RELATIVE

Scientists have used Einstein's Theory of Relativity to calculate how time is measured in deep space flights. The conclusion is itself a paradox. For a deep space mission, the astronauts may age much more slowly traveling at the speed of light. For example, they may age 28 years on a light speed travel across the universe, but return to Earth 1,300 years later.

The fact that deep space travel can cause a return trip to take 1,300 years in "local" time explains why aliens have never returned to Earth.

Another factor in deep space travel is that human beings do not do well with forces over 1 g. We are basically water bags that can pop under pressure. Scientists think the best deep space travelers would be spiny, thin, small alien grays.

As private space firms have advertised in their speculative missions to colonize Mars, even solar system space travel is a one way street.  If you plan to go out into deep space, the chance of your returning home is near zero.

Which brings us to a hypothesis in LOST.

Some believe the island may have been some lost alien space craft. If true, then Jacob, the island guardian would have been the alien pilot and his brother his co-pilot. If these space aliens came from a distant solar system with advanced technology, they could have crash landed on Earth without the means of repairing their ship.

The clues of being space aliens comes in the form of their physical presence. Jacob and especially MIB appear to be shape-shifting smoke monsters. They can change their physical structure, morph into human beings or monsters. This would make sense for deep space travelers to avoid the pitfalls of human bodies. If these alien travelers were not humanoids but energy beings, they could survive deep space flight.

A further clue on the island aliens is that Jacob's narrative that people who come to the island are from "shipwrecks."  This mirrors his own situation. By bringing people to the island looking for a solution to his problem, Jacob cleverly puts the humans in the same position he is in: lost, looking for a way "home."

And the human beings brought to the island have been a clever bunch. Dharma and the military brought vast resources including nuclear technology and experimentation on electromagnetic properties including time travel. Perhaps these Earth technologies were being used to try to re-boot the space craft island so Jacob could indeed return "home" as MIB kept saying to the castaways. But MIB continues to get frustrated with the humans who want to take their advanced technology and use it to increase their own power on Earth. In order to control them, Jacob and MIB use human history of "gods" including borrowing ancient Egyptian rites, to control the humans on the island.

In essence, the series concludes not with the humans getting home, but the aliens finding a way to end their existence on a distant planet far away from their home. After centuries of failed attempts to get their ship technology working, Jacob and MIB apparently release themselves from their species protections (the immortality we saw during the show) in order to cease to exist. In that way, their alien technology does not corrupt the Earth society as they had found humans to be barbaric and crude in their emotional states.

VOLCANO

The ending of Lost was almost much bigger than what audiences saw. Nothing was that different. The characters and island were always going to be what they ended up being. But, one big addition would have changed things significantly: a volcano.

Lost executive producers Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse told the story to Entertainment Weekly. The summary is that Lindelof and Cuse wanted some kind of visual identifier to bring together the idea that this island was like a cork on a bottle of evil. The symbol was going to be a volcano, and it would have been set up in the third to last episode. In that episode, where we learned the backstory of Jacob and the Man in Black, Jacob was going to throw the Man in Black into the volcano, turning him into the smoke monster that debuted in season one.

Then, in the series finale, Locke and Jack were going to fight on the volcano as it got ready to erupt—kind of a natural-disaster ticking clock, with tremors, lava, and, eventually, good triumphing over evil. Lost even set up the idea of the volcano being on the island some time prior, in a third season episode that featured a Dharma classroom. And yet, it ended up getting scrapped.

The reason is simple: money. Producers and executives realized that all the volcano effects and potential location filming were going to be way too expensive for them to handle, especially when another final season set, the temple, ended up being more pricey than expected. So, in the end, the very literal interpretation of the island as evil was cut out and things were left a little more ambiguous. Same ending, Jack vs. Locke fighting on a rocky area, but just no volcano.

Money woes and writing by the seat of their pants.

Jeff Jensen, the waterboy for the series theorists, writes:

Carlton Cuse, Lost’s longtime co-showrunner, got the idea for the volcano in the early years of the show after visiting Hawaii’s Big Island with his family, taking a volcano tour and marveling at the landscape. He thought it would be cool if The Island had a volcano of its own. “We were always looking to cannibalize anything on Hawaii to aid in the visual storytelling of the show,” says Cuse. “We also thought of the island as a character on the show, so we were always looking for things that would give it more personality.” He didn’t have an idea of how the volcano could be used, “but it was something we banked and thought we could use downstream.”

The volcano stayed in the back pocket until the producers started developing Lost’s concluding seasons. The premise that developed over time was that the volcano was a mysterious place that forged the ticking, shape-shifting monster, the billowing black mass known as Smokey. By season 6, the writers had settled on the concept that the island was like a cork that bottled up all sorts of bad stuff, some volatile stew of spiritual dark matter stuff that would rob life of meaning and goodness if unleashed. “The question was always, how do you basically visualize and dramatize the idea that the island itself is all that separates the world from hellfire and damnation?” says Lost co-creator Damon Lindelof. “And the answer was the volcano.”

Lindelof and Cuse initially envisioned a finale in which Jack (Matthew Fox) and Smokey incarnate (Terry O’Quinn) would brawl over the fate of the island at Lost’s proverbial Mount Doom. “The volcano had been dormant for the duration of the series,” explains Lindelof, “but based on moving into this endgame, the island had become unstable and the volcano was going to erupt. We were going to have lots of seismic activity, and ultimately, there was going to be this big fight between the forces of good and the forces of evil, which ended up in the series manifesting as Jack and The Man in Black, in the midst of magma. Magma spewing everywhere!”

And so it went that Cuse and Lindelof decided to end Lost by reigniting an actual volcano and spraying their cast with actual skin-searing magma. Just kidding. But they were determined to fake it the best they could. “It would be visually stunning and really exciting for the audience,” says Lindelof. “After six years and around 121 hours of the show, we had shot literally every part of Oahu that we could for island scenes and flashbacks. So the idea that, for the finale, we could go to this new locale that’s going to look new and different and unique, primal and ancient and end-of-the-world-ish, that would be great.”

The volcano wouldn’t have come out of the blue. The producers planned to take us there in Lost’s third-to-last episode, “Across The Sea,” a major mythological outing that revealed the origin story of The Island’s long-lived protector, Jacob (Mark Pellegrino), and his unnamed brother, The Man in Black (Titus Welliver), and dramatized the latter’s transformation into Smokey. You would have seen Jacob drag his mother-killing sibling up the slopes of the volcano and toss him into its smoldering, monster-making crater.

And this is where the people who wrote the checks for Lost put a stopper in Operation: Magma Spew. At some point in all the plotting, planning, and prepping for season 6, ABC calculated that it couldn’t afford the transportation cost. Not helping the cause: The set for the temple, a refuge for Jacob’s chosen ones and a key location in the first half of season 6, turned out to be very expensive. Says Lindelof: “ABC was like, ‘Guys, we love you, and we’re letting you end the show; we can’t let you bankrupt the network in the process.’” And that’s how Smokey’s crucible — Lost’s version of Buffy’s Hellmouth — was re-imagined as a cave of light and the fight between Jack and the monster was filmed on the cliffs of Oahu.

