WARNING: THE FOLLOWING POST CONTAINS SPOILERS FROM THE LATEST EPISODE OF LOST.
After the jump: Mini-recap, questions, theories, and predictions!
This week on Lost, we found out that not only are Jacob and Smokey brothers, they are twins that were born waaaaay back in the day to this woman who washed up on the shore of the island, only to give birth and then get clubbed over the head by a crazy lady I’ll call The Woman. The Woman then raised Jacob and Smokey as her own until they were 13, at which point she showed them a magical glowy light that emanated from the center of the island and told them that one of them was going to have to protect it. Overprotective would be putting it lightly when describing this Woman – not only did she make the twins immortal, but she told them never to go hang out with the other men on the island because they were evil and whatnot. But the ghost of the twins’ real mother gave Smokey a guided tour to the Others’ camp, and also let him know that The Woman killed her! Smokey was obviously pissed about this, so he left to go live with the Others, leaving Jacob behind with The Woman.
Later, the boys are all growns up and The Woman has trained Jacob to be the best island protector he can be, which sucks for him because she obviously wanted Smokey to take the job instead. But Smokey was off with the Others, figuring out ways to get to that pretty glowy light The Woman showed him all those years ago so he can get the hell off the island. Jacob hears about Smokey’s plans, tells The Woman, The Woman knocks Smokey out (because finding that light is bad news), fills in the well he was working in, and burns/kills all the Others! Sensing retribution, she quickly gets Jacob to drink some magical wine that apparently transfers her landlord rights over to him, then Smokey stabs her to death! Then an infuriated Jacob throws Smokey into the glowy light, which according The Woman is “worse than death!” Once he touches the golden light, Smokey turns into a cloud of smoke, his physical body is for all intents and purposes dead, and Jacob lays both The Woman and Smokey in the caves, to be discovered thousands of years later by Jack and Kate as Adam and Eve.
I liked this episode a lot, I hope too many haters don’t show up and rain on our parades.
The more I am thinking about all of this, the more confused I am getting.
Questions:
Big Question: Do you think that Smokey is the Man in Black, or was Smokey separate and released once the Man in Black touched the light? I think Smokey = The Man in Black. Why else would he still be fighting with Jacob? Those two hold a grudge. If Smokey was a separate entity, why would it have a beef with Jacob? He’d be happy Jacob set it free!
1. So what is the actual danger of Smokey leaving the island? “We all go to hell” How? Why? Because he’s the smoke monster? Will he go on a killing spree for no reason? He’s evil because Jacob made him evil…according to that episode, maybe he just wants to get a change of scenery?
2. What is the significance of Smokey seeing the visions of Jacob in the jungle in previous episodes, and why was he bloody? We still have no idea, right?
3. In the latest podcast, Damon and Carlton said they had Smokey kill Sayid, Sun, and Jin to prove he was really the bad guy, totally evil, etc. Then why tonight were we so sympathetic to him? He seemed like the good guy, while Jacob was a momma’s boy whiner!
4. Seriously, Smokey doesn’t have a name? STILL? What did all his villager friends call him?
5. So the sparkly light coming from the cave is the source of life and death and rebirth, but…wha? I mean…WHA? If you touch it, you suffer a fate worse than death – is it like your soul being ripped from your body? Is that what Smokey is, a disembodied soul?
6. How did the woman make Jacob and Smokey immortal? What is she? And how did she get that way? Sadly I don’t think we’ll ever learn the answer, but I have to ask it.
7. How exactly did the woman burn and kill that whole village? Was she possibly Smokey-like too? And that’s how she knew what happened if you went into the light?
8. How/when did Jacob figure out he could leave the island to visit people?
9. What made Smokey so special compared to Jacob? Was he the same kind of “special” Walt supposedly is?
10. So the wine made Jacob the same as the woman – is that what happened with Richard, when he shared wine with Jacob, making Richard the same as Jacob?
11. The woman stole a newborn baby to be her replacement – does that have anything to do with the Others and their baby stealing?
12. How did the woman magically let the mother speak English? That was weird, amiright?
13. Was the woman really just crazy, or did she have a point in saying that men will always turn to the Dark Side? If Jacob was taught that all men are evil, then how did he end up being the Pro-Mankind guy in this war he’s having with Smokey? Smokey’s the one that agrees with their mother, not Jacob.
