Image Credit: Mario Perez/ABCThey are not Cain and Abel. They are not Jacob and Esau. At least not the Jacob and Esau that we know from the Bible. They are not angels or demons, they are not gods or monsters, and they are certainly not incarnations of dead castaways like Juliet and Daniel Faraday. (Seriously! Whoever came up with that last idea was, like, totally stupid or totally high or totally nuts! Somebody shoot that guy before he hurts someone with nutty theories!) No, in the end, Jacob and the Man In Black turned out to have something in common with a lot of characters on Lost. [SPOILERS FOR "ACROSS THE SEA" FROM HERE ON OUT. REALLY.]
The two were revealed to be a pair of brothers who got royally screwed by some really crappy parenting.
Meet the mother of all Others–The Other Mother, if you will, in more ways than one. Nameless and lonely (and well played by The West Wing’s Allison Janney), she was the proto Rousseau, more fit to raise Claire’s fake squirrel baby than two human beings. She was a Wicked Wiccan Witch of the West, an earthy demi-goddess gone gonzo, an old world oracle-priestess gone dangerously loco. A long time ago, across the sea and far away, this wilderness mystic with the hair net tiara — Jacob’s immediate predecessor as Island guardian (and possibly The Island’s previous smoke monster, too?) — stumbled upon a shipwrecked castaway named Claudia gulping water from a stream. She took the pregnant woman to her camp, helped deliver her fraternal twin boys, and then took a rock and bashed in the poor woman’s head. (Happy Belated Mother’s Day!) She raised the children as her own. She filled their minds with interesting notions about the nature of reality and the nature of man. And through it all, she wove thread on her loom like some crafty fury of fate. What did she get out of the deal? Companionship. Motherhood. And perhaps… an ending to an eternal obligation? The Stork had dropped twin bundles on her dirty doorstep — but what may have dazzled her more was the prospect of a golden parachute offering an exit from an endless dead-end job. With her dying breath, she thanked the son she loved the most, the one that was most like her, the “special” one with the angry spirit – the dreamer, the gamer, the liar, the cynic — for stabbing her in the back and through the heart. Were the boys nothing but an escape plan for her? Did she raise one to take her job and the other to take her life? Is this the way The Island works?
“Across The Sea” promised oodles of noodle-cooking Island mythology, and we got just that — which is to say, a story that played like myth, albeit with a mean and sobering deconstructive streak. You got the sense that the drama that unfolded in this hour left some indelible grooves on the psychography of the living Island, laying track for all future drama to follow. We learned that The Island sits on a whirlpool of ethereal life-giving energy — a wellspring of eternal life, a wormhole into the afterlife, a weird-ass well of holy moley whatchamacallit. We learned that if you get tossed into this warm and fuzzy mystic maelstrom, your immortal soul gets severed from your mortal body. Behold the origin of Puffy The Magically Miffed Dragon, the spiritual portion of the Man In Black’s once-integrated person, exorcised from his coil after pissy Jacob punted his ass into the lacerating light for slaying their faux ma. And among many other things, we learned that the Adam and Eve skeletons belong to MIB’s first body and the woman who raised/warped him.
It’ll take days and weeks and probably longer for the willing to mine this sucker for all its implicit and explicit meaning. At the same time, I think we should be wary of coming to hard and fast conclusions about “Across The Sea.” In fact, I think “Across The Sea” stands as a cautionary tale about the whole business of “hard and fast” conclusions. The Other Mother said a lot of interesting stuff — but how much of it was true? Fake Locke was right: that woman was clearly a little bonkers. Regardless, the whole of her knowledge seemed to be a combination of inherited wisdom (which was probably flawed to begin with) and her own discovery and guesswork (which was surely distorted by her bias and instability). “Across The Sea” confirmed once and for all that The Island is a fundamentally spiritual place — but one that most likely defies human understanding, let alone a fundamentalist interpretation. Lost seems to be saying that the something like God actually exists — but anyone who claims to know who or what God is probably wrong, if not totally off their Jacob rocker.
