Dudes! Sara's shirt had 44 on the back of it in that scene with Jack at the piano.

But my question is, was Ethan around for that first head count? Or did he slip in later?

I don't know if I'd say terrible, but I did think it was the worst episode of the season. I don't think Claire going through labor and Boone dying of his injuries needed to take up an entire episode. The backstory was pretty lame too, except for Julie Bowen. You don't get cold feet marrying Julie Bowen, Jackass!

I'm annoyed at the writer saying publicly that they were going to kill off a main character, and then actually doing it. We were far enough along I was hoping it was a red herring. It made it worse in a way that it was Boone, since they made him out to be creepy and unlikable recently. I remember reading a quote that they wouldn't dare kill off the Hobbit because he's so popular. Wussies!

And did Jack include the pilot in his head count? Why wouldn't he?

Edit: To answer my own question (somewhat)- from the Episode Guide on the ABC website:

So it looks like Jack referred to the survivors as 48 "passengers", which I assume wouldn't include the pilot.

Edit 2: To further prove the point, this is from the episode 5 guide, shortly after the lady dies swimming:

So it looks like 48 is correct (not counting the pilot). But I assume that count did include Ethan.

Yeah, but Locke could have subsequently hit the SUV in some sort of chain-reaction collision with a numerically appropriate (44 or the like) number of vehicles...

Ciao,
Smithsguy

Now you're getting into a whole different debate. The question becomes whether an unborn child is "alive" or not and therefore can be said to be a "passenger" or "survivor." My answer is that the child counts.

I believe Ethan doesn't count as a "survivor" thus still leaving the number at 44.

Not specific to this particular episode, but the coming issue of Entertainment Weekly has the men of "Lost" on the cover...and it is issue #815 (the same number as the Oceanic Flight that crashed in the show).

As posted by

Big shocker! Every other week is a Lost cover. I think they are milking it more than ABC.

Seems like a realistic theory to me.

By the way, I'm Vulcan, my blood is green and we have no "blood type".

Oops. Oh well...

So I guess the threads have gone from the T-Rex and the wish granting island to studying numerology. I wouldn't be surprised if they were yanking our chains on most of it. "Let's put 44 on her shirt, that'll drive 'em all nuts!"

It isn't a debate at all. It's just about the head count that Jack made when he told the Pilot how many survivors there were. Whether or not the baby was counted by Jack could be a debate but not anything to do with an unborn child counting as alive or not.

My question is whether Ethan was counted by Jack? Was Ethan reallly around in the beginning? I can't remember him being there or doing anything until the census. Does anybody recall when he showed up?

I'm positive that we never saw Ethan until an episode or two before we found out that he was bad, and not part of the crash group. I've re-watched the series (up to current episode) a couple of times, and remember looking for this.

Ethan first appeared in the Sayid/French woman episode. He was Locke's hunting partner. In his second episode, he was revealed not to be one of them.

Why was Jack pissed at Locke, saying he murdered Boone? From what I saw, Boone went into the plane of his own free will. Granted, Locke had a big influence over him, but if someone else on the island found that plane I'm sure they would have wanted to poke around inside.

He was pissed because Locke lied to him about how Boone's injuries occurred -- Locke told Jack that Boone fell off a cliff, which was sort of true, but not entirely. I'm not sure how the "lie" Locke told to Jack affected Boone's condition; he still had a mangled leg and internal bleeding, I mean, how would Jack have changed Boone's treatment if he knew that he was inside a plane that fell from a tree (cliff?)? (It looked like a tree to me... tree on a cliff?)

Like Lost.... answer one question, raise ten....

Jack didn't know that. He just knows that Locke said he fell off a cliff (i.e. that he lied to him) and they dissappeared.

Jack said something along the lines of "he didn't fall, his leg was crushed." So he knew Locke had lied, and assumes it was his fault since he ran away after dropping him off.

Saying it was murder was just him being pissed. I think he just feels it was Lockes fault since he lied and ran off, rather than thinking Locke tried to kill him intentionally.

I have a Series 2 Tivo in use and a non-subscribed Series 1 in storage, but I think I'll probably just split the cable that night and watch one while I Tivo the other -- American Idol finale is an hour and 45 minutes of crap and 15 minutes of results anyway....

Oh, OK, I can see that. I was taking it as "you lied to me about how this happened and I treated him differently than if I had known, so you murdered him." But you're right, Jack didn't learn much from Locke before Locke left. I kept the episode because I wasn't tracking it completely Wed. night, so I should probably watch it again.

i loved that they keep you guessing what will happen next.

I guess there's no way to know whether or not Jack counted the baby as an additional survivor. IMO, Jack, as a doctor, would have counted Claire + baby.

As for whether or not Ethan was counted, his name was not on the flight manifest. When the census was taken, that's what they used. I'm going to go with that Ethan was not there in the beginning and snuck in a few eps later and therefore was not counted.

I'm not sure how we can prove one way or the other (baby and Ethan) unless they give us a headcount in an official recap.

anyone know the name of the piece of music played at the end of the episode? The piano notes repeated in the main portion was F D F D F D F A F.

Boone also told Jack about the plane, so Jack knew that Locke was withholding information.

It's kind of a stretch for Jack to blame Locke for his death, but it seems to be enough for Jack not to trust him. (Of course, Locke would also have a good alibi for keeping the information about the plane secret because of the heroin. Wouldn't want Charlie -- or anyone else who might be tempted -- to know about the giant stash on the island.)