recap

The road and sky collide, with drums

A songwriter comes up with a brilliant idea, comes up with half a dozen striking new ways to capture the sounds. And yet the most haunting parts of "Running on Empty" turn out to be the ones that contain no music at all.

I keep thinking about the first 30 seconds before the start of the opening (title) track. Bear in mind that "Running" is a fantastic song, certainly the best rocker JB ever wrote, both thoughtful and fiery, captured in a performance that is both stripped down and simply blazing. Holy shit. But it's that silence that sticks with me.

Actually, it's not silent at all. The band is onstage, gearing up to play a new tune. You can sense that the lights are low, you can hear the crowd get restless. Voices bellow song titles. "The Road and the Sky!" a woman shouts. "Ready or Not!" a guy honks. Other voices form a kind of wordless chorus - the sound of expectancy, of demand. Finally another guy finds the bridge between impatience and resignation. "Play what you want!" It's like a signal. A foot stomps, a hand chunks a rhythm on tamped guitar strings.  Then.......Boom.

A two-chord riff for piano and guitars, a simple bass line, David Lindley's jet-engine slide guitar. The drums pounding a hard stutter rhythm. Blazing and roaring.

"Lookin'' out at the road rushing under my wheels. . . .I don't know how to tell you all just how crazy this life feels..."

Remember the place where the road and the sky collide? This is it. And the point of "Running on Empty," the album, is to find a way to tell everyone else how it feels to be the man on the road. The poet as object of desire. The troubadour on the run. JB came up with a brillliant way to do just that: by recording an entire album of new songs on the road - onstage; offstage; in the hotel; on the bus. The whole experience, from the good (the glow of the stage) to the bad (cooped in the bus on an all-night ride) to the hideous (wired so tight on coke that even the stupidest ideas seem brilliant).

Brilliant in concept, less so in execution, "Running on Empty" is both a huge step forward and a lurch toward self-destruction. Funny how those two things can happen at the same time.

 
By Nick Gorini
 
They say good things come to those who wait. I don’t know who “They” are, and I’ve learned that occasionally, patience isn’t always a virtue.
 
But waiting almost always gives you one thing: perspective.
 
It was never my intent to document my immediate, visceral reaction to the ending of ‘Lost’. Going into Sunday night, I knew whatever my initial feelings may be (“That was PERFECT!” or “How could they have done this to ME?”), I needed time to reflect on the ending in the context of the entire Lost experience.
 
I mean, that’s what it has become for those of us who love this show, right? It was more than TV – it was a journey, a ride that for one hour a week put us somewhere else. Not just on the screen, but in our own noggins’. And if you believe in some of Lost’s theories, it may have been our collective consciousness-noggins, otherwise known as “col-coggins”.
 
Maybe at the end of our lives, we will all meet at some alternate bus depot in the sky (don’t call it Purgatory!) that we created out of our own desire, the desire to figure out every remaining Lost mystery. So, so many…
 
We can spend our oddly-houred days kissing strangers or beating the crap out of them with no repercussions. Heck, in some cases, they may even THANK us, even after running them over with our car. Then we can meet in a balmy, tropical Catholic Church with non-denominational stained glass (we wouldn’t want to exclude any of our viewers), hug it out one last time, and realize that the mysteries aren’t what mattered in the end.
 
What mattered is that we all experienced Lost, for better or worse, with joy or frustration, together.
 
Before I digress into any specifics of the finale, I want to say something that is all too obvious, but needs to be heard, so bear with me:
 
Network television is dying.
 
We all know it. The viewers know it, the advertisers know it, the executives know it, the cable companies and satellite/Direct TV entities know it, the writers and actors know it, too.
 
It may take a few years before the last rites are read, but network television is like Lost’s Michael, wandering around a magical wonderland, unable to move on because of it’s past indiscretions, haunting us with cheap reality shows, tabloid news and crappy copies of "Lost."
 
"Lost" snuck under the radar. It remains one of the most expensive shows ever produced. Cinematic in quality, epic in scope, complicated in plot, and deep, deeper than most anything found in popular culture today.
 
Apparently, we hate that kind of stuff. That’s why we get endless seasons of Dateline NBC, C.S.I., Two and a Half Men, The Biggest Loser. Dumbed down and cheap. You want intelligent? You want challenging? Watch AMC, HBO or Showtime. Read a book.
 
