Apparently, it's British (and probably Australian, then) to refer to doctors as Mr.

only and specifically hospital consultants in a hospital. if you meet someone with an MD otherwise you'd call them Dr X. If their surname was X. Nation of Islam doctors.

Hey, is our rule for the topic here that Things Said In Interviews Etc. By Lost TPTB are fair game for non-spoilerhood? That's the impression I'm getting, but I want to confirm.

Jack just seems so, I don't know, honest. And he had a surgery story and everything.

After skimming yesterday's Natter, I'd tend to believe you're on the right diet.

Haven't even done that yet. Now you've piqued me.

Hey, is our rule for the topic here that Things Said In Interviews Etc. By Lost TPTB are fair game for non-spoilerhood? That's the impression I'm getting, but I want to confirm.

I thought the default was aired stuff and promos are fair game. Everything else is a spoiler.

I think Jack has had medical training, and probably has an MD, but I think maybe something happened after that point that made him quit/and/or got his medical license taken away.

okay, I'll bite. Why does the notion that they may be in purgatory or something make you react so negatively?

It's a narrative cheat. Like a reset of a show -- the season of Dallas that never happened as soon as Bobby stepped out of the shower.

It's a cheat because it doesn't force the writers to deal with the complexities.

(No problem, Lee. I edited to hopefully remove any seeming spoilerishness.)

It hadn't occurred to me that Jack might not be a real doctor. A bad one, perhaps. I can't imagine what he could have done that was so bad it sent his dad off on a suicidal road trip to Australia. That looked like a lot of medicine in his hotel room - dad must be either really sick or psychotic.

What if Jack is the surgeon who worked on Locke four years ago and couldn't fix his spine? Okay, long shot, but still. Jack's a spinal surgeon, Locke had a spinal injury.

Steph is very cute. We knew this. Her logic? Sumptuous. Ok, ok, we knew that, too. Back off!

Okay, I started watching the first episode again and when Jack is asking Kate to help him sew up his wound, he specifically says, "I'm a doctor, but I just can't reach it."

So... ?

And I don't see Locke as a visionary at all. He's too much of a pragmatist. A meat and potatoes kind of guy, who doesn't believe in magic, even though he thinks the island is special in that regard.

I think Locke has the potential to become rather dangerously insane, which would map him more closely to Cowslip than Fiver.

I also hope that Jack's not really a doctor, or he's very recently a doctor, or that he lost his license somehow, or, well, really anything to take him down a couple of pegs. Right now, his only flaw is low self-esteem, and even that seems to have been resolved.