Lost: LA X

WOW!!! What a great start to the final season. When we last saw the Losties, Juliet had detonated the H-Bomb in 1977, in an effort to change the future. And the episode opens with a nervous Jack back on Oceanic Flight 815, along with various other Losties. The plane passes over the island with no trouble...and the island is actually underwater! So it seems that history has been changed...

But wait! After the first commercial break, we see Kate waking up on the island. She is joined by Sawyer, Hurley, Jin, Jack, Miles, and the badly hurt Sayid. They are at the Swan station...the way it was after Desmond destroyed it. And Juliet is buried in the rubble...

Next, it's back to the beach with Not!Locke, Ben, and Jacob's followers- who found out the truth about Locke too late to help Jacob.

The epsiode goes back and forth between the two island groups and the plane...which safely lands in Los Angeles.

Juliet dies. :( Sawyer begs Miles to "talk" to her...and Miles reveals that Juliet told him that "It worked." Dead!Jacob tells Hurley to take Sayid to the temple or he'll die. The Losties are captured by the Others, but a message Jacob left saves them. Sayid dies anyway.

Jacob's followers attack Not!Locke...who reveals himself to be the "Smoke" monster.

The Losties are grieving for Juliet and Sayid...but then Sayid suddenly sits up and talks!

So much stuff to digest! The big things- Juliet's "It worked" comment- apparently, they now have two timelines going. In one, everything happened the way it did before. In the second, the island is destroyed, and Oceanic Flight 815 never crashes. Alt-Locke is still paralyzed but seems content. Alt-Hurley is still a lottery winner...but he's happy and has had nothing but good luck! It's not happy for everyone- Alt-Jack's father is still dead and the corpse is lost again, Alt-Jin and Sun are unhappy, Alt-Charlie is suicidal (Jack saves him), Alt-Kate is still a fugitive. And Desmond is on the plane! Wonder what that's all about...

So Not!Locke is Jacob's Nemesis, a really evil creature/person/whatever. That much was obvious from the season finale, but the fact that he's the smoke moster threw me!

Sayid dies but suddenly comes back...could he be possessed by Jacob (in a good way)? Is this final season going to be a classic Good v. Evil story? And where are they going with the Alt-Oceanic Flight 815?

Poor Sawyer. The death of Juliet really broke him. :(

It was nice to see Charlie again...even though he seems more broken than he was in the pilot. Boone also appears on the plane, but without Shannon. We don't see Claire until Los Angeles...when she's trapped in a taxi with an armed and desperate Kate!

This was an awesome night of television, and I can't wait to see how all of this is resolved.