Network television, still free. For a limited time. And it gave us Lost. How did J.J. Abrams ever convince, coerce or blackmail ABC into putting this show on the air? Is Abrams the modern day Robert Johnson, selling his soul at the crossroads so the devil may gift him with unworldly talents? Or was it that mysterious elixir of talent, luck, timing and connections that got this gift off the ground?
 
If J.J. Abrams was a character on Lost, he’d be asking himself if it was his destiny to bring Lost to the masses, something he was always fated to do, or if it was hard work and sheer determination that put him into that position.
 
Whatever the case may be, Lost is like network television’s supernova, a final, bright hot burst of energy and beauty before the final, slow sputtering of a dead star.
 
Blah, Blah, Blah. What did you think of the finale?
 
The finale was overwhelmingly satisfying on an emotional level. But like Icarus, I think Lost may have flown too close to the Sun.
 
(Yes, just one paragraph ago, I called Lost a sun, more or less. But it’s the internet, and I can mix my metaphors. Writing on the internet is like the Frat Party Jungle Juice. It could be good, but there’s about 18 different flavors in it, and no one’s really sure what all’s in there. Just drink it.)
 
Before I explain what didn’t work for me, let state for the record, that Lost is still my favorite show of all time. Well, okay, top five of all time, for sure. It’s given me so much, and will continue to do so for many, many years.
 
In an effort to mend this dichotomy, and to heal my lost, broken heart, I have suddenly split off into two equally annoying bloggers (me, and me). Each will give his thoughts.
 
The Original Timeline Blogger
 
Oh gee whiz! What’s not to like? Some of my favorite moments:
 
· Naturally, all the enlightenment moments were incredible, especially Juliet/Sawyer’s, and Jin/Sun’s. What these couples went through to get… What? They’re dead? Oh man, that breaks my heart even more. Makes those scenes even more poignant.

· The Island as a real place. A daring move. And keep Locke/Smokey as a villain all the way to the end. No mystical spiritual wake-up call. Just a bad man needin’ some killin’.

The father, the son and the holy hottie

In the end there were no fireworks. No yelling and screaming. No fingers in the chest nor recitations of missed ballgames, withering slights, alcoholic screw-ups or Oedipal murderousness. The surface anger melted and all that remained - in the sheer white light outside the Unitarian church - was a father and son sobbing happily in one another's arms.

Their friends sat in the pews, unbloodied and unbowed. And, finally, together.

The island, with its heroes, villains, monsters and constant life-threatening struggles, was less a literal place than a stage for a greater emotional battle: a thrill-ride version of psychotherapy:, where the patient is made to confront, engage and then move beyond the obsessions and weaknesses that have defined his/her life. 

Everyone's answer is different. For Jack it was accepting surrender; for Hurley it regaining self-confidence; for Miles it had something to do with discovering his faith in duct tape.

What matters is that what once were lost are now found. And what was "Lost" is now a memory. A long series of memories, actually, packed with action and adventure and dark humor, but also yearning and heartbreak and frustration and all the stuff of human exerpience. But no matter the blood and bombs and bad-ass thugs and monsters and on and on, the source of all that white light  came from within the characters themselves.

The mythology, as cool and confusing as it could be, was exactly like the cool, confusing mythology we all weave for ourselves: A Hollywood-style animation of the internal drama flickering behind all of our eyes.

Are you ready to move on? That's always the question. And for most of us, pretty much most of the time, the answer is emphatic: Helll, no. Thus psychotherapy, if you're a secular urban mod with health care and/or expendable cash. College kids can take philosophy classes, and engage in dorm room bickerfests about reality. Everyone else gets religion, or worst case, primetime tv. And just in case you wanted to wrap it all up in one tidy package, these last six years have also given us "Lost."

No man is an island, even when he’s stuck on one

Jack, Sayid, Hurley and Sawyer, with friend

By Nick Gorini

 
Well – here it is. This week was the official beginning of the end. The biggest puzzle piece remaining now locked into place. Thus begins the mad tumble to the show finale, questions answered, issues resolved, lives lost, souls saved, and most important, solving the biggest mystery nagging us all: What happened to that damn dog Vincent?
 
I could go in-depth and recap this week’s episode, but I think “Happily Ever After” spoke for itself. Other than adding a couple of new questions, it used another deck-shuffling Desmond episode to lay down the law.
 