“Across The Sea” was an unconventional outing that deserves props for benching its stars to give us a story that felt absolutely necessary for establishing the Big Picture context for the final act that is at last upon us. Still, I can’t say I loved it. I thought it was a collection of Grade A ideas in a Grade B package. I can sum up most of my quibbles with two words: kid actors. It really wasn’t until Mark Pellegrino and Titus Welliver showed up at the halfway mark that I leaned forward in my chair and got lost in the story… although even then, there were moments when I wondered if these two fine actors weren’t completely connecting with the material. (I wouldn’t be too surprised if some of you felt the same way. One man’s “This is meaningful stuff!” is another man’s “This is a bunch of murky bulls–t!”) More tomorrow in my recap. [UPDATE: Here it is!]Until then, consider doing these three things. 1. Clicking here to see if Herman Hesse has something to say about tonight’s episode. 2. Watching the new episode of Totally Lost, located below. 3. Posting your own thoughts about “Across The Sea” in the comments, located even further below.
I laughed. I cried. I ended up even more confused than before.
They don’t call it ‘Lost’ for nothing.
Worst episode ever. I’m shocked.
Whew. Thought I was the only one. I was left disappointed.
This is the worst episode in the series! I can’t believe up Glee for this! ugh
3 episodes left of the greatest show ever and they put it in the hands of child actors, who cannot act. One of the worst episodes ever. What was that I just watched? A complete and utter dissapointment. If you are going to have a flashback episode with Jacob and MIB at least have it with Pelligrino and Welliver the whole time. Even with them it was still a C episode.
And count me as one who thought last week was crap and this week was pure gold. If you ask me the kids were great. Loved every minute of it and was mad when the hour was up.
This episode redefined the expression JUMPING THE SHARK.
This episode was one steaming pile of crap.
Here’s my question of the night: Where did the adoptive mother come from? Was she born there or brought there? Also, I thought it was interesting she and Claudia both spoke Latin and English. I wonder if the psychic Claire visited somehow flashed back to Claudia’s murder and MIB’s transformation and saw that unborn Aaron could get wrapped up in the same scenarios.
The skeletons saved it from Worst. Episode. Ever. But just barely.
Oh come off it you guys! This episode was not crap! It was very enlightening and should take time to process…
BEST… EPISODE… EVER…
Not a good episode, the whole light gimmick was a little lame, did not like West Wing lady horning in on LOST – it breaks with the sense of fantasy, they should only go with relative unknowns. How did the lady get on the island? just more questions
TERRIBLE!
I loved this episode. Very enlightening. Cannot wait until next week. I loved last week but it left me depressed and sad whereas this episode leaves me wondering and excited for next week.
I can’t deny that I have faith in what the producers are going to do with this, but I actually had a pit in my stomach while watching, feeling like I might be watching LOST flush itself into a murky, new-agey light only to emerge a shadow of what I hoped it might be. C’mon Doc, pull out the grand meaning of it all so I can feel the relevance and that the castaways are not just unwitting participants in the game of a couple of f’d up kids…
To anyone who felt this episode sucked: tell us all how you would have done it differently, and how it should all be told. Then let’s see how many people crap on your storytelling. How about we take the show for what it is, and reserve judgement until it’s all played out.
To anyone that didn’t like this episode: You have missed the greatest Lost Mythology episode ever. This episode was pure brilliance. It explained the MOST important question of the show: What they’re fighting for! And it did it in a powerful and poignant way. Now we know why they have to keep Smokey on the island, and yet doing so is a true tragedy for Smokey, who didn’t really deserve his fate. If you didn’t think this was genius, prepare to be disappointed, because you’re just not hooking into the true spirit of the show. BRAVO DARLTON! Master storytellers!!
Interesting all the bandwagon haters…Also, anyone who claims this was the worst of the series has never watched the show. Oh well, trolls are everywhere.
I actually love the show regardless the episode.
At least one mystery in a long line of mystery solved.
Still don’t know why Walt was special.
pastafarian, we’re asked for our “instant reaction”. And it isn’t our job to write the script.
