Okay My Little Losties....Read Up!

Here's some scoopy goodness to get you through until tomorrow at 9pm!

Episode 2.23: Live Together, Die Alone (2-hour season finale) (Desmond-centric)
Airdate: May 24, 2006 from 9 to 11 p.m.

"We are going to tell you why the plane crashed," says Cuse. "We're going to explain what happens if you don't push the button. And we're going to resolve the Michael-and-Walt story." (Michael's son, Walt, was kidnapped by "the others" in last year's season finale and has been missing ever since.) Desmond, the enigmatic guy originally discovered in the hatch, also reappears, and he's not in good shape, though he gives the survivors fresh hope for escape. Just as last year's finale expanded our scope of the island's boundaries, this year's will expand its relevance. "There is something else that is reverberating on our planet that is directly linked to this island," says Monaghan. "You begin to understand that what is happening there has a significant butterfly effect in the rest of the world." One more thing: we think another character is going to die, or come close. It's just a hypothesis, based on the fact that when we asked Michelle Rodriguez (Ana Lucia) to guess which character would die after Libby, she said: "I can't do that, 'cause I know." Then she clammed up.

At the beach, long-lost button pusher Desmond (Henry Ian Cusick) chugs from a bottle of booze and spills a secret. (Hint: It's sick.) [...] This time, we'll see Walt again, learn what caused Oceanic flight 815 to crash, find out what that mysterious button actually does (if anything), and more.

Harold Perrineau is not a regular for next season. He could be back as a guest star (à la Walt this season) but not as a regular cast member.

Michael Emerson (Henry Gale) [...] is returning next season as a series regular.

In Season 3, there will be new locations and new characters (one rumor has Desmond joining the cast full-time, but producers won't comment). The season's big theme sounds timely, twisty, and terrifying. Hints Lindelof: "'Us versus Them.' But who's the 'us,' and who's the 'them'?"

Damon Lindelof [reveals]: Libby's got this mysterious backstory, of which we've only given you the tip of the iceberg. We know she's spent some time in the mental institution with Hurley, and the idea of killing her before she had an opportunity to explain how she got there... we have a master plan for how we're going to tell that story, but it's all posthumous. You'll start to learn Libby's moves through flashbacks over the course of the next season. So we're not done with Cynthia, but Libby is dead.