It’s mildly interesting that the skeletons turned out the be the smoke monster and the bitch who caused everyone’s problems. But yeah, pretty weak and certainly not worthy of the HAY REMEMBER WHEN JACK AND KATE FOUND THOSE SKELETONS REMEMBER? treatment.
One thing I’m wondering, where does the idea Flocke can only change form that one last time and never again come from?
Jacob has seen one change, brother to smoke. Then another, smoke to Flocke. But now everyone has the idea, presented in the show by a ‘knowing’ character, that his ability to change form is over. He’s Flocke until…whenever he ends.
What kind of scenario allows for not one, not three, but two changes only?
Oh, you mean the scene at the end was actually from an early episode? Does anyone know which season and episode? I didn’t notice; I’ve only watched each season once.
This whole episode disappointed me in the sense that I felt robbed of experiences with the main characters. It’s kind of a drag to be in the last few weeks and then watch an episode and not have much to show for it. Maybe this would have made more sense in the 2.5-hour finale, though of course its placement seasons ago would have been optimal.
“Its.”
Wrong. She didn’t say anything to him prior to being stabbed. The instructions on How To Stab a Smoke Monster And Make It Count are:
- Don’t let the smoke monster speak.
- Stab smoke monster.
Sayid didn’t follow the first instruction, and therefore failed.
jeffd
6446
Errr, wasn’t it pretty clearly established that the point of sending Sayid to kill Smokey was so that Smokey would kill him? Because he’d lost his soul, or some such nonsense?
JD
6448
I guess it was just some shabby ‘quick-hack’ in order to get their asses covers. Otherwise you’d always be wondering why Smokey cannot impersonate his way through every problem he encounters.
I was rather disappointed by the episode. I always assumed that quite a number of the answers provided by the writers will not be really satisfying, but it seems that the pacing is really off for the whole series. Despite knowing that it would end with season 6 since mid of season 3, they waited far too long to answer some of the substantial questions. And now it’s like they’re trying to cram everything into the last 6-8 episodes.
I enjoyed Alpert’s episode, but, like the most recent episode, it also feels like the writers were desperate, thus dropping the standard narrative structure (flashbacks, sideways-flashbacks) because there still are tons of info pieces that need to get shoehorned into the plot.
It wouldn’t take me more than a minute to come up with a better explanation of why they built that donkey-wheel. Certainly better than “I know what I’m doing, I’m special, k?”
As for the “Smokey is not Jacob’s brother” theory - why can’t he kill Jacob himself then? You know, the whole “loophole” deal.
This is what Sayid guessed when he confronted Dogen, but clearly didn’t realize that he hadn’t followed the instructions as Dogen gave him. Dogen was emphatic about not allowing UnLocke to speak.
bloo
6450
Hardly. I’m simply asking you to name the comic book/fable/mythology you’re trying to refer to by not referring to it.
Senjak
6451
Seriously. Darlton said they had something specific in mind for Adam and Eve all along, but that reveal had exactly no emotional impact.
Dear Lost Writers: Good job pissing away the chance for a meaningful payoff on a 5-season-long setup. Also, the reveal that “Adam and Eve” are really “some guy and his creepy foster mother who killed his real mother” reminds me of the reveal that Lea is Luke’s sister. Don’t show us two characters kissing if you already know they’re siblings, and don’t have your main characters call the two mystery skeletons “Adam and Eve” if you already know the mystery couple weren’t a couple in the romantic/sexual sense. If the Adam and Eve skeletons were always intended to be “murdering kidnapper and one of her victims” instead of “husband and wife”, you should have placed the skeletons at least a few feet apart, and had Jack speculate on their identity without saying “Adam and Eve”.