I really must not have been in the mood for the show last night because I was bored out of my mind. What a waste of an hour to tell the brothers/island story since they kept belaboring the same points ad infinitum.
well said bg17 and guy: exactly what are they fighting for and exactly why do they have to keep smokey on the island? I didn’t get real answers.
This acting was TERRIBLE in this episode (like others have said). And on top of that, it was just corny. For a show that has prided itself on realistic emotions and set pieces for 6 years, to give us a crappy golden water cave as hokey as that was just a bad idea.
sorry, just to clear up- that should be @ guy
questions: how did that woman feed two twins with no milk? why did she say she fixed it so they wouldn’t die? the brothers had a rule they couldn;t hurt each other – what kept them from breaking that rule? why did only Titus see his mom?
One of the best episodes this season.
For those that are lost I suggest paying a little more attention to detail.
Agree. First episode in the series I thought was truly bad. Bad acting, cheesy dialogue, nonsensical explainations (donkey wheel), nothing exciting, the big reveal at the end is pretty insignificant. I’m so mad.
You’re right, it wasn’t the worst episode ever. That honor goes to the pointlessness that was Jack’s tattoo & Bai Ling, followed closely by the farewell to Nikki & Paolo. This comes in at third worst, unbelievably ahead of every Kate-centric episode there’s been; that’s quite some feat.
@tipsy
Except that the producers told us that we’re never going to learn the MIB’s name. Again, his name is IRRELEVANT.
This episode was a total waste. It explained nothing but who put the two stones in the leather bag. Who cares?!!! The rest was some new age religion-like mumbo jumbo that did not advance any understanding. And the “Mother” of Jacob and brother was way too evil to be the guardian of the Source of Light (whatever that was supposed to be.)
Whoever says this is the worst episode obviously didn’t see the Paolo and Nicki hot mess. This wasn’t “The Constant” by any means, but it did answer SOME questions. My question is, how can MIB be dead at the end, but alive later on? I may be missing something big, but I don’t get it.
Skip182…You said “Also, anyone who claims this was the worst of the series has never watched the show.” I’m someone who has – most definitely – watched the show. Because I was 10 minutes late for the first show of the 3rd season, I didn’t watch the show at all that season until the DVDS came out, cause it would have been incomplete! Get that? Because I missed 10 minutes. That’s how much I’ve loved this show! And if you think this was a good episode, or told us anything meaningful about LOST – I’ve got a nice steaming pile of horsecrap you might be interested in!
I cannot begin to express my disappointment with this episode. Instead of solving any meaningful mysteries, it added about 10.
1) Where is Alison Janney character come from?
2) Did Jacob’s brother really go thru life without a name?
3) What the he|| is this glowing cave?
4) Did Alison’s character have any “powers”?
5) If not, how did she know anything about the properties of the cave?
I disagree with Doc.. Did I just say that? I think the boys did a better acting job than their other mother. I think she didn’t connect with her character AT ALL. She wasn’t very believable. You can’t tell if she is lacking emotion and heartless, or if she is a terrible actress. I believed the characters of the kids more than her. This makes me confused. Do I believe what she says about all of this or not? It seemed like the story of the light was true. Something really bad happened to the person who went inside. When I saw this episode it made me think that going into season 6, the writers weren’t sure what the island was. It seems like they had to figure out a way to keep an island story going and an off island story. I remember them saying before the season started that the fans would feel cheated or be angry if they started over off island, or if nothing happened at all with the bomb and they were all back at square one. So, they created two stories. This episode just seemed too contrived and tries to explain too many things. The donkey wheel…c’mon. Where on earth would these people get the idea for this and what it would possibly do? The story could have been much, much better! It doesn’t explain why she doesn’t want him to leave. It totally doesn’t make sense why a little boy would WANT to leave the island or go live with strangers. His other mother was good to them and they were happy… I think. Are they saying he was born bad? Why would he be “special”? He was born to a random woman. Crazy mother said she raised them so they would be good. Well, something went wrong there! I am wondering if she is crazy or not? Doc has seen future episode stuff so I guess he would know. But, he doesn’t seem to question if she is nuts or not. He just automatically and definitely said she is nuts. Isn’t it possible that she needed to do what she did to protect the light on the island? Now imagine if the part of the crazy mother was played by someone with Michael Emerson’s acting ability. We would get a better idea if she was crazy or if she needed to do all that she did. P.S. I think it was pretty cheesy to add the 1st season footage in there for people who are not long time viewers and needed an explanation for the skeletons and bag of stones in the cave. Who are they trying to cater too?