Cuse says The Volcano That Never Really Was speaks to how practical factors, models of production, and s— happens variables affect the execution and finale form of big saga serials. Lost was marked by several such stories. Perhaps the most well-known involved Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje, whose Mr. Eko was a season 2 breakout. The producers loved writing for Mr. Eko (his showcase episode in season 2, “The 23rd Psalm,” written by Cuse and Lindelof, is one of Lost’s best) and envisioned a prolonged conflict with John Locke (O’Quinn) that would have made the middle seasons of the series quite different. When the actor abruptly ankled Lost the second season, the producers had to create a new story for Locke and other characters impacted by his sudden departure. (Akinnuoye-Agbaje stuck around for a few episodes to shoot Mr. Eko’s death-by-Smokey exit episode.)

Still, Cuse and Lindelof do think scratching the volcano was for the best. Lindelof says the producers came to believe during the writing of season 6 that it would be better if some ideas about The Island remained metaphorical or mysterious, things to be interpreted, not explained.

>>>> I have to disagree with the notion that Budget Killed the Volcano. You can use stock film footage of an eruption with close up footage of characters panicked reactions; and waves of ash clouds as they flee from the jungle.

The "monster making" volcano would explain how one is made but not WHAT it is. We got some circumstantial evidence of monster creation in Light Cave when Jack "rebooted" the island cork. But that was placed in the context of rebalancing good and evil not creating a monster. (Even though some say that the body of Jacob's brother was washed into the cave, knocking over the cork and thus creating the Man in Black.)

But if the volcano was supposed to be the climatic star of the Series 6 final episodes, why did the production crew spend so much time and money on the Egyptian symbols and the temple if the temple concepts were immaterial to the resolution of the story?

This story shows that the show runners and writers were struggling to find a way to end the series. There were too many ideas but not enough continuity to resolve the series story lines. Instead, it was decided not to answer the questions but create a final "character study" of the cast as they passed into the afterlife.

ENERGY MATTER SPIRITS

For what it is worth, the theme of spirituality can be changed to spirits as an explanation of the Jacob-MIB dynamic.

We were taught that e=mc2 or energy=mass x the speed of light squared.

Energy has a mass component, but also mass has an energy component (e/speed of light squared).

We look upon ourselves as organic beings with the sense of higher purpose, or a spiritual take on the universe.

What if it is the opposite. What if there are spirits who are beings who take on energy to form mass.

For example, when Jacob is "killed" but is still wandering the island interacting with the castaways, he comes to his final time at a camp fire. He tells the castaways that once the "fire" goes out his life ends. So he asks for a volunteer to be the next island guardian.

From this exchange we can postulate that Ben did not "kill" Jacob, per se. MIB burned Jacob's body, but that was merely a shell for the spirit called Jacob. The spirit could still live if it had a source of energy (a fire). The spirit consumed the body mass into energy, then recreated it in a physical form to interact and communicate with the survivors.

This is the same mechanism to explain the smoke monster. It can change physical appearance from MIB, smoke or Flocke because it is not confined to a human body. As a spirit, it can manipulate energy into physical form to absorb more energy (perhaps, as speculated in earlier posts, consuming the "fear" from human beings).

This explains why Jacob and MIB could not harm each other - - - because as spirits they are equals. They are not doomed by age, injury or death of a human being. They are immortal if they chose to be immortal. But if they chose to leave the island, then their spiritual existence would be compromised. The island, with its unusual magnetic energy, was the source of the spiritual well being of Jacob and MIB. But when that was disrupted, it endangered each of them.

In nature, all beings have some sense of survival. Crazy Mother's rampage against the Roman shipwreck survivors was probably to protect the spiritual energy field - - - her own survival. But just with Jacob's demise, MIB had altered the energy field with the FDW so Crazy Mother was venerable. She no longer wanted to live trapped on the island alone, so she submitted to her own death. Or so it would seem. Her spirit may have lived on in Jacob, who we were led to believe was a boy who became immortal when he became the guardian. Likewise, when his brother was killed but found his soul cast into the light cave, he turned into a spirit as well.

The idea that the island was populated with spirits and not immortal human beings helps explain the nature of the Jacob-MIB story. However, it does not explain the relationship with the island visitors and 815 survivors whose mortality was clearly displayed throughout the series.

TIME NUMBER

What is the most important Number in Time?

That question popped into my head while I was looking at a large public wall clock.

I saw the line between 12 and the 6 and started doing simple math: 12 minus 6 equals 6.

Then I mentally drew lines around the clock face:

11 -5 = 6
10-4 = 6
9-3 = 6
8 -2 = 6
7-1 = 6.

I concluded that 6 was a key number in time.

A minute is 60 seconds; an hour 60 minutes and a tenth (our current counting system) of an minute is .6.

Time was a major theme in LOST. In one aspect, Time had trapped Jacob and his brother on the island. Time was frozen for thousands of years based upon the people brought to the island. Jacob and his brother were then also brought to the island as candidates by Crazy Mother.

Who was the Number 6 candidate in the Lighthouse?

Jensen.

But his name was stricken.

What does Jensen mean?

The name Jensen is a Scandinavian baby name. Its meaning is from: Hebrew John 'Jehovah has been gracious; has shown favor.

In Numerology, the name Jensen is tied to these attributes: 

SOUL: 

People with this name have a deep inner desire to use their abilities in leadership, and to have personal independence. They would rather focus on large, important issues, and delegate the details. 

EXPRESSION: People with this name tend to be a powerful force to all whose lives they touch. They are capable, charismatic leaders who often undertake large endeavors with great success. They value truth, justice, and discipline, and may be quick-tempered with those who do not. If they fail to develop their potential, they may become impractical and rigid. 

There was a character who showed leadership ability with a strong sense of personal independence to leave his brother and his mother. He had a single focus on a large concept that there was something bigger and better away from the island; home. He helped the survivors try to harness the energy of the island to find a way home. He was quick tempered when his plans were thwarted, because he was rigid in his mission and ideals. 

That man was Jacob's brother.

We were never told his name. But it could have been Jensen based upon the attributes of the Number 6, the number tied to Time itself, something that MIB was desperately trying to release so he could become mortal and go home.

FOR THE LOVE OF CRIME

It's a different kind of fatal attraction.

Hybristophilia is a term used by criminologists -- but not scientists -- to describe a sexual attraction to violent killers in prison, who often receive racy love letters or sexy undergarments from their fans.

Also known as the "Bonnie and Clyde syndrome," it has existed throughout time and across borders.

Norway's most famous mass murderer gets hundreds of fan letters from lovelorn women, including marriage proposals. Charles Manson had his cult following, even in prison.

Why some women are attracted to "the bad boy" persona baffles normal men.

Perhaps, due to societal pressures and expectations, women have to repress their desires for freedom and adventure. They seek to find fulfillment with "exciting" men who appear to be the rebellious answer to their conservative peer pressures. It also may a motherly adaptation of the theme of trying to change a bad man into a good one.

So who were the "bad boys" of LOST?

Sawyer, the charming con man, clearly used his image and talents to find women falling over him. Even after the con, some women still adored him. The women who fell for him were usually those lonely housewives that lacked a spark of excitement in their marriages, or had self-worth issues that could be solved with a "big financial score." However, Kate was clearly drawn to Sawyer because they shared a same reckless, self-first survival mode.

