MiltonSearch.com blog

A local agency is looking for more than a few good men

Big Brothers Big Sisters of Halton is calling on men to consider the value in being a buddy to a local boy. The agency has launched a campaign to find 100 men in 2008 to be matched with a boy aged between five and 14 for as little as one hour a week.

Being a Big Brother can be as simple as kicking a ball around or flying a kite. For example it doesn’t take a lot of time to meet up with a boy in primary school one hour a week to talk about the latest hockey game or to just sit and listen.

In Milton, the agency has partnered with local businessman Mark Burger of Spokes ‘n Slopes to create a campaign poster targeting male volunteers. Burger recently volunteered to be an in-school mentor to a boy who really needs a buddy.

“You don’t have to change your life to change his is the essence of our campaign”, notes North Halton Coordinator of Volunteers Wendy Somerville. “We want to get across the message to men that being a Big Brother is really about just being a pal to a boy.”

The campaign poster shows Burger fixing a bicycle at his shop with a Little Brother. Fixing bikes, shooting hoops or playing video games can be quite typical activities for Big and Little brothers.

Big Brothers are in particular demand in the Halton area where 70 boys are waiting to be matched. Being a Big Brother can typically mean hanging out for a few hours a week. Three hours can fly by fast when you’re watching movies and eating popcorn, going to a baseball game or grabbing a pizza for lunch.

The United Way-funded agency is calling on everyone to get the word out to all those men who you think can make a difference in the life of a child. They could be your father, brother, cousin or friend. For as little as one hour a week, being a buddy to a boy can change, empower, educate and liberate both child and adult.

“Big Brothers are regular people. Role models come in all shapes and sizes. They are bus drivers, teachers, plumbers and grandfathers,” adds Somerville. “I think ultimately you just have to want to make a positive impact on the life of a child.”

Big Brothers Big Sisters of Halton has been serving our community for more than 40 years and continues to be a leader in mentoring children. The United Way funded agency will serve 700 vulnerable children through its mentoring programs this year. Big Brothers Big Sisters of Halton’s goal is to reach those 2000 children we know need a mentor.

For more information about Big Brothers Big Sisters of Halton and volunteering call (905) 878-8840 or visit www.bbbshalton.ca

A full day of Canada Day celebrations in Milton will certainly end with a bang!

With another successful Downtown Milton Street Party behind us, it’s time to look forward to the next signature Milton summer event, Milton Canada Day at the Fairgrounds on July 1st.

First, a couple of thoughts on this year’s edition of the Downtown Street Party….

It wasn’t quite as busy as last year, and there were a few less vendors, but overall it was a fantastic day again! The weather, like last year, was fabulous. The DBIA did an amazing job organizing the event. MiltonSearch.com participated again, offering face-painting at our booth, and from a vendor point of view, it was incredible how easy it was to register and access the area for setup - all thanks to the efforts of the Milton DBIA and their volunteers. A special thanks to Jacqueline Garrard of the DBIA for everything.

The event may have been a little busier last year based on the fact that it was the Town’s 150th Anniversary, who knows. I encourage everyone to mark it on your calendars for next year - the event is a fantastic day to get out and explore what Milton really has to offer – participating vendors (like AJS Filipino Grocery who were located beside our booth for the 2nd year in a row: mmmmmm), local musical talent, downtown businesses and just the chance to stroll leisurely along Main St. and feel the positive energy.

MiltonSearch.com was celebrating our 1st anniversary also, as our site officially launched last year at this event. In honour of the occasion, we’re running 4 promotions which can be found here, which include a kids’ colouring contest, classifieds contest, forums contest and our 2nd photography contest.

Anyhoo, summer is in full swing now, so get out and enjoy it! Next up is annual Canada Day celebration at the Fairgrounds, and here are all the details:

Milton Canada Day 2008 Events & Participants:

Veterans’ Breakfast from 10-11:30am at Victoria Park - open to everyone.

A “Moment to Remember” ceremony at 11:30am at the Cenotaph in Victoria Park, to honour our veterans.

The Veterans’ Parade starts at 11:50am from the Cenotaph to the Fairgrounds.

The Kidz Zone runs from Noon to 7pm featuring activities for kids.

The Teen Zone runs from Noon to 7pm featuring:
- Guitar Hero
- Dance Revolution
- Rock Climbing Walls
- Henna Tattoos
- Giant Sand Hills
- Playdough centre
- Bubble machine

At noon, there will be a Canada Day Message, the National Anthem will be performed by Terry Wheelen and a birthday cake for Canada will be cut.

As well, there will be a Swearing-in Ceremony for New Canadians.

The bands “Sokey” and “District” will perform in the afternoon, followed by “Scarecrow” (a John Cougar Mellencamp tribute band) and “Fleetwood Dreams” (a Fleetwood Mac tribute band) at 7 and 8:30pm respectively.

There are a number of other performers including:

- The Arial Angels
- Martial Arts exhibitions
- K9 Dog Show
- 5 Star Ranch
- Sciensational Snakes
- Mountberg “Birds of Prey”
- Petting Zoo
- Pony Rides
- Steam Era Display
- Remax Balloon

You will also have the opportunity to add a personal message to a banner being sent to Canada’s Olympic team, bound for Beijing, China.

The Amusement Park runs from noon until 10pm, followed by the Northern Lights Fireworks at 10pm.

Oh yeah, and the Beer Gardens and food vendors will be open from noon until 10pm!

For more information and details, we encourage you to visit the official Milton Canada Day website!