Let’s quickly state what we know/don’t know as of today:
 
What we know:
 
Love Matters. It certainly matters more than magnets, more than anything. It is love that redeemed Desmond. It is love that opens Desmond’s heart and this week, his mind. It’s clear that each character’s capacity for love, in its many guises (for your spouse/partner, for your friend, for your children, for your humanity, for yourself, even for your enemies) will determine the fate of this universe we’re experiencing.
 
Whatever Jacob may be, and he is most certainly not God-like, his power is in his capacity to love. Is Smokey the personification of evil? Not by a long shot, but what he represents is the inability to love. This might be something Smokey was born with, but I doubt it (and we will find out in a few weeks when he get his backstory).
 
As I think back on the Alpert episode, ‘Ab Aeterno’, I understand why Jacob couldn’t grant Richard his first two wishes (to bring Isabella back, and for absolution). Both wishes were only something Alpert could resolve (notice I do not say ‘grant’). Sometimes, love is holding onto something no matter what may come to pass. But sometimes, love is also about letting go. Jacob couldn’t give Alpert Isabella, because she really is gone, and Alpert needs to love her enough to let go. And Jacob couldn’t grant Alpert absolution, because true absolution comes from within. Absolution is an incredible, powerful act of love. However, Jacob can give Alpert all the time he needs to sort this stuff out, right?
 
Maybe that’s how the island is serving our heroes: It’s the therapist’s couch, with no time-limit.
 
With Desmond, he experiences the essence of love – love has no boundaries. We can forget about Jacob/Smoky and Faraday physics – these are the Lost McGuffins (McGuffins are plot devices that to keep our eyes glued to the screen. Think of McGuffins as the candy coating on a chewable aspirin). Love transcends time, space, squabbles between two petty island-bound brothers, even mortality. Thanks to Charlie’s not-so-gentle nudging, Desmond’s pursuit of love will cause two worlds to collide. The end result? Well…
 
For much of the show’s run, we were lead to believe this show was about survival (even Sawyer said so). But it’s about the survival of love.
 

Mmmmmm, electro-doughnuts....

Still a step or two off pace due to my flash-sideways into the fluish world, so I'll cede most of the turf to the far-superior ministrations of my colleague Dr. Nick, pausing only to offer a few random-ish observations on what I think will be turning point in the entire arc of "Lost." And a damned fine hour of TV, to boot...

Observation 1: An entire hour of network TV drama played without the vast majority (any?) of the original characters, in a reality that only may or may not be real, but in which life seemed more or less normal until one mysterious old woman, (Eloise) made cryptic reference to a whole other reality that until that moment in the episode no one else had even mentioned beyond the most implicit crinkle of the forehead, or briefly-puzzled expression, or psychotic-seeming rant about glimpses of.....something. Yes, this was the strangest hour in the history of American network TV. And God bless ABC for putting it up there.

Observation 2: Also God bless "Lost" for not just respecting it characters, but also having such obvious, and overwhelming affection for them. It's a terrific mythology, to be sure. The weave of quantum physics, philosophy, religion and bone-crunching action is simply miraculous. But it would all be immediately forgettable if it weren't for the deep sense of character the show has; its remarkably nimble, and yet deeply felt, character studies, and its perpetual emphasis on the visceral -- and entirely universal -- conflicts that animate, and often devastate, virtually all of its characters. Except Keamy.

Observation 3: Felt sorta nice to hear "You All Everybody" again, didn't it? Driveshaft did sorta rock, back in the day...

Observation 4: Worst acting in the history of "Lost"? The actress who plays Penny (name tk) trying to look natural running the stairs in the stadium. Body too rigid. Arms so tight against her sides she looked like Barbie Track Star, or something. I usually love that actress, and of course the writing of the scene (echoing Desmond's original off-island appearance in the stadium with Jack) was right on. But when I watched her runnning what I saw was a British woman whose regimen leans closer to ciggies and tea than sprints and fartleks. I'm just sayin'.

Ever wonder where Nick gets his insights into "Lost"? And no, he's not telling you where it is.

By NICK GORINI

Hello, folks! Once again, I have successfully procrastinated in bringing you my recap of this week’s Lost episode, ‘The Lighthouse.’
 
Why the delay? I’ve been spending too much time starting at myself in the mirror with the sound of running water in the background. You know, like all the characters on our show (Jack, in particular, seems to do this an awful lot).
 