14. Does any of this tell us more about the temple and the zombification of all these people? How did Smokey save Ben’s life as a child, and how did that steal his innocence? Does it have anything to do with the light?
15. I wonder if the magical glowy light is the same kind of thing as Widmore zapped Desmond with. Maybe if Desmond went into the glowy light he’d actually survive and not be turned into a smoke monster?
16. When Locke originally saw the smoke monster, he said, “I looked into the eye of this island, and what I saw was beautiful.” Is it possible Locke saw the magical glowy light and not flashes of his life as others have seen when they looked into the monster? If that’s true, maybe he’s special and that’s why Smokey chose him to possess all this time? (And don’t forget Locke was drawing pictures of the smoke monster as a kid when Alpert came to test him!)
17. The Purge happened when the Dharma people were very close to tapping into the island’s energy – perhaps that was Jacob’s way of stopping them from taking some of it away, just like his mother wiped out all of those ancient Others when they were about to do the same?
Thoughts:
– I like how the mother told Jacob that he had no choice in becoming the island’s protector because now we see why he had no problem drawing all these people to the island and changing their fates. He never had a choice, so neither do they.
– Smokey killed their mom with the dagger by stabbing her in the heart without letting her speak first, which is exactly the way everyone keeps telling other people to kill Smokey. Hm.
– Frozen Donkey Wheel shoutout! Although seriously those people thought deities made the weather and whatnot, how’d they figure out how to rig up a time machine?
– I can’t believe we finally know who Adam and Eve are! And that Jacob and Smokey were TWINS!
– Smokey was able to take on his own form once his physical body died, and that’s how Jacob was seen talking to him. Makes sense.
– As children, Smokey told Jacob that one day he’d be able to create his own game with his own rules, which is exactly what Jacob did in his quest to find a replacement. But I wonder how he went from putting the dead bodies in the cave to eventually writing the names on the cave walls.
– Smokey seeing the ghost of his mother was so like Ben seeing his mother. I wonder if there are any parallels between the two.
– Right before Ben killed Jacob, Ben asked “What about me?” and Jacob said, “What about you?” It’s interesting that both men were raised to think they were something special, but then were both told they were basically second best, or in Ben’s case, not even in the running for the position.
@Snoop, every week we come here and dissect the episodes and make fun of everything possible. Finding stuff to question doesn’t make somebody a hater.
As I said, I generally liked the episode but was disappointed with a few elements. Watching the dreadful Happytown, a new show with some fantasy elements, just proves to me how lame most TV is. Lost has raised the bar when it comes to TV shows so I get frustrated when it lets me down.
It’s amazing how much I don’t care about this show anymore. Is it me, or does anyone else feel like the writers are totally laughing at us right now?
A few years ago a teacher friend of mine said that Lost reminded her of a story written by one of her elementary school students. Nothing’s congruent; just a bunch of , “and then…. and then….” I think she was spot-on.
And if this show ends before someone explains why there was a polar bear on a South Pacific island, there will be hell to pay!
Boo hoo hoo — stop whining. I’m going to give Darlton the benfit of the doubt and not pass judgement til after the end (“The End” — get it?) :)
As one poster said elsewhere a few weeks back, I’m gonna sit back and enjoy the writers’ ride…
3.5 hours — dang. I’ll miss all this…
@ Princess : Okay, maybe hater is a strong word. But I stand by the rest of what I said. People complain too much. Instead, they could have focused on what they liked about the episode and try to interpret it. We’re obviously not going to be spoon fed answers and the show likes to deliberately leave some stuff up for interpretation. We can all nitpick, but there’s nothing better on TV. So, it is what it is. I do agree about satire though :)
OMFG CJCREGG I WAS ALL LIKE HOW COULD LOST MAKE ME A HAPPEE AND THEN THEY MADE ME A HAPPEE AND THEN ONLY WAY THEY COULD MAKE THE HAPPEE BIGGER WAS IF GILLIAN ANDERSON OR DAVID DUCHOVNY WAS THE LITE OF THE ISLAND
and then titus welliver’s biceps are hawt! and the genesis of the smoke monster! and adam and eve! and th —
L O S T
Big Question: Actually Terry O’Quinn had something interesting related to this:
“occasionally there’s residual Locke emotions or feelings that Smokey gets that may surprise him, may irritate him, that he can’t completely control, so he’ll be smug or make fun of John Locke. Or say he was a loser and he was pathetic and he was broken. But for my own edification, I keep a little spark of John Locke alive in this being…”
I feel like Smokey somehow brings Other Twin’s/anybody he inhabits’ worst side to light.