Viva la Vida, although darker, still retains Coldplay’s signature sound

MiltonSearch.com Album Review:

(3 out of 4 stars)

The cumbersomely titled Viva La Vida or Death and All His Friends marks the Oxford quartet’s most public effort yet at contributing some serious substance to their discography, enlisting the help of Brian Eno to put a bit of an unconventional spin on the band’s stadium-filling ruminations on love, death and religion.

The album comes with a few conservative risks that may please the critics, but for longtime, hardcore fans of the band, it’s not the total sonic overhaul that was feared. To me, it proves the band does have some interesting, if not earth-shattering, ideas up its sleeve.

After conveniently downloading the album from Apple’s iTunes (now without the maximum security digital encoding features to allow easier copying between computers and burning to CD’s I should add), my new preferred way to purchase music (life with a busy work schedule and two young children doesn’t often permit time to even make it out to the local music store for such hedonistic purchases) and putting the album through it’s paces, here are my thoughts:

Viva la Vida begins with the tasty intstrumental “Life in Technicolor”, before “Cemeteries of London” provides a little mood with some “Edge-like” guitars, reminiscent of U2’s “The Unforgettable Fire” album.

“Lost!” is a winner, employing a pipe organ and rhythmic percussion along with a signature Coldplay melody, despite it’s use of a lyric like: “You might be a big fish…. in a little pond”. The song also appears again at the end of the album with Martin singing solo on the piano. It’s a great version, but unless your name is Roger Waters or Neil Young, I’m against including songs twice on an album or cutting them in half etc. C’mon, save the solo version for concerts or a B-side album… geez.

Speaking of questionable lyrics, how about “those who are dead, are not dead, they’re just living in my head”? That beauty can be found on an otherwise solid “42″, the fourth track.

“Lovers in Japan” has a great energy and boucny, driving rhythm, followed up by “Reign of Love”, a slower, lower track – Martin has seriously toned down the “falsetto” vocals on their fourth studio album.

“Yes” is another solid, but darker song followed up by a great hidden track, mostly instrumental with a tight, driving beat and blaring guitars reminiscent of New Order which ends on a Neil Young-esque grungy, distorted chord (enough artist comparisons for you?).

“Viva la Vida” has the catchy, anthematic-sound Coldplay has become known for with a fresh twist – some nice violin work. From there, we jump into the first single, “Violet Hill”, an aggressive, head-pounding, fist-pumping tune.

“Strawberry Swing” brings out the “foot-stomping hillbilly” side of the band, while “Death and All His Friends” starts quietly before building into open-armed soccer-pitch anthemics.

Overall, a solid album from the British rockers. It doesn’t appear to be full of obvious smash radio hits for the masses like 2002’s “A Rush of Blood to the Head”, but it has a more refined, cohesive, moody feel, while again, retaining enough of the band’s loved (and criticized) signature sound.

Life-altering? No. Important? Not really. But it’ll do.

What do you think? We invite your comments below.

In the May 9th edition of the Milton Canadian Champion, town CAO Mario Belvedere said the town of Milton was doing an “outstanding job” managing growth and roads over the past several years.

Visit Mike Cluett’s Milton blog to read the articles and subsequent comments from readers presenting a slight difference of opinion on the matter.

Maybe the Town needs a little help getting ready the next time it decides to pat itself on the back.

Passengers wait to ride the Gold Line, a rapid transit line between Los Angeles and Pasadena, Calif., from an at-grade station in the middle of an expressway.

One lobby group says there’s a simple, cost-effective way of building a commuter rail line through our busiest highway. There’s no shortage of critics who say it’s a pipe dream

Imagine you’re among the nearly 450,000 drivers idling on Highway 401 through the Toronto area on a typical weekday, bumper-to-bumper traffic burning a $1.27-a-litre hole in your pocket and the ozone.

Now, fast forward just over a decade, when gridlock and gas prices are expected to make 2008 look like the good old days, and you glance from your car to see a high-speed, electric train stop in the middle of the 401. Hundreds of waiting passengers file aboard, open their papers and laptops and speed off.

Before you’ve passed the next exit, they’re halfway to work.

No one disputes that something must be done to ease the traffic congestion choking Highway 401 across the top of Toronto.

It’s bad for the environment and the economy, to say nothing of the physical and mental toll on drivers.

But now a group of sustainability advocates is pushing a radical solution to get the 401 moving again.

The idea – eliminating one lane of traffic in each direction to put subway-style rail down the middle of the highway – may be counter-intuitive.

It’s certainly ambitious – 51 kilometres and 28 new stations from Pickering through Pearson International Airport to Mississauga. It’s time-consuming – 12 years to complete. And, it’s costly – $5.9 billion.

But, the Sustainable Urban Development Association, or SUDA, believes we can no longer afford to ignore the need for a car alternative to east-west travel across the GTA.

“The need for sustainable transportation is expanding dramatically,” said John Stillich, general manager of SUDA, a charitable organization devoted to environmentally sensitive city building. “Climate shifts are happening faster than people previously thought, energy prices are hitting the fan.

“It’s gotta happen.”

There’s no shortage of critics lining up to say it cannot happen. They argue it’s too costly, the 401 is already too congested to reduce lanes and that getting people in and out of stations in the middle of a highway will prove difficult to impossible.

And, despite ever-worsening gridlock, critics are not even convinced there’s enough demand for public transit there.

Stillich, a former senior financial analyst with the province, first floated the idea of a 401RT more than a decade ago. While applauding the $11.5 billion Queen’s Park pledged last year for public transit projects across the GTA and Hamilton by 2020, he said they won’t keep up with growth in road travel.

