Is Locke the key to 'Lost'?
Posted: Thursday, March 22, 2007 12:00 PM by Gael Fashingbauer Cooper
Filed Under:
TV
I was about to give up on ABC's "Lost." I thought I'd reached my end when the show returned on Feb. 7 after a long hiatus with a horribly boring episode about horribly boring Juliet, one of the Others, and followed it up with an equally dull venture about minor character Desmond. Since then, the show has been hit-or-miss. But "Lost" may have saved its spot on my TiVo last night by focusing on one of the show's long-forgotten standbys, the cryptic John Locke. (Warning: spoilers for the March 21 episode follow.)
Locke has fascinated since the show's first season, when he discovered he no longer needed a wheelchair, that something on Mystery Island had healed him. He's the one who's developed some kind of weird synchronicity with the powers of the island, the one who was bound and determined to break into the hatch, the one who was dedicated to punching in Hurley's mysterious numbers. His character is written in a wonderfully mysterious way: Is he good? Is he evil? Does he have the best interests of the other castaways at heart, or is he all about the island and its secrets? One of the best things about Locke's character is that he's written in such a way that you could easily argue either position for hours.
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Terry O'Quinn
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But no matter how well the character is written, much of the credit for his strange pull has to go to the actor who plays him, the talented Terry O'Quinn -- familiar from such other spooky shows as "The X-Files" and "Millennium." O'Quinn is a marvel.
It's odd to compare him to a comic actor, but he does much the same thing with his face as the talented John Krasinski does in his role as Jim Halpert on "The Office." Both men don't rely on their voice to act for them, some of their best moments come when they aren't saying a thing. Krasinski is now famous for his lips-pursed, much-put-upon straight-man face as Dunder-Mifflin Paper falls apart around him. O'Quinn has a way, too, of staring off into the middle distance after he delivers a line, as if challenging the viewer to determine if he just lied or told the truth, daring them to pick a side.
That was on display in full flower on last night's "Lost," when viewers learned (finally) about the fall that put Locke into his wheelchair. No shocker, it seems to have been caused by his evil kidney-stealing daddy, played by Kevin Tighe (Roy DeSoto from "Emergency!"). Is said Deadly Daddy the same con man who was responsible for the deaths of Sawyer's parents when he was just a boy? Heavy hints seem to have been dropped in that direction, since everyone on this show is connected in some weird way.
The episode ended with a true jolt: Creepy Other Ben promised Locke a look in a box that contained whatever one most desired. What did Locke want? Apparently, a shot at revenge on his creepy father, because suddenly, there was Evil Daddy, bound and gagged and looking a little the worse for wear.
Will Locke take out his revenge on the man who took his kidney, his legs, and his faith in people? Or will the calm, logical, good side of him win out, leaving the man to his own fate? Who knows, but it's got "Lost" viewers talking again, and that should be a lesson to the show's writers. You went ahead and got fans invested in the lives of your original crashees -- Locke, Sayid, Hurley -- and then you somehow got "Lost" yourselves, focusing on nameless, faceless Others no one cared about. If the show takes a roundtrip back to its core focus again, I may not feel so "Lost" after all.
