LOST Thoughts For S6E17 The End May 23rd, 2010 Part Two

When the decision was made to end LOST after six seasons, I felt it was a sad, but great move. The problem with a show like LOST is that you can find yourself hard pressed to figure out the ending when you keep getting renewed each season. A lot of things can happen in a year’s time. The continuity of your storytelling model can sometimes be left to the mercy of contract negotiations and puberty, as in the case of Walt growing up faster than the timeline of the island being shown each season. Not to mention, if you find yourselves dragging out mysteries, you need to pay attention to what has already been shown in previous seasons. You need to establish the continuity of something an actor did three years ago with how they finish a plot line next year, as in the case of the skeletal remains of Jacob’s family (a.k.a Adam and Eve) appearing to change positions from season one to season six. So, I applaud the creative team for picking a point in space and moving towards it. That gives them some framework in which to explore and tie up story lines and mysteries on the island. Where they did come up short was that there was no shortage of additional mysteries being added to the mix in season six.

So, now that the show is over, are you satisfied with the way it ended in terms of answering all your questions? I’m not. It’s not that I’m and jumping up and down mad that there was some ambiguity left out on the field but man, they knew where we were heading. Don’t you think they could have tied everything up this season?

There’s a great video from collegehumor.com that illustrates the many, many questions that some LOST fans might still be asking. I know I’ve had a few of my own.  First and foremost the one question I thought would be answered above all others was never solved. Those who have read my posts about LOST can probably answer this without any prompting.

WHO WAS SHOOTING AT SAWYER?
This had to occur in the present day (2007) Why? Because there was an Ajira bottle in one of the outriggers. So, how hard would it have been to just show a scene of red shirts from Widmore’s team patrolling the shore in the other outrigger this season? No big mystery. Problem solved.

WHO WAS ZOE?
There was a lot of speculation that she was really important. She was searching the island for something. It made her character overly annoying and I was glad MiB killed her. It was almost a nod to the fan base. Nobody liked her. She was equal parts Nikki and Paulo.

WHO’S SIDE WAS WIDMORE REALLY ON?
From day one of his introduction he was labeled the bad guy. Since we know that Ben was acting on orders from MiB and not Jacob that makes it seem like Widmore was really the good guy. But if that’s the case then why didn’t Richard already know that and say, “Hey, everybody. I’ve been on the island longer than anybody else alive, I can vouch for this guy?”

WHY DID THEY KIDNAP WALT ONLY TO LET HIM GO?
It seems to me if you are going to make a big deal about a kid being special then you better at least explain why you kidnapped him, subjected him to Room 23, made him jump through all sorts of hoops and then just let him go. Beyond that, how the hell did Walt show up on the island in different places like talking backwards just before Shannon got shot and standing above John Locke who was lying in the D.I. burial pit. We know that MiB could only take the form of someone dead so we know it wasn’t him impersonating Walt. We also know that John Locke saw Walt after he left the island and there wasn’t a clear acknowledgement of that little pep talk at the edge of the pit. What gives?



WHERE WAS CHRISTIAN SHEPHARD’S BODY?
MiB impersonated Jack’s Dad in "White Rabbit." He led Jack to the caves. But, the coffin was empty both in that episode and… oddly enough at the end of the series. Where the hell was it? My one and only theory was that the body never left Australia. Remember when Jack fought with someone at the airport in Sydney about lacking the proper documentation to store the coffin on Oceanic 815? Well, what if they removed the body but left the coffin? We get a similar sense of this in the afterlife flash forwards as Jack finds out that the airline lost his dad’s body. I think Christian Shephard became a lost piece of luggage in Australia and was probably buried in an unknown location.

WHAT WAS THE PURPOSE OF THE STATUE AND PREGNANCY ISSUES ON THE ISLAND?
I’ve theorized that all the different people brought to the island over the last few millennia were done so in order to debate the bargument that Jacob and his brother had. “You say that humanity is inherently evil and will always chose the wrong way and I say that free will exists and allows people to chose to do the right thing with little encouragement.” So, in that case, while they are stranded on the island bickering and killing and being generally naughty they have explained their surroundings and experiences in the form of structures (i.e. The Statue and The Temple) that are native to their own culture back home… Across The Sea. But… What the hell did it all mean in terms of the statue being depicted as Taweret in regards to pregnancies on the island? Jacob and his brother were conceived elsewhere and born on the island. Aaron was conceived elsewhere and born on the island. Sun and Jin conceived Ji Yeon on the island but gave birth away from it. Miles, while not specifically shown being BORN on the island was obviously conceived there. So, why is it that Juliet was really brought to the island? Why do pregnant woman die if the child is conceived on the island? Was this all part of Jacob’s plan? Did he intend for women to not be able to give birth on the island? Did his brother? WTF?!?!?!?