An essential component of cutting congestion and pollution across the GTA is an east-west transit line across its middle – Highway 401.

The SUDA concept would see trains stop at stations typically located on bridges and underpasses, which are wide enough for buses to drop off passengers without the need for expensive bus terminals. From one end in Pickering to the other in Mississauga would take about 75 minutes, with travel to Yonge St. from 35 to 40 minutes either way.

“If we don’t do it now, we’re going to have greater hardship for everybody in the GTA,” Stillich said, forecasting 150 million riders a year on a line that would cost $304 million to operate. “Things will get worse.”

Stillich is hoping Metrolinx, the body developing a comprehensive transportation plan for the region, will include the 401RT as part of its draft due out this summer.

Though there’s an obvious sticker shock that comes with a $5.9 billion tab, when broken down over its 12-year construction period and with the expected federal and provincial support that comes with major infrastructure projects, the average annual cost per income taxpayer in Toronto, Peel and Durham comes in at $60, Stillich said. With the price for gas and other driving expenses climbing, he’s sure people will see trading in their wheels for rails as a bargain.

“It’s only high cost in terms of the dollar amounts that people have to spend to put the thing together,” he said. “But if you look at the resultant impact on households of that initial investment, it’s cheaper than business as usual by a long shot.”

To back up its argument, SUDA used part of a $76,000 Ontario Trillium Foundation grant to survey households across the GTA. It found more than two-thirds of respondents willing to pay more to improve public transit.

That’s in line with an Ipsos Reid survey of 1,000 residents of the GTA and Hamilton done last fall for Metrolinx. It found two-thirds believe increasing public transit is the best way to improve the traffic situation, compared with one-third calling for more roads.

Metrolinx also has its eye on public transit across the 401. But it envisions an express bus corridor using high-occupancy vehicle lanes.

Stillich, who is looking for a “political champion” to push the 401RT concept, admits SUDA’s pitch needs more thorough analysis through a feasibility study.

But a huge hurdle with a 401RT is access, said Toronto transit activist Steve Munro. With trains running down the middle of the highway it would be next to impossible to get passengers into stations without large – and expensive – bus interchanges, parking lots or tunnels.

Also, the sprawl-oriented development across the 905 region “is not suited to transit,” unlike the concentrated areas of Toronto serviced by the subway. Add to that the fact that few people have a final destination on the 401 and a rail line proves “superficially seductive” but impractical, Munro said.

“The idea that somehow we are going to solve regional transportation problems by putting an express line on the 401 sounds nice in theory, but how the hell do you get people to it?” said Munro.

SUDA’s concept includes a massive network of buses, much like those that will feed Toronto’s seven planned Transit City light rail lines.

But unlike Transit City, which is supposed to extend light rail into the recesses of suburban Toronto, the 401RT concept doesn’t have the same city-building potential, argues TTC chair Adam Giambrone.

He espouses the power of light rail to transform neighbourhoods by contributing to higher densities of housing and jobs, building pedestrian traffic that makes for lively neighbourhoods.

“Those cars were fed to that (highway) corridor,” he said. “They came in on streets. The goal here is to make transit accessible by pedestrian measures so you can walk. If you have (transit) in a corridor like the 401 series highways or a hydro corridor, that becomes very difficult.”

It can be done. It is done. The TTC buses people to subways and expects to feed the Transit City lines with buses as well. It’s just not the preferred option, said Giambrone.

“You would miss all the walk-on traffic and all the streetscape possibilities,” he said.

You could do it but it would be a bad substitute for the kind of more localized higher order transit corridors he believes will succeed under Metrolinx.

From an environmental perspective, it already may be too late to change direction for something as radical as a 401RT, says Pollution Probe’s climate change program director.

Anything that gets people out of their cars is good, but given the time constraints, building on the existing transit network might be more practical, according to senior scientist Quentin Chiotti. “We basically have 10 to 15 years for the globe to turn around their whole emissions of greenhouse gases. If this doesn’t happen we’re in serious trouble. Twelve years (to build the RT) may be beginning to fall into that window, but just how much will that give us, given the investment?” he said. “Are there other ways of spending that $6 billion that’s going to give us more bang for the buck?”

In the Toronto region, freight has priority when it comes to the rails, said Chiotti.

“Can’t we do something about who has priority over the rail system? We have a system that is supposed to get people moving through the GTA but the system has a lot of barriers to operating as efficiently as possible,” he said.

“Instead of saying we should give transit a high priority, I think we need to look at the whole rail system and improve that so we have more dedicated lines for people movement and freight.”

What’s needed more than anything, Stillich said, is public understanding of all costs involved in the 401RT project. While people may wince at a $5.9 billion pricetag and losing a lane of highway traffic each way, he said they’re not aware of the true toll on the environment and economy of taking “inadequate and incremental steps” rather than embracing his “dramatic change” now.

“If things get so bad that everything is jammed every day, there’ll be more and more screaming that, no, we can’t do this construction and lose another lane because nothing will move,” Stillich said. “Something has to be done now to avoid the worst-case scenario.

“And, if you don’t do this, or this kind of thing, then nothing is going to move on the 401 anyway.”

Interactive map: 401 transit proposal

One lobby group says there’s a simple, cost-effective way of building a commuter rail line through our busiest highway. View an interactive map of the proposal.

AIRPORT LINK

Plans to build a long-awaited rail link from Union Station to Pearson airport would become redundant under the 401RT plan, according to SUDA.

