EARLY AND LATE

This is an early promotional picture for LOST. It is interesting to reflect on how the early LOST vision as set forth in the photograph panned out in the actual series.

Front and center are Jack and Kate. In the original scripts, Kate was going to be the main focal character of the series. She did not have the criminal back story of the pilot. She was a little older, wiser, married (and may be widowed after the crash). Jack was supposed to be one of the first initial characters to be killed off (purely for dramatic purposes; to show how the island was a dangerous place). But viewers were quickly drawn to Jack, so the network made him the focal character of the series. In many respects, Kate remained the main female lead, but with a more secondary role.

Just behind Jack and Kate, literally having Jack's back is Charlie. Charlie's original character development was going to be Jack's right hand man - - - his loyal friend who would be in the center of most of the action (in some ways Kate morphs into this buddy role for Jack). Charlie's character went from possible loyal companion to lone-sick, drug addicted puppy.

Sawyer stood in the fourth lead role in the photograph. His character had the built-in elements for conflict: cockiness, rudeness, humor, criminal intent, and ballsy personality. He was a primary character who really did not affect the main plot lines. His decisions did not affect the final ending of the series. He was more representative of "leave me alone" survivor than a community builder.

Interestingly, the next group represents the "family element" of the show. ABC billed itself as the family network. Sun and Jin were the allegedly happy newly weds who we would learn were escaping from her demanding father. Whether the language barrier and stereotypical discrimination elements were initially cast for the Korean couple is unknown. But their story seemed to be more filler episodes than an overwhelming key to the solving of any of the island's mysteries.

Now, Walt and Michael could have been huge factors in the island story development. Walt was in fact touted early that he had "special powers." The danger and cruelty of the Others was established when they kidnapped children like Walt. The dynamic of a child reunited with a father he never knew was probably the most complete and compelling story foundation in the series. But that story arc got the short shaft based upon Walt's actor literally growing out his part. Then the writers began to use Michael as some all-knowing McGuyver on construction, boating, etc. to make him an unbelievable character.  The families never made it to the end as a complete unit. Sun and Jin's back story was better than their island story. Walt and Michael's story just fell off the face of the Earth with the muddy main story supernatural elements taking over the plot.

The first of the background characters were Locke and Hurley.  This makes sense in one regard: both were loners. Hurley was supposed to be a successful businessman and Locke a knock-about bachelor who never could get his act together. But once the show began to be filmed, Locke turned into a miracle survivor on his own quest for acceptance and recognition from his peers. Hurley turned into a meek soldier who lent himself for comic relief. Both men were originally not supposed to play big roles in the series. But the viewers were quickly drawn to the excellent acting skills and personality traits to become fan favorites.

Ironically, the next background pair actually wound up together in the end even though their characters were polar opposites. Shannon was the typical rich bitch, spoiled brat persona which would have had a hard time adjusting to the primitive island life. She had little skills (except French) to contribute to any plot. She was cast for eye candy. Sayid was supposed to be another diversity character, with the background that would cast an evil eye toward him. As someone who fought against the Americans in Iraq, he would naturally be considered by the other survivors as suspicious and untrustworthy. The camp needed his skills but the camp leaders could not deal with the politics of accepting an outsider as an equal. Sayid's role grew to be that "go-to" mission specialist in electronics, weapons, rescues, tracking, etc.

Off by himself, which really happened as the series went on, was Boone. Boone initially had a greater role in the series, but with an ensemble cast he was not paired with a dynamic focal character. In the pilot he was put into the role of potential go-getter leader, but was quickly shot down by Jack. Boone was left to gravitate towards Locke's stronger outback character as the Gilligan to the Skipper relationship. In many respects, Boone had the target of being a red shirt in the writer's room.

The last character in the photo was Claire. She was developed as a main character in the original treatments. As a pregnant young woman, her story was a simple tale of an unwanted pregnancy, bad decision making, and a horrible end crash landing on the island. One would have suspected that she could have died in child birth, got the island infection or had mad PPD to become an outcast in the group. But for Charlie's diminished role to Jack's leadership squad, Claire would have been quicklly written out of the series. Still, her motherhood role did not have any bearing in helping the main island themes pan out into interesting reveals. In fact, the Others intense interest in her, her baby, her birth, the infection shots, the kidnapping and her rescue had no impact on the Season 6 story elements.

What is interesting to note from this photograph is Bernard and Rose are missing from it. They were a "family" element more stable than any other pairing on the show. They were the "adults" in the room. In many respects, they were the base line for common sense on the show. But clearly, they were never intended to have any major role in the series.

MEMORY WIPES

One body of LOST theory is that the show's premise resides solely in the mind(s) of a character(s).

