Welcome to another Big Shiny Robot! roundtable. This was for the final episode of the fourth season of Lost.

Neotron: I know some of you watched it. I think it’s worth discussing in a group. Thoughts?

Budgetron: Oh my gosh! I can’t even begin to write down all of the things I am thinking right now, but I will say this: Next season better pick up with Jack trying to convince everyone to go back to the island. I mean, I’m sure that’s where they’re going, and I think it’s genius. I can’t say more, I gotta sleep on this shit. So good, though! I hate typing…

Kill-tacular-tron: Yah, this finale blew my mind. I think your episode review covers all of it. I missed a couple points that you ended up pointing out to me. I bet Penny ends up dying. That’ll be the only way they get Desmond to return to the island. And it would be a punch in the gut for the audience. Especially since they found one another so easily. He gets off the island and BAM there she is.

McFrogger: Jack has to convince Sun, whom now seems to be teaming with Whitmore, to come as well and how is he going to convince Kate to bring Arron?

Swank-mo-tron: First, I don’t think Jack is going to be convincing anyone. I think Sayid will be doing it at gunpoint. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if the scene with Sayid and Hurley in last nights episode were post-fake-beard Jack and Ben’s meeting over Benthal’s corpse. As far as my general feelings go, were I a slightly less manly-programmed robot, installed with tear duct functions, I might have used them during this episode. Repeatedly. This episode was extremely satisfying and fun to watch and had plenty of twists, turns and hidden crap aplenty to sufficiently short wire my programming and wanting for more. I hope we get to see more Frank, too. I really like that SOB.

My biggest complaint about this episode? The fact that there won’t be anymore until two-thousand-and-fucking-nine!

ARRRGGGHHH!

Arse-bot: Last night I got comfy with a Jack and Coke and a bag of delicious Jalapeño Kettle Chips (yes, they are delicious, Kill-Tacular-Tron can verify) and strapped in for the event that was the LOST season finale. The consensus for this round table seems to be speech-less, and I am in the same boat. LOST crams a lot of plot in to just one hour, let alone two, and a lot obviously happened. While a lot of questions were answered even more were created, like, is Michael really dead? Or is Hurley just telling Walt he was left on the island so he doesn’t have to tell the poor kid his dad blew up? Same with Jin. Mortality seems to be a fluid concept on the island, but Michael and Jin weren’t on the island when they met their demise… but then again, neither was Jack’s dad… And yeah, the Sayid/Keamy fight was tits, Sayid is a badass with a heart of gold (not so much the “heart of gold thing” after he gets off the island apparently, but we’ll see). I am a big Jin fan, I think his character has come a long way, and I’d hate to see him gone for good, so I’m hoping for a different POV of that boat blowing up when he and Michael jump off just before it goes “Boom”. I think we should start a pool for 2009 with predictions as to how many episodes into the next season it will be before finding out what happened to those still on the island after the white light… 3? Maybe 4? Much, much more happened and I obviously have so many more questions and theories etc, but there is just too much going on in my processor to even be able to compute most of it right now, let alone put it to words. Great season finale, can’t wait until 2009! (fuck that’s a long time…)

Dr. Cyborg: I liked it, I just wish that they focused more on the dead coming back to life stuff. Shit what if Keamy comes back to life? I hate that fucker. I was so hungry to know about the dead people, and I thought that Ben was going to be the one in the coffin, and then when he was in the funeral parlor, I still thought he was going to be the one in the coffin, and there were going to be two Ben’s, that would have been fucking cool. I think somehow the highlight to the episode for me though was when Sayid fought Keamy, I know we have been seeing him being an assassin for a while now, but it just seems that I have been waiting to see him do, what he did to Keamy, since the first season. Dr. Cyborg out’chall.

Clang! Boom! Steam!: Did the island really vanish? I could have sworn it sank leaving that perfect circular ripple (that only a sphere should make?) Maybe my eyes were playing tricks on me.
Anyway, so good, everything I love about the series in this episode, including creepy old Dharma videos. The Frozen Donkey Wheel part was some of the coolest/weirdest shit I’ve seen since the 4 toed statue in season one – total Atlantis feel – I know that’s an old tired theory, but still.
As for season 5, I care less about who convinces who and more about how the Hell they find their way back – that will be something.

Neotron: Here’s some highlights from my review:

The fact that I think Ben and Locke are brothers made their interaction even more joyous. The sense of sibling rivalry has always plagued the two. Ben admits defeat and sends Locke off to be the new Island Prophet while he spins the “Frozen Donkey Wheel” and we see a flash similar to the hatch explosion. The Island vanishes (it doesn’t sink for those of you who think so) and water spills in to fill the void where it once stood. If it had sunk, there would be debris and people floating on the surface. Not to mention the Black Rock.

Note: Ben cuts his arm in the Ice Room and is wearing a snow parka. It’s the same parka he’s wearing when he appears in the desert in Tunisia a few episodes back. And his arm is cut. So we know what happened to Ben. He was flashed forward into the future.

Another note: The new Dharma video was cut off as he was explaining that the time-traveling bunny “only appears to have vanished”, but really it…….. What does this say about the island and Ben? Did the island go into the past? Or did it go into the future? Is the reason they can’t find the island yet because it hasn’t appeared yet?

Oh, and this episode made my lubricant tubes leak also.

Oh, yeah: What happened to Desmond’s vision last season where he saw Claire and Aaron get on the helecopter? You know, the vision that Charlie sacrificed himself for? Wow, I hope the writers did not screw that up…

Swank-mo-tron: And what about the pigeons that found the island and Claire and Desmond attached the message saying they were all alive, too? I bet that’s going to come back and bite Jack’s lying in the ass.

CONSENSUS: This episode blew everyone’s mind and Lost, once again, proves why it’s a really cool nerd show. Anyone else have anything to add?

Also, anyone else hit the Octagon Recruiting Agency website?