To reach the airport, commuters could ride to the top of the Yonge or Spadina subway lines, and transfer to the 401RT. The last 7.7 kilometres of the route, beginning at Airport Rd. and Highway 409, would travel underground, passing directly below Pearson and ending at Hurontario St. in Mississauga.

Constructing this leg would cost an estimated $1.4 billion of the $5.9 billion budget.

OPTIONS

Elevated

Building an elevated rapid transit line can avoid the call to eliminate a lane for cars in each direction on Highways 401 and 409. If the goal is to avoid eliminating a lane for cars in each direction on Highways 401 and 409, it can be built as an elevated rapid transit line. Rising above existing bridges would send the train — and costs — way up.

Cost: An additional $1 billion, for a total of $6.9 billion.

Subway

The Sheppard subway, which runs for about five kilometres from Yonge St. to Don Mills Rd., could be extended east, to Scarborough City Centre. Using more costly tunneling, it could also be pushed west under and through Pearson International Airport and the surrounding area.

Cost: Estimated at more than $10 billion.

At-grade and subway

Placing most of the line at road level means much less tunneling or elevation, making this a cheaper option. It includes adding nearly 400 more buses to get more passengers to stations and intersects with subway, GO Transit and bus routes.

Cost: Estimated at $5.9 billion.

TRAVEL TIME

Stations would be two kilometres apart on average. That means trains could often move faster than cars on the congested highway. Travelling from Liverpool Rd. in Pickering at one end to Hurontario St., or Highway 10, in Mississauga at the other would take about 75 minutes. Travel from either end to Yonge St. would take 35 to 40 minutes.

TRANSIT CONNECTIONS

In addition to 15 more buses on most of the routes to the 28 proposed 401RT stations, the line would also connect with existing public transit lines, including:

• The Yonge subway line at Yonge St.

• The Spadina subway line at Yorkdale

• The Bloor-Danforth subway via the Scarborough Rapid Transit line at Scarborough Town Centre

• Etobicoke North GO station

Source: Sustainable Urban Development Association

– By Daniel Girard and Tess Kalinowski, Transportation Reporters for the Toronto Star

The following post is by Mike Cluett. Please visit Mike Cluett’s Milton blog

Is the town making the right decision by looking at changing the ward boundaries in Milton?

By the sounds of this letter to the Champion last week, they might be jumping the gun. Milton resident Robert Harris states that the Town of Milton should wait until the Region of Halton completes its “Sustainable Halton” plan before making changes to how the town is divided up. Here’s the letter…

To continue reading this column, go to Mike Cluett’s Milton Blog.

The Red Wings are on the verge of yet another Stanley Cup win while the Penguins seem to be doing their best impression of the 1983 Oilers

What should have been a fast-paced, exciting and competitive Stanley Cup Final, reminds the Milton Sports Guy of how the 1982-83 Season wrapped up

A week ago, it looked like we were on the verge of a Stanley Cup final for the ages. Now, it appears like it will be one of the more forgettable finals with the Red Wings on the verge of a tidy, efficient 5-game victory. What happened?

First of all, let’s look at the Red Wings who are often overlooked and underestimated – I predicted back in my original Stanley Cup preview column that they wouldn’t be around to see the semi-finals. I don’t know why (probably the heavy Euro-influence on the makeup of their roster), but although they seem to ease through the regular-season year-after-year, they’re rarely the pick to win it all. For me, it’s the ‘playoff toughness’ intangible - after being dispatched by the tougher, younger and more fiesty Flames, Oilers and Ducks in recent years I just thought they’d be too old and slow to advance to a 4th round.

Well, the MSG was fooled. Instead of being soft and old, the Wings have proven to be calm, cool, collected, experienced and opportunistic – much in the character their captain, Niklas Lidstrom. The tougher but more inconsistent Flames gave them a bit of a challenge in round one; the Avs were outclassed and embarrassed by Detroit in round two, and the toughest test they’ve had in the postseason thus far came when the Stars beat them twice in a row – after the Wings had won the first three games of the series, mind you.

They had effortlessly sliced through the Western Conference like a hot knife through butter and were prepared to take on the new kids on the block, the Penguins.

The Penguins – the NHL’s newest marquee club with 2 of the league’s youngest stars and a boatload of other young up-and-coming studs coming from a raft of high draft picks after several trying seasons. A club reborn after years of financial troubles with an exciting young nucleus reminiscent of the Oilers from the early 80’s. Instead of Gretzky, Messier, Kurri, Anderson, Lowe and Fuhr, this year’s edition of the Penguins boasts the likes of Crosby, Malkin, Staal, Talbot, Letang, Dupuis and Fleury.

Like Detroit, they too coasted through three rounds, ousting the dysfunctional Senators without barely breaking a sweat and dismantling the Rangers and Flyers. All in 5 games. The young Penguins had appeared to have come of age and were advancing to the franchise’s first Stanley Cup final since the glory days of Lemieux and Jagr.

So here we were. A marquee final. The young, talented, sexy Penguins versus the experienced Red Wings from hockeytown going for their 4th cup in 10 years. A can’t miss final for TV ratings as well: the star power of Crosby and Malkin, and two U.S.-based teams from northern, hockey-friendly cities.

What has happened since the opening faceoff at Joe Louis Arena last Saturday? From my point of view it reminds me an awful lot of the 1983 Stanley Cup final between the New York Islanders and Edmonton Oilers. Yes, the Penguins roster not only reminds me of that young Oiler team, but so does their level of play so far – and that’s not a good thing.