Ben was a sociopath, a mass murderer. In the show, he had no girlfriend. He tried to impose his will on the women in the compound, but his tyranny did not evoke any connection with women in the camp. However, in fan groups, there were several women who adored Ben's character, which may be closer to the Bonnie and Clyde syndrone mentioned above. Women could be attracted to such a bad character because Ben was not a real person in their lives, much as a prisoner in a life sentence without parole could never be part of the real lives. It is that real barrier that allows the fantasy connection to be expressed by these women.

Jacob may have also been a sociopath. He brought people to the island as candidates, only to have almost all of the candidates perish. He played games with human lives. But he was also a loner. We never saw any connection to anyone, except his Crazy Mother (also a sociopath) and his estranged brother. In an odd way, perhaps Jacob's game of bringing people to the island was a means of combating his loneliness, or a weak attempt to attract someone he could truly love. The mystery of Jacob did spawn a group of followers, including women in the Others camp. But it seems that Jacob never acted upon his cult followers in any way to allow them to meet or interact with him in a human way. Even in Greek stories, the gods would at times come to Earth to mingle, tease, and procreate with interior humans, usually to invoke the wrath of higher gods.

DEAL WITH THE DEVIL

One of the themes was good vs. evil. Most literature has this theme in one form or another. It is the basis for most conflict between characters and it gives a writer a redemption road map to change an evil person to change to good.

Jacob was protrayed in white. White is symbolic of good. MIB was dressed in black. Black is symbolic of evil. But things may not be as they appear.

There are various theories that have Jacob as the Bad Guy. And there is plenty of support for it.

Why would a good, immortal angel like Jacob walk up to Locke just after he was pushed through a skyscraper window to land crippled on the ground just to say he was sorry. Wouldn't a "good" supernatural being heal Locke - - - give him the miracle he was searching for?

Also, when Sayid finally found the love of his life, Nadia, in the O6 story arc, it was Jacob who stopped Sayid from crossing the street - - - which allowed Nadia to be killed by a motor vehicle. Wouldn't a good supernatural being protect Sayid - - -  and stop both of them from harm?

And the clearest story of the series about Jacob came from Dogen. Dogen was the man who supervised the Temple. He said that he was a distracted father. He never cared much for his son. But after he was in a traffic accident, and his son was critically injured, Jacob came to the hospital and offered Dogen a deal. He would save his son in exchange for Dogen coming to the island to serve him.

Dogen made the deal.

He would not see his son again. But he knew that his son would live.

This story is a key foundational element that Jacob was not good. Why would someone good make a father chose between his own life and his son's?  Logically, the bargain was Dogen's life for his son's. That means that Dogen would the substitute soul that the grim reaper was going to take to the underworld. That means that Dogen gave up his life in a bargain with the Devil. That Dogen gave up his life to follow Jacob to the island means that the island is Hell.

In Christian texts, the Devil was fallen angel banished from heaven after he had a jealous rage against God. The Devil vowed one day to return to overthrow God and rule paradise. But the Devil was never strong enough to do so. Other texts believe that the Devil was sent to Hell not as a punishment but to prepare human souls for their journey to Heaven. The Devil is a warden for those sentenced to Hell, the portal purgatory between life, death and the after life.

But even the job of being a warden would be a dull, thankless task. Dealing with the worst, immoral and corrupt people for eternity, far away from the paradise he once enjoyed, the Devil would want to find a "loophole" from God's service. The loophole he sought was a person who would take over his job and become the Devil - - - the guard of the island (Hell).

The candidates were good people who could do the thankless job of helping other people through their sins. But Jacob could not tell them. Each soul retains their own free will. For example, Ben's psychotic anti-social behavior did change after he killed Jacob. Jacob's own followers decided not to kill him - - - which gave Ben a chance to change to become a good person. Even in the sideways world, Ben's new attitude was that he needed to make amends for his past mistakes before moving on to paradise.

If one looks at LOST through the "prison" of various deals with the Devil, Jacob, it is interesting that most characters did achieve something that they were missing or looking for in their pathetic lives. Charlie got his own "family" in Claire and Aaron. Claire actually found a man who would love her unconditionally and never leave her. Locke found something he never had: a group of friends who believed and respected him. How each character got to their revelation moments is actually quite sadistic and dramatic, but there is that underlying theme that the characters were pushed into their decisions, deals, with Jacob for a greater purpose.

LEADERS

The final test of a leader is that he leaves behind him in other men the conviction and the will to carry on. - - Walter Lippman

If leadership was a central theme to the drama of the show, how did the characters pass "the final test?"

Jack did leave Hurley in charge of the island. A very, very, very reluctant Hurley in charge of the island. But it is inferred that Ben was very "beneficial" in Hurley's island reign, so much so that Hurley was rewarded with heavenly reunion with Libby. (In the succession plan, that would leave Ben in charge of the island and sideways view, with the dual knowledge that only Eloise had).

Locke was only briefly in charge of the group when the time skips happened after Ben screwed things up in the FDW. However, Locke was a pawn in Christian smoke monster's plot to get Jack back to the island in order to thwart, kill Jacob to find MIB's alleged loophole (which may be the same as everyone else on the island - - - get to the sideways plane of existence, the after life, from the way station island).

Flocke was a more successful faux leader, who ruled like Ben and Widmore  did the Others, by an iron fist and no mercy. But Flocke was not a real human being, and he wanted to leave no one behind (as his mental state, if any, was to destroy all human candidates in order to escape his prison.)

Sayid was only briefly in charge of his Iraqi torture unit. But when push came to shove, he betrayed his uniform, killed a superior, let a prisoner escape, then became a U.S, CIA operative. On the island, Sayid refused a full leadership role (except on a few rescue missions) because he could not trust himself.

Sawyer was in charge of the beach castaways ("by default," as Hurley said) but that time Sawyer tried to "act" like a leader, but as a lone wolf con-man it was impossible for him to adapt. However, in the time warp arc, Sawyer did become a leader of his castway time travelers by becoming the sheriff of the barracks, waiting for the time skip to send them back. It was during this three year period that Juliet apparently tamed the wild Sawyer beast.

Kate led a few rescue missions, but tried to avoid becoming the leader of either the beach castaways or the candidates forum. She always put her own self-interests above other people. Even when she claimed to have "saved" Claire in the end by getting her on the plane, Kate could have stayed and gone back to try to save Jack, but she did not. She only wanted to get off the island. There were no tears in her decision.

Jacob was the leader who hid in the statue. He commanded through his liaison, Alpert, who in turn, gave instructions to Ben (who would twist things so he had the power.)  Alpert led the quiet Other near revolt against Ben, when he gave the file to Locke to make Locke the leader (by killing Cooper, his father, by Sawyer's hand.) Jacob assumed the leadership of the island at the request of his Crazy Mother, and regretted his actions that led to his own brother's demise (by the hands of the smoke monster). A leader with such guilt, shame and regret was never a good leader.

Widmore was a born bully of a leader. He was exiled from the island, and made his sole mission in life to return to recapture it. He used his inner strength to gather a vast fortune to fund his quest. In a certain respect, he succeeded at the task as he returned to the island, and indirectly defeated Flocke. But as a leader, he got blindsided by the vengeful rage of Ben, who killed Widmore for killing Alex. Many leaders find it appropriate to lead with "an eye for an eye" mission statement.