It is a tempting premise because it discounts any factual, scientific and memory errors in the actual story lines.

A few key clues in these theories were the fact that the Others (and Dharma) brain washing facility was known as Room 23. We got two references of this room. First, Walt was taken prisoner there and subjected to the high intensity film images. It seemed the sheriff used it as a punishment tool, for which Walt respected and therefore behaved himself. Second, we got an intense look at it when Ben put Karl in the room. We got the aspect of cult programming in that scene with early reference to "Jacob loves you."

23 was also the Number for Jack, which most believe was the central character of the story. Tying the two elements together, Jack was also subjected to mind control games at Hydra, and possibly at the Barracks (or Room 23 facilities) when he integrated himself in a game a football with Mr. Friendly.

The idea that LOST was a nightmare of Jack's subconscious has some merit. Because in the End of the series, Jack got the one thing that he wanted: a chance to see his father again. And Jack's mind rewarded his imaginary friends with happiness and a sense of belonging (especially with the couples).
But the one other big clue is that Aaron, who was born on the island, was also born later in the End. That can't physically happen. So it must be mental.

Jack's mind could have forgot about certain memories in the course of concluding his dream series.

And science backs up the notion that our brains "over write" memories when recalling other ones.

Forgetting certain memories while remembering others may be a normal part of brain function, new research shows. In short, the very act of remembering may cause people to forget other memories that are overridden in the retrieval process, according to the study published in the journal Nature Neuroscience. Researchers from the University of Birmingham and the MRC Cognition and Brain Sciences unit in Cambridge, England, discovered that intentional memory recall isn’t as simple as mentally reawakening a memory. In fact, the act of remembering can actually trigger the brain to forget other competing experiences that interfere with memory retrieval.

“Though there has been an emerging belief within the academic field that the brain has this inhibitory mechanism, I think a lot of people are surprised to hear that recalling memories has this darker side of making us forget others by actually suppressing them,” study co-leader Maria Wimber, PhD, said.

While there are other studies on memory interference, researchers say this is the first to isolate the adaptive forgetting mechanism in the brain. It’s this mechanism by which remembering dynamically alters the aspects of our past that remain accessible. 

Researchers used MRI scans to monitor patterns of brain activity in study participants while they were asked to recall certain memories based on images they had been shown earlier. Over the course of several retrievals, participants were asked to recall a specific memory, which became more vivid with each trial. The results showed that competing memories were retrieved with more difficulty with each trial carried out.

The findings are not limited to specific memory types — semantic memory, episodic memory, and recently acquired short-term memories are all impacted. In fact, though people differ genetically, researchers say that it is thought that all brains are capable of inducing varying degrees of this forgetting mechanism.

There is a bright side to the study. “[Forgetting] can be incredibly useful when trying to overcome a negative memory from our past. So there are opportunities for this to be applied in areas to really help people,” Wimber says.

WHAT NUMBERS REPRESENT

What do Numbers represent?

A number is an arithmetical value, expressed by a word, symbol, or figure, representing a particular quantity and used in counting and making calculations and for showing order in a series or for identification. It is also a quantity or amount; such as several, in a group, company or order (such as a magazine issue to indicate a position in a series).

In the LOST mythology, the Numbers were the glue that bound many clues.

We really first learn of the power of the Numbers by Hurley hearing them while he was at the mental institution. The Numbers were supposed to have been heard by a patient, who said they were cursed. But despite the warning, Hurley used the Numbers on a lottery ticket. So, the Numbers were at first, lucky. But as Hurley started to embrace his new wealth and fame, the winning lottery ticket became his own curse (with family members being hurt, people dying, etc.)

We also found out that the Numbers were broadcast possibly as an island location beacon to the DHARMA group.  Why the numbers were important to DHARMA has led to speculation that the main purpose of island research was to re-set the Valenzetti Equation, a large doomsday-predicting formula on the demise of mankind.

We also found the Numbers stamped on the Hatch cover. This apparent serial number freaks Hurley out as a bad omen. In some respects, that was true.  The Hatch discovery led to Desmond and the internal workings of DHARMA, and more mysteries and clues (such as the blast door map). Desmond was a lost soul also imprisoned on the island to do unexplained work for an alleged higher purpose.  (One new theory is that the Hatch and electromagnetic fields were being operated by human souls in order to regulate the gateways between life, death, heaven and hell. The operators were not told of their role, least they could interfere and destroy the natural world.)

Finally, the Numbers are the code in which needed to be placed into a computer control every 108 minutes or bad things would happen (an electromagnetic build up would create a lockdown, a purple flash, release of energy, to dangerous explosion-implosion events). Why human beings had to enter the code to regulate the release of an alleged energy build up is unclear, but may take homage to the soldiers who man defense missile silos - - - who have to manually enter launch codes in order to fire destructive nuclear warheads. The idea is that these men and women have the final say on their own fate; and as a check against a computer malfunction.