Dear Lost Writers Pt 2: I bet the fans who thought “Adam and Eve” were really Bernard and Rose are pissed today. Here’s a few quick examples of how their idea would have made a better story than the gruel you served last night - Bernard and Rose go back in time (hundreds or thousands of years) and act as co-guardians of the [UNDEFINED] McGuffin, living nearly immortal lives in peace together, until Jacob washes ashore and volunteers to accept the guardianship from them, freeing them to move on to the afterlife together. Alternate 1, Jacob is their son (work with me here), rather than a shipwrecked stranger. Alternate 2, Jacob and MiB are both sons of Bernard and Rose, and they have a Cain & Abel conflict which throws the island out of wack, and resolving/repairing that conflict will fix the island and end its cycle of bloodshed, as well as ending the island’s negative impact on the rest of the world.
There is a fairly easy way to spin that, as Sayid was instructed not to listen to Locke say anything before he stabbed him and Jacob’s brother knifed his mom in the back prior to any conversation. So one could speculate that hearing the voice of a smoke monster somehow makes the person unable to kill him/her.
Having said that, I don’t think she’s supposed to be a smoke monster, just a “guardian” (whatever that is) like Jacob and whichever candidate replaces him.
XPav
6453
But what did it really accomplish? Does stabbing Human Smokey just make him go back down the Pretty Yellow Smokehole until someone throws a body down it?
bloo
6454
Either smokey was
- already in the light cave and released by jacob’s actions,
- created by jacob’s actions, or
- is jacob’s brother in a new form
If the former, the baby-stealer/protector probably lied about what the light is (in addition to lying about the brothers’ ability to hurt each other), though perhaps only by omission. Something she should have mentioned. Convoluted way to make it be released/created/transformed - kill someone (possibly only candidates?) very near the entrance to the tunnel.
Now my head hurts. Pending more thorough explanations, what a bunch of crap.
He’s changed more than 2 times, he’s also been Christian and Richard’s wife and probably others (including Eko’s brother).
I don’t think he had some set number of transformations in him, I think some event (probably the death of Jacob) is responsible for him getting stuck in one form. Not that I see how that makes any rational sense outside of the world of Lost, but I’m pretty sure that’s what they are implying on the show.
HRose
6456
I was just finishing to elaborate on my blog when I saw this. It’s the best description.
The reason why every time in this show a mystery is revealed that revelation is followed with some delusion and disappointment. Why? Because instead of “answers” we get just to draw another curtain. All smoke and mirrors.
We start at: why did the plane crash? And we went through all the Dharma experiments with magnetism, that caused the crash. But it wasn’t an answer, because they were called to the island and the crash meant to be. By who, why? Jacob. Because they are candidates to protect a dangerous power. So who’s Jacob and the smoke monster? We get to know their origin, first their mother and then back to: a cave with magic light. (with plenty of dead end delays along the way, like expecting Richard to actually know something)
Nothing is revealed because the nature of the mystery is constantly pushed back.
Instead of getting answers, we are simply backtracking forever. The show went through an expansion of the mythology from season 2 onward. And now with this last season we get an “infinite regression”, down to a core that is still unrevealed.
Definitely turtles all the way down. They’ve yet to explain a single thing.
I think he’s a bit of all of the above.
I think it is supposed to be the dark side of the cave (the dark side of the yin/yang within the island) and something that predates Jacob’s brother, but I also think he took on aspects of Jacob’s brother like he has since took on aspects of Locke as part of the transformation.
I thought that was the devil’s spin that UnLocke put on it.
I think he was, err, “locked” into that form when Jacob was killed. For much of the show he did impersonate his way through every problem when he wasn’t RAAWR SUBWAY DEATH CLOUDing it up.
HRose
6459
Now let’s not be totally dumb.
Do you really think that the smoke monster speaking grants it invulnerability? On what basis? Come on, it’s ridiculous.
The reason why one should let it “speak” is simply to avoid the risk of persuasion. This is a theme of the show and it was made clear in the Richard’s episode. Richard tries to kill Jacob and then Jacob persuades his to pass on his side.
It’s words that are dangerous, not that if one speaks then becomes invulnerable.
This is Lost. Nothing is off-limits. NOTHING.