THE SWAN
What the hell did the Blast Door map have to do with anything? It showed the LOSTIES some of the stuff on the island such as other hatches but who cared? Kelvin took over for Radzinsky when he died… supposedly from suicide… I think Kelvin shot him. He was a tool. But why was Radzinsky stuck in the swan? Punishment for the Incident? Why did nobody bother to relieve him from DI? Was it because he was stuck down there during the purge and no one bothered to come back and find out what happened? It’s obvious that there were still Supply Drops made by… someone. I think if I spent a hell of a lot of money on something like the Dharma Initiative I’d want to check up on it from time to time. Was it like Isla Sorna in The Lost World Jurrasic Park… left for dead? Was the quarantine on the hatch written to keep people in because of the purge or a sick psychological experiment perpetrated by DI? Why would Ben tell Locke that nothing would happen if he pushed the button. He was in the Dharma Initiative? He ended the Dharma Initiative. He saw exactly what happened when you didn’t push the button (Oceanic 815) And why didn’t someone just turn the fail safe earlier?

THE DHARMA INITIATIVE ITSELF
Was this all red herring? Did the DI serve only to be the newest players in Jacob and MiB’s game of free will? Instead of Egyptians or Romans there were scientists and hippies? The hatches and stations were simply the temple and the statue of the latter 20th century? Who built the Lamp Post and why was Eloise Hawing off island, anyway? If Eloise was an Other, then why was she involved at all? After spending an entire season with the characters in the damn thing (D.I. circa 1977), did it mean nothing in the end? Probably. Just another plot line being launched into an open field somewhere in the framework of the show.

THE RULES
Jacob and his brother were told by their mother that they could never kill each other and that there were rules. So, are we to believe that MiB was not killed by being thrown down the into source waterfall? His body was merely resting in the caves for 2000 years. He was mostly dead? And why did the rules apply to Ben and Charles? Were they the same rules? Obviously, not since Ben unloaded a clip into Charles during the finale. Also, if Charles broke the rules by having a life as well as a family, off island, then why wasn’t Tom reprimanded for his little off island escapades? Was Charles’ indiscretions more about Eloise than anything else? Was his sentence proposed by the same governing body of Others that branded Juliet? Why was Richard Alpert not more vocal about their dealings as an advisor to Jacob?

OFF ISLAND ADVENTURES
Why is it, or more to the point how is it that Jacob knew where the Candidates were and were able to contact them? What means of transportation did he use? If we are to believe that Christian Shephard was primarily being worn as a suit by MiB then how did he appear to Jack in "Something Nice Back Home?" Was his appearance off island a hallucination? If not, then why the hell was MiB trapped on the island?

PENNY
Why did she appear to be in front of an Olan Mills photography backdrop in video communication with Charlie? Did she ever reunite with Desmond and how?

BEN
Why was he a globe trotter? Was he working for MiB all along and never for Jacob? Why didn’t Richard make that distinction? Why did Richard go to the foot and say, “Jacob, you know that cabin out in the woods? Do you still use it? Is that you telling Ben what to do?” How did Ben acquire so much money?

LIBBY
Why was she mental and how did she get out?

THE FROZEN DONKEY WHEEL
Who finished the work MiB started? Why was the chamber frozen? How did the DI get a polar down there to turn the wheel? Why does the island move? How is water involved? Why are you never allowed to return if you spin the wheel? Ben did. Locke did. If the wheel was just a piece of a larger mechanism how did that get built and did all the workers turn into smoke before completing the machine?

THE SOURCE
Why did the water stop flowing when the plug was removed? The water did not flow backwards. It did not continue to simply flow down the drain when it was removed. Where did that drain go? Why did the MiB instantly turn into a smoke monster upon falling over the waterfall but Jack and Desmond had to walk a ways before reaching the plug? Who drew on the plug and how did they do so without dying? If being in the pool caused a fate worse than death, then why did Jack die and go to church with his friends?

