Who is your favorite minor character on LOST?

DarkUFO has an interview with Francois Chau, the actor who plays the doctor in the Dharma Initiative training films, and it’s got me thinking about who my favorite minor character on Lost is. Chau’s character certainly ranks high up there, but I’m not sure that I can decide. There are so many great characters on this show, both major and minor.

What about you? Who is your favorite minor character on Lost? Is it Chau’s Candle/Wickmund/Halliwax/Chang? How about Rousseau, the French woman? Are you a closet fan of Dr. Artz? Let us know in the comments. And, well, you know the rules: if you can’t decide on just one, give us your top five!

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Because You Left - Lost Season Five Premiere

The fifth season premiere of everyone’s favorite television series, Lost, will be titled “Because You Left,” according to Entertainment Weekly columnist “Doc” Jeff Jensen. The premiere is expected to air at the end of January 2009, and should include at least two new characters, according to DarkUFO’s spoilers site.

If we could just skip this fall and the whole holiday season, I would be fine with that. Bring me January, and bring it to me now!

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Worth Your Consideration 014 - A GF5 Linkdump

I think I’ve been collecting these links since Thursday, and the fact that I haven’t done anything with them since then is probably proof of the fact that I’ve been playing with my new iPhone way too much. Oh well. Better late than never, right? Here are some links worth your consideration:

• Mashable has an article about despamming your iPhone e-mail, which is probably worth it to some people, but seems like a whole lot of overkill to me. Does anyone really get that much SPAM anymore? I thought that almost every e-mail account (any worth having, that is) had some sort of SPAM-protection at the server level. My Google Apps @ Your Domain e-mail does. My Engine Hosting e-mail does. Really, I’m not sure why we should be doing anything this elaborate anymore. Why not just forward everything to a central Google account (why get the desktop and filters on a desktop client involved?) and let their servers sort everything out? That’s what I do, and it works fine for me.
• There will be another Harry Potter book, after all. Sure, it won’t be quite the same as the others, but the announcement that The Tales of Beedle the Bard will be published this December has me more than a little excited. If you watched my 5 Things video the other day, you know that I’m obsessed enough with Potter that I re-read the books each summer. I can’t wait to add another to my collection.
• And, while we’re on the subject of Harry Potter, why not check out this shot-by-shot look at the trailer for The Half-Blood Prince, which I previewed this week. You haven’t seen the trailer itself yet, you say? Well, check that out here.
• In other news, there’s a workers revolt going down in the Mushroom Kingdom and it’s pretty darned funny. The minions of Bowser have some really good points about how they could more effectively fight the scourge of the Mario brothers. The question is, will the big boss listen? Watch and find out. And then, go thank Kottke for pointing the way to this clip.
• Oh, and speaking of Kottke-provided links, check out this list of the top nine songs about masturbation.
• Or, if you’re more of a sports nut, check out 20 Ways to Die Trying to Dunk a Basketball. Though, I must warn you, these clips do nothing to disprove the notion of jocks being dumb. In fact...
• Moving on, here’s the trailer for the first traditionally animated Disney film since 2004. It’s called The Princess and the Frog and it’s supposedly set in Jazz age New Orleans. It features Disney’s first African American princess. And, if you ask me, it looks like it could be pretty good.
• And if you’re feeling like going negative on me after that story ("Disney sux! Pixar 4-eva!” or some such shit), please do yourself a favor and read this Tweet from Merlin Man (found via our good friend Kottke): “Some days, the web feels like 5 people trying to make something; 5k people turning it into a list; and 500MM people saying, ‘FAIL.’” If you don’t like the creative output that’s out there (on the Web, on the silver screen, or wherever), shut up with your fucking complaining and go make something yourself.
• Dan Walsh is someone who does his creating by re-creating, but that’s paying off for him. His online comic strip, Garfield Minus Garfield, (previously mentioned here) is coming to a book store near you, thanks to an understanding and supportive Jim Davis.
• DarkUFO has an embedded version of the latest episode of The Official Lost Audio Podcast. This one was recorded live at Comic Con 2008 (previously mentioned here and here), so it’s definitely worth a listen.
• Anyone who can tell me what instrument Trent Reznor is playing in this photo of a recent Nine Inch Nails performance wins a free Geek Force Five t-shirt (whenever I finally make some). That’s not just a xylophone, is it? It’s something else, isn’t it? In any case, seeing them doing this kind of experimenting on stage makes me salivate over the thought of seeing them later this week in Connecticut.
• Just a couple more… Did you know that Wal-Mart is basically ordering its employees not to vote for Barack Obama? It doesn’t surprise me, but that doesn’t make it any less scary.
• In happier political news, NBC has hired Luke Russert to cover the Democratic and Republican national conventions. I had no idea that the lad had previous experience, but it appears he does, and that this isn’t just a publicity stunt in the wake of his old man’s passing. I think Big Tim would be proud.
• And, lastly, check out Kevin Smith’s interview with Ain’t It Cool News for Kev’s thoughts on Zack and Miri Make a Porno and George Carlin’s performance in Jersey Girl (a performance I praised in my goodbye to George).

