It all started in the intense opener when Desmond leaped eight years into the past as the helicopter passed through the "temporal barrier" surrounding the island. What exactly caused this? We didn't get a great answer to that, but Faraday hints it might have something to do with Desmond's exposure to unusual forces during the hatch explosion (which makes us wonder if Locke might experience something similar if he were to leave the island). Unlike Desmond's prior travels into the past, this time his memory of the future is clouded (in the past), and in the present, he has completely lost his mind.

Throughout the rest of the episode, Desmond continues to flash between 1996 and 2004. With each flash, he seems to be better able to cope with the transfer - capable of remembering things from the "future" when he is in the "past", and vice versa. Yet, not without a cost. The long awaited introduction of George Minkowski (from the other side of the sat phone), in my opinion, was a bit of a let down. Strapped to a bed, and seemingly suffering from the same effects plaguing Des, Minkowski serves as an example of what is going to happen if Desmond cannot stop his excellent adventure (or, perhaps bogus journey). The cost of finding yourself lost in time? A bad cold, with primary symptoms being nose bleeds and death. Why Minkowski and others that tried to get to the island are experiencing this phenomena isn't explained. Which leaves us confused as to exactly why Desmond is experiencing these side effects. Obviously, it is not directly and uniquely related to the hatch incident and his previous time travel experiences if others are experiencing the same thing.

Fortunately, Dan Faraday is able to come up with a solution to Desmond's problem. Over the sat phone, Dan explains what Desmond needs to do: he needs to find Dan back in 1996 and convince past-Dan to help out past-Des. Why the boat doc and crew don't want Faraday talking to Desmond and helping him also isn't thoroughly explained, but a fight breaks out in the sick-room in efforts to pull Des off the phone. Perhaps they're just running low on minutes? At any rate, Dan is able to give Des some numbers which past-Dan can presumably use to send Desmond back to the future (or, so I thought).

Indeed, past-Des and past-Dan hook up in... the past. Desmond provides the numbers to Faraday, which he uses in his machine to send the conscious mind of a rodent into the future (or to pull it back from the future) with the aid of a pimped out flashlight. The whole scene was confusing, but in the end we get a rodent who knows how to run a maze before Dan teaches him how to run it. So, what's next? Will Desmond have to ride the purple light to fix his stuck-between-two-worlds problem? Will Dan have to steal a bunch of plutonium from Libyan terrorists to build a Desmond-sized version of his time machine? Will Desmond physically be sent through time to stop the Army of the 12 Monkeys? Will he be turned into a man-fly when an insect enters the time machine just as he is zapped through the fabric of time and space?!

Unfortunately, none of the above. The solution to Desmond's predicament? He just needs to find a constant in 1996 and 2004... and... look at it? Hold it? Talk to it? Oh, wait, it has to be something he really, REALLY, cares about. What? Why? What does any of this have to do with time travel? What kind of "Fifth Element" love conquers all contrived solution is that? Personally, I didn't like the fact that talking to Penny in 1996 and 2004 was the answer to Desmond's problem. I wanted to see Dan do something really cool with that flashlight. The Penny solution was really a let down for me, and one I still don't fully understand. What exactly a "constant" can be seems to be a very big gray area.

Continuing on, Desmond somehow makes it intact back to the present (which is, of course, really the past) and all is fine and peachy with him after his Penny talk (in which he completely neglected to pass on any important information). So, we finally come to cliffhanger time. This one shows something quite unexpected. Dan searching through his journal, comes across a note (which seems to surprise him): "If anything goes wrong, Desmond will be my constant". Wait, what just happened here? Did Desmond's meeting with Dan in the past change the present? It appears so. This, of course, opens up the whole concept of multiple time lines and multiple realities. Are we really getting into this on LOST? Would that be a good step (tell us what you think)? We now seemingly have a time line in which Dan arrived at the island having never met Desmond, and a new time line in which Dan arrived at the island having met Desmond in 1996. How will this effect their relationship? Does Dan really care that much about Desmond, after all, according to Dan your constant has to be someone you REALLY care about. Can the future now be changed? Could the flash-forwards we are seeing be altered? Will more time-travel be involved in the show? Al? Ziggy? A little help here?

I don't think we will see LOST continue to get really heavy into the time travel themes, and the theoretical physics involved in such themes. It just gets too confusing and complicated to keep the average viewer's interest. If you really wanted to geek out on this episode, you could go crazy looking through the journal and chalkboard screen caps, and reading up on Einstein, Kerr and Minkowski; driving yourself mad with theories about time travel, black holes, white holes, and other mysterious phenomena of quantum physics. But the average fan isn't going to be up for that, and wants to be entertained above all. Obviously, time travel is now more important to the mythology of LOST than ever before, but how far will that theme be pushed? I can't imagine much further than what we got in "The Constant".

Overall, I really enjoyed this episode. Despite some week areas, and some confusing moments, I thought it was a great episode as a whole. Especially after "Eggtown". Let's hope for more clarity and further answers in tonight's episode, "The OTHER Woman". Sound off in the comments below!