I could go on but you get the idea here. There were more questions left open than answered by series end. Next up, a report card on my theories throughout S6. I promise this is the last one…

LOST Thoughts For S6E17 The End May 23rd, 2010 Part One

Notice the title change? That’s because there’s no need to post theories or think about how things will play out because it’s over. Well, what did you think? Me? I loved the finale. I thought it was a beautiful tale of moving on and letting go. I got choked up more in those two and a half hours then I had the entire series. As far as Series Finales go that was one of the best. The only problem is that I have no idea what series it wrapped up.

I have so many thoughts in my head and I don’t want to sound pedantic but the episode did nothing for me in terms of wrapping anything up on the island. It was like watching the opening five minutes of Evil Dead II, which asked me to completely forget about what happened in the first movie since they rewrote it all in that span of time. Again, do not jump on the pitchfork and torch bandwagon yet. Let me reiterate, I LOVED WHAT I SAW, but I just don’t get why I saw it.

You know I am going to bore you to death with my ramblings.  I attempted to swallow the pregnant Metis, also known as my ability to go to Erie to tell a story, but couldn’t.   If I don't, the Athena-like rant shall spring forth from my head. So, I will break it all up into a couple of posts because, quite frankly, I’ve been mailing it in lately with reposting CarTalk puzzlers and I really don’t have the time to get all pop culture geeky on you with new stuff. So, let’s start off with this past Saturday’s repeat of the pilot episode, OK?

SHOW OF SCIENCE, SHOW OF FAITH

When LOST was first announced on the fall schedule I thought it was going to be utter crap. Why? Because I didn’t think a show about people shipwrecked on a island was going to be able to hold my attention. I made an attempt to watch Alias and after I missed two episodes I was completely… LOST.   My wife was also not interested in watching the show, which kind of made it easier for me to just let it slip into the pile of missed shows. Still, I was willing to give the show a chance with the pilot. Why? Because I hate to miss things.

That opening scene was quite simply one of the best things I had ever seen. And remember, this was a season that boasted Rescue Me, Desperate Housewives, Grey’s Anatomy, albeit in March, CSI: NY, Deadwood, Veronica Mars, Boston Legal, and House. Unfortunately it also had Joey and The Apprentice. So for me to put LOST’s premiere ahead of these other really decent shows gives me a newfound appreciation for appointment television. Until now, I had only done that with Buffy, Angel, West Wing, and The Oscars.

Here was a show that defied convention. It was a piece about characters and people and it just so happened that they were stuck on a tropical island. Had that been it, it may have lasted two seasons and I probably would have been happy with it. Then that pesky noise in the jungle came about and things took a turn. Still, even with that noise, that mechanical roar accompanied by the swaying and cracking of trees, the show stayed rooted in the focus of the people who survived. We had little snippets of back story concerning each castaway. There was a doctor, a con man, a rocker, a fugitive, a sad sack, a couple isolated by social mores and language, a father and son, a broken man, the pretty young over privileged rich girl and her infatuated step brother, and a torturer. Talk about The Real World. This was almost a slap in the face of reality shows that pit opposing personalities and backgrounds against each other to see if they can coexist in a confined space. Then Greg Grunberg got sucked out of the cockpit. After a bit, we saw how the passengers were flawed. We saw the post 9/11 fears play out as Sawyer attacks Sayid. We saw Jin tell Sun to stay covered and keep a low profile. We saw one of the most terrifyingly real depictions of a plane crash I’ve seen since Alive. We saw a spoiled brat refuse to help out and face the facts that no one is coming. We saw the first steps of a group of strangers working together towards becoming a community by looking for help. Then Sawyer shot a polar bear. “Guys, where are we?”

THE REST OF SEASON ONE

Those two hours held the world on edge for something different. It strayed into the bleeding edge of drama and hovered around science fiction but it stayed firmly rooted in its storytelling about people and their problems. How they were lost in life and how their time on the island might help them. From then on it became a finely tuned instrument that delved into the nature of what happened, happened. But I am referring to what happened off the island. Here it didn’t matter. Daddy issues, mental issues, abandonment issues, and Spanish Graphic Novel issues aside, everyone on the island was given a blank slate with the chance to redeem themselves. It only took four seasons to change all that.