Before I begin, two real-life Lost-related incidents to share with you:

1.   Earlier this week I was watching that Michael Bay masterpiece known as ‘Con Air’, or as I call it, Crap. I mean, rarely do you get a pop-culture moment with so many talented people (Cage, Malkovich, Cusack, Rhames, Buscemi, etc.) dumpster-diving for dollars in one dingy flick.
 
Anyhow, there’s a scene where the convict-plane pilot, played by Frederic Lehne, is booted from the cockpit. Frederic Lehne plays Kate’s caustic pursuer, Marshall Mars, on Lost. Well, when he steps out of the driver’s seat, who steps in? A swarthy convict by the name of Swamp Thing, played by the great character actor M.C. Gainey… Who was Mr. Friendly, original face of ‘The Others’ on Lost! One Lost character gets replaced by another Lost character in a movie over ten years old. Whoa!!!
 
2.   If that wasn’t enough, I took my family for a fun weekend hike around Sauvie Island. On the far Eastern tip, away from the farms, corn mazes and bike lanes, there’s a three-mile dirt trail that is the only island path leading to… A lighthouse! Knowing what was coming up on Tuesday night, and (while looking at the map) realizing that in all the times I’d gone to this island I NEVER knew it had a lighthouse, I had to check it out. Maybe it would give me wisdom or insight into this week’s episode and what was to come. Or maybe it was just a beautiful, sunny winter day in the Great Northwest.
 
 
THE 'SIDE' TIMELINE AND THE ORIGINAL TIMELINE – SIDE BY SIDE!:
 
(If you’re curious why I’ve now combined the two, it’s because there aren’t two timelines! Ha! Read more about it at the end of the post.)
 
Jack wakes up in his nice, antiseptic apartment (hey, this other Jack doesn’t sit on his dirty apartment floor drinking whiskey and dreaming about frequent flier miles!), and stares all deja-vu-like at his reflection while water runs out the sink (see?). He sees his appendix surgery scar (you know, when he wanted to operate on his damn self until Juliet and Kate tricked him?). He has NO memory of any surgery, even after a quick phone call to his mom (welcome back, Veronica Hamel! Loved you in ‘Hill Street Blues’) reveals that he had it removed when he was a boy. Oh yeah, your dad wanted to do it, but the hospital wouldn’t let him. Just like your old island self, Jack! A chip off the old whiskey barrel..
 
Jack gets ready and we briefly see the same exer-cycle that Desmond had in the hatch. In fact, I believe this cycle has shown up at least three times this season. I believe the cycle officially has a SAG card now.

Follow the jump for a wide array of mind-bending revelations. . .
 

Mama said knock you out!

Talk about feeling lost: parents never really know what's going on with, or what they've done to, their own kids until it's too late to do anything about it. I just listened to a song by Okkervil River, "Savannah Smiles," that captures the feeling. Tune is "Savannah Smiles," the narrator a divorced dad contemplating what he'd just learned by (accidentally) reading a page of his teenaged daughter's diary. In that moment he realizes he can't reconcile the smiling photos he keeps on his wall with the feelings she records by hand.

"Is she someone I don't know at all? Is she someone I betrayed?"

So back to "Lost," and another haunting episode describing the emotional discord haunting its characters: the disconnections between parents and children; the terrors of a failed parent; the scars borne by lost and confused children. Particularly when they become parents themselves, and realize how their wounds now define the unhappy relationships they have formed with their own children.

"Just cannot believe, could do that to a child," the song continues, far beyond the point where feelings trump words. "A child, a child."

It's easy to forget how crucial the emotional side of the saga has been; how easy it is to get so caught up in the action we barely notice how we keep coming back to these particular headwaters. It's the one undertow that never, ever loses its grip.

"Lighthouse" was a Jack-centric episode, toggling between Island Jack in 2007 and alterna-Jack in Los Angeles, 2004. Island Jack, we recall, lives in a jungle of his father's creation. We've always known how fraught/broken the relationship between Christian and Jack Shephard has been. It is Jack's most primal experience: of loving and fearing his dad; the tangled strands of admiration and resentment; the love and the hatred; the need to be nurtured, and to destroy. Jack was bringing his (alcoholic) dad's body home from Australia when he stepped onto Oceanic #815, and when the plane crashed the impact seemed to revive Christian's soul: He kept reappearing, silently, only to lead Jack further into the depths of a literal/figurative jungle that presented far more questions than answers.