In their own way, and collectively, no one person was a great leader. Each had terrible personal faults and lacked command of their people and circumstances (which led to many lives lost.)

WHY MOTHERHOOD WAS CRAZY

It cannot be coincidence that so many mothers were crazy.  Really, crazy.

From Locke's child common law wife mother who went institutional crazy after abandoning her child in the 1950s, to Claire's "Rousseau's Walk" into the dark side of the jungle, LOST's writers painted a real bleak picture of motherhood.

Almost a tortured representation of the divine gift of life.

Juliet was kidnapped so Ben and the Others could find an answer to why their pregnant women were dying in the third trimester. Why would the island, as the alleged place of "life, death and rebirth" continually kill expectant mothers and their unborn children?

Jacob and MIB's mother gave birth on the island, but she was killed by another crazy woman, whom we think was a smoke monster (by the aftermath of her wiping out the Roman camp). She had been alone so long that she was crazy. Crazy dangerous.

Rousseau also gave birth on the island, to Alex. They survived but were separated by the Others (who apparently could reproduce or keep children alive. Perhaps there was a social stigma against any woman except those worshipping Jacob.) Rousseau saw the violence of the smoke monster killing her shipmates, which led her to kill their reincarnated corpses in order to protect her unborn baby. For her honor, she was to live a lonely, hardscrabble life in the jungle - - - under constant threat of attack, real and imagined.

Even the surrogate mothers were crazy. Kate was no Ms. Housekeeping when she took charge of Aaron. Kate's background was a homicidal runaway. Eloise, Daniel's mother, thought nothing of throwing her son or step-daughter, Penny, to the flames of hell in order to maintain control over the island and its secrets.

There clearly is an undertone of anti-motherhood in the series.

There is no explanation for it.  Yes, bad mothers could infuse psychotic traits in their children. But the vast majority of mothers who had children were crazy, alcoholics (Jack's mother) or totally out of the picture, strangers to their own children.

Was the undertone a subliminal message for mass contraception, zero population growth, or an oddity of male dominated showrunner excess?

A BROTHER?

Evil begets evil.

Without the time travel arc, where tortured soul Sayid kills a still innocent child in young Ben (who is taken to the temple and reborn as "a different" person, "one of the island") we could assume that Ben would have grown up as a bookish, meek man (like in the sideways teacher arc).

But instead, Ben turns into an evil, angry, vengeful tyrant.

But if the island "saved" Ben thorough the temple waters (and water was a means of summoning a smoke monster) one could resume that Ben was transformed into a smoke monster.

When Jacob killed his brother, the smoke monster was released from the light cave. We assume that MIB was the manifestation of Jacob's dead brother as a smoke monster. That is how MIB was created, from the waters of the island. Likewise, we can assume that since Ben was taken to the temple for a water ceremony (such as what happened with Sayid), then Ben would have been created into a smoke monster as well (and perhaps a better representation or brother to Jacob).

Ben was loyal to Jacob like a younger brother would have been under normal circumstances. But like a younger brother, Ben was upset that his younger sibling did not give him the attention, admiration and acknowledgment he thought he deserves. That was the focal point, the weakness, that MIB used to kill Jacob.

It makes some logical sense that only another smoke monster could kill another immortal entity on the island. But since the Crazy Mother's law that Jacob and his brother could not harm each other, that "loophole" was Ben.

MIB would have had to created a vast, complex and long term plan to even reach the loophole stage. He would have have spent centuries trying to find the right people to use, manipulate and sacrifice to get his "loophole." MIB knew about the island's special powers, and what it would take to create a smoke monster. So, by allowing humans to work on the island, try to tap the potential of the island energy, he got the humans to create an inexact time travel machine which the mixed up 815ers go back to encounter there nemesis, Ben, when he was an innocent boy. Already mixed up and confused, a time traveling Sayid was the perfect "assassin" to put MIB's final plan into action: shooting Ben gave the opening to create a smoke monster who would become Jacob's "assassin." It would have been the perfect check mate after a long game of cat and mouse between Jacob and MIB.

THE RECYCLED

A LOST showrunner and actor are about to get another new series.

"The Returned," an American remake of the French format "Les Revenants," will air from March 9 on the cable network. The fantasy drama series is written and produced by former "Lost" showrunner Carlton Cuse.

First aired on the French cable network Canal+ in fall 2012, "Les Revenants" has garnered glowing reviews and was honored at the 2013 International Emmy Awards with the title of best drama.

The French-language series has even developed a strong following abroad, as its first season was broadcast in the original format on Channel 4 in England with the title "Rebound" and on Sundance in the US as "The Returned."

Also titled "The Returned," the forthcoming American adaptation will reprise the premise of the original: a small town is rocked by the sudden return amongst the living of several dead individuals, who have no idea of their death and resurrection. While they attempt to carry on with their lives where they left off, the loved ones who have been grieving their death struggle to come to terms with their new circumstances.

Mark Pellegrino (Jacob on "Lost"), Tandi Wright ("Jack the Giant Slayer") and Jeremy Sisto ("Law & Order") star in this remake from Carlton Cuse, who is described in the media reports as "something of an expert at fantasy drama TV thanks to his time as a producer and showrunner on Lost." 

In the writing room, J.J. Abrams' former colleague enlisted the help of Raelle Tucker, a screenwriter and producer on another famous drama series with supernatural elements: "True Blood."

The French channel Canal+ is known for its quality drama programs, so there is probably a good chance that the original source material is solid.

PRESENTS

In the holiday season, if Jacob was the magical Santa, what gifts did he give the islanders?

Santa is an immortal character passed down for centuries. The lesson was that if little boys and girls were good, they would receive presents in their stockings. Some consider that the first parental mind control game. The holiday gift giving traditions corresponds to the bounty of the harvest and cultural imprints to share with those in need. Noble concepts, indeed.

But there were few, if any, noble concepts in LOST.

What Jacob gave most visitors, including his followers, was pain and suffering.

What present did Jack get from the island? Death. He died fighting an immortal smoke monster which we still don't know what it was, what it was made of, and what purpose it truly had on the island.

What present did Locke get from the island? Death. He was murdered by Ben who in a sudden fit of rage subconsciously thought he was protecting the island from Eloise Hawking.

What present did Michael get from the island? Death and imprisonment. His soul became a trapped island whisper. Was Michael's sins any different from the lives that both Jack and Locke took on the island? The answer would be no - - - they were senseless acts of violence.

What did Charlie get from the island? Death in a senseless, but noble way. Charlie sacrificed himself to contact a rescue boat, but then warned Desmond it was not Penny's. Charlie only wanted to save Claire, but by dying he lost that opportunity.

What did Jin and Sun get from the island? Death. When Sun was trapped in the submarine, Jin stayed with her knowing that their decision would leave their only child an orphan. Normally, a parent would do anything to help their child, to protect her and support her. Jin's death was really a senseless suicide.

What present did Kate get from the island? She got the marshal killed, and she got the chance to continue to run away from responsibility and accountability for her actions. She never got punished for the men she killed. She got a free pass and a Get Out of Jail Free card.