It started with that damn hatch. That pill bottle lid that just stuck out like a piece of the alien ship in Tommyknockers. Once the characters began digging in the dirt looking for answers the show became more about science than faith. With the end of the first season we had found that somehow people and things on the island were connected off the island. Soon, the show became more about spotting the connections, the numbers, the crossed paths, and less about people’s atonement and relationships. Sure that was still there, but the questions and mysteries took over. Some of the highlights of that first season include some of the best music I’ve heard in a series. I can’t help but love Michael Giacchino as a composer. For me, he ranks up there with Christophe Beck and Snuffy Walden. I still get weepy when I think of that church scene from the finale with the “LOST theme” playing over it just like I used to when Beck’s theme for Season 2 of Buffy played as Angel got skewered into oblivion.

In fact there were so many great scenes from Season One that were punctuated with that damn heartstring tugging tune. Boone’s death while Aaron is born was one. The launching of the raft was another. I was immediately struck with the imagery of Tom Hanks leaving his island captivity on a raft outfitted with a port a john. The same kind of weepy music accompanied Hanks as he looked back on four years of his life as a different man, island man. As the rafties made their way out to sea to look for rescue I felt that same twinge of longing for a place that had become home for several months, even though it had been like two weeks for them.

But nothing could have prepared an audience, so willing to accept the small quirks of the island like evil others and a faceless monster, for what was about to happen. The other pillar of black smoke came and they hid, the raft encountered salvation only to find it was taking something away, and a cork was pulled out of the bottle that unleashed the island’s mysteries upon the castaways when that damn hatch lid blew. Season One was full of everything that made LOST so engaging and intriguing. It beguiled us and bugged as for the next five seasons until it had to come to an end.

Next up, Did Season 6 answer all those pesky questions?

LOST Theories For S6E15 Across The Sea May 11th, 2010

Games. Across the sea was either the greatest gift to a baffled fan or the longest con of all. In it we get an answers to a few of the biggest head scratchers this side of the Tunisian bus stop on the Frozen Donkey Wheel line. But as C.J. Cregg, er Allison Janney tells Clauida, “Every question I answer will simply lead to another question.” Such is the nature of LOST, for every answer there is another question.

Now, I’ve tried and tried to look at this episode as objectively as possible and not read too much into it. After all, there’s no sense in postulating a lot of theories about the history of the island since we will probably not see anything of a pre 21st century timeline in the last three episodes. All we can hope for is Michael Emerson to give us some exposition over the highlight reel during the obligatory recap episode we’ll get just before the finale. However, I want to draw some parallels that have been running through the history of this show since "Pilot".

IN THE BIG INNING
In the beginning there was a woman. She delivered two boys. The mother was killed and the boys were raised by another. The fair haired angelic son was named Jacob. The other, the bad twin (get it LOST fans?) was given no name. He was the favorite. He was loved above others. He was manipulated into being a means to an end. The good son doted, obeyed, protected, defended his giver of life while “He who shall not be named” was curious, questioning, willing to disobey and discover. Fate vs. Free Will. And for every beginning there is an ending. Perhaps it’s a snake eating its own tail. A wheel spinning around, marking the events on an island, ultimately returning to its starting position.

We get the glimpse of Claudia floating on wood towards the shore of the island. She is pregnant. Right away we know who she’s carrying and that leads us to my second biggest theory debunker of all.

4. Jacob and Locke Monster are actually brothers and the whole mother thing will play out a bit more in a final showdown. We already know that Alpert is the only character to have a flashback this season so it stands to reason that any explanations will be done through exposition between characters.


1. Jacob was loved more than MiB
2. MiB will be known as either Samuel or Esau

It actually turns out that this works in favor of my theory. We know that Jacob and MiB are brothers but whether or not Jacob was loved more than his brother remains to be seen. Their mother said they loved each of them in different ways. (more on that) And we did get more exposition about their back story like I said. I was off on the name but frankly I like it that way. I thought it was a cruel joke by Team Lost to not give him a name. We’ve all been speculating and when we finally get a real chance to hear the magic name, we get “I only picked one name.” HAHA LOST fans, we screwed you. In actuality he needs no name. Voldemort, The Devil, Keyser Soze, whatever you want to call him is evil. And evil does not need a name, it only needs an audience.

