‘Lost’: Was that Jack’s dead dad?

Last night's season debut of

Lost

was a smash-up ride to a crazy place.

Figuratively for fans.

Literally for Hurley.

When a hot red car flees L.A. cops and crashes, out steps the rotund Hugo, who relishes landing in an asylum - until dead rocker Charlie strolls by to chat.

But Charlie's not the only character back from the dead, according to fans.

So is Jack's dead dad.

Credits for the show apparently confirm.

Lost fans are buzzing, of course, about which castaways will live and who will die, as doubts grow whether strangers aboard approaching helicopters carry rescuers or killers.

We know from the flash-forwards of last season's finale that Jack and Kate escape, and last night's Hurley flash-forwards reveal that he is one of six surivors of Oceanic Flight 815 - what he calls "the Oceanic Six!"

(Yes, flashbacks are a thing of the past, you could say.)

But the biggest buzz may be about another mystery: Whose faces did Hurley glimpse last night in a ramshackle island dwelling?

The face at the window might have been Locke's, but who was sitting in the chair?

During Season One, we learned that Jack was on the fateful Sydney-L.A. flight to ferry his father's coffin home.

Only problem: When the body box was found, the corpse was nowhere to be seen.

Jack - and fans - were left to wonder: Was a figure the nerve doc saw really his undead dad?

The character's name, Christian Shephard, sure invites resurrection talk.

Last night, Hurley gets lost (fancy that) and stumbles on a dilapidated place, where several episodes ago a mysterious entity named Jacob was seen - for a flash - sitting in a chair.

Through a window, again we suddenly see a man in a chair. But this time he looks like Jack's dad, down to the pinstriped burial suit.

Or so fans say.

Screen captures posted on the Web last night seem to support the idea. (View one here: http://i12.photobucket.com/albums/a216/cupcakesaysmeow/facecabin.png.)

And so do the credits on imdb.com for John Terry, the actor who plays Jack's dad. The citation reads: "The Beginning of the End (2008) TV episode .... Christian Shephard." (See it at http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0994348.)

Besides, in last season's finale, Jack in his flash-forwards speaks as if his father's alive.

Maybe, like Lost, he wasn't just in a crazy place.

Maybe his dad is one of the Oceanic Six.