I thought the Pens could really give the Red Wings a run in this series and it wouldn’t have surprised me if they actually won. But after 4 games, I’ve come to realize what the Oilers figured out in 1983 – experience counts and sometimes in sports, you have to lose on the big stage in order to learn how to win on the big stage.

In 1983, the Islanders came in with the experience. They had already established their dynasty coming off of three consecutive Stanley Cups with a deep, talented team. It looked to be coming to an end though, as the high-flying Oilers had breezed their way through the playoffs. They were an offensive juggernaut and it looked to be their time. The wiley Isles had finally met their match.

Four games later, the Cup was being hoisted by the guys from Long Island.

Now, a year later it should be noted, the same two clubs met again to play for the big, silver mug. As we know, the Oilers prevailed 4-1 in a series that wasn’t close. The Islander dynasty came crashing to a halt and Gretzky & co. were beginning a dynasty of their own – 4 championships in 5 years (5 in 7 years counting the 1990 Messier-led, Gretzky-less Oiler team).

No one really talks about that 4th Islander championship. You remember they won 4, then you remember the Oilers winning their cups. Everyone forgets the drubbing the Oilers suffered that year in their first Stanley Cup final appearance. Let’s look locally to another sport: baseball. Remember the Jays’ tough postseason defeats in ‘85, ‘89 and ‘91 before going the distance in 1992 and ‘93? I’m a firm believer that most of the time, teams need to get close and taste defeat to really know what it takes to win it all.

Cut to the 2008 Penguins. As the Red Wings sit on the edge of another championship, did we really think the Penguins could go all the way? Like those young Oilers, they sure looked good through three rounds but you can’t help thinking that before they win it all, they need to learn a lesson like the one the Wings are giving to them now.

The series has been far from entertaining, with the Wings efficiently keeping the high-flying Pens at bay while capitalizing on every mistake or chance they get. It’s been a low-scoring series and outside of a two-goal Crosby outburst in game three, the Penguins’ young stars have been invisible. Marc-Andre Fleury has been steady in goal for the Penguins, but has been outdueled by Chris Osgood every step of the way (yes, THE Chris Osgood that led Detroit to the championship ten years ago and who still wears one of those oh-so-retro mask/helmet combos).

You have to think Detroit wraps this thing up Monday night back at the Joe.

Now, here’s the question: what happens to the Penguins?

Will it be difficult to keep their nucleus of young talent together in this salary-cap era of the NHL? If so, will they be back to the final next year or will they take a step back?

Or, like that young Edmonton team, is this just the beginning. The tough loss that inspires them to rise to the level of greatness?

Will we look back years from now and forget about this series, instead talking about the Penguins’ dynasty led by Sid the Kid & co.

As I said earlier, their play in this series reminds me of the 1983 Oilers who also suffered a Stanley Cup finals beatdown. And that’s not necessarily a bad thing.

The Milton Sports Guy is a regular contributor to MiltonSearch.com who had not been born yet when the Toronto Maple Leafs were last Stanley Cup Champions.

RAFT OF LIES Jack was the one who made up the cover story while it was finally revealed who was in the coffin: John Locke, aka Jeremy Benthem

A Moving Ending: While Locke and Ben succeed in their mission to displace the Island, we learn why only the Oceanic 6 escaped, why they lied, and why Jack feels the need to go back

The season finale of Lost was a major leap backward for the show, and I mean that with a big wink and much admiration for a powerful conclusion to a bold, winning season. ”Rewind” was the operative word for ”No Place Like Home (Parts 2 and 3).” An orientation film mysteriously looped back on itself. Old moments were revisited and re-examined, if not reinvented. Heck, the whole show was rebooted from the beginning, with Jack the Hero falling from the sky and rising to action and building a community out of lost souls, just as he did in the pilot. The final moments even ironically echoed the first season’s famous twin cliff-hangers, with a raft at sea and two men peering into the abyss of a dark box — the coffin of one Jeremy Bentham, who looks a lot like a certain boar-hunting bald man we’ve come to know, love, and fear the past four years. ”No Place” wasn’t the magic act of last year’s flash-forward fake-out, but it was more meaty, more emotional, more epic, and, with a gulpy leap into WTH? sci-fi, maybe more ballsy.

”OH, AND ONE MORE THING: YOUR BEARD SMELLS LIKE WET VINCENT!”

Here’s what I mean by rewind: The episode began where last season’s flash-forward fake-out finale left off, with Kate driving away from Beaver Pelt Jack, and then — screeeeeeeeeeech! — the former fugitive came to an abrupt stop and floored it in reverse. Apparently, Kate had a few things she wanted to get off her chest — stuff she forgot to unload on Jack in last year’s finale. She told him that his ”we have to go back!” crap was galling, especially in light of what happened on their final day on the Island; that a man they both knew — the man in the obituary, one Jeremy Bentham — had come to her a few days earlier and tried to make the same wacko ”going back” argument; that Aaron still doesn’t quite understand why Jack isn’t around anymore to read Alice in Wonderland to him before bedtime. She slapped him and told him to keep his distance and then drove off in a heartbroken huff.

I’ll keep the Wikipedia-informed digressions to a minimum in this TV Watch, but a couple words about Jeremy Bentham, another classic loaded Lost name. Bentham was a 19th-century philosopher associated with utilitarianism and liberalism. He also designed the ”panopticon,” a cylindrical-shaped prison that requires minimal security and facilitates intense paranoia. He was also buried in a bizarre box designed for public display called an ”auto-icon.” Bizarre. Clearly, one must consider comparing and contrasting philosopher John Locke to philosopher Jeremy Bentham, but one should consider those things when one is not falling asleep at his computer at midnight.

