LOST character of the week

I can haz mummified arm?

Vincent! Love him! He may actually be my favorite LOST character. First of all, who doesn’t love a yellow lab? Secondly, it does my heart good to see at least one survivor bouncing around like they’re in paradise, no matter what is going on to the survivors. Thirdly, I’m pretty sure that Vincent is the mastermind behind the island. He knows everything that’s going on, he’s everybody’s friend, and I think he may be the being who created and controls the island. Just because I’d love it if the series ended with a talking, vindictive dog. I’m just kidding, I would hate that with the heat of a thousand suns.

So what’s Vinny’s story? Well, Vin belonged to Brian Porter, the anal retentive stepfather of miracle-grow Walt. When Walt’s mom died, Michael took Vincent when he came to pick up Walt. Walt told his dad that it was wrong and Michael lied to his kid and told him that Brian wanted Walt to have the dog. It would have looked better if he had put one of those big bows on him, like from the Lexus Christmas commercials.

Vincent had to ride in the luggage compartment of the plane, which is probably why he doesn’t care about the survivors. They didn’t care enough to pretend he was a seeing-eye-dog and let him sit in coach where he could get some peanuts. Why should he care about them on the island? Be good to your dog. That’s all I’m going to say.

Jack wakes up after the crash to see a happy Vincent giving him a look of love before he bounces off into the jungle to chase polar bears and boars and that bird that screams Hurley’s name. Vincent spent his early days on the island running away from Walt. Walt would find him and Vincent would run away again. It was great fun for Vincent. Not so much fun for Walt. Ever seen a kid with an ulcer? I’m betting Walt has one now thanks to dog stress, being kidnapped by a boatload of banjo playing ninjas, and his stint as a dripping hologram. Locke eventually makes a dog whistle, because he’s the island MacGyver, and Vincent comes running. Locke is the man.

Later on, Vincent wakes everyone up with his barking. I can relate because my neighbor’s dog does this every night. Only my neighbor’s dog barks at dumb things like trees and air. Vincent was actually letting the survivors know that those pesky boars were running their own panty raid on the camp.

Michael and Walt had a fight because Michael caught Walt actually having a good time with Locke. Walt storms off into the jungle and Vincent gives his , “Yo, somethin’s not copasetic here” bark. Turns out there was a polar bear and it was licking it’s chops for some Walt. Walt hides in a tree that might be a bush. Where’s Vincent? He ran away. You would have done the same thing, admit it.

Vincent also interrupts Michael when he tries to kiss Sun, effectively preventing an affair. I told you he was a wonder dog.

Walt leaves and doesn’t want to take Vincent with him, so he leaves him with the most irresponsible person on the island, Shannon. And she promptly loses him. Is anyone surprised?

Vincent brought Hurley the key to the VW van he so desperately wanted to drive. He also brought the arm of Roger Workman, but he’s a dog. Cut him some slack. He was just trying to help, and a bone looks tasty to a dog.

After Ben moved the island, Vincent, Rose, and Bernard retired together in the jungle in the year 1974. This was the best possible ending for Vincent.

My thoughts on Vincent and the series finale: It is very possible that everyone on this island will die. Everyone except Vincent. He belongs there. No one, not even Locke, took to the island the way Vincent did. I love his character because you know he knows everything. He knows the Dharma stations. He knows the Others (more than likely). He knows all the secrets.

Sawyer Nicknames: Lassie, Marmaduke, Old Yeller

Connections: Vincent has met every main cast member at some point or another, according to Lostpedia. I think that he only met Walt and Michael off of the island, but I may be wrong.

Sources: lostpedia, a lot of episodes, my memory and brain.

Who's my next victim?

LOST character of the week

Shannon Rutherford



Background:
Shannon is the stepsister of Boone Carlyle. She dies in the second season, episode “Abandoned.” She’s an unhelpful wench on the island, preferring to soak up the sun instead of help building shelters, etc. She seduces Sayid with her venemous ways. Naveen Andrews, the actor who plays Sayid, actually encouraged the writers to create the relationship between Sayid and Shannon I guessbecause he was tired of his character not getting any action. Critics found her to be an unsympathetic character. Probably all the whining, refusing to help, and just being a giant load in general. When Shannon was eight, her father married Sabrina Carlyle and Boone is brought into our life. We’ll talk about Boone-walking-eye-candy on another day. Shannon pretends to be an innocent ballet dancer, but we all know that she’s an evil ninny from the get-go. She also teaches young girls how to be evil, I mean how to be ballerinas. Then Shannon’s Daddy Warbucks dies, oh noes! And he almost kills Jack’s future cheating wife in the process. What a jerk. Anyway, proof that rich people aren’t always smart: Papa Rutherford never made a will. WHAT? His lawyers weren’t very good at their jobs. Anyway, Sabrina soaks up all the money and completely cuts Shannon off, which I’ll admit is a little cold. Especially since Shannon just got an internship at a prestigious dance school. Shannon can’t come up with the money for the internship on her own so she decides to be an au pair. That doesn’t work out so she resorts to using her womanly wiles. Because women are too stupid to have more than one skill that can make them money. Thank’s writers. Do you take your pig noses off when you eat or do you just stick your faces right in the trough? Moving on. Shannon starts running a con on Boone where she dates guys, pretends they beat her up, and she calls Boone to the rescue. She picked the right mark because she does this multiple times and Boone never catches on. He comes with money to pay the boyfriends off and get them to go away. Then Shannon and the boyfriend split the cash and run. Sydney boyfriend reveals all to Boone after he gets his hand on the check and ruins the con for Shannon. Boone gets so mad that he stomps off to his hotel room and slams the door. Shannon goes to his door and seduces him. Afterwards, she tells him it was a one time thing. Boone’s been carrying a torch for Shannon for years and so this cuts him. It cuts him real deep. She’s so evil. Then they go to the airport because, for some reason, Boone still wants to take care of her. He goes to check the tickets or something and Sayid walks up and asks Shannon to watch his bag. She says, “Of course, strange man! I would love to watch your bag! Watching bags is what I do!” Then she gets Sayid handcuffed for the flight, which would suck because Sydney to L.A. is a long flight. Oh yeah, Shannon has asthma and she’s too irresponsible to take care of her own medical condition so Boone has to do it for her.