So, after the babies are born…which look to be 2 months prior to being birthed… they are wrapped in swaddling, opposite colored clothes and there is a moment of “ah ha!” in C.J.’s... err Allison Janney's eyes. She then says “I’m sorry” and bashes in Claudia’s head with a rock. What was that moment? A revelation, a means to an end. One side is light and the other is dark. One will protect the island. The other will provide me an escape… a loophole.

Still… LOST? What if Claudia had washed up on shore and met Allison Janney and Allison Janney had said, “What did one snowman say to the other?” Would that clear it up for you? (Ok, we’ll come back to that.)

MAN OF SCIENCE VS. MAN OF FAITH
The players change but the game is always the same. There are two players, one side is light and one side is dark. The man of faith accepts what is happening and plays his part. The man of science searches for more answers, rallying against the status quo. From the get go, Jacob is the man of faith and his brother is the man of science. Jacob never questioned his origins nor did he leave his faux ma to be with his people. He accepted his role. His brother got a glimpse of another life with “his” people, off the island, and wanted to leave. He wanted to use science to leave the island. Just as Locke became the man of faith and Jack became the man of science when it came down to everything, the island, the button, the freighter.

Now, the roles have been reversed. Jack is now the man of faith, taking the leap of faith off the starboard bow of the Elizabeth, a baptismal if you will into the role of “Man of Faith” while Locke, now possessed by the soul of Jacob’s brother, has become the man of science using technology, a plane, a sub, explosives to leave the island. Ultimately we will see the donkey wheel again because I have no doubt that he intended to use every other means of escape as a means of disposal for the candidates only to return to his original work as the way to leave.

THE GAME
Whether it be Senet, Backgammon, Chess, or Stratego… Does anyone want to play Stratego… I have Stratego… the game itself is an overly complex design to achieve a simple task. But the game that Jacob’s brother found was simply a metaphor for what is really going on here. Manipulation of pieces on a board. One side moves the pieces into place. Some are used for sacrifice to expose the opponent to more substantial attack. The player cannot directly get at the opponent but can use his pawns to win the game. Think of the island and everyone on it as a game board and a bunch of pieces. In every age the game is adapted to the time. For Jacob and his brother it was what looked like to be a Senet board. For the LOSTIES it was backgammon. Two sides, two colors, two players, multiple pieces.

Perhaps since the dawn of time, the island has been a game. Maybe what we believe to be the game masters, Jacob and his brother are merely the newest round of players. I get the feeling that their mother was forced to play the game as she was handed the role from the previous player. In any case, the game continues and continues much like a game of Tic-Tac-Toe. That is a game which, if played correctly, will never have a winner. It always ends in a tie, the balance of power stays the same.

JUMPING THE DHARMA SHARK
When The Other Mother showed the brothers to the cave of light I wanted to throw my fandom at the television. WTF?!?! (Mandatory Internet Slang Quota Per Post Reached) It’s a cave with a hundred watt bulb hanging inside of it. I think we need to change the name of the show to LAND OF THE LOST because that was straight outta Sid and Marty Kroft’s playbook. I half expected there to be Sleestak running about and claymation dinosaurs chasing the family back to the cave to grab the flyswatter. It also looked as if Jacob’s brother went over a waterfall into the light before smokey appeared, much like the Marshalls went over the waterfall in the opening to Land of the Lost.

We have been told that there is a very simple explanation for what’s going on and that it was rooted in reality but this was just too much. I should give up that theory because this whole season has pretty much blown the rules of science and reality out of the water. However, cheesy metaphors for the source of life aside, the cave did serve a purpose. It sets up the tasks to be performed by the protector and the prize for mere mortals to fight and plunder over for centuries.

You get the sense that Other Mother blindfolded her sons so that neither one could assume control of power until it was time. Keeping the cave a secret allowed for them to be captured and not be able to tell the location.

THE LONGEST CON OF ALL
I’m coming back to my comparison of Jacob’s mother and the button. I have said before that we should not read too much into the glyphs and structures on the island because they are inconsequential to the overall story. Every set of people that have come to the island have used their culture to interpret what the island is and the mysteries that reside within it. The more we fish for rationalizations of the importance of the temple or the statue the more red herrings we catch. Quite simply, if I arrived on the island and experienced these weird things, I would interpret them as being a product of whatever culture or civilization I came from and would document or deify them as such. The players change but the game stays the same. So disregard all you think you know about Greek or Egyptian mythology. Forget trying to figure out why the button had to be pushed every 108 minutes. It means nothing.