So the Numbers represented good luck, bad luck, a key, a curse, and tie that bound many different elements of the story together.  But in the end, TPTB merely said that the Numbers were a red herring, with no real significance to the main story. That reveal was one of the major disappointments to serious fans.

EYES CLOSED

For those with a work ethic, a close family and bills to pay, the idea that one can shut out the realities of Life is impossible and reckless.

Life's challenges are multiple daily decisions that have ramifications, both big and small. Navigating the pot holes in the road of Life is something that is conditioned upon experience, upbringing, morality, culture, education, skill and common sense. Life is Hard.

But in many ways, Life was easy for the many of the main LOST characters.

Closing one's eyes to the problems around you so you don't have to confront them (or your fears) was symbolic of many relationship issues throughout the series.  When Jack opened his eyes in the bamboo field after the crash, it was symbolic of Jack going on a journey to deal with the problem he had put off until it was too late: reconciling his issues with his father.

Likewise, Kate kept a blind eye to responsibility and accountability for her actions. It seems she was never punished for her childhood transgressions. She learned that your cute charm could get people to do her bidding. She never seemed to work hard at anything because people, boys, would try to help her. Her eyes only opened when she uncharacteristically decided that she needed to help Claire, a stranger and fearful young mother, with the birth of Aaron and his later rescue to the mainland.

Hurley also had an easy life. His doting mother gave him a home and plenty of room for Hurley not to have to work hard. The safety net of his mother's love closed Hurley's expectations for himself. He was ashamed about himself. He had self-esteem issues. He was closed minded about his future (like working as a fry cook would be his career). He was self-conscious about meeting women because he lost the feeling of love when his father abandoned him. It was when Hurley closed his eyes and went into his dream world did he find comfort with his one true, but imaginary friend, Dave. Hurley avoided the need to make hard choices by being in a mental institution where he had no pressure to do anything.

Even if one went wide eyed into a new venture, it does not mean he would see the truth. That was Locke's problem: no matter what path he tried to take in his life, he would stumble and be made the fool.  He was blind to the fact that other people used his good nature against him. When he dreamed about himself, it was of a grander man that he could ever become in real life. And that image of himself haunted his daily life to the point where he went from meaningless and unfilled job after job with little responsibility or expectations for himself.

Many characters kept their responsibility meters off. They did not want to confront their own problems in such a way to be accountable for their own mistakes. They would rather wallow in self-pity than change. It was only by the basic instinct of survival did any of them actually have to come to terms with their closed minds to make some sort of personal mental redemption. One can skate through life with your eyes closed to the harsh realities of life, but in the end that is not really living.

CLUELESS

In the last post, we reviewed probably the four biggest "clues" shown in the series: The Hatch, The Blast Door Map, The Egyptians and The Lighthouse.

All were physical objects that contained highly detailed information we fans thought were vital clues.

The Hatch gave some of the castaways some hope for rescue. It gave a few, like Locke, purpose. It gave the beach camp some needed supplies. But what it did not give everyone was shelter. That was the odd aspect of the story line: the beach camp was surrounded by danger - - - the Others kidnaps and the smoke monster attacks - - - why didn't Jack move everyone underground? Instead, he kept it a secret. And once the rumors spread in the beach about the hatch being opened, why did not the camp people demand access? Instead, they decided to stay on the beach instead of going to safer areas (including the caves). For some reason, the castaways were more comfortable on the beach. Was it because that is where they landed; survived? Was it because they did not want to miss sighting a rescue ship? Was it because to them it was their new "home?"

The Blast Door Map outlined the entire unseen Dharma story arc. Research facilities, the smoke monster, an accident, experiments and unknown island mysteries were all scrawled on the door. The island once housed a large and complex military-industrial complex doing highly theoretical and advanced research projects. And this type of detail spawned viewers into theorizing about worm holes, star portals, parallel universes, space ships, psychological experimentation, mind control, mind manipulation, torture chambers and death. But the vast library of possible science fiction story lines or answers never came to the forefront. The main characters themselves never were too interested in these stations for what they were supposed to do . . . they were merely back drops. One of the worst misuses of these sets was the chemical weapons station, where the computer was set to countdown mode to release the toxic gas . . .  but we all saw clearly at the entrance the power switch to shut down the facility. The "danger" was merely an illusion to test the resolve of Jack and make him trust the Others' spies. But then again, the Others wiped out the Dharma folks for no real reason other than a territory dispute over control of the island. Why the Others felt they were good and everyone else coming to the island was bad was nothing more than a childish refrain developed over centuries of Jacob's laisse faire leadership.