On the Island:
Shannon refuses to help anyone with anything and sees herself as on vacation, thinking that the rescue plane will fly by any minute. She has obviously never read any books or seen any movies because it never works that way. Anyway, she prefers to sunbathe. I want to take an aside for a moment and talk about Shannon’s choice of flight clothes. If you are ever flying over the ocean, pick something comfortable to wear. Don’t pick a mini skirt. That’s just ridiculous. Because you will stuck in that mini skirt for a loooong time if you do happen to crash on an island. Just sayin. There is a time for mini skirts, and an 8 hour flight is not the time. Go with the yoga pants.

Back to the island. Boone tells her she’s a selfish lass without the l and they go on a hike with Sayid to send a distress signal. Why? Because the writers realized that Shannon was a complete load and decided to give her a purpose. There is already a distress signal playing and it’s in French? What? NO ONE from the plane speaks French? Wait, Shannon does! Shannon to the rescue! She starts translating the signal and becomes a little less of a selfish twit.

Sayid and Shannon fall in love, or lust, and have a talking date on the beach. When she returns to the caves, she learns that Boone fell in the woods and got crushed by a biplane. Instead of asking What the heck?, Shannon starts pointing fingers at Locke, which was fine because it really was Locke’s fault. She asks Sayid to punish Locke and Sayid refuses and Shannon gets her panties in a big ol’ twist about that. She steals the keys to the gun case and pulls a gun on Locke in the jungle. But she continues the vein of never finishing anything she starts and doesn’t off Locke. Shannon moves back to the “rape” caves with everyone else and takes Vincent with her as Walt has sailed off on the Swiss Family Robinson raft. Season Two starts and Shannon loses Vincent. I’m still convinced that Vincent is in charge of the island. I’ll address that in my Vincent character essay. Anyway, Vinny bounces off into the jungle to chase polar bears and Shannon chases him because who needs a man when you have a good dog? While she is looking for him, she comes across dripping wet hologram Walt. Sayid finds her and Walt is gone and Sayid starts re-thinking his relationship with the crazy chick. Still he builds her a love hut and they spend the night there. Sayid leaves to get some water and Shannon sees wet ghost Walt standing in the love hut (gag. Was he there the whole time?). Sayid tells her she was dreaming. Again they run off into the jungle in the rain where they both see Walt. Shannon runs to Walt and Ana Lucia answers the silent pleas of fans everywhere and pulls the trigger, effectively ending Shannon’s life on the island. And Curtain.

In all, I didn’t like Shannon. There were times when I felt bad for her. Her stepmother was horrible. It seemed that people liked to tell her how useless she was. The only person she felt like she could trust was Boone and she had to watch him die in a pretty violent way. Someone gave her a dog and she couldn’t even keep up with it (although no one has kept a leash on Vincent since this show began). She was finally getting things in order on the island when she got shot by the likes of Ana Lucia. And she probably would have been an excellent dancer if she had been given the chance to pursue it. But her wench of a stepmother took that away from her.

Off Island Connections:
Boone Carlyle – Stepbrother
Jack Shepherd – Future wife was almost killed by Mr. Rutherford’s SUV
Sayid Jarrah – Had him cuffed as a suspected terrorist before the flight
James “Sawyer” Ford – was in the background in the police station flashback when Boone was talking to the police about one of Shannon’s boyfriends.

Any other connections that anyone can think of?

Redeeming quality – suffered great loss. That would make anyone jaded. And she did put forth effort in translating the maps and in taking care of Vincent.

Sawyer’s Nicknames for Shannon: Sticks

Sources: Wikipedia, Lostpedia, lost.about.com, My brain, Season 1 &2 DVDs

Leave your observations of Shannon in the comments and suggest someone for me to write about next week!