Terry O'Quinn ruined last week's "Lost" episode for me

OK, that headline is a bit of an exaggeration. He didn't exactly ruin it. Considering he is probably my favorite actor in the show, I shouldn't call him out like that, anyway. And it's tough for anyone or anything to ruin an episode of "Lost" since I consider myself a casual fan at this point and don't get too wrapped up in any of it. Besides, in a way, he actually made it the most enjoyable episode of the season for me.

So last week was a Locke episode, and that's usually a good thing for me, though my wife dislikes the character. O'Quinn made an odd choice, though, maybe 2/3 into the show, one which reduced me to a helpless giggle fit so overpowering Mrs. Shark not only had to stop the DVR, she had to consider administering CPR.

Locke was sitting in his wheelchair telling Peg Bundy--oops, sorry. It's Katey Sagal, and the Peg Bundy label is so damned unfair to everyone involved, but it's much more fun than calling her "Helen," and I may not be the only one who thinks that. In this intense scene, Locke told Helen he got fired that day. Only he didn't just say, "I got fired today, Helen." No, he did something different, telling her, "I got fired today, Alan."

At this point, I looked over at my wife and said, "Uh, did he just call her ALAN?" There is absolutely no reason he would. I really don't think he did. He was raising his voice a bit to get across his frustration, and the name came out sounding way different than it did before and after within that scene. But it sounded a hell of a lot like "Alan," and that's what I'm going with.

We backed it up and played it again. Mrs. Shark is used to me saying idiotic things when we're watching the idiot box, but I could tell that she knew I was on to something here. After all, she gave nary a protest when I asked her to replay that line. Sure enough, on a second watch, it held up. He called her "Alan!"

Something about this struck me as really, really funny. I began turning over the possibilities in my mind and wondering why the director would let that go, why the post-production team would leave it in, why nobody would just say, "Hey, you guys DO know Locke called Helen 'Alan' there, don't you?" I convinced myself it was another B.S. "clue," some key aspect of the larger puzzle that makes up the grand mosaic that is "Lost."

But mostly I just giggled. I tried to stifle my laughter as the show continued, but the absurdity of it all built up inside me like the tell-tale heart until finally I exploded. Mrs. Shark kindly attended to me--I believe her exact words were "What the hell is the matter with you?"--and I explained to her that I couldn't get past Locke calling Helen "Alan," and it was gonna bug me the rest of the episode.

She let me laugh myself out, and a few minutes later, she resumed the program. But I knew she didn't think I was totally crazy. She heard it, too, I tell you! And when we reached the end of the program, I wanted to think she was as unsatisfied as I.

"Don't delete it," I yelped as soon as the show ended. "You know what I want."

She glanced over at me but couldn't muster a proper full eye roll. She sympathized!

"You played it before. You can play it again. Play it."

I'm happy to say that I still heard ALAN on the third go-round. It was still funny, too. Is it funny now? Probably not to you. I admit it's becoming less so to me as the days go by. But somewhere inside me, I still believe that Terry O'Quinn not only called Katey Sagal's character "Alan," but he did so on purpose, and furthermore, everyone was cool with that.

I'm a casual fan of the show nowadays, someone who watches for goofy moments like this and doesn't care much about the so-called mythology. But I am issuing a challenge to all "Lost" fans who DO obsess over the details: Come up with a Grand Unified Theory of "Lost" that incorporates Locke calling Helen "Alan" into its awe-inspiring connectivity. You know, kind of like the old No-Prize system at Marvel Comics, where Stan Lee encouraged readers to come up with explanations as to why things that seemed like errors in the stories really weren't.

I'm talking to you, too, "Doc" Jensen of "Entertainment Weekly." Don't make my embarrassing breakdown go for naught. Prove me right. Ladies, you're welcome, too, but just don't make me call you...Alan.

(OK, it's still kinda funny for me.)