3. This was actually the first time I liked Jacob. Before he seemed so sure of himself that he was teetering on the “demigod or dick” line for me. Knowing now that he didn’t really want to do this at first, that he thought it was stupid and CJ Cregg was being deliberately obtuse, humanized him in my eyes.
4. A boy named Sue
6. For some reason, I feel this is so important that they will actually eventually tell us. She’s just too…big.
7. Seriously, how did she kill them all?
What I want to know is: Alison Janney is a pretty good actress. Why did she sound so modern in what was basically the Viking era? Is she from the future?
I didn’t think The Woman made them immortal (I could just not remember correctly), but I thought she just made it so they couldn’t kill each other. Since the boys kept growing, I assumed they didn’t become immortal until Jacob drank what The Woman gave him that made him like her (immortal, island protector, etc) and The Man in Black became Smokey, because those are the age/forms they remained.
Also, I read an interesting theory elsewhere that the mother was both a smoke monster and the protector of the light, but when two babies were born, she realized the duties could be split between them. There’s nothing really to support this except the destroyed village, but it’s an interesting thought.
I liked the episode, but I thought that more was going to be explained. Not that the ep was a let down, just not as informative as I was picturing it to be but I am still IN LOVE with LOST and am definitely not disappointed by any means. Plus, we still got 3 nd a half hours left and I’m sure that we’ll be satisfied by the end of this awesome ride! Don’t lose faith people, LOST is one of the best shows on TV right now, possibly the best ever, and even if it ends bad (which I don’t think it will!), it will still go down as an absolutely epic show!
LMFAO AT SignatureOne-PunchKnockout! I love the way you ended your comment!
Go DARLTON nd every single cast member! I’m gonna cry a dang ocean when it’s over!
[So what is the actual danger of Smokey leaving the island? “We all go to hell†How? Why? Because he’s the smoke monster? Will he go on a killing spree for no reason? He’s evil because Jacob made him evil…according to that episode, maybe he just wants to get a change of scenery?]
Perhaps Smokey will unintentionally unleash “the light” upon the world if he leaves the island.
Meh. Damon Lindelof tweeted about Negative Capability, which is defined as a theory of poet John Keats describing the capacity for accepting uncertainty and the unresolved. I guess that’s where we’ll be, folks, in 2 weeks.
I think this ep was informative enough. It’s just like any Lost show that has major answers in it. It reminds me of Ab Aeterno, besides the fact that AA was a realistic period piece where this one had people speaking in American accents during whatever pre-America time period they were in.
It’s just a way to show how these two people, Jacob and Smokey, came to be how they are now. I’m thinking they’ll give us other answers (what the hell the Cave of Wonders is, how the lighthouse and the temple came to be) later this season. We’ve got three and a half hours left, but come on now, they had to EXTEND the finale because it has too much stuff in it. That’s a good sign, don’t you think?
Also, @Mojomom: You mentioned that this show illustrated what happened instead of giving us answers. That’s what Lost has been doing from the start. They do that because they don’t assume that they’re viewers are stupid and need to have concise explanations from the characters taking up a scene. This is one reason I like Lost. Other shows assume people won’t catch on to what they’re doing with certain plot elements. Lost just shows us what happens and lets us glean our own truth from it.
Someone earlier mentioned the polar bears. Those were explained… sort of. Well, they were “illustrated”. Charlotte’s team of archeologists found a polar bear skeleton in the middle of a desert somewhere in Africa before she ever got on the freighter. And her investigation led her to the island. So we can assume that the polar bears were being used in time travel/teleportation experiments (like the rabbits). Remember how Ben traveled a bit through time and ended up in a desert in Africa when he turned the donkey wheel of DOOM? The polar bears was probably subjected to the same thing he was. And that’s why they kept them in cages on Hydra island. (Why they used polar bears specifically, I don’t know. Maybe they were cheap or something.)
