As usual, Lost left me almost more confused than before, while still answering a whole helluva lot of questions with this Locke-centered episode.

The main question it left me with was the same I’ve had since we first learned of the Ben/Widmore battle: Is Ben truly evil or does he honestly have the island’s best interests at heart?

Hear me out: In order to get back to the island, they supposedly had to replicate the circumstances that led them there in the first place. And Jack had a coffin on the original trip, with his father in it. Didn’t someone have to be in a coffin? And didn’t Locke come back to life (or whatever kind of consciousness that is) on the island? And haven’t we been told we can’t change the past anyhow, so in some way that means you can’t change the future, everything is predestined, so didn’t Ben have to kill Locke?

Oh, and Ben didn’t seem to stop shooting at Locke & Abbadon after Abbadon was obviously dead. And I didn’t buy Ben’s explanation that Abbadon was evil. He seems to have never done anything other than try to get Locke to the island. I mean, working for Widmore, it seems that served his boss’ best interest to get Locke there, but it never seemed he wanted Locke dead.

Yeah, my head hurts, too.

I mean, everyone keeps saying the island wants Jack & Co. there. So, if Jack put himself in the right spot, same circumstances or not, wouldn’t the island find a way to snag him?

I’ve heard a few folks saying over the past week that maybe Locke is the smoke monster, somehow. He is sort of set up to be a guardian of the island. And Smokey did let go of him way back in, what, Season 1?

I do, however, want to know why Ben was so shocked and threatened when he realized Locke knew about Eloise Hawking. Who and — maybe more important — WHAT is Hawking? I mean, what’s her story? Why does she know so much? And it doesn’t appear she ever told Ben about the suicide note, though I’d be surprised if she didn’t know Ben had actually killed him. (Or did I just miss it, and Ben snagged the note off Locke’s dead body?)

Other questions: The guy who found the gun in the Dharma office on the island obviously knows more than he’s saying. Who put him on the plane? And the woman who had Sayid in cuffs isn’t just some marshal. She was put there, too. She seems to know the island is more than it seems to be.

As for the pilot and the woman who stole the boat, that’s obviously Lapidus and Sun, heading over to the main island to rejoin their buddies. How’s Locke going to get there? Or does he even need to yet? Is he alive or is he “alive” in the sense that Christian Shepherd is?

So, what does everyone else think?