As the series continued it seemed that Christian had some connection to Jacob. He appeared in Jacob's stead. He delivered (or claimed to deliver) Jacob's instructions. But now that Jacob has stepped in himself, in both real and spectral forms, the connections between the Island's Good Father and Jack's bad daddy have grown murkier. Is there a reason why Christian and Jacob have never been seen together? And if the Man in Black has the power to animate the bodies of the dead, doesn't it make sense that Jacob would, too? Has he been walking in Christian's burial suit for all these years?

What seems clear now is that Jacob plays the role of Father of Fathers. From his perch on the Island - and in that groovy, previously-unseen lighthouse - he has been keeping track of his charges, monitoring their lives and stepping in when it seems they need a gentle push to keep them moving in the right direction.

Jacob's vision of a right direction, anyway, which opens up an interesting can of worms: For all his clear-eyed, seemingly warm-hearted affection for the Losties, has Jacob's presence enriched their lives, or simply made them much, much worse?

Consider that alterna-Jack in L.A. - the Jack who never went to the island and seems untouched by Jacob's presence - is actively breaking the cycles of dysfunction that "broke" him (as the other Jack tells Hurley on the island). So while his relationship with his own teenaged son (who didn't even exist until now) bears the marks of his own disconnection from Christian, Jack is growing and changing on his own. He comes to terms with his own feelings for his dad, admits his failings as a father and these revelations lead him to reconnect with his own son.

We've seen this again and again in the alterna-Losties in Los Angeles: From Locke to Hurley and now to Jack, the bonds between fathers and sons seem far more functional than it is in their island alter-egos. And now that Jacob presents himself as a kind of father-in-general. . . . God the father. . . what are we to make of how screwed up the Jacob-influenced Losties are? Why are the Jacob-free characters so much more able to control, and find satisfaction, in their lives?

Is this gonna be on the test?

By PETER AMES CARLIN and NICK GORINI

So a month into the final season we're still made to wonder: What is "Lost" really about? Is it a show about philosophy? Is it a vast analogy about the wages and moral toll of imperialism? Or is it all, somehow, about the polar bear?

So many ideas, so many direct quotations, so many books turning up everywhere you look. But a lot of that stuff is pure Maguffin; a graduate school of red herrings.

So we here at PAC.com's "Lost" central - including our shadowy leader, Guru Dev Nick Gorini, lit the candles and fired up the incense, took a dunk in the hot tub of wisdom and attained clarity. What follows are the REAL moral/intellectual/narrative headwaters of "Lost."

THEORY THE FIRST: "LOST" IS A METAPHOR FOR RISE AND FALL OF THE BEATLES

John Lennon is the Man in Black: A little bitter, more than a little sardonic, determined to escape the bonds of the utopia he helped create (to say nothing of the wide-eyed fans who reside there), he's possessed of an explosive temper and, when you least expect it, deep sensitivity. When the MiB told Sawyer that Jacob and the other Island cultists were killing one another over nothing he was really saying: “Imagine there’s no countries/it isn’t hard to do/Nothing to kill or die for/And no religion, too. . . “

Paul McCartney is Jacob: Handsome, charming, a trifle melancholy, deeply in love with his own illusion. Jacob/Paul is more than a little manipulative and never shy about picking a fight. Many people believe he’s dead, though his regular appearances - often looking far younger than you’d expect - argue against it. Convinced that ebony and ivory can live together in perfect harmony, but there sure are a lot of names scratched off his cave ceiling. . .

George Harrison is Sayid: Meditative, eastern, suffered at least one near-fatal attack before actually getting killed. Reincarnation important to both. George didn’t seem to return from the Other Side as quickly as Sayid. . . but something in the way he moves just might remind you of another lover.

Ringo Starr is Hurley: The perpetual baby brother, mostly adorable and funny, but a surprisingly capable hit-maker. See also: “It Don’t Come Easy,” which Hurley discovered all too clearly when his lottery winnings seemed to spell nothing but doom. Later turns out to be far more intelligent and better-adjusted than anyone expected.

Stu Sutcliffe is Charlie: Artsy, sensitive, troubled, not quite able to stick with the band. Doomed to die young, but given immortality in the name of his legacy and the spiritual impact he had on those who would go on to greatar glory.

Pete Best is Ben: The very foundation of the rock-and-rhythm, the drummer is always a group’s secret leader. Until the group calls for a new drummer. Now Ben is in his own spiritual Liverpool, sentenced to a life of woulda, coulda, shouldas.