It is hard to imagine that the Others were the children of the ancient Egyptians, the servants who were brought to the fore-hell of their Pharoah's journey into the underworld. In the ancient rituals, kings and queens were buried with their possessions and servants in order for their souls to have the means to navigate the challenges of the underworld journey. This journey was supposed to be a dangerous but magical adventure that only the worthy could successfully complete. In some respects, this description does fit in what some of the characters were doing on the island. There was a theme that the survivors had to work together or die alone. An individual needs group support in order to achieve positive results. It is how the group works together that was important. If you are on the same page, great things can be accomplished, from building the great pyramids to the island's temple. But the ancient culture myths involve the after life, something that TPTB abhorred discussing from Season 1 to the present. LOST was wrapped up in the cloth of life and death story lines, but the premise of a land of death was not acceptable to most.

The Lighthouse gave us Jacob's plan which was to spy on off-islanders to find "candidates" to replace himself as island guardian. Why an immortal with some god-like powers needs human "candidates" to replace him is one of the large unanswered questions of the series. And what Jacob needed to guard and protect was not fully explained, since the light source (life, death and rebirth) seemed to be a stationary fixture. But since the island was cloaked and hard to find, why was a guardian needed to protect something hidden from mankind? And was it not the fact that Jacob bringing people to the island made the the island open to human attack? It is a contradiction easily solved when Alpert landed on the island. Jacob could have given Alpert the guardianship - - - which he would have accepted since he knew he was dead, and this was his punishment for murder (in hell) to remain on the island forever (and away from his wife's soul). But then, where would Jacob go? Is the after life of an immortal so boring that non-existence is a better alternative than life itself? That seems to be a sad and pathetic explanation to the final big story line.

If the four big clues were mile posts in the LOST journey, where did they take us?

One explanation was that it was not the journey, but the relationships between the characters was the most important thing.

A relationship is the way in which two or more concepts, objects, or people are connected, or the state of being connected: the study will assess the relationship between unemployment and political attitudes. It is the state of being connected by blood or marriage; they can trace their relationship to a common ancestor. It is the way in which two or more people or organizations regard and behave toward each other.  It is an emotional and sexual association between two people.

Is that what LOST was about? A patchwork quilt of various relationships: good, bad, ill conceived, short, long, tortured, fractured, weak, cold, angry, manipulative to friendly? A graduate student looking at the raw data of such relationship pairs and sorting them into categories would a) be boring and b) not very productive for gleaning insights into the vast story tangents thrown at us in six seasons. All the clues made a clueless stew of information about relationships but no real conclusions about them.

BIGGEST CLUES

When the series was unfolding, fans went nuts on several things we thought were the Holy Grail of plot clues.

1. The Hatch.

Oh, Locke's epic quest to open the hatch. He himself told his fellow castaways that the answers were down the hatch.  In certain respects, he was right. In other respects, he was wrong (as the plot went down the rabbit hole on the Dharma story arcs).

The Hatch had the potential to be the game changer. It set forth the following points:

a) There was an advanced technological people who inhabited the island in the recent past.
b) The Numbers were embedded in the island's past history through the countdown timer.
c) The hatch computer seemed to control the "unique" electromagnetic properties of the island, which we were led to believe in the end was the Light Source.
d) It gave us the first "orientation video." This was the introduction of the scientific experiments that the Dharma group was conducting on the island. It began the connection between the polar bear, and future stations showing brain washing and human experimentation. Some fans concluded that the island was one large psychological facility (which leads to possible explanations such as the characters being institutionalized and programmed to believe they were on an island.)

2. The Blast Door Map

Instead the Hatch was the treasure trove of set design: the blast door map.  When Locke, the keeper of the Hatch protocols, got trapped under the blast door during a drop, the blue light revealed the details of the island map. This was probably the most focused HD screen shot of the series.

The map gave investigative viewers many great details, such as the smoke monster being a Cerberus, a warning to escape "from hell,""the remedy is worse than the disease," various areas of unstable conditions, a reference to dragons, cosmic coordinates, other science stations, an unknown center, shutdowns, escape areas and "an accident."

3. The Egyptians

There became an overriding set design with Egyptian hieroglyphs during the latter part of the series. One had to see that all the background glyphs were created in extreme and accurate detail - - - so they had to be important to the story line. Many of the Egyptian writings were about life and death, Egyptian burial rituals, and the ancient beliefs in the after life. While the producers-writers dismissed the notion that the characters were in "purgatory," the use of so much Egyptian mythology in the sets, including the temple and its life spring, made many believe that despite what TPTB were telling the world, the filmed episodes clearly represented a potential journey through the after life.

