"Where's the chopper?!" "I saw a cow."

Last night's new Lost, "Confirmed Dead," was surprisingly even more mind-blowing than last week's season premiere. Holy shit, did a lot happen. We learned a bit more about the "freighties," the four new characters who (it was presumed) came to rescue the survivors of Oceanic 815. However, the freighties have another agenda (more on that in a minute) and the questions bubbled to the surface at a breakneck pace.

First, the new cast members. Lost has been mainly dead-on with new additions (with the notable exception of the dour Ana Lucia. Hell, I even liked Nikki and Paulo, if only because of their campy and well deserved end in "Expose") and the freighties are no exception. We had "the drunk," the helicopter pilot who claimed to the scheduled pilot for 815, played by Jeff Fahey. (The Lawnmower Man, dude). There was Miles, the Ghostbuster with the Dustbuster, who delivered every line with a cocktail of venom and sarcasm, played by Ken Leung (who I remember for his unhinged turn as Uncle June's nutshouse friend on The Sopranos). There was the eternally twitchy Jeremy Davies as Faraday, who uttered one of the evening's many funny lines; "can't say I was in charge of packing." And Rebecca Mader as dogged anthropologist Charlotte, who I remember from the short lived Justice (with Spy Daddy). She affected a very convincing American accent for that show, since she was using her natural Brit tone here. All had an agenda and a role in the team assembled by Mister Abbadon (!) and led by knifed in the back Naomi, who didn't really have a sister to love (code for "I'm being held a gunpoint") and had, I believe, the first dead-person flashback.

Whew. Questions and Observations (and mainly questions):

• At first, I thought that we were in a flash forward, and perhaps the island had been swallowed whole by the ocean and that's why 815 (with notable shots of the cockpit and tail) was underwater. However, by the end, it was pretty clear that this was a flashback, and that the 815 seen submerged was an extravagant fake. Where do you find a plane to "fake crash" and put deep in the ocean? And why? And when (in the future) the "Oceanic 6" make it back to civilization, how is this plane explained? Do Jack and the other 5 go with this story, that the plane they were on is the one at the bottom of the ocean? Or is this exposed as a fake?
• "Colonel Kurtz taking orders from Walt."
• Was there a reason we didn't see much of Faraday's wife? Especially her face?
• Does a Dirt Devil allow you communicate with the dead?
• Why was Faraday so upset about seeing the wreckage of 815 at the bottom of the ocean? He claimed "I don't know," but is that true? Could it be that he believed that it was really elsewhere -- on the island as it was/is in "reality," -- and was shocked and saddened to hear a news report that that this wasn't true (before it turned out to be false)? Typing that hurt my head.
• Why did the freighties have gas masks? Is this related to the facade that the the dude Desmond killed (Kelvin) perpetrated about toxic conditions outside The Hatch? Or the "Purge" that Ben enacted? Or something else?
• "Rescuing you and your people – can’t really say it’s our primary objective." Holy shit. So what is? Turns out, the agenda (or so they say) is our own resident psychopath and master manipulator, Benjamin Linus. And where the hell was that photo of Ben taken? Isn't he supposed to have been on the island since he was a kid? Then how did the freighties get that pic? And why do they want him?
• Speaking of pictures, how did Naomi also have a picture of Desmond? Wasn't that picture of Des and Penny one of a kind, a Polaroid taken when they were together in London? And do the rest of the team know about Des and that pic? Arrrgh. My head hurts more.
• If the fake 815 was discovered by folks looking for a sunken ship, was that ship the Black Rock pirate ship? (and why didn't anyone go to the trouble of building and sinking a fake Black Rock like 815? Just kidding. I think).
• "It's only a matter of time before he gets us Johnny. And I bet he's already figured out how he's gonna do it."
• "I don't know Miles, how stupid are you?"
• "Sure, who are we to argue with taller ghost-Walt?!"
• Why was there a polar bear skeleton in the desert of Tunisia? Why was Charlotte giddy to find it? Why did it have a Dharma / Hydra collar on it? How long has it been there?
• How does Ben know so much about Charlotte, and why did he shoot her? Because he has a "man on the boat." Who is that man? Could it be Micheal? Or could it be one of the three other freighties?
• What did Ben and Locke think about Hurley's confession that he could see Jacob's cabin?

Again: Holy Shit. Only 6 more days until Thursday.