At some point I realized they weren’t giving us Smokey’s name and was a little disappointed, but I shrugged it off.
3. I think the purpose of this episode was to 1. Give Jacob and Smokey’s history and 2. Point out that even if Smokey’s life sucked, that’s no excuse for taking it out on Jacob’s candidates.
4. Well, the Fake Mother at least honored Claudia’s wishes by calling Jacob by the name she gave him. Smokey may or may not have gotten a name. Maybe she was on the island for so long that she didn’t know any other male names? I do think it’s telling that Claudia appeared before the son she didn’t name and asked to see before she was killed. Telling of what, I’m not sure.
9. Well, special in that he could see dead people. Just…like… Hurley… OSHI-
16. Maybe Locke really WAS special? :)
The preview at the end of the episode was beautiful.
“Special” — yeah, and Locke also had issues with being special (or not special).
As for the Purge, great idea — someone told Ben to stop Dharma before it reached the light. BUT, who was really counseling Ben: Jacob (as he thought?) or MIB? Cuz it woulda been MIB as his dead mom (totally not a coincidence with the dead mom motifs). But we thought Richard represented Jacob only? Do Jacob and MIB work together sometimes? Or just both appear to the same special people to try to “win” them to their side? WHO WAS REALLY LIVING IN THAT CABIN?
Now, I can suspend disbelief with the well-wheel that transports people off the island, but… HOW DO THEY RETURN? How did Ben and Richard and Tom and Jacob come and go so quickly and easily when Widmore could never even find the GD place again? Not to mention the O6 and all those compass/Eloise/magical mystery shenanigans to get them back. It just doesn’t fit with some people easily coming and going with no probs at all.
The shiny gold light: I kept thinking…. Stay away from the light, Carol Ann! Great idea that it’s what Locke saw, the EYE… “so beautiful.” Is this maybe why Widmore wants to come back, to steal it or its power? (evil men want to possess it, or they are corrupted by their pursuit, like the fountain of youth?) Yet, if it’s a good, valuable thing that must be protected… it’s dangerous to let it off the island? Or only because MIB is associated with it now and he’s a one-man clickity-clakkity locomotive, smokified killing machine? Hmmm.
CJ Cregg rocks. Her latin sounded passionless, but maybe it was supposed to be. I’m figuring a timeline and guessing that she got the twins in the time of the Roman Empire so I’ll assume that Jacob is over 2,000 years old. The first ppl the boys encountered looked like Vikings or barbarians so who knows how many civilizations have visited the island.
I would like to know how Esau figured out that he could manipulate the material with a damn donkey wheel? Is that mechanism some crude and large version of Jacob’s mirror? Big wheel move island and little mirror can let the island show you whom it wants as BIFF(Best Island Friends Forever… seriously forever).
My cousin adopted an infant and was able to breastfeed it. I had never heard of this but it’s common and definitely possible if you nurture the infant and it sucks… the milk then comes. I know that’s kinda weird and gross, but… just to answer that question above.
Also: Wasn’t there also a glowing suitcase in Repo Man? Or was that just a car trunk? :-\
I don’t think those people were vikings, they all looked pretty hispanic to me. Because the island moves through time isn’t it possible that this was like 17th century?
Here these original others were trying to dig for the “light” and built that wheel, when all I could think of – if they really wanted off the island like the MiB did – then why didn’t they just build a freakin’ boat?!
Also – STAY AWAY FROM THE LIIIIIIIGHT! Where’s that little short woman in this? ha!
Thanks @Alexsa :-)
@Keeks It’s from Reservoir Dogs.
@GenGen The reason I said Vikings is because they were the only society I could think of that were both widely seafaring and dressed like that, but yeah Romans would be a better fit if we take the Latin into account (although how Latin survived as an Other language all the way up until now is still open for debate).
