So, after 6x09 what don't we know?

[Temis the Vorta]

Well as for the Hanso descendants, somehow the Blacck Rock's Ship's Log must have made it off the Island and into Hanso family hands because we saw that it was up for auction (after the last Hanso died) and Widmore bought it.

Maybe they sent a ship looking for the Black Rock after it went missing? Maybe they found the Island and made it off with the log? That's kind of weak, but it's the only way that fits.

Unless someone abandoned ship during the storm, just before it shipwrecked and they took the log with them?

Maybe someone besides Ricardus survived the shipwreck/Smokey attack, stole the log, hid out, and somehow got off the island (via teleportation for instance).

I also want a good explanation for why the button-pushing was "saving the world." Also, what exactly happened when the island vanished? Did it move someplace else? Is it someplace else now? Was it in the Atlantic when the Black Rock wrecked on it?

I heard one person's theory a year back is that the same magnetic anomaly that caused the crash also slowed the plane's descent so after it broke apart, the magnetic fields caused the plane to fall at a much slower rate. Just a theory though, I'd like to see them address this as well.

That was a good theory until the episode where we saw the tail section slam into the water at a high rate of speed that should have killed everyone. Yet they popped up in the water right afterwards...like they weren't in the tail when it hit? Teleported into the water perhaps?

Supposedly Kate remembers the entire crash. What did she see/experience?

After Dharma hit the pocket of energy they saw that it needed to be released every 108 minutes lest it all build up. So the button in the hatch did that. When Desmond hit the fail safe it released the energy into the Island and activated the frozen wheel thus moving the Island. The effect of the Island moving is the same in both "Live Together; Die Alone" and "There's No Place Like Home, Part Two."

That's just too easy. They needed to push the button to "save the world," yet there was a perfectly good workaround, which they stumbled across. Doesn't fit with the enormous build up of the importance of the button pushing. It makes the characters look foolish for pushing the button and the audience foolish for caring if they did.

 

[DevilEyes]

We do know that the lack of being able to give birth was, apparently, a huge deal for them. To the point that they were worried that they'd have to recruit off-island to maintain their numbers. Which directly implied that they had been sustaining their numbers naturally on the island, which we know to be false.

There's tons of things like that which has changed since the beginning. The fertility issue -- and the presence of a statue devoted to a fertility goddess on the island at all -- just doesn't make any sense at all considering what we know at present. Especially since the lack of fertility was portrayed as being some major punishment to the Others because of Ben.

Who said that it was a punishment? Or that it had anything to do with Ben? It seems that you're confusing Internet speculation with what was actually portrayed in the show.

I don't see why the Others being concerned about infertility (or rather, children and their mothers dying at childbirth) and worrying that they might have to do more recruiting, should be considered evidence that they are ancient and native to the Island or that they have been there for centuries.

It's clear that they - or at least their parents or grandparents - have been brought there at some point in recent history. Once they are brought to the Island, they (or at least some of them) are allowed to leave temporarily and spend some periods of time off-Island to run errands, manage the finances and sources, recruit, etc., but are forbidden from starting a family and a life outside the Island (Widmore was apparently punished for it by being banished from the Island). They are expected to make a life and a community on the Island. Naturally, many of those people are going to try to have children and raise family on the Island. This may have been enough, for the most part, to keep the community going, without having to recruit large numbers outside the Island, though they probably still occasionally recruited some people they considered worthy/useful. Also, their numbers would get depleted in skirmishes such as those with the US Army in the 1950s or with Dharma in the 1970s and 1980s, which required additional recruitment. The "fertility problem" that seemed to have appeared sometime during the 1980s or 1990s, meant that they had to recruit larger numbers. They got some from Dharma and a few from the plane crash of Oceanic 815, but it was not enough and they had to go off-Island and recruit more people. They were decimated in 2004 in conflicts with the survivors of 815 and with Widmore's people. I wonder how many people have been recruited since, and if Dogen and "Lennon" were among them, or if they had been there before (among those Others who lived at the Temple), but we just didn't see them in season 4 finale.

 

[Hober Mallow]

Right. I'm not convinced Christian is MIB - in fact, Claire states specifically that they are two separate entities.

Of course Clair thinks they're two different people, just like she thinks MiB/Christian is actually her father. She also thought the Others had her baby, so clearly MiB has duped her the entire time and her perspective doesn't really help us clarify anything.

If Christian isn't Flocke, then where is Christian now? Why is it the very last time we saw Christian was right before Flocke appeared to the Ajira survivors? And after Flocke appeared, we never saw Christian again.

Where is 'the kid' now?

The kid is Jacob.

Where is Christian's body if MIB isn't using it?

MIB wasn't using Christian's body. He was using his form, just like he's using Locke's form now. How would he have been able to get Christian's physical body down into the tunnel where the frozen donkey wheel is?

Why haven't we seen Rose and Bernard since before MIB appeared to the Ajira survivors?

