Last week I gave “Lost” a big compliment: I said I loved how the show occasionally allows the characters to voice the same frustration and confusion that we, the audience, often feel while watching this cuckoo-crazy series.

For instance, a couple of episodes back, Sawyer smacked Daniel around until he explained the island’s time jumps. When the off-island gang gathered at the marina last week and argued about returning to the island, Kate did what any reasonable person would do: She said, “You people are crazy” and drove the heck home.

But I must have done something to jinx all that, because last night’s episode, “316,” had all of the Losties practically mute, but simmering with unasked questions. I know they’ve seen some seriously bad juju since 815 went down, but come on, what’s going on now is not remotely normal – even by their messed-up standards.

Wouldn’t SOMEONE have said, “Huh?” when Eloise Hawking was sketching out this insane return-to-the-island plan?

And didn’t you want to shake your television when Desmond walked out of the Lamp Post station without asking Mrs. Hawking, “OK, exactly WHY isn’t the island through with me, you crazy old bat?”

Then at some point on that ridiculously long Ajira Airways flight, you’d think Jack would have asked an injured Ben, “So, dude, what the hell happened to you?”

But here’s the biggest question I had: Why, oh why, was Sayid wearing a purple tank top that showed way, way too much man cleavage? Was the cop escorting him (shades of Kate and the original 815 marshal, by the way, but more on that later) from the Fashion Police? Now THAT would be a credible explanation.

Anyway, fasten your seatbelts and prepare for a landing, because this flight into “316” is now taking off! Click through to read the way-too-detailed breakdown…

MRS. HAWKING AND THE LAMP POST STATION

Turns out, Dharma didn’t just have stations on the island. It had posts all over the world, including one in that Los Angeles church where Mrs. Hawking hangs out. This station is called the Lamp Post, and Dharma created it years ago when it was trying to find the island, which is constantly moving.

One Dharma “fellow” (which begs the question, who?) finally figured out that by using a Foucault pendulum and lots of important-looking scientific equations, he could determine where the island was going to be. Um, okay. That doesn’t quite cover how Dharma knew about the island in the first place, but whatever.

Hawking tells the group that they have to be on Ajira Airways Flight 316 to Guam, which will be flying over where the island will be for the next 36 hours.

That’s when Desmond says bye-bye, and calls Mrs. Hawking (FINALLY!) on sabotaging his relationship with Penny way back when he was time-tripping in his head two seasons ago. Before he leaves, she tells him the island isn’t through with him yet. Whew! I thought Desmond might be off the show for awhile.

Hawking then pulls Jack aside for, as Ben later calls it, a private after-school session. She tells him Locke actually hanged himself and hands Jack a suicide note addressed to him. She also explains that they have to try to recreate the conditions of the original 815 flight as much as possible for the plan to work. So he needs to bring something of his father’s on board. Obviously, Locke is meant to be a stand-in for Jack’s deceased daddy.

JACK’S WILD RIDE

Jack, as usual, had a lot of issues going on. Before he could get a handle on the crazy Lamp Post visit, he gets a call from an assisted living facility about a resident who has tried to run away. It’s Jack’s grandpa, Ray Shephard, who just happens to have a pair of Christian’s old wingtips that Jack can use on the flight.

I liked that the show revisited the Christian shoe issue: We’d all wondered why Ghost Daddy was wandering around the jungle in those bright white sneakers. But I have to admit that the whole grandfather scene felt a bit forced. I get that the writers had to move quickly in this episode, but I don’t think bringing in a random family member was the way to do it. After all, if Ray was Christian’s father, wouldn’t he have been to the memorial service?

Then there was Jack’s whole weirdness with Kate. It was wildly out of character for Jack to simply accept Kate’s request that he never ask about Aaron again. (Where’d she park that little tyke anyway?) Perhaps that was the show’s way of proving that Jack is now taking those leaps of faith that Locke and Hawking mentioned, when he’s always been the man of reason before. Hey, maybe he just welcomed Kate’s booty call. Either way, it rang a little hollow for me.

That brings us to Jack’s relationship with Corpse Locke. I didn’t quite get why Jack was still so angry with Locke, when it was clear that he now knows Locke was right about the island. Otherwise, why would he be going along with this cockamamie plan?

Locke’s suicide letter kept turning up like a bad penny, too. Jack refused to read it at first – I would have torn that sucker open in Hawking’s office – but it kept coming back to haunt him. When he finally did read it on Flight 316, it was a simple one sentence affair: “I wish you had believed me.” Sheesh, talk about a beyond the grave guilt trip.

Before we move on from Jack, let me just say that starting the episode with Jack waking up on the island in the jungle post-crash – with the cameras focused on his eye – was a brilliant connection to the show’s pilot episode. That’s exactly how “Lost” began, remember?

