She begins her time on the series as a Tailie in Season 2. She is caring but very secretive of her past.
She claimed to be a clinical psychologist, but also apparently dropped out of medical school. She was a supportive character, first to Ana Lucia when she was leading her group and then to Hurley when he was having his own personal issues. Libby had a very short term relationship (one date) with Hurley. Libby died along with Ana Lucia when Michael shot them while arranging Ben's escape from the Hatch. Libby died without being able to tell anyone that Michael killed her.
From her own words and background observations, this is what we "know" about Libby:
1. She lived in Newport Beach, California.
2. She was a medical student but dropped out in her first year.
3. She eventually became a clinical psychologist.
4. She broke her leg skiing with an instructor in Vermont.
5. She was married three times, apparently last to a man named David Smith.
6. David Smith named his boat Elizabeth after her.
7. David Smith died of an unknown illness.
8. Libby inherited David's boat, and later gave it to Desmond for his Pacific race.
9. Some time after David died, Libby admitted herself to Santa Rose Mental Health Institute, the same place where Hurley and Leonard Sims were patients.
10. Libby was traveling home from Australia on Flight 815.
11. Libby briefly intervened in an argument that Eko was having with Charlotte Malkin, the young woman who had drowned but miraculously returned to life on the autopsy table. Her father was a psychic who refused Eko's request to interview Charlotte for the church investigation on the miracle. Charlotte was telling Eko that she saw Eko's brother, Yemi, when she was between worlds. Libby had asked them if everything was alright, but she got the silent treatment and left to board to the plane.
There were only five Tail section survivors left when Jin, Michael and Sawyer washed up on shore (Ana Lucia, Eko, Libby, Cindy and Bernard). Libby was the first person to reach out some support to the raft survivors, telling them that Ana Lucia "had trust issues."
| Libby used her knowledge of psychology to persuade Sawyer that his wound was not as bad as it looked or felt (which was a comforting lie). Unlike Ana
Lucia, she was willing to help construct a stretcher to transport Sawyer
in the hopes of keeping him alive. When they were lifting this
stretcher up a steep cliff, Cindy disappeared without a sound. Libby expressed great fear when they heard The Whispers right before Ana Lucia shot Shannon, as the two groups of survivors paths' collided in the jungle. The Tail section survivors met the beach camp members on Day 48 after the crash. Libby was killed on Day 65. This means that Hurley and Libby only had only 17 days to interact. When they met during this time, neither one of them acknowledged that they had been together previously in the mental hospital. During a Hurley flashback involving his imaginary friend, Dave, we clearly saw a disheveled Libby in the same day room, staring blankly into space, being given medications from a nurse. Even when she was visibly emotionally spent and mentally out of it, she looked intently in Hurley's direction. Hurley, being comfortable in the day room, would have noticed all the other patients, including Libby. This is one of those plot points that screams "set up." Was it a background story to lessen or tarnish Hurley's monumental moment (his first island date) since Libby knew him before the crash? Or, in an inversion of a fan theory that the whole Island adventure was Hurley's own dream, that the whole LOST sage was the imagination or dream of mental patient Libby. It is odd that Libby was the person who gave a stranger, Desmond, an expensive boat to sail off on a one man race across the Pacific Ocean. It is also odd that Libby is suddenly on Flight 815 in Sydney making sure that Eko was okay - - - and would board the flight. It is too convenient to place Libby at such desperate locations which have direct consequences of other people landing on the island. One could extrapolate the Libby was a player early on. She could have been an agent for Jacob just like Naomi was later on. Libby was a spy that was making sure that the candidates would make it to the island. And Libby died like Naomi trying to get the candidates all back together. Even if Libby was just another lost soul who found her way to the Island, why would she have wound up with Hurley? She had a more serious relationship with her husband, David, whose death traumatized her enough that she had to be admitted to Santa Rosa. Why did she not wind up with her husband in the after life? One answer is that her entire back ground was lies and cover stories. Even so, why did Libby become Hurley's "soul mate" after an extremely short island tenure? One could speculate that Libby was merely a prop or a reward that Hurley desired and that the Island's magic box provided to him. But this I Dream of Libby explanation is based purely on a childlike crush and not an intense romantic relationship and commitment. The character of Libby gave us certain plot twists and mysteries. But her predominate position in the end with Hurley makes little sense. If Hurley's relationship with Libby (the courage to ask her out) was the lesson why Hurley had to journey to the island in the first place, then when Hurley finished his guardianship and "closed" it, he would have returned to the main land to live a long, rich life (and presumably meet other women). But based upon the ending construction, Hurley gave us no indication that he had a life after he became the island guardian. That the island and the people he met "were the most important people" in his life. Libby's inclusion in the end church was merely to give a popular character, Hurley, happiness in the end. Apparently, that was the whole objective of the end sequence: to give the main characters a happy ending (logic and common sense not required.) |