That question doesn't even make any sense. Rose and Bernard, chonologically, were last seen 30 years before Flocke appeared on the beach. Chronologically, the last time we saw Christian was only some moments before Flocke appeared on the beach. He no sooner disappears than Flocke appears. The one event happens right aftert the other. Christian tells Frank and Sun to wait at the barracks for Locke. Lo and behold, Locke appears to the Ajira folks right after that, and we never see Christian again.

 

[MikeS]

Where is 'the kid' now?
The kid is Jacob.

Where were we told this? That is merely conjecture.

Where is Christian's body if MIB isn't using it?
MIB wasn't using Christian's body. He was using his form, just like he's using Locke's form now. How would he have been able to get Christian's physical body down into the tunnel where the frozen donkey wheel is?

So the question still stands - where is his body? It wasn't in his coffin that Jack found in the caves back in season one. In fact we could also ask where his body has gone in the flashsideways.

 

[LitmusDragon]

edit: revised

Something that is still unanswered and I hope we'll see onscreen- how exactly did Smokey become Smokey? How did Jacob become Jacob? When did Jacob decide to keep Smokey trapped, and why? What does Jacob think will happen if Smokey breaks loose?

Presumably they both became whatever they are now while on the island, but Jacob was the slightly more powerful of the two and decided to keep Smokey prisoner because he was a destructive force. In which case the "cork" analogy says more about Jacob's motivation than it does about what the island itself is all about.

If the island is indeed just a "cork", and exists for the express purpose of keeping Smokey there, then what happened to Smokey before he came to the island? How was he lured there?

Either way it will be interesting to see how it plays out.

 

[Lindley]

I just want to know who was dropping all that Dharma food.....

 

[label]

I just want to know who was dropping all that Dharma food.....

I didn't think they would revisit this one but apparently the writers said not too long ago that we would get the answer to this question. My guess, it was Widemore making the drops .

 

[Mallet]

It couldn't have been Widmore, because at that point in time he was still trying to find out the location of the Island. If he had known where the Island was and could fly a plane there to drop food off, he could have come back to the Island at anytime. or just parachuted people in, etc... No, it had to be someone else who did the food drop.

My guess is that it was some of the Other's working off of the Island. We know the Other's have a big network of people, businesses, etc... off of the Island and the Other's know where the Island is and how to reach it. Plus, the other's in Dharmaville had lots of food and supplies that they couldn't have gotten on Island (bottles of wine, packaged food, caned food, multiple copies of the same book (for book club), tools, paint, etc...). The submarine isn't big enough to bring back lots of food and supplies, especially since it only has that small entrance hole to get in and out of. So the Other's off the Island must have been dropping food for the Other's on the Island. That one pallet must have gone off course through and instead of landing at the barracks it landed off in the jungle.

 

[label]

Good point. Must be a remnant of Dharma or the Hanso foundation.

 

[Mallet]

Yah, I wonder if at the same time the Other's on the Island did the "Purge" to rid of the Dharma people, a second "purge" happened off island, getting rid of the Dharma foundation people off island, or at least a "hostile takeover" of the Dharma Foundation and it's resources, by the Other's off-island people. Because just taking out the Dharma people on island, wouldn't have prevented more Dharma people from showing up and fighting to reclaim it, unless they managed to take care of all of the off-island Dharma people as well.

I'm not sure if it is considered "cannon" but I seem to remember in the Lost novel "Bad Twin" there is mention of infighting at the Hanso foundation and people trying to take control of it away from Alvar Hanso or something like that.

 

[trekkiebaggio]

It couldn't have been Widmore, because at that point in time he was still trying to find out the location of the Island. If he had known where the Island was and could fly a plane there to drop food off, he could have come back to the Island at anytime. or just parachuted people in, etc... No, it had to be someone else who did the food drop.

My guess is that it was some of the Other's working off of the Island. We know the Other's have a big network of people, businesses, etc... off of the Island and the Other's know where the Island is and how to reach it. Plus, the other's in Dharmaville had lots of food and supplies that they couldn't have gotten on Island (bottles of wine, packaged food, caned food, multiple copies of the same book (for book club), tools, paint, etc...). The submarine isn't big enough to bring back lots of food and supplies, especially since it only has that small entrance hole to get in and out of. So the Other's off the Island must have been dropping food for the Other's on the Island. That one pallet must have gone off course through and instead of landing at the barracks it landed off in the jungle.

What about Eloise? Seeing as she was at the Pendulum.

 

[Mallet]

What about Eloise? Seeing as she was at the Pendulum.

Well, first just because she was at the pendulum doesn't mean that she necessarily has access to Dharma planes, food, shipping crates, etc... It would take a lot of people and resources and access to Dharma supplies to make a food drop happen. If she's not working with Dharma then why use all of their stuff. Why not just buy regular stuff from the grocery store?

Second, why would she continue to drop food on the island? Who would she be sending the food to and why? The drop was far enough into the woods that there would be a good chance that anyone in the Swan station wouldn't find it (not in 108min) and how long would it take one or two people to move all that food back to the Swan? and if the food wasn't for Desmond in the Swan, why send it?

Third, If she could know the location of the Island and send a plane there to drop off food, why did she have to send the Losties back on a passenger plane with lots of innocent people on board and risk having the plane crash, killing everyone? Why wouldn't she just have them parachute down to the Island?