BEN IS A LIAR (LIKE, DUH)

When will those Losties learn that Mr. Linus is a compulsive liar? Even Mrs. Hawking knows it.

(And how funny was that exchange? Jack asks Ben if he knew about the Lamp Post. Ben says no. Jack asks Hawking: “Is he lying?” Hawking smiles sweetly. “Probably.”)

So let’s go through Ben’s secrets and lies of the evening.

First, he calls Jack and asks him to pick up Locke’s body and bring it to the airport. Ben is battered and bloody. This comes after he left Jack at the church to fulfill a promise to “an old friend” that would tie up “a loose end.” Could this mean bad news for Penny? He promised Widmore that he’d kill his daughter to avenge Alex’s death. Penny, Desmond and wee Charlie were living on a boat. Ben looked like he was at a marina. Gulp.

Then on the flight, Ben jokes to Jack that his mother taught him to read. A minor lie, but still, Ben’s mother died in childbirth.

But the whopper, of course, was Ben’s response when Jack asked if he knew Locke committed suicide. He said no, but because of next week’s trailer, we know that’s a big fat fib. It not only looks like Ben knew about it; he watched Locke go through with it.

AJIRA AIRWAYS FLIGHT 316

Wasn’t that plane ride one crazy trip from beginning to end?

First, Hurley shows up with what looks like Charlie’s guitar (or a stand-in for it). Why does he need to hang onto the guitar so badly? He was even desperately clinging to it in the lagoon on the island. More importantly, who convinced Hurley to get on the plane? And how did he get out of police custody so fast? (Sure, Ben’s lawyer said there wasn’t enough evidence to hold Hurley for the murder of the guy Sayid killed outside the mental institution. But what about the other two at the safe house? Hurley was caught on camera phone with a gun in his hand, folks!)

Sayid was on board, too, in what looked like handcuffs. As I mentioned, this was clearly meant to recreate fugitive Kate’s 815 flight with the marshal. But why was Sayid in custody? And why on earth would the police be bringing him to GUAM?

And who was the pilot of the whole shebang? FRANK LAPIDUS! Maybe this was the universe’s way of “course correcting,” as Mrs. Hawking once explained. If I recall correctly, Frank was supposed to be the pilot of Flight 815, but something happened. Is this the island’s way of getting Frank there properly? (P.S. Loved Frank’s comment after spying Ben and the O6 on the plane: “We’re not going to Guam, are we?”)

One final comment about the flight: Don’t think the random guy sitting next to Hurley – who gave his condolences to Jack on Locke’s death at the airport – and the gal escorting Sayid are Red Shirts.

Their names are Caesar and Ilanna, and they’re going to be recurring characters from now on. So expect that these two – along with Ben, Sayid, Sun and at least some of the rest of the 316 passengers – landed on the island, too.

Speaking of the island…

THEY’RE BAAAACK!

Yup, we know for sure that Jack, Kate and Hurley made it back, though none of them remember actually crashing.

So when are they? Well, judging from the music coming from the suddenly brand-new Dharma-mobile, it’s the 1970s. And guess who’s driving?

JIN!

But why is he dressed in a Dharma jumpsuit? He also looks like he’s kinda happy to see his old pals, doesn’t he?

EASTER EGGS and OTHER TRIVIA

There were lots of clues strewn around last night’s episode, but here’s a few that were referenced:

• The magician in the assisted living home was doing a trick with a white rabbit, just like the bunnies that Dharma used to test time travel and Ben used to trick Sawyer into thinking he had a pacemaker back in Season 3.

• When the gang was going through security at LAX, there was an Oceanic Air poster on the wall.

• Ben was reading James Joyce’s “Ulysses” on the plane; the book has drastic time shifts, but all takes place in a single day. Another clue? Joyce’s work was based on Homer’s “Odyssey,” about another journeyman whose wife, PENELOPE, remains faithful all the years that he’s gone.

• Ben goes to the bathroom on the plane to give Jack privacy; Charlie was in the bathroom on 815 when it crashed.

• Hurley is reading a Spanish-language comic book on 316; he was reading one on 815, too.

• The black-and-white photograph of the island on the Lamp Post wall is from 1954, the same year that the Jughead bomb was brought there.

• John 3:16: I actually wasn’t quick enough to catch this biblical reference, so props to all the fans who did. It’s pointed out that JOHN Locke is bringing everyone back on Flight 316, and that particular Bible verse reads like this: “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.” Sounds like Locke will be resurrected soon.

What did the rest of you Lost-philes spy with your little eyes? Sound off with your observations and theories in the comments section below!

And check back here next week to discuss the upcoming episode, when we find out what Locke said to the O-Sixers and exactly how he got in that coffin!

(Photos courtesy of ABC)