What present did Walt get from the island? He got the status of being an orphan after Michael died, and he lost his dog, Vincent. At best, he got a normal life living with his grandmother, but he was still haunted by his island memories.

What present did Sawyer get from the island? He got only a short glimpse of a wonderful, normal relationship with Juliet. But then the island killed her off in a bizarre incident at the Hatch construction site. So he left the island still a bitter man.

What present did Sayid get from the island? He got an even shorter glimpse of a physical relationship with Shannon. But then the island killed her off in a senseless accident. The island turned Sayid back into the dark torture monster of his past; a self-loathing character with nothing to live for (even though he had pined for decades over his lost Nadia) and eventually perished only to be reincarnated as a evil minion. He would die trying to do something noble, but wound up killing more of his friends.

No, Jacob's and the island's graces to the castaways were not holiday presents. It was a struggle; a lot of pain and suffering; and death.

AMBIGUITY

One aspect of LOST left open to personal interpretation is whether Jacob was good and MIB was bad.

MIB seemed to represent the "dark," while Jacob the "light."  But the relationship between the two is more gray.

A key component of ancient Egyptian burial rights is the story of Set and his brother Osiris.

Set is portrayed as the usurper who killed and mutilated his own brother. Osiris' wife Isis reassembled Osiris' corpse and resurrected him long enough to conceive his son and heir Horus. Horus sought revenge upon Set, and the myths describe their conflicts. The death of Osiris and the battle between Horus and Set is a popular theme in Egyptian mythology.

In the temple, there is a painting of the smoke monster sitting across from Osiris, the god of the underworld. They look at each other on the same level, which may represent equality in the spirit world. 

In one interpretation, Jacob could be the Osiris character while MIB the boastful brother Set. In the island world, Osiris would have taken revenge on his brother as Jacob did with his brother. As a result, Set is transformed not into a sun god, but a smoke monster, to continue their underworld battle.

Another interpretation could be that Jacob is Horus, the nephew of Set, who set out to revenge his father's death. The crocodile statue of Tawaret represents fertility so the island can be considered a place of rebirth of Osiris. So it is possible that the smoke monster is a transformation of the underworld god (who can shape shift) while MIB is is also a disembodied spirit. Jacob, as Horus, the sun god, must be weary of the night in the underworld where he is most vulnerable. So the dynamic between Jacob and MIB is one of caution.

In either case, they are not purely evil or purely good.

THE GOLD NUGGET

In just about every endeavor, there is a certain amount of "gold rush" fever.  People are passionate about what they are really interested in . . . so much so that it can become all consuming endeavor to find deeper meaning. In historical context, people left their families, jobs, home to rush to areas far away on the prospect of finding gold or silver or a better opportunity.  For the vast majority of those, these journeys were fool's errands, for the only people who got rich in these fevers were the suppliers of mining equipment, food and shelter.

So was LOST's main characters involved in a fool's errand of their own?

A sense of survival, to rescue, to friendship, to protection, to redemption - - -  all seem to be worthy of all consuming passion and intense enlightenment.

Did the characters actually have to "survive" on the island?

Did the characters really need to be "rescued?"

Did the characters have real friendships or merely truce by convenience?

Did the characters have to protect each other from the unknown?

And did any of the characters actually redeem themselves?

It is really a harsh analysis because in the final season, the story line changed so dramatically to put everything before it in question.  The Jacob-MIB backstory put a supernatural god like control over everything that happened on the island. Though Jacob said he gave any visitor "free will" to make their own decisions, but at the same time Jacob and MIB were constantly manipulating the characters - - - attacking their fears, personality flaws, emotional states and desires. Some could say that the island was training human circus animals to perform surreal plays for the gods amusement.

If the characters were trying to find their own souls, to reform and redeem their past sins, did they actually find that gold? Not really. The island ordeal was a harsh existence with many deaths, psychological breakdowns and inconsistent alliances. The real miners for the golden ticket was Jacob and his smoke monster buddy (who we learn is not actually his real brother but some supernatural shape shifting spirit being).

It seems that only Jacob and the smoke monster could "survive" on the island. They were both trapped on the island for reasons not really understood. They get bored with each other, and bring inferior humans to play a game of survival without rules. And when they don't play to the violent nature expected, the captors send their wrath upon them.

It also seems that Jacob and the smoke monster were the only ones who really, truly needed to be rescued from their immortal prison. The survivors really had no lives to go back to, as Jacob told them bluntly. They were picked to come to the island because of their various deep rooted faults. They were castaways from society before they even crash landed on the island. It was MIB who desperately wanted to find a "loophole" to get off the island - - - which probably was as simple as getting some stupid fool to accept the responsibility of becoming the next imprisoned guardian (which mirrors Desmond leaving the Hatch confines when Locke found him).

Whether Jacob and MIB were actual "friends" is debatable; but at least they were held as equals in their own minds, which is the foundation for any friendship. Though presented as being immortal foes, one does not get the sense of real anger between them - - - more a resigned sigh that their confinement is never going to end. It was only when Ben killed his mentor, Jacob, did MIB's fake blood boil as he burned Jacob's body. But we still don't know if that was a real death, or part of the loophole catch to make the other candidates believe someone had to step up and take Jacob's place (thus opening the lock of their island cage). MIB's performance convinced Ben that Flocke was truly evil and had to be stopped . . . . but from what? It was all an elaborate con on the humans to get them to act a certain way - - - to kill each of the immortals by sacrificing themselves in dangerous situations. What right minded individual would do such a thing? In the past, no one did (which frustrated MIB to no end).

Jacob and MIB did not need protection from each other because they were island equals. The only rule was that each could be killed (released from bondage) only at certain times and in certain places at the hands of an inferior human being. There was no redemption in Jack, Kate, Ben or anyone else killing off Jacob or MIB. It really did not solve any of their personal problems. It did not make their world a better place. All the finale did was release Jacob and MIB from their island hell. (Some could say that the island experience kept the characters spirits linked as one to be reunited in the after life, but others would say that is just a Hollywood trope happy ending with no logical connection to the show's own mythology).

No, the only true "winners" in the series were the two characters with the least scene time.

THE ORDER OF JACOB

All religions have been obsessed with the meaning of life and death. In this alternative LOST, Jacob is the leader of secret sect whose mission is to protect the most sacred of places, the source of the life force. The life force which creates, destroys and renews all life in the universe. A force so powerful that its protection is protection of all life.

Jacob would have his followers in an underground temple in an abandoned California mission. There, we would see the Lamp Post facility with its old computer and swinging pendulum. Alpert would be Jacob's liaison to Dogen, the temple master who would teach the new recruits like Locke to the path of enlightenment. 

There is one concept that is clear as day. The concept of god, creator, and all knowing being is found in one place, in the light source. It has the power to create life, destroy life and to give rebirth. As such, it is an entity of enormous power. But in its energy form, it is venerable to attack or discharge which to throw the universe into chaos.

Jacob's cult is part religious order and part paramilitary guards. Chief among Jacob's recruits is Sayid, a despondent Iraqi War veteran who seeks peace and redemption for his past sins. Sayid is trusted with a crusade to protect the energy source from the heathen capitalists that want to exploit its power to the destruction of mankind. Sayid believes that this mission will get him to paradise in the after life.