One thing I realized: Jacob’s an etymologically Hebrew name. Are the settlers Jews/early Christians on the run from Rome? If so, was the island actually in the middle of the Pacific back then? *shrug*
Yeah, totally, but maybe they DID try to build rafts/boats and were constantly defeated like Michael and Desmond were later… The island’s force-field or whatever. Although the time-anomalies and force fields don’t seem to work anymore since Widmore could come and now fires missiles with perfect (not delayed) aim. (Sorry, not hating, just saying.)
Really, I’ll try to shut up now. xox
Call me crazy, but am I the only one who saw this and wondered whether or not Jacob is the evil one in the picture, not Smokey? I thought the episode painted Jacob in a very shady and somewhat obtuse light. He seemed a little slow and almost taken advantage of by The Woman (LOVE Allison Janney!!) who seemed definitely evil. Maybe it’s one of those, have to do bad things to achieve good, but she did murder a woman she sheltered to take her children and she murdered an entire village of people to make a point to Smokey. It seems that Jacob took this on without really understanding wtf was going on, killed his brother and then started messing with people’s lives in his little Island game. I don’t know about anybody else, but I sort of feel like Jacob seems more malevolent and Smokey seems more the victim of The Woman and then Jacob’s schemes more than “pure evil”.
What did baby Jacob and MIB live on as newborns? Coconut milk? Dead mommy can’t nurse. Island “mommy†can’t nurse. No cows or goats on island. Boar milk?
I think the reason Smokey (fake MIB?) still has a beef with Jacob is Jacob is tasked with not letting him leave the island. I suspect the Pulp Fiction Suitcase hole was the original cork and now the cork is the island only because Smokey’s slippery when wet.
Released on the island is not the same thing as released from the island. It just made Jacob’s job holding him in one place that much harder. (Because now he has a body with which to talk, lie, scheme, rub a cat maniacally, curse inspector Gadget, etc…)
Also, I believe they’re speaking Latin the whole way through but that funny sound cue is proof we’re just hearing it in English (like in Red October). Quick, let’s see if they ended a sentence in a proposition!
/sorry, iz geeky
//likes to tell cops who ask if I know how fast I was going ‘no but I know exactly where I am’
At least one question has been answered thanks to Allison Janney.
Yes, there are worse wigs/hair extensions than Claire’s.
Random disjointed theorizing that I haven’t seen elsewhere yet (and I want to share so I can go neener if I’m right on any of it):
1. When they revisited the “Adam and Eve” skeletons, I started thinking… what if the island is the garden of Eden, and smokey WILL escape, which WILL make the island sink, and the “horror” inflicted upon the world is just the capacity for evil under which we currently exist already? What if the worst that could happen already has?
2. I was thinking about MIB and how he’s not all bad, or wasn’t, and then I started thinking of Lucifer the fallen angel, and then I started thinking of the Stones song Sympathy for the Devil, and then I thought hey that would have been a better episode title. ;)
3. Remaining candidates: Shephard (Aaron is a child of this bloodline) Kwon (Ji-Yeon is a child of this bloodline) Ford (Clementine is a child of this bloodline). Does Hugo have a child somewhere? Or will he die, like childless Sayid did? Or something else?
4. Maybe Jacob built the statue in memorial to their Fmother. We didn’t see it in last night’s episode, so maybe it wasn’t built yet. Which would make Fmother that Egyptian goddess, wouldn’t it?
5. Back to children and Eden. What if the only way that Eden can exist is through children, because in Eden anything you imagine can happen, and only children have the innocence to allow themselves to imagine anything?
6. What if Rose and Bernard are another Adam and Eve? “One black, one white” as they keep saying, yin and yang, the guardians of the island… the ones who know more about what’s truly going on than anyone else, happy to blissfully live with nobody but each other forever… etc.
7. What if the “true love” thing they keep exploring is that they’re not looking for someONE to be the guardian of the island, but someTWO to do it, because the one flaw in Jacob/his mom was that they are lonely, and perpetual loneliness makes you nutty mc-coo-coo.
Okay I know, tl/dr, but I feel better having shared. :)
“Boo hoo hoo — stop whining. I’m going to give Darlton the benfit of the doubt and not pass judgement til after the end (“The End†— get it?) :)”
Spot on, nuff said.