4. The Lighthouse

The last great clue was Jacob's Lighthouse. It also contained hieroglyphs, but this one came with an explanation from the immortal leader. The lighthouse had a dial which could be turned to view the past lives of the "candidates."  The clue that the people who came to the island were not accident victims but intentionally culled and diverted to the island by Jacob alone brought a new realm of theories to the fan community. A candidate is a person seeking to hold a position or office. A candidate who obtains that office usually acquires power or control over something important. This was part of the story arc of Jacob and his brother, both diverted to the island in ancient Roman times by a Crazy Woman who was seeking her own "candidate" to replace her endless guardianship of the island. In the end, Jack reluctantly became the new island guardian to help slay MIB-Flocke from escaping to allegedly "destroy the world." But the final plot never explained the elements, purpose or powers of the guardian had over the island's heart. It also did not explain the sideways world or the show's conclusion.

These four items were the viewer launch points to various show theories which sustained them from episode to episode, series year to year.

19

The Numbers were a constant throughout the series. Fans want the Numbers to mean more than the explanation given by TPTB.

In typical in-series episode clue hunting, scratch math of the Numbers:

If we look at the "progression" of the Numbers, we find an interesting pattern. The number "19" is produced by the first four number sets and by the final number set.

How does the Number 19 apply to LOST?

In the lighthouse, candidate 19 was Nguyen, and that name was crossed out. Lostpedia references the trivia of brutal Vietnamese leader Ho Chi Mihn was born Nguyen.

In the chart of elements, Number 19 is for potassium. It's symbol is K. 

K is the eleventh letter of the alphabet.It's abbreviation denotes things like 
• kelvin(s).
• Computing kilobyte(s).
• kilometer(s).
• kindergarten.
• king (used esp. in describing play in card games and recording moves in chess):
• knit (as an instruction in knitting patterns):
• (also k ) informal thousand
• Baseball strikeout.
• karat.
• a constant in a formula or equation.
• Chemistry Boltzmann's constant,  the ratio of the gas constant to Avogadro's number, equal to 1.381 × 10−23 joules per kelvin. (Symbol: k ).

It is interesting to note so many things pop up from K. Kelvin was the character in the Hatch who lied to Desmond to keep him imputing the Numbers into the computer. He was also a military officer Many people think the characters interactions with each other was like kindergarten children. Everyone wanted to be king of the island. The turning point for Jack, in captivity, learned  the Red Sox won the World Series, reversing a fan curse. We were also told about "constants" by Daniel as the means of surviving the island's unique properties, including time travel.

Potassium is a metal and is the seventh most abundant and makes up about 1.5 % by weight of the earth's crust. Potassium is an essential constituent for plant growth and it is found in most soils. It is also a vital element in the human diet.

Potassium is never found free in nature, but is obtained by electrolysis of the chloride or hydroxide. It is one of the most reactive and electropositive of metals and, apart from lithium, it is the least dense known metal. It is soft and easily cut with a knife. It is silvery in appearance immediately after a fresh surface is exposed.

So the Number 19 is a number derived from LOST's series of numbers. Is it a clue that the key to understanding LOST can be learned through Kelvin? Probably not. He was a minor character who conveniently shows up on two different characters' background stories. The themes attached to him include military, duty, manipulation, lies, and wanting to escape. Potassium is never found "free" in nature; it must be manipulated to be obtained. Again, the clue could be that the characters had to be manipulated by the island in order to escape the traps and lies of their human existence.

THE GOLDEN RATIO

Throughout history, the Golden Ratio has been deemed a magical mathematical formula that is the basis of the greatest engineering feets (i.e. the pyramids) to objective marks of human beauty.

The Golden Ratio is 1.618.

The human eye is drawn to this proportion.

It somehow fits the world into our long term mental picture of our environment.

Throughout history, some of the greatest mathematical minds of all ages, from Pythagoras and Euclid in ancient Greece,  through the medieval Italian mathematician Leonard of Pisa and the Renaissance astronomer Johannes Kepler,  to present-day scientific figures such as Oxford physicist Roger Penrose,   have spent endless hours over this simple ratio and its properties. But the fascination with the Golden Ratio is not confined just to mathematicians. Biologists, artists, musicians, historians, architects, psychologists, and even mystics have pondered and debated the basis of its ubiquity and appeal. In fact, it is probably fair to say that the Golden Ratio has inspired thinkers of all disciplines like no other number in the history of mathematics.

In the numerology of LOST, 1.618 can be interpreted as follows:

1. The number 16 and 18. In the candidates representation, that would mean Sayid and
Kueffner is a surname that appeared to be scratched off on the lighthouse dial.

2. 4, 8, 15, 16, 23 and 42 can be added, subtracted or used to get many other number combinations to include 16 and 18 (16 + 2).