Yoko Ono is Kate: Beguiling, not always friendly, perfectly capable, and willing, to kick anyone’s ass at any moment. Just when she seems charming - that’s when you should be afraid. Very afraid.

Linda McCartney is Juliet: Blonde, smart, no evident musical ability, but a natural-born matriarch. Dies tragically young, leaving behind a shattered partner who rebounds quickly into another, extremely ill-considered new partnership.

Brian Epstein is Locke: A man of faith whose reach often exceeded his grasp. And yet his spirit was pure, his belief in his cause unwavering, and his success so astonishing as to be inarguable.  All this despite being shockingly ill-equipped for his role, and more afraid than anyone would guess. Died young under conditions so murky no one can say for sure if he committed suicide, died accidentally or was murdered.

Allen Klein is Charles Widmore: Shadowy, scary, will do anything and kill anyone in order to get what he wants. But even when he wins the battle, he always seems to lose the war.

THEORY THE SECOND: "LOST" IS A METAPHOR FOR THE GW BUSH WAR TEAM: 

After a cataclysmic event, a group of empowered surviviors gathers together to fight back, survive, solve life's greater mysteries, and tackle the essential question of man's nature. Was it fate or free will that led us into war? Both groups are/were lost in many ways. Let's briefly break down some of the key players:

George Bush is Locke: After a life riddled with failure and endless daddy issues, finds himself in a position of great power. A man driven by faith who doesn't spend much time using logic or thought to make decisions, the power goes to his head. Like Locke, Bush's reputation is deader than a crab-riddled corpse.

Dick Cheney is Jack: The REAL power broker in the group, almost too coldly analytical, and unwilling to listen to anyone, even when the truth is staring him in the face. Convinced he can fix anything, and that anyone who doesn't understand what he's doing or where he's coming from, he rarely tells anyone in the group what his motivations are. The only difference between Jack and Dick? Jack has a heart.

Saddam Hussein is Ben: Am I telling truth? Am I lying? Am I your ally? Am I your enemy? Sure, I do awful things, but you understand, it's for good reasons. I may be a tyrant, but I provide you some stability. I sure love all this power. Oh, wait - are you getting sick of this game yet? Sorry, I'll tell you truth about everything! Wait! Wait! Damn, too late. I've lost all my power...

Donald Rumsfeld is Smokey: More than ready to head to war, nearly salivates over it. He just wants to go home, if home means a world where Capitalist-based Christianity reigns in every nation. He'll do anything to get home. He's tired of the game of balanced diplomacy. A war needs to happen, and there has to be one winner.

Colin Powell is Jacob: Strong and reserved, a peaceful warrior, if you will. He tries to guide the group towards what is good, but ultimately, he is not in a position to affect choice. He can only show them 'The Way'. Like Jacob, he can never go outright and just say what he wants. And like Jacob, he ends being symbolically sacrificed (his political career, that is).

Condoleeza Rice is Kate: Strong, smart, sexy and easily influences the men in her group. She isn't above compromising some of her evident morals for people she loves, she's torn between bad guys and good guys. Can she/we even tell the difference anymore?
George Tenet is Sayid: Both like to torture people, ALLEGEDLY, and are decidedly good at it. Can they elevate their morality and use their power for good? Doubtful... 

John Ashcroft is Jin and Sun: Essentially good, but surrounded by a lot of destructive ideas, and an old-world view that limits personal growth. Resistant to change, but not incapable of it. C'mon, John - Let the Eagle Soar!

Ari Fleischer is Sawyer: Strong, charming and sharp-tongued, he can speak for the group on many levels, and people really, really like him, even when he says or does some really dumb things.
 

In the end there's always hope. And Greenwich Village.

So as we end this season of "Mad Men," just weeks after the assasination of JFK and, by extension, the ceremonial end of the way it all used to be, the horizon has once again flown open.

But first, let's take a listen to the "Mad Men" theme song. Have we ever talked about it? About how sleek and timeless it sounds, how that vaguely hip-hop rhythm, the fretful strings and heart-like pulse, describes an essence that has precisely nothing, and yet everything, about the show's time and place? In all this talk about eras being evoked, about the verisimmilitude of this and the perfect evocation of that, it's easy to forget that the first sound we hear each week in the sequence designed to propel us into "Mad Men"s imaginary world has no time-and-space trappings whatsoever. It just is, like the thrum of electricity in your nerves, the relentless need wired into your brain, the appetite for something more, something else, something beyond the here and now.

Consider this for a moment. The show's about to begin.