey’s Cousin gets his Kaiser Soze on when he tells her (I’m paraphrasing) “I brought you to the beach because I want you to see the ocean.  I gave you the dress so that you’d feel like a lady.  And I’m feeding you this breakfast so you will have something nice to hang on to, because the next two weeks are going to be very… unpleasant.”   Hey, baby, slow down. We haven’t even established a safe-word yet.

A quick aside.  Hard to believe, but I used to have a lot of trouble getting laid.  It has only gotten slightly easier now that I have a girlfriend, but that’s a separate issue.  I’d often turn to female friends for advice, and one of my friends used to always advocate “Hot-Cold”, where the guy seems interested in the girl, then doesn’t, then does, blowing her mind with insecurity and weakening her defenses against the inevitable seduction.  I could never do it.  That’s some varsity-level, Warren Beatty type of shit right there.  When Kevin Spacey’s Cousin told Kate that the next two weeks were going to be very unpleasant, it was like he took “Hot-Cold” to its logical conclusion the same way someone looked at an Apple 2E, turned around and wrote Blade Runner.  What I’m saying is, as terrified as Kate was, I’m pretty sure she was also turned on.  I also realize that was not a quick aside.  Whatever.

Then both Jack and Sawyer manage ill-advised escape attempts.  Sawyer’s is uneventful except he gets tasered in the forest by a nice-looking blond lady, taking him up to two shocks in twelve hours.  This will be significant later, and honestly, this supermodel’s proclivity towards electrics makes me kind of glad she’s staying away from my junk.

Jack’s escape attempt comes when the same nice-looking blond lady tries to bring him food.  He grabs her, puts her in an arm lock and tries to leave the bunker through a hatch with a red wheel.  She tells him they’ll die, but nuts to that - Jack opens the door anyway.  All of a sudden water rushes in and would have drowned them both, but Jack and the blond hadn’t hit some emergency button and sealed the hatch.  Then the chick knocks Jack the fuck out.  She’s pretty bad ass.  I want to see her and 24’s Jack Bauer make sweet, sweet love with a taser gun, a .38, and submission holds. 

When Sawyer wakes up, he goes to work in his cell.  He places a heavy rock on the foot pedal, pushes the red food button and throws his boot at the lever.  When all three are engaged at once, he is rewarded with a fish biscuit.  What pisses me off is that I never would have put those all together.  I’m not saying I’m a genius, but for crissakes, Sawyer has had two electric shocks; it would have taken him a hour and a half just to get his boot off, more if the laces were double knotted. Worse, one of The Others sarcastically congratulates him and tells him, “the bears only took two hours to figure it out.”   So we’re in some kind of zoo???  Even if that were true, polar bears would never think of pressing the big red button because they don’t know what a fork and knife are, let alone that they are the international symbol for ‘cafeteria.’   This is not a zoo; it’s a level in ‘Myst’.  (If you didn’t get that reference, don’t worry about it.)  Then again, if a supermodel handed me a Rubik’s Cube and told me it was the only thing standing between me and first base, I’d grab a six-pack of Red Bull and get to work.

A similar thing happens to Jack.  He wakes up back in his original cell, and says “We’re in an aquarium…we’re under water.”  Jack, I know you’ve been punched in the head, but the hatches are all people-sized and there are chains bolted into the ceiling; I would have guessed “merfolk prison” long before “aquarium”. 

Given the arbitrary levels of pain and restraint, the whole complex seems less like a zoo and more like something my older brother would have designed when he was fifteen, but for the record, I don’t think the producers of Lost are dumb. They didn’t fuck up their zoo design; it’s not really a zoo.  They just want you to think it’s a zoo for naughty animals.  Instead it’s a supermodel, dressed up as another supermodel for Halloween.  Sure, the costume’s fake, but there is a sexy, sexy surprise underneath!  Who has no intention of sleeping with me at all! Arrrgh!

Now where’d I leave that fucking Rubik’s Cube?!?