Kueffner is a name that means "barrel maker" in German.

In historic Germany, why were barrel makers so important? Barrels were needed to ferment and store beer or "spirits."

That may be another clue that the LOST island and events was part of a spiritual world, as referenced through Sayid's "multiple" deaths from wounds that could not be healed in the Temple pool, to the shocking reincarnation, to his final demise by bomb detonation on the submarine.

Spirits may inhabit us in multiple lives.

Kueffner \
ku(e)-ff-ner\ as a boy's name is a variant of Kiefer (German), and the meaning of Kueffner is "barrel maker".
Read more at http://www.thinkbabynames.com/meaning/1/Kueffner#glgZqTlqWl03J6Id.99

THE BIG QUESTION

The next part of the leaked LOST writers guide used to sell the show to the ABC Network dealt with the concern on whether the series could deliver on what it promised to executives. ABC had to have some real doubts on how the show would present its stories and characters so that it could capture and more importantly, maintain a audience.

The guide emphatically promised:

THE BIG QUESTION- IS IT SELF-CONTAINED OR SERIALIZED? 

Self-contained.

Seriously. 


We promise. 


Yes - the mysteries surrounding the island may serve an ongoing (and easy to follow) mythology - but every episode has a beginning, middle and end. More importantly, the beginning of the next episode presents an entirely new dilemma to be resolved that requires NO knowledge of the episode(s) that preceded it (except for the rare two-parter). 


Yes - character arcs (romances, alliances, grudges) carry over the scope of a season, but the plots will not. Viewers will be able to drop in at any time and be able to follow exactly what's going on in a story context. 


This is not lip service- we are absolutely committed to this conceit. LOST can and will be just as accessible on a weekly basis as a traditionally "procedural" drama. 

The first issue is whether LOST was going to be a series of long, interrelated episodes or whether each episode would be self contained. For example, in a crime story drama, you will have the same characters show up week to week, but they solve one crime or mystery within each weekly program. There is no holdover - - - where the viewers would need to have seen last week's episode to know what was going on in the current week. This is important to network executives because traditionally "serial" programs tend to lose viewers quickly because it becomes too much work to follow a long narrative.

The network was sold on self-contained adventure episodes. The creators promised that each episode would be self-contained - - - requiring NO knowledge of the episodes that preceded it.
 Nothing was farther from the Truth than that broken promise.

Viewers could not just drop in on a random episode to determine what was going on between the characters. Individual story lines were carried forward through multiple episodes and seasons, cut up by the over use of back stories and new characters. To this day, fans will continue to debate what actually happened on the series. There was no clear beginning, middle or an end to any episode, let alone any season. (For example, Season 5's cliffhanger with Juliet and the bomb. Did it go off? Did it re-set? Did it create the sideways world? Why didn't she die if the bomb went off? Is dead really dead?)

What changed to torpedo this promised episode expectation? Perhaps, the writers got caught up with the stylized editing of the show - - - throwing bits and pieces of characters back grounds then trying to mirror those personal issues in future episodes (like trying to hide Easter eggs in an overgrown back yard). Perhaps, the show runners wanted to do the opposite as a way of trying to "hold" the audience over from week to week. The addictive substance they threw on the screen was more mysteries and questions from new clues at the beginning of each new episode. Some could say that the writers turned into clue-pimps trying to prime the pump of on-line blogs, reviewers and posters. The clues then turned into tangents, red herrings and outright continuity errors and lies. The answers were the last thing TPTB wanted viewers to know. Keeping fans in the dark became the real conceit of the show.

The one thing that LOST failed to do more often than not was actually resolve an issue.  For example, what did we see in all the episodes prior to the End which would guarantee that Kate would go back to Jack? 

All the truly Big Questions still remain unresolved. What was the island? Who was Jacob? What was his real role? Were the survivors dead on arrival? Why is there no past, present or future in the sideways world? How was the sideways even created and by whom? What were the moral lessons of LOST? Why were criminals and sinners never punished? Was the drama all dreamed up inside a character's head?

All the story line plots were supposed to have a clear and definite end after each episode. That did not happen. The only thing that the writers envisioned that would overlap season to season would be the character's personalities (their romances, grudges, struggles and alliances) as applied to new weekly dilemmas.  

It could be the instant critical acclaim and success took TPTB by surprise. However, they indicated to the network that they had dozens of stories already in mind when the guide was written. The immediate success must have changed the conceit to contempt - - - someone was now the smartest man or men in the room so all rules or constraints did not apply anymore. A hit series needed to be cleverer and more mysterious than any other show on television. And when that page was turned, the writer's guide promises were clearly lost.