More interesting to casual Lost fans is this: The name Jeremy Bentham all but confirms as legit the obit text that has circulated throughout fandom since last year. There are many more curious details in this notice — including the suggestion of suicide that was raised by Sayid later in the episode — but why don’t you go over to lostpedia.org and read the obit yourself. We’ll analyze the implications next Friday in my last Doc Jensen column of the season.

FREIGHTER BOMB = ISLAND?

Desmond, Jin and Michael tried to prevent an intricately wired bomb from going boom by freezing it with liquid nitrogen. We learned that the explosives were linked to a dead man’s switch strapped to Keamy’s arm. If his heart stopped beating, the bomb would explode. In other words, Keamy had forged a symbiotic relationship with the freighter — kinda like the way the Island has formed a symbiotic relationship with all these castaways who it won’t let die until they complete their destined service. And how about all that ice? Later in the episode, we saw that the massive gears in the bowels of the Island were covered in frost. Was that ancient machinery deliberately frozen to keep the Island from going ballistic, as with the freighter bomb?

EXIT: FREIGHTER MERCS

The cliff-hanger from the previous episode resolved itself pretty quickly when Richard Alpert and the band of merry Others ambushed Keamy’s men and liberated their once-exalted leader. Did you hear the Whispers start their whispering just before the Others made their move? (We’d hear them one more time in the episode, and in a more unexpected, unprecedented locale.) I liked Keamy’s Hacky Sack action with the grenade, expertly kicking it over to another mercenary, who was then blown away by it. Ultimately they were all subdued, with Sayid taking down Keamy in a nicely choreographed mano a mano struggle marked by quit cuts and bloody loogies — but it ultimately took the last-second intervention of Alpert to settle the matter. ”Thank you for coming, Richard,” said Ben, sounding a touch surprised that Alpert even bothered. After all, last season, Richard tried very hard to manipulate Locke into taking over the Others from him. Indeed, and judging from his halfhearted acceptance of Ben’s salutation, Alpert wasn’t wild that the devilish Dharma kid was still in the picture. But he’d get his regime change soon enough.

Just as intriguing was Ben’s reaction to the arrangement Alpert had made with Kate and Sayid to secure their help in springing Ben: He had agreed to let them go. Ben affirmed the deal with a casualness that was almost glib. ”Fair enough,” he said. Even Kate was shocked. ”We can leave the Island, and that’s it?” she said hopefully. Ben gave her one of his patented bug-eyed stares and line readings that suggest layers of meaning. ”That’s it,” he said, clearly not meaning a word of it. The whole sequence echoed the end of season 2, when Ben fulfilled the bargain his people had made with Michael. Ben is a shifty dude, but he does good by the people who risk their lives for his — even if he never quite fills them in on the fine print that stipulates that those who leave the Island never really leave it until the Island itself is through with them.

”LEADERSHIP STUFF”

While the liberation of Benjamin Linus was under way, Jack and Locke met in the ruins of the old Dharma greenhouse to discuss ”leadership stuff,” as Hurley put it. Once again — for the final time — the man of science and the man of faith had one of their super-heated philosophical smackdowns about design and chance, mysticism and science. The battle was specifically about the whole notion of miracles and whether such things were possible or credible. And wouldn’t you know, it just so happens that season 4’s author-philosopher in residence, C.S. Lewis, wrote a book called Miracles that tackled the empirical debate that Jack and Locke embody. I’ll let you investigate that one at your leisure.

Spooky how Locke was able to see the dark road that lay ahead for Jack. He told his rival that he was going to have to lie about the existence of the Island and the remaining castaways, and he knew that doing so would eat away at Doc Integrity. I also thought this was painfully catty: ”If you do it [lie to the world] half as well as you lie to yourself, they’ll believe you.” Rrrowww! Frankly, it’s that kind of insight — and button pushing — you usually get from Ben. Guess the Other is starting to rub off on John. The Jack-Locke standoff climaxed with their eyeballs blazing at each other. ”You’re crazy!” ”No, you’re crazy!” But I got the sense that something like doubt was beginning to creep into Jack’s position.

One last observation: I have often made the mistake of articulating the ideological conflict between these two in ways that suggest Jack and Locke are exemplars of their respective stances. That’s wrong. Rather, I think Lost has used each to dramatize the limitations of adhering dogmatically to either worldview. Jack is a humanist who believes solely and foolishly in his own agency, while Locke submits himself to an external, exotic agency he doesn’t even understand. I love how Matthew Fox and Terry O’Quinn don’t play the heady ideas but rather the desperate, murky psychology underneath them. Jack stubbornly refuses to believe in anything but himself, while Locke has a hard-on for the purpose and power his exalted Island status has brought him. For Locke, the moment at hand held the promise of rectifying an entire lifetime of being kicked in the nuts by that ”fickle bitch,” destiny. ”Just wait until you see what I’m about to do,” he declared. Be very afraid.

WALT. WOW.