Since Mother wasn’t aging and was not going to die on her own, but was tired of the whole protection stuff, it seems like she wanted to die and knew that MIB would do her the favor of killing her after she torched his friends. Likewise, Jacob was happy to have Ben stab him to death after way too many years of his protection role. That would answer why Jacob didn’t fight back when Ben attacked him.
“…you can safely bet they will never reveal his name… why?”
Because it’s Cosmo, just like on “Seinfeld,” and that could only be funny once.
Add me to the list of disappointed persons, but not to the haters’ list. I still have hopes that the final two episodes will be worth it.
The Woman did not kill the villagers.
Woman bonks MiB. (“I’m sorry.” “Thank you.” rly? is she British?) The wheel was not finished and MiB slumped in the chamber. *SCENE* So then she FINISHED THE WHEEL SHE DOESN’T KNOW HOW TO MAKE, carried MiB out, buried the chamber, and exacted maximum smokey-like carnage on the village? Not so much…
Besides, she had an alibi, she was taking Jacob to the source. Afterward, she tells him, “now we are the same.” Yes, Jacob easily took down Richard, so she had the same powers, but a whole village? And Jacob is not smokey, so Woman cannot be smokey. Besides, if she could take down the village she despises and fears, she waits until it’s too late…and then lets them still finish the wheel. Not likely…
SO Woman leaves, villagers find MiB and carry him out, finish the wheel ONLY THEY KNOW HOW TO CONSTRUCT, and now can leave the island at their leisure…except original smokey needs a vessel, wants MiB enough to have led him to the village as bio-mommy, but he’s still alive…so smokey trashes the village to prevent MiB from leaving…yet. Way plausible.
Smokey can only get the candidates to kill each other. It catches the floater it wanted from the beginning and the game is afoot. Jacob knows post-mortem MiB is not his brother but acts with his persona.
QED
Sorry, I’ve seen the same thoughts on Pop Candy and feel the need to splash some temple water on it.
Jay,
To answer your question, “…you can safely bet they will never reveal his name… why?†I believe so because of the dramatic element. Also, if it were significant what his name was I think they would’ve revealed it last night.
As to this theory,— “What if the “true love†thing they keep exploring is that they’re not looking for some ONE to be the guardian of the island, but some TWO to do it…” This may very well end up being Rose and Bernard :)
I haven’t even finished this yet, but came straightaway to post: It’s a great interview where Lindelof/Cuse are being asked some of the same exact questions everyone’s asking here (and elsewhere):
http://tinyurl.com/across-the-sea-interview
There’s no reason that MiB/Smokey couldn’t have taken human form and shown people who arrived later how to dig a well and make the wheel. It doesn’t have to be the same wheel, and we know there are lots of wells. I’m pretty sure she killed the village.
They were speaking Latin throughout the episode. That probably means Jacob and MiB were raised speaking Latin, and I would guess that Jacob is the one who prefered that the Others learn to speak it.
I think the question of how some people have left the island and come back is really key. Jacob seemed able to come and go as he pleased, and Smokey didn’t escape when he did so. Other people also started seeing dead people off-island, like Jack seeing Christian in the hospital, and that’s super weird and I don’t really get it.
The other question that seems really important to me is what it means and why it’s significant for some people to be “special”: Hurley seeing dead people, Miles talking to dead people, MiB seeing dead people, Walt’s fancy abilities, Ben seeing his dead mother, maybe Alison Janney has fancy abilities independent of guarding the “light,” etc. etc. Interesting to me that Alison thought her successor would be MiB because he’s “special,” kind of like how Jacob had the Others kidnap and test Walt because he’s “special.”
Fwiw, I think it’s pretty clear that Alison Janney “brought” the ship to the island so she could steal and raise some babies to be her successor(s), just like Jacob brought people to the island to prove his point to his brother and to get his Candidates for succession. Then he can finally retire (die!).
Dharma brought the polar bears to the island to do experiments on them and train them. The bears can handle the cold so they can hang out in the freezing cold donkey wheel room, and they’re very smart so they can learn to turn the donkey wheel. Which is why one turned up in Tunisia’s past.
