Wouldn't the muscles atrophy just from lack of use? My knee injuries resulted in a fair amount of atrophy, and that was just months of partial use, not years of not any.

Which is to say -- that's not somewhere I'm looking for symptoms to match sense. I doubt they'll resolve cleanly, unless he's been doing isometrics in his sleep this whole time.

The atrophy would occur no matter the cause of lack of use. I don't imagine they will address that issue. They have left open the possibilities for cause. I haven't heard anything that clearly indicated a physical event. If it was then it will have to link with another character.

Wouldn't the muscles atrophy just from lack of use? My knee injuries resulted in a fair amount of atrophy, and that was just months of partial use, not years of not any.

Bear in mind I'm only surmising and trying to find a sensible explanation in the context of a TV show, so don't get too crazy over my insensible reasoning. I presume your injury would've made it painful to work the leg until your knee had healed sufficiently, thus atrophy began to occur. However, once the knee had healed you were able to build the muscles back to what they are now. With Locke, it's reasonable to presume he would've begun receiving physical therapy after a certain period of time, which would've begun to reverse any atrophy occuring. Now, since there was no actual damage to the spinal column, the nerves running to the legs would still be getting the full measure of signals and blood and stuff and so the muscles would also be getting worked the same way as a non-paraplegic. Therefore, when the psychological block causing the paralysis was broken after the crash, his legs were as good as if it he'd never been in the wheel-chair.

edit b/c it's "your" injury, not "our" injury :)

BTW, over at Readerville, there was a suggestion that the kid in the toystore was our "connected backstory".

Yeah, in the Cleolinda discussion, some speculation was that the kid was Boone.

With Locke, it's reasonable to presume he would've begun receiving physical therapy after a certain period of time, which would've begun to reverse any atrophy occuring.

My dad underwent physical therapy for many years for left side paralysis. I don't know that his results would be universal, but even with full use of his right leg allowing him to walk he suffered considerable muscle atrophy in his left leg. This despite several therapy sessions a week. PT could slow the rate of atrophy and maintain some function, but after the first few months if his paralysis had been miraculously cured he'd still have been limited to a shuffling very slowly and keeping most of his weight on the good leg until exercise let him build the muscles back.

I don't see a way around Locke being physically healed if we take the 4 years in a wheelchair as a given.

An interesting NYTimes interview with Terry O'Quinn.

Ambiguity is power, potentially, for an actor - and the power has come as a revelation to Mr. O'Quinn. "That's the gift that they've given me on this set - the time to explore the depth. Some actors get it when they're 12; they feel strong enough. But some of us feel, as functionaries, that we don't really have the power. We're not important enough on a set, or to throw our weight behind something, because we don't feel we have the weight. That's terrible. I let myself be that way for way too long in my career."

(X-Post with Minearverse)

Goood Golly Gosh!

AICN reports that Fury is leaving Lost and going to The Inside and 24.

AICN report

Nooooooooo!

The Inside is bogarting all the good writers!

I'm sad for Lost but kind of excited for 24.

(And The Inside. )