The simple fact of the matter is that there has been a lie perpetuated by centuries of misdirection and misinformation. Allison Janney came to the island “by accident” as she told Claudia. However, instead of being part of the game, she was made a player. She opened the ancient equivalent to a hatch and the equivalent of Desmond popped out fed her a line and gave her some wine. Then she probably killed or found a way to cause the death of whoever was guarding the Easy Smoke Oven. Then she became the ageless guardian and with the birth of twins she found a means to the end. “One of them will take my place as guardian of the island and the other one will kill me finally ending my Richard Alpert problem.” All she needed to do was figure out which one was going to be which. She planted the seeds of destruction with the game. Think about The Long Con in which Sawyer happened to drop open a briefcase full of money. “Oh my, don’t look at all that money that you were obviously never supposed to see. Damn these cheap briefcases. That’s the last time I go to Staples.” Except in this case, the Senet game established the sides. The one who is devoted to me will be the protector while the one who chooses to keep secrets and deceive me will be the one to kill me. In fact, are we really sure she wasn’t involved with the “appearance” of Claudia to Jacob’s brother? After all, most dead people on the island are a product of the smoke monster. And if we’re pretty sure that, prior to Jacob kicking his brother to the cave, Smokey never existed then how did Claudia show up? Moving pieces. Strategy. Money in a briefcase. The Mousetrap Game.

By revealing the truth of their origins to Jacob’s brother she set him down the path of rebellion. He wants to leave. He’ll work his whole life to find an escape and just as he’s about to do it, I’ll take it away. He’ll be so pissed that he’ll kill me, right after I secure his brother as the protector of the island. And to think that she gave Jacob the same wine that Jacob gave Alpert is telling. Whether the wine is actually sacred or magical is debatable. The incantation she gave could be window dressing. One may simply have to accept the responsibility to be a part of something and the wine is a contract. A covenant. A pact. A handshake. Communion.

Over the centuries the torch has been passed. The cons continue. MiB conned Ben into doing everything he wanted in order to push Ben into the mindset that he had done everything at the behest of Jacob and Jacob never cared. Jacob may have never had any dealings with Ben. Ben was a fanboy who saw too much into the imaginary relationship he had with his hero, the rock star, and it was all the machinations of MiB to push Ben into killing Jacob. And now he has conned the con, Sawyer, into believing he could get him off the island when in fact he meant to trap every candidate and blow them up, allowing him the chance to leave the island.

THE SOURCE, THE SMOKE, THE SCIENCE, THE SKELETONS
So, we got some answers. The Source is the cave of the 100 watt bulb. The donkey wheel was constructed by Jacob’s brother. The wheel when connected to the source moves the island and drops you in Tunisia and the skeletons of Adam and Eve were Jacob’s family. That’s a lot of stuff crammed into one episode. I still don’t know what exactly the Source is but I don’t think it will matter much. It’s a trope of television and movies. What’s inside the Lost Ark in Indiana Jones? What’s inside the briefcase in Pulp Fiction? It is merely alien space bats or a macguffin. Look them up. It’s something that is shiny and pure and needs protecting from those who would attempt to poison and destroy my brothers…

Does the source turn you to smoke? Or is it Pandora’s box and using a human to open it unleashes all the evils of the world in the form of the smoke monster, leaving only hope. And why did Jacob’s brother’s body end up like the pilot from "Pilot?" Simple, he was spat out, blown out by the rushing smoke. He was the mentos dropped into the cave of diet coke and got shot out. The smoke monster took his form because he was dead, assuming the identity and memories of his host. That’s why it is possible for him to be Adam and why none of us would have ever seen it coming. Why? The possibility of Eve being their mother was never suggested to us until we learned from Smokey/MiB that he had a mother in "Recon" and that he never really had a body after the events of "Across The Sea."

