Who was that guy on the beach? Did the bomb go off? What’s in store for season six?
Last night’s season-five finale of Lost answered many questions in typical Lost fashion–by bringing up more questions at the same time. We take a look at some of the lingering mysteries and do our best to make sense of it all.
1. Who is Jacob’s nemesis?
What a great intro to the show–two men on a beach looking at what appears to be the S.S. Black Rock coming to their island. Our attention is too concerned with the “it’s Jacob!” bombshell to realize the big mystery here: who is the other dude? All we know is he wants Jacob dead, and he can assume the identities of the dead on the island. Some theorize he’s the Smoke Monster, but I’m not so sure. I still think Smokey is a security system, as previously revealed.
Looking at Lost through Bible-colored glasses, we’re inclined to think Jacob’s nemesis is actually his brother, as dictated by the tale of Jacob, Esau, and their mother Rebekah. We’ll refer to him as “Esau” until proven wrong. Other theories on the two include a God-Satan relationship, Jesus-not-Jesus opposites, and your basic good-versus-evil dynamic. But that almost seems too simple for Lost.
2. Who are Ilana and her people?
Cronies of Jacob, they have to be. Jacob visits a bandaged Ilana in a hospital in a flashback, and she agrees to help him. They obviously aren’t strangers. We still don’t know much about her backstory, or the backstory of Bram (her burly cohort), but just as Widmore has assembled a squad (the freighter folk), it appears Jacob has a SWAT team of his own. And, as Jacob whispers to Esau/Locke at the end, “They’re coming.”
3. What did Jacob mean when he said, “It can only end once”?
Esau/Jacob’s nemesis claims that the approaching ship (we assume it’s the Black Rock, possibly with Richard Alpert and company aboard) just wants to mess the island up… again. “It always ends the same” he says. To which Jacob replies, “It can only end once. Everything before that is progress.” This is a huge hint into what’s in store, and supports the theory that these time loops are simply trial-and-error for a greater result. Hear me out on this.
The two seem awfully nonchalant about a boat approaching–perhaps because they’ve lived this before. By tinkering with the “variables” (free will, humans, whatever you want to call it) in the equation, one can get a different answer/result if one tries enough times. Esau is content to assume everything will stay the same. Jacob does not–each “time loop” or whatever one calls it, is progress to a greater solution. We, as an audience, have simply seen one of the time loops… so far. The first five seasons were just progress folks, not the final answer.
4. Okay, what’s the deal with the statue?
This is a big stumper. It started off–for us–as a foot with four toes. Then we saw its back in “LaFleur,” and now we’ve seen a partial profile of its face–which turned out to be a FRICKIN’ CROCODILE or something. We’ve seen that there is something very Egyptian going on here, and in that mythology, Sobek is a crocodile-headed god whose purpose is sketchy at best; to some, he’s linked to The Nile and fertility, to others, he’s a frightening god with links to the dead. The Lost writers certainly know how to pick them, don’t they?
5. What’s in Hurley’s guitar case?
Ummm… probably not a guitar. But seeing as how Jacob gave it to him, it could be a few things. We want to know what’s in there just as badly as you do.
6. Why did Jacob visit everyone in the past?
We’ll give you a couple answers here. When he visits Kate, he tells her to “be good.” When he visits Sawyer, he tells him not to finish the letter (basically give up his quest for revenge). If these two were to follow his advice, their actions would not lead them to the island. Was Jacob trying to prevent them from getting on Oceanic 815?
On the other hand, he saves John’s life thus giving John a reason to go to the island (he’s not dead, but he’s paralyzed and now headed for his walkabout). Jacob is also responsible for Nadia’s death, thus setting Sayid on a course back to the island. He also flat-out tells Hurley to get on the Ajira plane. Was he trying to get everyone on Oceanic 815?
We’re leaning towards the latter–Jacob’s master plan (more on that later) is to get everyone on the island. We’re just not sure why he visited the Losties at those specific times.
7. What is John Locke’s future in the series?
As much as I hate to say it, John Locke–the real John Locke–is dead. Unfortunately it appears that old Locke may have just been a pawn in a greater plan–Esau’s plan. Notice how happy he (Esau as Locke) was since he was “resurrected”? That’s because he is now leader of “The Others,” and he’s got Ben strung up like a puppet… and of course we know what he wants Ben for. Only a bleeding-from-the-gut Jacob knows that it’s not actually John, and Esau is totally cool with that–now he can rule The Others and they’re none the wiser. That is, until Alana and her pro-Jacob group dump the real (and really dead) body of John Locke in front of The Others and start a coup against the imposter.
8. What did Ilana mean by asking if Lapidus was a “candidate”?
According to us, Ilana and her team are pro-Jacob. At the end of the episode, Ben stabs Jacob, but let’s face it, Jacob didn’t exactly fight back. Jacob even told Ben he had a choice, to leave or to kill him–which leads us to believe that Jacob “dying” is all part of his plan. So how does Lapidus fit in? Ilana clearly isn’t interested in using Lapidus for anything more than Jacob’s benefit. Is Lapidus being primed as a corporeal vessel for Jacob’s next incarnation? How about a not-John-Locke-versus-not-Frank-Lapidus (Esau versus Jacob) fight to the death in season six? Hey, we said we’d answer the questions, we didn’t say we’d be right.
9. Did Jughead actually blow? And what are the consequences?
Yes, kablooie time. Thanks Juliet! Given Faraday’s scribbles (if a man says he’s a physicist and he throws out crazy numbers, we’re inclined to believe he knows what he’s talking about) is there any doubt that they did change the future/past? Otherwise season six will involve a lot of charred bodies, and that won’t make for a sexy Juliet-Jack-Kate-Sawyer love square. The question is how the future changed, and if the alterna-future sets them on course or off course.
10. Where is season six headed?
The obvious answer, if one does believe the bomb did go off, is we’ll see what happened if the plane didn’t crash and instead landed safely in Los Angeles. The way the show ended–with a brilliant flash of white and the famous Lost title card in reversed colors–suggests that we may be in store for an entirely new Lost world–an alterna-world. But let’s not forget that Jacob still touched each of our Losties… is his pull strong enough to bring them back to the island even if the plane lands? We think so. We’re hoping season six is a series of “progressions” as Jacob thinks of them, and we’ll see the “variables” fail several times through various loops before they finally get it right–whatever “it” is–and that’s the season six and series finale.
Text written By Tim Surette
Hi, I'm Fernando Souza. An ESL teacher based in Rio de Janeiro who works for language schools and multinational companies. At the moment I’m working on a distance learning project based on moodle.