SUNKEN ISLAND

According to a Celtic legend, there was an island approximately 120 miles west of Ireland in the North Atlantic called Hy Brasil. This island vanished from view a long time ago. According to Irish myth, the island is a phantom island, cloaked in mist, but which makes its appearance for one day every seven years. But no one can seem to find it, even though sailors have tried to map it since the early 1300s.

The island was supposedly inhabited by a race of super-intelligent people, who had technologies thousands of years ahead of its time.

Some theorize that this ancient legend follows the pattern of that of Atlantis. Atlantis was also a place ruled by highly intelligent people who were much more advanced than normal tribes roaming the continents. But Atlantis somehow vanished from the face of the earth, and any ruins of their civilization have not been found.

Which gets us back to the submerged island scene from Season 6 of LOST.

Many viewers thought this was a clue to the premise of the series that the island was Atlantis. The island had been described as a place, a ship, a space craft, a time portal, a localized worm hole, an illusion, a dream, a game and a time-space vortex. If one can find the answer of what the island was, then that should explain the other unsolved mysteries.

Just as a few have tried to tie the advanced Atlantis civilization to unexplained artifacts like Stonehedge or the Bermuda Triangle, it is hard to connect disconnected dots on map. Atlantis legends state that the island country was in the Atlantic Ocean. Our LOST island was in the Pacific. Atlantis was said to have a highly advanced technology. Our LOST island technology apparently stopped with the Dharma construction in the late 1970s-early 1980s. So there seems to be little connection between the legend of Atlantis and LOST's island except that they were mysterious islands that explorers could not find.

MUSICAL CLUES

Music that was played on the series was speculated by some viewers to be hidden clues.

For example, in the Season 2 episode, "The Hunting Party" Jack faces a major problem as he wakes to find a gun wielding Michael, who leaves to find Walt, who kidnapped by the Others. With the help of Locke and Sawyer,  Jack heads out to bring Michael back before he is killed by the natives.

During this episode, the music playing in the Hatch was "Fall on Me", by Pousette-Dar Band.

The lyrics may be the clues:

Fall, fall on me

If you're gonna fall
fall on me
and if you're go'in down
hold on to me

I can see the sorrow in you're eyes
I can feel you're heart wondering why

If you're gonna fall,
fall on me
and if you're go'in down
hold on to me

Now you feel
you've lost all reason
can't face another day
when it's despair
it's just a season
that comes and goes away

If you're gonna fall
fall on me
and if you're go'in down
hold on to me

If you're go'in down
hold on to me
when you got a soul
that shines on
so much love can't help but turn mine on,

If you're gonna fall,
fall on me
and if you're go'in down
hold on to me

Fall, fall on me

Two things come to mind in reading the lyrics:

1) when a castaway like Michael loses all reason (his anger to get back his son), it is just another seasonal plot point that "comes and goes away."
2) the reference to "a soul" prequels death, but in Michael's case even Walt's love for him cannot turn his soul from a trapped whisper to the sideways world reunion.

The first comment reinforces that retrospective feeling for some that LOST had no continuity from season to season; there was no clearly defined plot structure; it was a free form series with more story arc dead ends than well constructed story telling of an epic tale.

The second comment reinforces that the characters were not whom they seem to represent, either in human form or as lost spirits trapped in a transitional world of the living and the dead. Many of the main characters brutally failed in their actions on the island, but still received a happy reunion in the after life sideways church. It would seem that failing together was better than failing alone.

HUME PHILOSOPHY

Desmond Hume was also a name clue. Many people thought Desmond's character may be a reference to English philosopher David Hume (1711-1776).

Hume's position in ethics, which is based on his empiricist theory of the mind, is best known for asserting four theses: (1) Reason alone cannot be a motive to the will, but rather is the “slave of the passions”  (2) Moral distinctions are not derived from reason (3) Moral distinctions are derived from the moral sentiments: feelings of approval (esteem, praise) and disapproval (blame) felt by spectators who contemplate a character trait or action  (4) While some virtues and vices are natural  others, including justice, are artificial. There is a great debate about what Hume actually meant by these positions. He defends them within the broader context of his metaethics and his ethic of virtue and vice.

Hume worked on the issues of  ethics and political philosophy.

One is a question of moral epistemology: how do human beings become aware of, or acquire knowledge or belief about, moral good and evil, right and wrong, duty and obligation? Ethical theorists and theologians of the day held, variously, that moral good and evil are discovered: (a) by reason in some of its uses (Hobbes, Locke, Clarke), (b) by divine revelation (Filmer), (c) by conscience or reflection on one's (other) impulses (Butler), or (d) by a moral sense: an emotional responsiveness manifesting itself in approval or disapproval (Shaftesbury, Hutcheson). Hume sides with the moral sense theorists: we gain awareness of moral good and evil by experiencing the pleasure of approval and the uneasiness of disapproval when we contemplate a character trait or action from an imaginatively sensitive and unbiased point of view. Hume maintains against the rationalists that, although reason is needed to discover the facts of any concrete situation and the general social impact of a trait of character or a practice over time, reason alone is insufficient to yield a judgment that something is virtuous or vicious. In the last analysis, the facts as known must trigger a response by sentiment or “taste.”