It is Sayid who finds a wayward Locke the perfect tool to help in Sayid's quest for immortality. Locke is a man without a family; without dreams; without hope for a future. Sayid can use that emptiness and fill it with the purpose of the Order.  Locke falls for the high purpose and his elevated personal stake in something much larger than his pitiful life. So Locke is recruited to spy on Dharma. But Locke, thinking himself as an avenging angel, takes it upon himself to destroy Dharma which leads to major headaches for Jacob and Sayid. Locke's actions actually brings Dharma and Widmore closer to finding the hidden light source. Jacob must scramble to contain the damage.

He finds a prospect in Bernard, a dentist who is searching for a miracle cure for his wife's terminal cancer. Bernard finds Jacob at the mission and asks him for Divine intervention. Jacob makes "a deal" with Bernard - - - he must get a job at Widmore's research facility in order to disrupt Widmore's chase of the light source. The early information Locke acquired from Dharma is Bernard's passport into Widmore's facility . . . posing as a disgruntled ex-Dharma employee.

Rose only learns of the deal after Bernard has started to work for Widmore. She is livid that Bernard was conned by some "religious nut," and their relationship turns sour. Bernard is distraught. Widmore sees a sudden change in Bernard, and he confesses that his mind is on his sick wife. Widmore offers him hope (a false promise of a cure that he is close to achieving) if Bernard can recruit "someone special" for his project. Bernard goes to Rose's social worker mission where he meets a lonely boy who has lost his mother, and is abandoned by his adopted father for foster home placement. Bernard talks to Walt about the future, how it is always darkest before the light. Bernard sneaks a peak at Walt's file while waiting for Rose to end her work day. He finds out that Walt's adopted father abandoned him because Walt has "unusual abilities" to control nature, especially birds in dangerous ways. Bernard steals a copy of this report and takes to it Widmore, who is impressed by Walt's condition.

Bernard says he is not unsure Walt can trust him. So Widmore gives Bernard the candy to lure Walt to their side: the identity of Walt's real father, Michael. So Bernard makes another deal with Widmore to recruit Walt with the promise of giving him a chance at a new family life. Walt, who has no future on his own, accepts the proposal to go with Bernard to meet his father. But once in Widmore's compound, a distraught Bernard confesses that it was a trap - - - a pledge to get a cure for his sick wife - - - that Walt was merely a pawn in a bigger game. Walt feels betrayed by adults, again. So he lashes out, causes lab animals to die, foam at the mouth, bite their handlers, and destroy much research gains. But this mental ability fascinates Widmore to no end. He could use Walt's mind to find a portal to the life source.

But after confessing to Rose his bad deeds, Bernard is told that he has to make amends to Walt. So Bernard, through the files at Widmore's offices, tracks down Michael. He tells Michael that his son "needs" him. That he is being held like a lab rat at Widmore's facility. He needs to rescue his son.

But Michael has no means of taking on Widmore and his men, like Keamy. Until he meets a man outside the research campus who stops his car to ask Michael if he needs a lift. That man is Alpert, who takes Michael to the mission to meet Jacob to discuss his problem. And Jacob offers Michael a solution: Sayid and his skill set. And thus Jacob finds a weapon to pierce Widmore's iron gate. But Sayid will only use Michael and his life as a diversion for his own plan to take down Widmore's research facility.

Jacob's cult then has a two front battle on its hands: one to take down Dharma, and another to take down Widmore.

NON-ISLAND ALTERNATIVE

One of the ways to test the story construction is to see if it would work in a different setting.

In this post, we take away a key feature of the series: the island.

The main characters never arrive on the island. There is no plane crash. Things play out in LA (like the sideways world view).

The island focus was on Jacob being a protector of the life force that could destroy the world if it fell into the wrong hands. We still don't know for sure what he was talking about. But if all life in the universe is made by a single energy spring in an Earth dimension in space-time, then it could be located anywhere.

The nomadic cult of The Others would be turned into what Dharma should have been: a layered R&D academic-military corporation charged with trying to a) find the source; b) capture the source; c) and weaponize the source. Who would not have bought into Ben being the ruthless CEO of Dharma?

Likewise, the rivalry with Widmore over the search and control of the power source would have been a more realistic and compelling fight than Widmore's return to the island and their short and bloody confrontation in the presence of Flocke.

Since the life force is a scientific property, Dharma and Widmore would need to recruit scientists, medical professionals and test subjects in order to research and development the energy. Jack and Juliet could have been recruited for their medical/research expertise. Widmore could have retained more unethical or risk takers like Dr. Chang, Daniel or even Keamy. It would be like two rival mining companies drilling on opposite ends of a mountain to reach the motherlode of gold.

What about the non-technical people in the series, like Kate and Sawyer. How would they get involved in this scientific show down? Well, it was past procedure to use criminals in medical experimentation and human trials. With Kate and Sawyer's criminal backgrounds, they could have made "deals" to lessen their sentences and be assigned to the R&D departments. Likewise, mental patients were unethically used as guinea pigs in drug experiments. People who could talk to the dead like Hurley and Miles could have been transferred to the R&D departments.

So we have these two rival companies sparring over the motherlode of life itself. But is that enough conflict? Perhaps, but like in the series, there is another element at play - - - the pseudo-religious, faith in humanity based players in Jacob. Even today, big pharma companies are going back to ancient civilizations to research their treatments and remedies to see if their crude medicines have any modern applications. Further, many religious orders kept alive the ancient secrets and knowledge during the Dark Ages. So, if we give Jacob and his followers like Dogen, Locke and Alpert a monastery setting as guardians of life source, then we have a three way battle for control. It could be like the Knights Templar guarding the Holy Grail.

The basic elements of the island story could have easily been ported to a modern, industrial park setting with probably more reasonable intrigue, corporate sabotage and spying, human manipulation and dangerous gambits than the generic jungle trek missions. And clearly, there would have been a single end game to the series: one of these three groups would be the victor and control the life spring. But the open question is who would be that group (and whether there would have been changed loyalties and new alliances to make it happen).

One result could be Dharma and Widmore destroying each other's plans with the help of the religious zealots. Or another result could be the test subjects could rebel and take control of the light source and use it to regain their freedom and purpose in life (in other words, becoming the new guardians of the life force).

THE RULES

The island "rules" were a fast and loose term used by the writers to NOT explain critical points in their story.

The show runners played things fast and loose, hoping that the momentum of the characters’ story arcs and the whole “good vs. evil” showdown would be enough to appease most fans. But the promise of an intellectual drama was what most fans wanted to see.

One explanation of the island mythology has to be centered in "Across the Sea," the Jacob origin story in Season 6. The semi-explaination what the island was – a sort of container for a very important energy that seemingly links this world with worlds beyond... or something else.  There is a view that the unique "energy" is actually a form of light and water, and if that light goes out and the water stops flowing, so the world is basically end.

Everything magical or fantastic about the Island stems from this energy, and many of the technological oddities found on the Island (the Swan Station from Season 2) are a result of the Dharma Initiative trying to harness and control that energy (i.e., man trying to bend magic and mysticism to the will of modern science).