Every time they find a place like this they dig. It doesn’t matter what culture whether it be Jacob’s people or the Dharma Initiative, when they find a hotspot they dig. In fact you could probably call Jacob’s brother a part of the original Dharma Initiative. Then they were purged. Probably because they were coming to close to finding The Source. Makes you wonder if the Orchid, The Well, and The Swan are a triangulation around the Source. But how does the wheel, water, and the 100 watt bulb work? Once again, it does not matter in the scheme of things. What does matter is that now that the submarine is gone and the plane is rigged to blow, it may pan out that MiB was going back to his old ways all along and that these other means of transportation were just more red herrings. Ones that could get a candidate killed. MiB will probably go back to the donkey wheel to escape.

Adam and Eve have been a topic of debate since "House of the Rising Sun" in Season One. With every new wrinkle of possibility introduced each season the list of candidates who they are has expanded. I always figured it would be Rose and Bernard. Turns out, I was way off on all my theories, and the whole white stone / black stone. Another red herring that really represented pieces of the game that Jacob and his brother used to play. An inside joke. Two players. One side light and one side dark. But the rate of decomposition does not jive with Jack’s assumption that they were only 60 years dead. Maybe the nature of the island is responsible or maybe Jack is really bad at that kind of thing and figured as a doctor, no one would question him.

THEORY DEBUNK TIME
"Sundown"

1. MiB, UnLocke, Flocke, Lockeness, Esau, Nemesis, Not Lock, whatever you call him is a fallen angel, perhaps the devil.

8. The reason why Jacob and MiB cannot kill each other directly is because they are the same entity and only through indirect contact can the scale of power be tipped towards one consciousness and eventually it will be revealed ala Tyler Durden.

Yeah, no fallen angels here. He was mortal. Also, I can scratch off number 8 because they are definitely two distinct people and their mother somehow made it impossible for them to directly hurt the other.

"The Package"

1. Adam and Eve are…


1. Rose and Bernard. 40% Most acceptable answer as we have not seen them yet in the OT
2. Jin and Sun 20% It would be the payoff of them finally being reunited.
3. Desmond and Penny. 10% Low score on this since if Desmond ends up being the new Jacob he wouldn’t have died and these skeletons died in the past.
4. Kate and Jack. 10% Unlikely since they would have to time travel again.
5. Kate and Sawyer 10% Unlikely in that Sawyer was married to Juliet, he’s done with Kate romantically.
6. Never explained. 9% I’d have a brain melt down.
7. Nikki and Paulo. 1% That would send me over the edge.

BUUURRRRRRR! Way wrong on all counts. Although, it begs the question of what happened to Rose, Bernard and Vincent after the time travel from the 70s to the present? I’ll accept the answer but it was really a softball one. I pretty much feel as if the producers said, “Everyone thinks they know who Adam and Eve are. Why not throw them the biggest curve ball ever?”

"The Last Recruit"

The biggest gamble of a theory I have is that at the end there will be a reveal that one or more of the remaining Losties aside from Locke will be MiB. Wouldn’t that be a trip if it all came down to Team MiB and Team Jacob standing on opposing sides only to have select members of Team Jacob turn and point their guns at Jack and Desmond. It’s a long shot theory because that would mean that Frank infected Hurley who was voted least likely to become a host for the smoke monster in his senior year.

Yeah, I think I can safely say that there is no need to go the route that one or more of the remaining cast is also part of the smoke monster. Whew!

"Everybody Loves Hugo"

1. The little boy is


1. A rapidly growing Jacob getting ready to assume the persona of a candidate and that’s why his hair has changed color with every candidate that witnesses him in the presence of MiB. Blond for Sawyer, Brown for Desmond.

Yay for me, sorta.

NEW THEORY TIME
Not much to theorize since we will never see this time on the island again.   I pretty much laid out my theory that MiB will attempt to use the donkey wheel to escape and probably Desmond will be involved with that.   Maybe Desmond is now the source and Jack is going to be the new Jacob.

Three and a half more hours to go.   Can you feel the tension or will you be glad to have it over?

P.S.
One more thing for your homework assignment.   Go watch Land of the Lost and a small obscure show called Children of the Stones.   Children of the Stones was on Nickelodeon when I was a kid.  It was a British Fantasy / Sci-Fi / Horror series about a Stonehenge like ring of stones in Britain that held mysterious paganistic powers that invloved astronomy and magic.   Very scary to a young kid but follows the same style of storytelling involving time looping and repeat actions toward an end that you get on LOST.   Go to YouTube and look it up.  I just watched the pilot epsiode last week.