Lost premiered its fourth season last night. Wow. I’ve given up trying to theorize about where this show is headed. It’s a fun ride, though, and they throw in all these seemingly random references to literature and mythology and political theory and physics that you think you must be learning something. (Yes, John Locke was a 17th-century English philosopher, Our Mutual Friend was Dickens’ last novel, B.F. Skinner was a 20th-century American psychologist … and, yes, treastises on free will and critiques of materialism and theories of operant conditioning … but did you notice what beautiful skin these people have?). I just hope that the writers know what they’re doing, and that all these disjointed plot points are leading us toward some fitting conclusion, and not down the rabbit hole of bizarre screenwriter logic, a la The Matrix or Twin Peaks.

I’m glad to see that Lance Reddick from The Wire showed up in last night’s episode, and that Ken Leung (who was terrific in The Sopranos‘ last season) will also be playing a recurring character this season. Just fly in James Gandolfini and the show will be perfect.

One thing I like about Lost is that it tries to be global and multicultural in its outlook — much more than other Hollywood fare, at least — and yet it doesn’t have everyone around a campfire singing "Kumbaya." There were cultural conflicts aplenty among the survivors in the early episodes, but the interesting thing is how those differences became somewhat muted once armed conflict with another group on the Island — "The Others" — took precedence. In the last season we started to understand what makes The Others tick, and suddenly they’re not (well, with one exception) the monsters they once were, but another group trying to survive, feeling threatened, and setting up in their minds that instinctual divide between us and them that is the root of all misunderstanding and conflict.

It’s a state of nature, in other words, with a social contract being cobbled together, and guys named Rousseau and Locke and Bakunin and Hume duking it out … yeah, I hope these writers know what they’re doing.

Victor Tan Chen Victor Tan Chen is In The Fray's editor in chief and the author of Cut Loose: Jobless and Hopeless in an Unfair Economy. Site: victortanchen.com | Facebook | Twitter: @victortanchen