However, there are some things that were definitely left unexplained: Why did the Man In Black become a smoke monster when he was exposed to the light (was it a manifestation of his corrupted soul?); What is the nature of the “rules” that governed certain aspects of the Island – who could come and go, who could kill who, who was healed from injury (Locke, Rose), who lived forever (Richard). How were these rules established and maintained?

We were vaguely told that the island guardian made up his own rules, but what we came away with were a lot of vague pseudo- explanations. But if Jacob's rules controlled the island, he would never die because that was against the rules. And the randomness of who lived and died on the island, who was saved and punished by the smoke monster, also did not fit into any established rules. So why was MIB was obsessed with “finding a loophole” in order to kill Jacob? And since MIB was NOT Jacob's brother, who Crazy Mother said he could not kill, then Jacob could have destroyed the smoke monster long ago. If Jacob would not allow or could not kill the smoke monster/MIB, then how could Jack and Kate do it?  Some say that since Smokey was connected to the energy source, and when Jack had Desmond “turned off” that energy by re-setting the cork, Smokey "lost" his powers and was merely flesh and blood again. Except that does not make any sense. The cork was in the bottle and MIB still had all his powers. When the cork was removed, MIB still had his powers. Since we don't know how MIB was created in the light cave, nothing is canon.


If Jacob's final rule was "if I die, you can die," then that is not a dramatic loophole for the smoke monster. The smoke monster's statement that he wanted "to leave" the island mirrored Jacob's brother's, but since MIB was not human, where could it actually go if it was tied to the light source?


Without rules, one cannot have order. And with LOST's non-rules, the story is tangled in messy inconsistencies and legitimate questions.

THE SIDEWAYS

One explanation for the Season 6 sideways plot exit into a confusing after life realm is that two points have to be taken as true.

Christian told Jack in the finale that in the sideways world he was dead (they were all dead) and that his friends died before and long after him.

In other words, people take Christian's comments as the basis that the plane crash and island events were real - - - that Jack and his friends survived the plane crash and were alive until they lived out the remaining time on Earth. The sideways universe was a "purgatory," a place where souls put themselves in limbo until their friends died on Earth.
 
Each person in this “purgatory universe” created a reality for themselves based on their lingering issues in life – that which they could not “let go” of. For Jack it was Daddy issues; Kate, the guilt of murder; Sawyer, the quest to find “Sawyer” and be a better man; Sayid, the unrequited love of Nadia; Charlie, looking for something “real” like a family instead of trivial past fame as a rock star.


The explanation is that the main characters made a connection amongst themselves because they were all  still attached to their  personal life concerns. Because of this strong island survival connection,   they never forgot the journey and growth they had experienced because of the Island, and then each character could finally understand the connections and “purpose” brought into their damaged lives by being there. With that greater understanding of themselves, they were each ready to “leave” or “move on” to the next phase of existence – i.e., the true after life. 

This view does not answer all the lingering questions, like how a dead soul can create a memory blocked sideways world with thousands of strangers based upon the "unforgettable" island experiences. Who or what directed each character's dead soul into a cosmic holding place - - - to actually live out totally different lives than the past, including Jack having a son!, and not making those "new" experiences count for anything except filler?

As explanations for the ending goes, this falls into the supernatural bin.

But look at a few other key elements of the sideways story arc. Eloise, who had present knowledge in both the island world and the sideways after life, tried to keep Desmond from "remembering" his past because she feared Desmond would awaken Daniel, who would leave the sideways world and Eloise. Why was Eloise so hellbent on keeping Daniel in the dark about his life and his current death status? Simple: she feared that Daniel would leave with the other Losties to the next phase of the after life.

But was Eloise smarter than the rest? The puppet master of the entire series? If we look at the Season 6 back story of the island, the answer would be no. Eloise would have just been another "candidate" brought to the island by Jacob. It would then seem that Jacob was the supernatural being capable of creating an after life purgatory.

Jacob did grant Alpert "immortality" on the island. And if one looks at the canon that only the island guardian can bring people to the island, then Jacob manipulated the lives of all the characters to come to his island world. There is something "mad scientist" about Jacob collecting human beings with personal issues and faults to conduct some crude and cruel experiments on them. It is then probable that Jacob orchestrated his candidates to get on the same plane in Sydney in order to crash it on his island. In normal circumstances, everyone on the plane would have died. But Jacob intervened magically and "saved" his candidates from certain death. (Or perhaps, reincarnated them as human beings without their souls - - - which were dispatched to the sideways purgatory to continue to live a false life).  The split soul concept is found in ancient Egyptian culture, which was featured heavily in Season 6. 

It comes down to a personal definition of "life." Is life the mortal existence on Earth? Or is there a life "ever after?" 

All cultures have some sort of "creator" mythology. A super being, usually from the stars,  that created all life on Earth. The same could be true for the sideways world - - - some creator imagined a continuation of the characters' airplane journey without the detour to the island - - - while Jacob kidnapped the characters to his island. Perhaps, this is the real conflict between Jacob and MIB. Jacob was the one how kidnaps souls for the island world, while MIB is trying to find a "loophole" in Jacob's game. It is possible that MIB's loophole was the creation of the sideways world (since as a smoke monster, a supernatural being that can manipulate matter and memories of human beings to take any form). 

If MIB created the sideways world in order for the characters' souls "to remember" the island, that could be the check mate move - - -  no one before had ever "remembered" the island after dying. Once the island was recalled in the after life, Jacob's game was revealed to his superiors as an unsanctioned interference with normal people's lives. Thus, knowledge of the island was the key to stop Jacob's candidate games (like a Hunger Games for lost souls).

GAME THEORY

Another popular fan theory from later in the show's run: the Chess or Game Theory.

Fan Theory: The Chess Game Theory 

At the end of Season 5, we not only saw Jacob for the first time, but also a mysterious Man in Black. He suggested that Jacob was bringing people to the island, "still trying to prove me wrong." He says: "They come. They fight. They destroy. They corrupt. It always ends the same." Jacob counters with: "It only ends once. Anything that happens before that is just progress." Their dialogue suggests that Jacob was the one who brought the plane to the island as part of some long cosmic battle between these two entities, turning the Oceanic 815 survivors into nothing but pawns in a huge chess game of the gods.

This was a clear that Jacob and the Man in Black would be  two key figures in the last season, and their epic war is definitely part of the show's end game. Or that is what we were led to believe.

In the Jacob back story, we would learn that Jacob and his brother were shipwrecked in vitro on the island. Their mother gave birth to them and shortly thereafter was murdered by Crazy Mother, the island guardian. Growing up, the boys found a box which contained the ancient Egyptian game of Senet, a very early board game. In the game, the goal is to roll a counter or dice to move your pieces (black or white) off the game board.

Viewers have tried to match the parallels of the Senet game with island events. Some believed that Jacob played white (good) and MIB wearing black was bad. Yet, the whole Jacob story line really fizzled into a mishmash of gray.

If there were two teams and the pieces were represented by the loyalty of the characters to a specific leader in Season 6, then what was the key moment of the game? Who won? If the character pieces needed to be removed in order to win, did that mean the candidates had to die in order for someone to claim full victory? But in the end, several of Jacob's crew (Sawyer and Kate) left the island - - - did that make Jacob the winner (but he died) or MIB (who was really the smoke monster taking the form of his dead brother)? It is quite confusing considering the grand build up and introduction of two major players near the end of the series.