I think Jacob and/or the light saved Ben’s life as a child, and Smokey had nothing to do with it. And hey, maybe the water from the magical-light-stream feeds the water in the Temple pool. When MiB went down the stream into the light, it turned the water cloudy and red, just like how the pool looked after Jacob was killed. And that cloudy water was slower to heal, and it brought back Sayid but he was “infected.”
Anybody else think “Wicked Witch of the West (Wing)” when Alison Janney’s character went a rockin’?
BY THE WAY
When what’s-her-face…Claudia? was giving birth to Jacob/Smokey, The Lady said “You can do this” and it was all rather like Kate helping Claire give birth. So this may mean something very significant about Aaron. Or it’s foreshadowing of Kate killing Claire. Or it may mean nothing at all, what the hell.
Also, LOL EPISODE TITLE.
9. I thought it had to do with him seeing dead people. At least maybe Mother didnt know he saw dead people, but thats part of what makes him special.
12. I thought it was just a storytelling device, to not make us watch an hour of subtitles. She didnt make her speak english, the show folks just didnt want us reading all episode.
16. I was thinking the same thing, he somehow saw the light, maybe thru Smokey somehow.
– As children, Smokey told Jacob that one day he’d be able to create his own game with his own rules, which is exactly what Jacob did in his quest to find a replacement. But I wonder how he went from putting the dead bodies in the cave to eventually writing the names on the cave walls.
They’ve been on that island for a loooooooong time. Enough time for MIB to ferment his anger/rage/etc and enough time for Jacob to create his own game.
The fall of Lucifer, is all I’m saying.
Also, allegories to The Sandman: Seasons of Mists.
Ok, so the last scene paralelled the three people in the cave. Jack, Kate, Locke and then The Woman, Jacob, Smokey.
What if the Guardianship is supposed to be handed down matrilinearly? Perhaps The Woman inherited it from her mother. But she got two boys, so it had to be one of them.
What if Kate is supposed to take over? What if she’s not a candidate because shes The One? She took a baby that wasn’t hers. Just like The Woman.
A woman guardian for the source of life, death, rebirth sounds about right. What if Jack’s job is to usher Kate into the guardian position, like The Woman did with Jacob?
I dunno. Just spouting ideas. But it’s not like they are any more crazy than some theories I’ve seen out there.
Now we know what was in the briefcase in Pulp Fiction
Also, how the hell does CJ Cregg keep her whites so white in a jungle?
And I agree with Sophie that Kate is marked out for something special: that’s why she’s not on the list anymore.
> 4. Seriously, Smokey doesn’t have a name? STILL? What did all his villager friends call him?
Brothah
12. How did the woman magically let the mother speak English? That was weird, amiright?
No magic involved, just storytelling device so people wouldn’t be reading subtitles all night. I think the giveaway was the louder-than-normal music cue right before the languages changed.
The Hunt For Red October did something similar when all the Russian characters started speaking English.
Brian- HAHA. I turned to my roommate and said just about the same thing re: Marcellus Wallace’s briefcase.
It’s amazing how much I don’t care about this show anymore. “Is it me, or does anyone else feel like the writers are totally laughing at us right now?”
I wouldn’t go that far. I still love the show and will be so sad when it ends. I just worry about them wrapping it up in a satisfying way with so little time left.
“And if this show ends before someone explains why there was a polar bear on a South Pacific island, there will be hell to pay!”
I thought that was answered
Have there been any discussions about perhaps The Candidates are not meant to be candidates to take over for Jacob? Like maybe they were candidates to become the next body for Smokey?
Again, random, but it was a thought I had.
I mean, Locke was the perfect Candidate for something in both worlds.
I had a thought about why the MIB turned into the smoke monster. The mother said that the light was inside every man but they always want more. I noticed that when the MIB floated into the source it suddenly went dark. Maybe he absorbed all the light and was punished which caused him to still retain his memories but transformed him into the cloud of black smoke which also made him evil. Er, this theory made a little more sense in my head. I’m going to stop now.
Jacob must stay innocent
You cannot ever go to the source of the light
I’m guessing that the woman was a smokey too and somehow Esau figures out that by being able to kill her (with that short sword of course) that he can somehow kill Jacob and as long as he has not gotten replaced yet that he can get off the island. How is any of the replacements for Jacob (other than Hurley) in any way innocent????