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No Flashes in LOST Season Five

“We have something new this year,” says Lost executive producer Carlton Cuse, in reference to 2009’s fifth season. “We’re going to mix it up.”

This quote comes from a BBC piece posted by DarkUFO earlier this morning. Cuse’s partner-in-crime, Damon Lindelof, adds: “When season five starts, you won’t know when or where you are. And the way we tell stories will be different too.”

E! Online gossip gal Kristin Dos Santos, in trying to describe what her source is telling her about season five’s structure, says “Think about the Jin and Sun episode from last season.”

Interesting… very interesting.

Also interesting (and I’ll end on this note): speculation over in the comments section of this DarkUFO article. It seems that the person who is behind the camera in the latest Dharma video (which I mentioned in yesterday’s linkdump) is someone the audience has met before, and that it’s someone who definitely should not be a fully-grown adult when the video is being shot, but is.

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Worth Your Consideration 013 - A GF5 Linkdump

• The official Website for Nine Inch Nails is getting updated far more frequently these days, now that the band is on tour again. Only trouble is: there is no official archive of the front-page articles that are coming fast and furious. Enter the NIN Blog & Media Archive. It is simply a must-bookmark for any serious Nine Inch Nails fan.
• In other NIN news, Rolling Stone has a full set-list from and a nice write-up of the private rehearsal show I mentioned last Thursday. The setlist that Rolling Stone has up says that the Ghosts songs played were 1, 25, 19, and 31.
• DarkUFO, Ain’t It Cool News, and the Lostpedia Blog have write-ups of the Lost panel held at the San Diego Comic-Con. Among the many teases provided by executive producers Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse was a tidbit about the apparently ageless Richard Alpert. It turns out that the number of toes on Richard’s feet may have some significance. You do remember the statue with four toes at the end of season 2, right? There was also a new Marvin Candle/Mark Wickmund/Edgar Halliwax video shown, which was available on YouTube for a short while. That was really interesting, and I encourage you to check it out if you can find it. Apparently, Marvin/Mark/Edgar is actually a guy named Pierre Cheng. And he seems to have a bit of knowledge about his future that maybe he shouldn’t have.
• Also at Comic-Con: the one and only Kevin Smith. Kev was there pimping a bunch of things, but primarily his upcoming film Zack and Miri Make a Porno. News Askew has you covered on that front. The thing that piqued my interest the most was that the clip shown at the convention featured Justin “I’m a Mac” Long and Brandon “I’m Superman” Routh as a gay couple. The casting news on this just keeps getting better, doesn’t it?
• Lastly, AICN gets its second mention in today’s linkdump for providing the trailer to Oliver Stone’s George Bush biopic W. The accents don’t seem right, but the casting seems superb.

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