Damn, did that kid get big or what? There have been rumors that actor Malcolm David Kelly’s real-life growth spurt has impacted the show’s ability to use him, and now we can see why: There’s no way he can play the Walt we knew when he left the Island. He can only make sense in the far-future flash-forward scenes, now the show’s present, which happens to be our present: spring 2008. Chaperoned by his no-nonsense grandma, Walt paid a visit to Hurley in the mental hospital. ”I was waiting for one of you to come visit me, but nobody did,” he said, sounding almost hurt, if not downright neglected, and I couldn’t help wondering if some winky meta-resonance was intended in light of so much ”Where’s Walt?” wondering this season. The moment was brief: more cryptic Bentham name-dropping, more justifying the lie of the Oceanic 6 cover story. But it made me wonder if this scene was a setup for Walt’s joining next season’s Island search party. And we still need an explanation for the kid’s spectral appearance in last year’s finale. So hopefully not the last we’ve seen of Big Walt. PS: This is where you guys tell me about all the drawings on the wall I’m not talking about, like the ladybug painting, which, yes, I know, has been a recurring motif this season, but it’s already 2 a.m. and I’m only this far into this freakin’ thing. Another time, I swear!

THE FREIGHTER FOLK PUNT

As the last of the beach castaways were ferried to the freighter, we got some cryptic moments with the season’s much heralded new arrivals, the freighter folk — scenes clearly meant to set up arcs for next season. Psychic hustler Miles Straume announced he was staying on the Island — all the better to give Lost someone who can make sense of the show’s mounting infestation of poltergeists. Miles also confronted Charlotte on her big secret: that she’s been to the Island before, and was perhaps even born there. (I let out a whoop when I heard that bit of business, as this has been my Charlotte theory all season long, dating back to my recap of the second episode.) When Charlotte played dumb and asked Miles what he meant, the quippy ghost whisperer responded with perhaps one of the best line readings in Lost history: ”Yes…what do I mean?” We’ll talk about Lapidus and Faraday in a minute, but allow me say, one final time, that the freighter-folk story line got screwed by the strike, but I’m glad that the show gave us reason to believe that these promising characters will get their respective due next year.

MOVING THE ISLAND: ”EXOTIC MATTER,” INDEED

We come now to what will probably be the most debated parts in the finale, as it involved sci-fi stuff that I know scares a chunk of the viewing audience. Deep below the dilapidated greenhouse (how deep? ”Deep,” Ben said) lies the laboratory level of the Orchid, a Dharma station devoted to time travel. This whole sequence was dotted with great humor the Ben-Locke bit about not knowing what anthuriums look like; Ben sitting Locke down in front of the TV to watch the orientation video while he loaded metallic objects into the Vault — all the better to ease us gently into the weirdness to come.

The newest orientation film included a laundry list of sci-fi buzz terms: Casimir effect, space and time, electromagnetic energy, negatively charged exotic matter. All of these are necessary ingredients for wormhole theory. Or in the quippy-smooth words of Ben, it means ”time-traveling bunnies.” The most baffling part of the orientation-video experience was how it stopped and rewound before the narrator, Edgar Halliwax, could demonstrate how the machine was used. But this is a staple element of all the Dharma videos: the possibility of mind-game tomfoolery, which invites the viewer to question the legitimacy of the narrative.

Before Ben and Locke could get down to moving the Island, an interruption. A not-dead-yet Keamy crashed the party and tried to flush Ben out by bragging about his bomb and mercilessly taunting him about his daughter ”bleeding out.” Ben cracked, allowing emotions to get in the way of ”command decisions” (or so he claimed; you never know with this guy), and beat and stabbed Keamy. The merc died soon after, activating his heart-monitor detonator. Locke castigated Ben for dooming the freighter, which may have been his intention all along. ”So?” Ben said. (My wife wanted to know why, when Keamy passed, Locke didn’t just quickly transfer the heart monitor to his own arm.)

After coming to his senses, Ben dropped a whopper on Locke. Yes, while Jacob may have told Locke he had to move the Island, Ben reasoned that the actual work fell to him, because (1) Jacob never told Locke how to do it, and (2) ”moving the Island” has a consequence to the mover — he or she must leave the Island — and Ben figured Locke, being Jacob’s new golden boy, was indispensable. He told John his destiny was to become his replacement as leader of the Others, a coronation that would bring a proud, dangerous smile on Locke’s face later in the episode but in the Orchid made him a little angry. Wasn’t it his job to move the Island? Once again, Ben had pushed him aside. ”Goodbye, John,” says Ben. ”Sorry I made your life so miserable.” That’s pretty provocative wording for all of you who’ve speculated that Ben and his minions have been using the Dharma time machine to meddle with Locke life since the beginning.

Ben then donned a Dharma parka and descended further, into a subterranean region that was either ancient (the remains of Atlantis?) or extraterrestrial (the engine room of a big spaceship?) in nature. Maybe it was both. Inside an icy cave, Ben beheld something that came as no suprise to him: a massive stone wheel embedded in a glyph-spotted wall crusted over with frozen snow. Spitting some bitter words to an unseen Jacob, Ben started pushing on the wheel, activating energy on the other side of the wall. As he did, Ben whimpered, and for the first time ever on Lost, I found myself not totally convinced by Michael Emerson’s performance. Then again, maybe I’m just not used to seeing Ben playing big emotional moments that are unquestionably genuine, especially when he’s pushing on giant sci-fi donkey wheels. But basically, it was a breakup scene; the deep, profound symbiotic relationship he had with the Island, apparently already weakened by his faithlessness, was now being severed.