Fourth, she wasn't always at the pendulum. We know she also worked at a jewelry store in London England for awhile, she had some ties to a Scottish monastery and a monk living there. She seems to get around a lot.

So I don't think it would have been her. At least I don't think it would make sense for it to be her, unless she also happens to work for/with the Dharma Initiative now days.

 

[Mr Light]

""I also want a good explanation for why the button-pushing was "saving the world." "" They poked a whole in the pocket of exotic energy. My personal theory is a pinpoint black hole. So they had to construct a mechanism to routinely let off some of the "steam" to prevent a backup or explosion. They couldn't just automate the system because the E-M disturbance could interfere with the systems, so a human being had to punch in the numbers.

 

[MikeS]

So the Other's off the Island must have been dropping food for the Other's on the Island. That one pallet must have gone off course through and instead of landing at the barracks it landed off in the jungle.

That is a good theory. But if, as the writers say, they are going to explain the food drops, it would make for a pretty uninteresting scene. Hence I think there's something more to it.

 

[trekkiebaggio]

What about Eloise? Seeing as she was at the Pendulum.

Well, first just because she was at the pendulum doesn't mean that she necessarily has access to Dharma planes, food, shipping crates, etc... It would take a lot of people and resources and access to Dharma supplies to make a food drop happen. If she's not working with Dharma then why use all of their stuff. Why not just buy regular stuff from the grocery store?

The Pendulum was a Dharma station, so if she has access to that there's a possibility that she has access to other Dharma resources. Of course we don't actually know the state of Dharma in the present day, whether it's abandoned the Pendulum or not or indeed how Eloise knew about it in the first place (unless we chalk it up to Daniel's journal).

But I think we do need to know more of Dharma's current status, whether The Others took over the whole Initiative and not just the barracks on the Island.

Second, why would she continue to drop food on the island? Who would she be sending the food to and why? The drop was far enough into the woods that there would be a good chance that anyone in the Swan station wouldn't find it (not in 108min) and how long would it take one or two people to move all that food back to the Swan? and if the food wasn't for Desmond in the Swan, why send it?

For the survivors of Flight 815? I'm sure they were in Daniels journal as well, and the date of their crash etc (although I don't like to think of all her actions being explained by his journal).

Third, If she could know the location of the Island and send a plane there to drop off food, why did she have to send the Losties back on a passenger plane with lots of innocent people on board and risk having the plane crash, killing everyone? Why wouldn't she just have them parachute down to the Island?

Well the whole thing with the Ajira flight was to recreate the orginal crash as much as possible, hence Jack getting his fathers shoes to put on Locke, Locke standing in for Christian.

Fourth, she wasn't always at the pendulum. We know she also worked at a jewelry store in London England for awhile, she had some ties to a Scottish monastery and a monk living there. She seems to get around a lot.

So I don't think it would have been her. At least I don't think it would make sense for it to be her, unless she also happens to work for/with the Dharma Initiative now days.

I agree that it does require her working for/with Dharma.

 

[Lindley]

The Pendulum was a Dharma station

It's call The Lamppost.

 

[Hober Mallow]

I wanna know how Ilana met Jacob. She seems to have an even more honored position than even Richard ("He was like a father to me") so what's her story?

Maybe the biggest mystery now for me is why Henry Ian Cusick is still a main star? Elizabeth Mitchell has had as much screen time this season as has Cusick.

 

[RoJoHen]

Again, I might be wrong and this is Lost so I might be wildly wrong, but given the story up to this point, I think things are becoming pretty clear.

I guess we'll have to agree to disagree. Because it ain't clear to me at all.

Fair enough. Like I said, I could be wrong.

While I'm not sure which aspects are unclear to you, I respect that this show is complex enough where people can certainly interpret things differently than others do.

It's not that any of your answers don't make sense. It's that, while they make sense, I can also come up with about 12 different explanations that ALSO make sense but completely contradict everything you've said.

Plus, every time I get it all figured out, a new episode airs that completely destroys my theories.

 

[Python Trek]

A few stray thoughts:

To my mind, it's looking more and more like the writers are trying to tie together all ancient mythologies (or at least two: Egyptian and Hebrew), by giving us a chess game or backgammon game) of good vs. evil. NotLocke reminds me a great deal of the Old Testament's Satan---he's mankind's prosecuting attorney, as much as he is its tempter. This also ties into the couple in the cave---that's Adam and Eve, I'll wager. Their skeletons shouldn't be intact after all these centuries, but the island moves through time, so...

"Jacob" is an Old Testament name. Jacob said he can't absolve sins---Yahweh/Jehovah or Jesus would be able to, though. But an angel wouldn't.....and he did say they are not in hell. I'd say that the "Lost" Island is Eden.

The producers should make a series retrospective for the season 6 DVD called "Paradise Lost".....many ancient cultures imagine the world as starting out as a perfect paradise, which becomes corrupted by the taint of evil...............

 

[RoJoHen]

^Maybe the Dharma food drop is the Forbidden Fruit.