Maybe she was a novice scuba diver? and I thought Boone was a freaking life guard? for being a life guard..he sure was having troubles.

I thought this week's episode was pretty damn good.

He didn't need to travel with them, because he is a doctor. He could have written the prescriptions for himself after getting to Australia (unless there is some rule or law against that).

i also think it was an empty coffin. he already paid for it, and mentioned that the hearse was meeting them at the airport. they could put the coffin in there (empty) and still proceed with the service. they weren't having an open-casket wake, if i recall. he mentioned going right to the funeral.

but i agree that that does not answer the question as to whether the body is still in Australia.


So i'll mention it again. Did anyone else see the rope hanging below jack when he fell off the cliff?

But if it were an empty coffin, why would he even go to it and open it? There would be no logical reason. To me the reason he went to it was to make sure his fathers body was still in there. When it wasn't, we started thinking all kinds of weird thoughts!

Chris

Yes, I also saw the rope and wondered why he didn't grab on to it. But if it were really a rope, then that would mean that there are / were other people on the island!

Chris

I just wanted to give my two cents.

It seems to me that the show will have layers of backstory. Right now, they are only showing enough backstory to let the viewer know why they were on the plane headed for the US leaving Australia, but we never really know what they did or what happened to make the truly want to be in Australia. For example:

Locke - he was leaving Australia because he couldn't do the walkabout, but you don't really know anything about his past.

Jack - we know he was leaving Australia to bring his dead father back and come to some closure. We don't know what he did or his father did to want to go to Australia to begin with.

Kate - she was running from the law and was being extradited back to the US from Australia, but we still don't know what reasons made her decide to go to Australia or her crime that drover her there.

Charlie - not much backstory yet other than the drug addiction

Hurley - no backstory yet

Sayed - not much backstory except that he seems very MacGuyver-ish(...or the Professor if you will)

Koreans - backstory coming next week...maybe on the honeymoon?

Dad and son - we know the mother died, but do we know why the mother and son where in Australia instead the US?

Brother and Sister - no real backstory except that they seem well off( The Howells on Gilligan's Island)

Cowboy jerk - no real backstory at all.

Pregnant girl - no real bacstory yet.

I think they will have to delve deeper to give more insight into the characters themselves.

Remember, we still only know the general stuff for the main characters, and we have plenty of time and flashbacks coming to fill in the the reasons for them going to Australia.

It appeared he was having some sort of mental issues, as when he was talking to the chick on the phone (about the trip) he mentioned paying her for talking..and that he already had another shrink or something

Those of you who think they shipped an empty coffin are retarded.

I've seen pretty good arguments for both sides. I'd prefer to wait and see what the show tells me before I call people 'retarded' for their opinions/thoughts.

From a storytelling standpoint, he has to open the coffin to let us, the viewers, know its empty. Regardless:

1. He can't sleep because he knows the coffin is empty. We know he was going to have the casket picked up at the airport and immediately buried. Why the hurry? "Because I need it to be over?" is a lame excuse for "I don't really have the body in there, which is also why I don't have the proper paperwork, and I don't want anyone to find out so please break the rules for me." Flash forward to the empty coffin. He needs to find it and smash it before anyone finds an empty coffin and discovers his secret.

2. He can't sleep because he knows the coffin is not empty. A proper burial will bring closure, and he can't sleep until the coffin is in the ground because of ingrained Judeo-Christian ethics. Apparitions of his father's restless soul will haunt him until he performs this task. The body was in there, but the wish-granting mechanical T-rex* found it and took it, and therefore he assumes the body has been skinned and placed in a tree, where it will not be eaten by the wild animals that don't belong on the island. Unable to get the closure he was seeking, he smashes the coffin in a fit of frustration. That makes him feel better, so he goes back to camp.

3. He can't sleep because he knows the coffin is not empty. His father was carrying a deadly disease, and if the body is found the disease could spread. During the crash, the body was jarred loose. The coffin is destroyed to hide the evidence that a body was on the plane.

That was some extra rope left by Chuck Nolan.

DigIt, I'll take option # 2

Chris

I got burnt by it going long once. After that, I padded the end of my recording by two minutes. I couldn't watch it live this week since I was at Game 6 of the NLCS.

So we've got a guy who can walk again, a guy who sees his dead dad and finds his empty coffin, so what's next? Maybe the woman who lost her husband on the flight and sits alone is right. Maybe he is still alive.

I like option #2 also.

so what did the Oceania Airlines attendent do with the body in the Phillipines? sell it for organ research?

No, no, no. The zombie grants wishes. He rides the t-rex. Shesh. How hard is the concept of this show to grasp?

Fixed original post.

* Where "wish-granting mechanical T-rex" stands for wish-granting mechanical T-rex, wish-granting zombie riding a mechanical T-rex, or MagiWish Penisula.

so i'm retarded? interesting...

if the writers are indeed going with a scientifically explainable premise, bodies don't just get up and walk around. Having Jack open the empty coffin makes the average J6P think "that there body must have been brought back to life! That there island is magical!"

Maybe the woman who "drowned" really found her way off the island.

Yes, I don't think that we can deny the fact that, although the writers have stated that the show will have a plausible explanation, the show speaks for itself -- and the show is obviously geared towards playing up the supernatural aspects of the island, or at least playing with your perceptions of the island.

They gave the scientific explination on the show.

Locke asked him - what if you had a patient that just went through a tramatic experience, only had 2 hrs of sleep in a couple of days, and was dehydrated?

Reply: I'd say he was seeing things.

So they took the body OUT of the coffin at the airport and did what with it? Tossed it in the back of a truck? When would anybody take a body out of a coffin? WHY would anybody take a body out of a coffin?

I stand by my claim of retardation.

took it back to the morgue?

was there ever a body in it to begin with?

i agree that this show is geared to make people believe that the island is mystical. but is it really? that's the question that remains to be answered.