(Continued)
6) Why is Jacob so long-lived?
7) Why does the smoke monster hate Jacob? Until Jacob killed un-Jacob, it looks like he was trapped at the bottom of the waterfall.
8) What did Alison’s character mean when she said she had set it up so that the brother couldn’t hurt each?
9) Why, then was Jacob able to beat (as a child) and kill (as an adult) his brother?
10) Who built the 10 storey statue that Jacob lived in? It certainly wasn’t those hut dwellers?
yeah the kid actors were annoying, but by the end of the episode I did find myself shocked and annoyed by the fact that the hour was already over!
I ain’t done yet!
11) Why couldn’t Jacob see dead people but his brother could?
12) Are people who see the dead (e.g. Jacob’s bro, Hurley, Sawyer) eliminated as Guardians?
13) How did these seemingly ancient hut dwellers figure out about the donkey wheel? (I won’t even get into how that thing works.)
14) Assuming smoke monster inhabited the dead body of Jacob’s bro, why is he unable to leave the Island?
15) Knowing that, why would unJacob/smoke monster bother to build the donkey wheel? Cause a guy needed a hobby?
16) When did all this take place?
17) Jacob’s mom was killed by Janney who was killed by Jacob’s brother, who was killed by Jacob. Do you have to kill someone in your family to protect the Island?
18 ) Jacob was originally supposed to be the Island guardian? Does that mean the next guardian might also be someone not on Jacob’s list of six? (And here, I’m looking at you, Kate.)
19) Did Janney and the mother actually speak English or was that a convenient way to not have the whole episode in whatever language they started in?
20) Whatever language did they start in?
21) Who taught them modern English?
Three questions here, because LOST has never before shied away from subtitles. There have been nearly entire episodes in Korean, Spanish or Portuguese. I remember one episode had translations from at least 4 different languages. So why English now, unless they actually spoke English?
@ Joel-
You waited for the DVD release because you missed 10 minutes? You have the internet, darling, the episodes are available on ABC.com if you have no DVR or TiVo.That’s not loving the show, that’s unreasonable obsession that requires meds and a therapist. Or at least a trip out of your Mom’s basement to mingle with other humans.
Not that good. Sorry. This crazy woman living on a crazy island with no idea how she got there is guarding a tunnel of light? Really?! At least we know who the Adam and Eve skeletons are, but other than that the premise of having to guard the light fell flat, smelled of desperation and lacked creativity. It was not the worst episode, but close. Didn’t like the mother character or thought it was well acted. The kid actors were sometimes believable which is something they shared with the adult actors unfortunately. Let’s get back to island present and finish the story of our Losties.
This should’ve been a webisode.
They didn’t answer any of my questions except the Adam/Eve skeletons. What was that energy? How did the mother give “special powers” to her children? Why doesn’t anyone age? Did the golden energy get transferred to MIB? How did the mother get there? When does Jacob realize that the smoke monster is his brother, kind of? What about the allusions to the “game” or “rules” that they’re playing right now (~2007), how did that start? What kind of powers did the other mother have that allowed her to incinerate people? It was a fine episode, not great, but I could have used this one, like, several seasons ago… not an hour or two before the end.
Rock Golf – I believe the language that Jacob and Smokey’s mother spoke at the beginning of the episode was Latin, indicating that she was Roman and that the time period was anywhere between 500 BC to 500 AD. The statue of Tawaret and the hieroglyphics on the walls of the Temple and the Donkey Wheel room, however, were ancient Egyptian. Egypt became a Roman provence around 30 B.C., but by that Egypt was well in its Hellenistic period (Alexander the Great conquered it around 300 B.C.) and weren’t using hieroglyphics. This indicates that whoever built the statue and temple probably predated Jacob and Smokey by several hundred years. Of course I could very well be wrong.
