Well, after I got past, man, this episode sucked, I have a few more useful observations. I guess I'm glad the hatch and the people inside the hatch have now been dealt with. Still no clue what happened there, and I have a disturbing feeling we arent really going to get that much more information at least for a while. How anyone survived seemed to be rather unimportant to the show for some reason just that they did. And Desmond espcially, because while the others appeared to have the crap beat out of them, Desmond who in theory was the closest to the explosion came out without a scratch (or clothes for that matter).I guess I wanted a little more, or at least a little more concern from their fellow survivors. That to me was where the show which has been so tightly focused the past two weeks failed miserably. Where was the search team from the beach? Why did no one seemed to be all that concerned about the missing people. Especially after Locke comes back, you would think there would at least be someone other than Charlie who would be at least interested in what was going on, after all Jack/Kate/Sawyer are off on who knows what kinda of mission, Sayid/Jin/Sun sailed off in the boat, and there was the giant explosion in the jungle leaving a hole where the hatch was... the lack of concern or interest in what's going on just disturbed me a little... I mean geesh, what more important thing are the other people dealing with right now?
The Boone dream was weird, I guess its the beginning of Locke trying to come to grips with his role in Boone's death. Some of the imagry is disturbing, especially given Locke's past which is so very different than his island personna. Is he the choosen one that is destined to save Jack/Kate/Sawyer, a victim of a drug induced self-delusion, or perhaps just loosing his mind. Given what we know the delusion seemed pretty accurate and combined with the Desmond sees the future story arch, I suppose we should expect the Locke Action Hero leading the charge into Otherworld. Whether he's successful or not is highly debatable, but then the island may have changed him from the "farmer" he always was to the "hunter" he always wanted to be.
The flashback was probably the best part of the episode. It might eventually help explain his disgust at Charlie the addict. I suppose we can assume that the commune was after his fathers betrayal and loss of Helen, so we can then presume whatever causes him to loose the use of his legs will happen soon. Perhaps it is a result of something that happen when his hippy friends and the police have their showdown, I do expect we will get more of that story at some point as it did kinda leave things hanging there.
-ICB
...is it bad that every time Charlie opened his mouth I was rooting for the polar bear?