“And if this show ends before someone explains why there was a polar bear on a South Pacific island, there will be hell to pay”
Anyone else want to scream when they read comments like this about those stupid polar bears? They were one of the first things explained back in the third season (in the first episode!). Dharma used them for experiments. After the purge they swam to the other island and were fruitful. What fan doesn’t know about those polar bear cages or of the polar bear skeleton that was dug up in the Tunisian desert at the exit point for the frozen donkey wheel? The polar bear cages were even shown in the episode before this one. What more do we need to know about them?
“1. So what is the actual danger of Smokey leaving the island? “We all go to hell†Because he’s the smoke monster? … He’s evil because Jacob made him evil…according to that episode, maybe he just wants to get a change of scenery?”
I don’t think we know this yet but will be told later. Perhaps the mother was a priestess and her dark son was the reincarnation of a dark god? The real mother might not have been as innocent as originally portrayed? Why did the MIB want to leave if men were so bad? What was his plan?
The MIB was special even before being vaporized into black smoke. He could see the dead. His real mother cared enough to come for him but not for Jacob so she seemingly knew something about him. He knew how to play a game that washed up on the shore (Claudia did not make it for him). He just knew things Jacob didn’t. He was the second born twin whose existence was unknown to the mother and I’m sure there are some mythological/religious references about him somewhere but I am just back from vacation and just saw the episode today. Claudia loved him but never says she loved Jacob. Poor Jacob tried to be as good as he could so she would love him too. Even after she admits killing their real mother he stays around seeking her approval. But it was her favorite son who gave Claudia what she really wanted: a way off the island. An end to her centuries of servitude to it and she thanks him in the end.
“2. What is the significance of Smokey seeing the visions of Jacob in the jungle in previous episodes, and why was he bloody? We still have no idea, right?”
I thought Jacob’s bloody arms were meant to represent how he had to lift the dead body of their mother-a not so subtle reminder of the MIB’s matricide. Now that we know the MIB can see the dead, we know he can see Jacob and likely Jacob is haunting him in the shape of a his younger self.
Re specialness of Walt. I think he was either “a” candidate or a candidate for the next leader but since he was uncontrollable he was of no use. I loved this episode and I hope others enjoyed it as much as I did.
I read that comment about Jacob and Blackie being 2,000 year old twins… this reminded me of the Roman twins Romus and Remulus, who were found and nursed by a wolf, and later went on to build Rome. They fought about who was to be the ruler of Rome, and Remus was killed… now that I think about it, it may not have anything to do with it. It just reminded me of that story.
First of all I want to ask why those of us who did not like this episode and wish to comment about our questions and frustrations are immediately labeled “party-poopers?” Is there no room for intelligent debate with differing opinions?
Second question: Where does iczorro get that the others were speaking highland swedish or whatever he said it was?
While it does seem that this short story occurred before the erection of the temple and the statue, and really that would make sense, is 2000 years ago an arbitrary number or did I miss something?
Why has there been not one polynesian/pacific/asian looking character to have landed on this islands shores? (excluding Sun, Jin, and of course the Marvin Candlewax family) This has bothered me from the introduction of the backstory of Alpert’s Others. I could understand the Dharma people all being westerners, but where did the original “Others” come from? And why ffs was ANYONE, Dharma, Other, Losties, allowed to stay????
I found this epi very disappointing and a wast of time,and I am with mojomom in having serious doubts about Darlton’s ability to wrap this up properly. And I have no background on Ms. Janney, don’t know if she has any talent or not, but her portrayal of this mother figure was distasteful to me. I could easily blame the script she was handed…I am not a hater, I have been as obsessed with this show as anyone, and as near as I can tell my biggest difference of opinion with you Ack (and your fanclub) has been that I was a big Ana-Lucia fan. But. This. Epi…..sucked
I look forward to reading your recap tomorrow though!
They explained the polar bear thing 4 seasons ago. The Dharma initiative brought them there. Come on.
I love that when you know about “the red warning thing”, you always assume the worst. Did you notice that there were red flowers behind kid-Smokey when they looked at the caves? And later… he dies.