Some believe that the writers threw in the Jacob story arc as a means of trying to find a way out of their hopeless prior plot twists that were supposed to lead us to a logical, rational and clear explanation for all the island events. An immortal man and a smoke monster are playing a board game on the beach . . .  . just does not provide the answers promised by TPTB.

Again, if this was just a game, there was nothing important by the characters actions, reactions or decisions because they were mere pawns in a chess game run by supernatural beings.

PUTTING IT ALL TOGETHER

What we knew about the island is what we perceived about the island. Perceptions are reality unless the perceptions are deceptions. Then our perception is wrong.

What do we truly know about the island?

It looked like a tropical island.
It had palm trees, beaches, ocean currents, a reef, volcanic mountains and bamboo groves.

It also was "moving" away from the freighter. Daniel's rocket experiment data proved it.
It also "vanished" without leaving a massive void in the ocean space which would have created a massive tsunami. Instead, it was just a ripple on the ocean's surface.

So we have something that looks like an island but acts like a  . . .

Space ship.
A portal to another dimension.
An illusion.
Something else.

We were also told that the island needed "protection." Protection from what? It seemed that human beings could exploit the power of the island's core for evil purposes, but we never saw anyone actually harness that power. We saw individuals turn the frozen donkey wheel, but that exercise merely teleported those turners off the island. The Dharma Initiative drilled into the electromagnetic pockets in an attempt to harness the energy, but the only things that happened were time traveling bunnies and The Incident.

Like nature, the island seems untameable by human hands.

But the entire series undercurrent was the need to find an island guardian. In the first instance, Crazy Mother killed a Roman woman to steal her new born sons. She took those babies in order to have one of them replace her as the guardian of the island. That role went to Jacob. And after Jacob killed his brother, he sought to replace himself. He brought hundreds of candidates to the island to match wits with the apparent dead spirit of his brother, MIB. But the goal was the same as Crazy Mother: to give up the burden of the guardianship.  The role went to Jack for a short period to re-set the island cork and rescue Desmond from the light cave; but then it was transferred to Hurley, who also did not want the job.

But what exactly was the job? Ben said it was anything Hurley wanted to do; he could make up his own rules.

Ben also remarked that the island was like a Magic Box; if you wished hard enough, your dreams could materialize.

So, it is possible that the real connection between the island and human beings is the runaway, uncontrollable dreams of human beings that the island could actually give them - - - if there was no governor - - - something to stop someone from becoming a god.

We were told that Hurley merely wound down the island, shut down the air drops, and went to the sideways world church reunion. But there is a huge gap in between these activities. First, the sideways world is in the after life. Second, if Hurley was alive on the island, how did he get to the sideways world if he was an immortal guardian? Did he have to trick someone into taking over his island guardianship in order to escape the island's hold on him?

It would seem so. Unless Hurley's grand wish was always to have a group of close friends, a woman who truly loved him, and a place where everyone could come together in peace and tranquility. Then his Magic Box moment would have been the sideways church reunion.

THE CRASH

On September 22, 2004, at 2:15 pm local time, Oceanic Flight 815 left from Gate 23, and took off from Sydney, Australia, scheduled to arrive in Los Angeles at 10:42. 
 
Approximately six hours into the flight, the crew encountered problems with their radio. Having lost contact with ground control, the pilot decided to alter course and "turn back" towards Fiji. 

Approximately two hours later, having traveled more than 1000 miles off their planned course, the plane hit turbulence, which eventually resulted in the plane's crash. The plane had suffered a mid-air break up and crashed on an uncharted Island, with more than 69 passengers and 2 crew members surviving the crash itself. Later in the series, six of those survivors made it off the Island and became known as the Oceanic Six.
 
Eight hours after take-off would put Oceanic 815 on the Island around 10:15pm Sydney time, later local time since they were flying eastward (Fiji is 2 time zones later, Tahiti is 4). However, it was clearly mid-day when the plane lands, and on the printout from the Pearl found by Locke and Eko, it is clearly shown that the Swan's system failure occurred on September 22, 2004, at 4:16 pm.  This is another indication of the time discrepancy the Island and the outside world.  Similarly, Ajira Flight 316jumped from night to day after experiencing severe turbulence following a bright yellowy white flash.

At first, everyone believed that the airplane crashed due to mid-air turbulence which tore a part the aircraft. Later, on the island, Desmond believed Flight 815's breakup and crash by his failure to enter The Numbers into the Swan computer, causing a large burst of electromagnetic energy. However, the last explanation was that the plane's off-course deviation and arrival to the Island's airspace was  Jacob supernatural ability to bring  the plane because many of the flight's passengers were candidates to replace him as island guardian.

Two months after the crash, wreckage was found in the Sunda Trench in the Indian Ocean near Bali. All of the passengers were presumed dead. In reality, however, the discovered wreckage was staged by Charles Widmore to keep people finding the real plane crash site.  

There are several aspects of the event time line which really do not make much sense. First, if the real reason Flight 815 crashed on the island was that Jacob made it so, then there really was no reason why the pilots were off-course for two hours before the break-up. Jacob could have just instantly taken the plane and diverted it directly to the island. This would have been more feasible especially if his "powers" got all his potential candidates on Flight 815 in the first place. 

In addition, if Jacob had such supernatural powers to divert and break a part of airplane, did he not also have the power to teleport just his candidates from plane as shown when Ajira plane crash landed on the island? The Oceanic Six members were teleported into different times.

It also quite bothersome that if Jacob's sole goal was to get his candidates to the island, why did he need to "kill" 253 other passengers and crew?

The second issue is why Desmond believed he "caused" the crash by not putting in the Numbers. At the time of this reveal, it was an "ah-ha!" moment of clarity to viewers . . . it actually explained a real island event. However, this explanation was taken away as a red herring by the Jacob story arc. It is strange that Hume, who supposedly was not a candidate, somehow got sucked into the island snow globe. The one person who really wanted to get rid of Hume (by manipulation) was Eloise, who actually knew her own "future-past" of killing her time traveling son.  It is also odd that Widmore would have known about the 815 crash on his mystery island when in fact, he could not find it.

The whole idea that Jacob brought other people to the island, including Widmore's mercenaries, to "test" his candidates also seems to be stretch. How did the violent forces of soldiers or even the smoke monster actually factor into the final decision? It did not. Ghost Jacob merely asked for a volunteer in the end. So all the criss-crossing double crossing events on the island had little basis in resolving the reason why Flight 815 crashed and why there were certain survivors.

When one looks backward from Season 6's explanation of the plane crash (Jacob's doing), it really puts no context into the island events. The main characters were like lab rats running a confusing maze for no apparent reason. There is an overlay of cruelty by a bored, unsympathetic supernatural figure, Jacob. Why would he have taunted the pilots with 2 hours of being off-course? Why would he have snapped the plane in two, killing most of the passengers and crew on board? Why would he allow the other inhabitants to kill each other off, then go after his precious candidates?

The LOST story line was like the plane crash: an ugly debris field of a tangled mess of ideas and plots which cannot be put back together.