Anyways, there was a big sound and a blinding flash and the Island disappeared, and with it a whole bunch of people, including Locke and the Others. Combined with the freighter explosion, that left a lot of characters in drastically changed circumstances:

Sawyer sacrificed his spot on Lapidus’ chopper to make it lighter to save fuel. But before he jumped into the drink, he tasked Kate to execute an errand for him in the real world — presumably, I think, checking on his daughter, Clementine — and then planted a big kiss on her. And now we know why the ladies love Sawyer. As an added bonus, when he returned to the Island, he emerged from the surf sans shirt. (The yin to this yang: plenty of Kate cleavage shots for the guys.)

Juliet stayed behind to help everyone get to the freighter — then had a front-row seat on the beach to watch it blow up. Last seen chugging rum with shirtless Sawyer. You sense a setup for romance next season?

Faraday was last seen taking a raft of castaways to the freighter when the Island disappeared. Since the smaller Hydra Station island also disappeared, I have to assume that the move extended beyond the Island into the ocean. So I’m betting Faraday got caught up in that.

Jin was last seen on the freighter when it exploded. But if he survived and swam into the circumference of the move, he too could be wherever — or whenever — the Island is now.

Michael the castaway traitor earned his redemption by staying with the bomb. Moments before the blast, however, he heard the Whispers. Looking around, he noticed what appeared to be a videocamera in one corner (was it on?) and the ghost of Christian Shephard in the other. ”You can go now, Michael.” Then: Boom!

As for Ben, we now know how he wound up in his Dharma parka in the Tunisian desert at the start of ”The Shape of Things to Come”: Apparently, that’s where he landed after he moved the Island. The date: October 24, 2005, or about 10 months from when Ben moved the Island. So…where did the Island go? Nowhere. My guess is that it’s in the same spot where it’s always been — it just rematerialized in reality 10 months in the future, just like Ben.

Let’s blow through the rest of the episode quickly:

THE CREEPY KATE DREAM (?) SCENE

According to a sound file sent to me by reader Russ Boyd, the backward voice on Kate’s phone said, ”The island needs you….You have to go back before it’s too late.” The dream encounter with Ghost Claire — who told Kate, ”Don’t bring him back” — suggests that each of the Oceanic 6 is getting a ghost to haunt him or her. Kate and Aaron get Claire; Jack gets Christian; Sun would get Jin (though I hope not); Sayid would get (?) (he’s clearly the flaw in my theory); and Hurley has Charlie and…

”CHECKMATE, MR. EKO”

My other favorite line of the night — even Sayid seemed to smile. In Hurley’s second flash-forward scene, Sayid killed a mystery man keeping tabs on Hurley and persuaded the troubled castaway to come with him to a safer location. Hurley asked him if he was taking him back to the Island. Sayid said no. Was he telling the truth? Unresolved Season 4 Hurley Mystery: In the season premiere, Hurley told Jack he wished he had stayed with him instead of going with Locke. Now that you’ve seen all of season 4, if someone asked why Hurley felt that way, how would you respond?

HERE COMES THE SUN KING

The season finale included two great Sun moments: her out-of-her-skull hysteria over watching Jin’s apparent death and her attempt to form an alliance with Charles Widmore in the flash-forward future. (We finally got confirmation: Mr. Paik and Widmore are buddies. How much did Sun’s dad know about the Island before his daughter crashed there?) The anguish clearly established a lady with desire for vengeance — but who is she really after? Widmore? Ben? Jack?

THE LIE

After getting to the freighter for fuel, and then following the most suspenseful gas-pumping scene in recent pop-culture history, the Oceanic 6 (plus Lapidus and Desmond) took to the sky to escape the soon-to-explode freighter, then watched the Island disappear in a flash of light, and then crashed into the water. Everyone survived, thanks in large part to Jack. Repeating his lifesaving from the pilot, the good doc revived a waterlogged Desmond. Later that night, amid yet another conversation about miracles in which Jack flat-out denied the extraordinary event his two eyes had beheld earlier, the Island’s disappearance (this guy is as stubbornly scientific as Dana Scully), Lapidus spotted a boat approaching, evoking the Others’ tugboat advancing on the raft at the end of season 1. The castaways would soon learn that the boat belonged to a much friendlier entity, Penelope Widmore, setting up an emotional, smoochy reunion between the two time-tossed constants. But before that happened, Jack came around to Locke’s way of thinking: They would have to lie. About everything. The plane crash, the Island, their friends. I had a little trouble following the logic. The primary motivation for covering up is to protect their friends. But how can they even be sure if their friends still exist? I just wish Jack had rallied around the best, simplest argument for lying: No one would ever believe the truth. Of course, there’s a whole psychological theory for why someone like Jack would concoct this lie — but that’s analysis for another day.

THE COFFIN

Why is Locke in it? Why is he calling himself Jeremy Bentham? How did he get off the Island? Did he really kill himself? What happened on the Island after he left? How are Ben and Jack going to motivate their friends to go back to the trippy tropics — with a dead body in tow, no less? What are Ben’s ideas? And was it me, or did Ben did look unnaturally Alpertesque young? Do ex-Islanders start aging backward once they leave?

My mind, as you can tell, is now mush. I’m going to let it congeal, then think anew and return next week with more cogent analysis. It’s been a blast TV Watching with you this season; I hope to see you again in this space in eight months.

Until then, a prediction: I’ll bet you 20 bucks that either the teaser or the final scene of the season 5 premiere episode will feature one character — I’m betting Sawyer — renewing one of the oldest Lost mysteries by repeating the iconic question of the pilot episode. As they wrap their minds around the riddle of their mysteriously displaced Island, Sawyer — or someone — absolutely must say:

”Guys…where are we?”

BONG!

– By Jeff Jensen of EW.com