A related but more metaphysical controversy would be stated thus today: what is the source or foundation of moral norms? In Hume's day this is the question what is the ground of moral obligation (as distinct from what is the faculty for acquiring moral knowledge or belief). Moral rationalists of the period such as Clarke (and in some moods, Hobbes and Locke) argue that moral standards or principles are requirements of reason — that is, that the very rationality of right actions is the ground of our obligation to perform them. Divine voluntarists of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries such as Samuel Pufendorf claim that moral obligation or requirement, if not every sort of moral standard, is the product of God's will. The moral sense theorists (Shaftesbury and Hutcheson) and Butler see all requirements to pursue goodness and avoid evil as consequent upon human nature, which is so structured that a particular feature of our consciousness (whether moral sense or conscience) evaluates the rest. Hume sides with the moral sense theorists on this question: it is because we are the kinds of creatures we are, with the dispositions we have for pain and pleasure, the kinds of familial and friendly interdependence that make up our life together, and our approvals and disapprovals of these, that we are bound by moral requirements at all.

Hume represents the following points:
1. A person's free will is not controlled by reason but one's passions.
2. Reason does not set morality.
3. Morality is determined by feelings of approval or disapproval felt by others to one's actions.
4. Virtues, vices, ethics and justice are artificial concepts in a natural world.
5. A person gains awareness of moral good and evil by experiencing the pleasure of approval and the uneasiness of disapproval from a character trait or action formed from family and friend interdependence bind everyone to a moral requirement.

In LOST, Desmond is a literal and figurative drifter. He drifts from job to job, career to religious order. He gets involved with women for pleasure, but runs away from the moral commitment of marriage. He seems to have a chip on his shoulder, that his poor station in life is just as good as the rich and powerful elite. But in order to prove that point, he must build up his own character by completing something great (like the solo boat race).

Desmond is also a contradiction. He is deeply in love with Penny, but in order to cement that bond, he must leave her for a suicidal boat race to impress her father. Many people would call that illogical - - - nuts. His moral compass is completely off. His decision making is formed by passion and not reason or sound judgment.  Despite Penny's disapproval and anger, Desmond turns his back on any traditional moral ground to stay with Penny.

Once on the island, Desmond's life has no ethical or moral bearing. He has no free will. He classifies himself as a prisoner in a snow globe. He is filled with self-remorse, guilt, and delusion. He had lost Penny. But in all his decisions up to the island shipwreck, subconsciously, that is what Desmond wanted: his fate was not have any happiness with Penny or any other woman. His character was to be a dour nobody.

So Desmond's character really had nothing in common with David Hume's positions. Desmond was not the moral barometer for the show.

The side story of Desmond and Penny was not critical to the show's ending. Yes, Desmond became the livery driver to "awaken" the island survivors to their island memories - - - which in itself is an illogical construct - - -  but that job could have been done by Charlie, who started to think outside the box before the concert, or even Libby getting Hurley to remember. Desmond was not associated or close to any of the sideways characters. His final position in the church reunion with Penny is another one of those odd inconsistencies in the ending.

CANDIDATE WORDPLAY

Shark.
Hark.
Rash.
Ark.
Ash.
Ask.
Far.
Jar.

Those words come from an anagram for the initials of the final candidates at Jacob's fireside chat: Jack, Kate, Hurley and Sawyer.

All those words are clues to the saga that was about to conclude.
Shark was the unemotional predator, Flocke.
Hark was the call to arms of Widmore's men coming to the island to stop Flocke.
Rash were the decisions the 815 survivors were making on the fly.
Ark is the vessel of salvation, in this case Frank's plane.
Ask was the request by Jacob for a volunteer to become the guardian.
Far is the next meeting place for their reunion.
Jar was Jack's final scenes in the bamboo grove after Flocke was pushed over the cliff.

There is no way TPTB knew these words would fall out of the candidate circle of initials to explain the end of Season 6. It is just another coincidence. An interesting coincidence, no doubt.

Fans searched for clues hidden in background images, hidden in words, hidden in names or hidden in plain sight. The search was monumental because fans sought answers to their questions. And since answers were not forthcoming from the scripts, fans had to make due with their own theories and rationalizations. So we keep pondering the Big Questions by throwing old, rusty darts on the Blast Door map hoping to spark some new insight into the mysteries of the series.