Hey CP, did you see the smokey come out after MIB was thrown in? Did you then see his dead body? Did you see the light in the cave go out? The energy didn’t so much transfer as it was released. Jacob didn’t kill his brother, the cave technically killed him.
Most everything went crazy last night. Especially if you are also fans of American Idol (insane song choices, poor performances) and LeBron James (the Cleveland MVP played just about the worst basketball of his life–another curse for Cleveland fans). Nothing good can be on the horizon.
@Rock Golf – I came away from this ep with most of the same questions you had here. As someone else mentioned, then language at the beginning was Latin, and I presume they just didn’t want to have an entire episode in a dead language. They have had at least some native speakers for each of the other foreign language-centric episodes you mentioned. Hard to find a native Latin speaker. That said, I found the transition to English a bit jarring given the way the rest of the series has used language. Just one of many issues I had with AtS.
I loved it. I think the Lost audience can be divided into 2 major groups: 1) those who are more interested in the stories of Jack, Kate, Sawyer, and Hurley and 2) those that are more interested in the story of the island and its succession of guardians. I think that latter group is also more prone to enjoying the way Lost engages “big picture” ideas like faith vs. reason, how can a good exist in an evil world, do we have free will or are we governed by fate, etc.
@Rock Golf – They weren’t speaking English. They used the classic music cue and instant change of languages, where two people, Claudia and the mother, are talking in one language, and then suddenly you hear a sound and they’re talking in English. Also to some of your earlier questions, Jacob didn’t kill his brother. He sent his brother’s live, but unconscious body into the light, and it created the smoke monster. Remember the Man In Black is the smoke monster. His original body is dead, but the Man In Black’s soul is still very much alive.
Everyone is so disappointed… because it isn’t what you WANTED it to be?? Just sit back and enjoy it already. It’s a gold water source. So what. Didja think it was going to be something that answered real questions of the universe? It’s just a (great) tv show.
@cf: Women can breastfeed other women’s children; when the infant sucks, the body creates milk. Kinda weird and gross, but true. Adoptive mothers do it. (Google “wet nurse”)
I’d like to thank Rock Golf and everyone else here for all the questions…. LOVE THEM! Not sure whether to laugh or cry over the fact that I am sharing them with each and every one of you.
This episode was absolute rubbish. It was back to the typical lost of old, where questions are answered with even more complex questions. We’re close to the end of the series and they’re still doing this whole question answered with question thing?
Putting that issue aside, the plot was lame. I expected the story of Jacob and MIB to be epic. Everything I watched, a complete let down.
My main reaction to this episode is disappointment. Not only disappointment in the writing and story, but even more disappointment that instead of answering questions, they only made us ask MORE questions. We’re in the end game, and they are STILL introducing characters, introducing mysteries, making us ask more details about what the H is going on. It’s just too late for this.
Examples of the problems I had with it:
1) WHY does MIB have to stay on the island? “Because I said so” does not count.
2) HOW did FakeMother “arrange it” so Jacob and MIB cannot kill each other? “Because I said so” does not count.”
3) Why can MIB see his dead real mother, Claudia, while Jacob cannot? (The only interesting thing introduced in this episode, that I can think of at this point is that MIB can see ghosts, talk to the dead. THAT is why he asked Sawyer and Richard “Can you see him?” when he encountered young Jacob in the woods several episodes ago. He doesn’t know ghosts from real people when he encounters them. Is this a hint of how he might be tricked or done in? OH yes, I think so.
4) From where springs FakeMother’s “power”? WHO put her in charge of protecting “the light”? What the H IS the light?
And on and on. Really just frustrated.
Those of you who think that this episode was the worst episode ever clearly have no conception of what the show is trying to do, or what constitutes truly artistic storytelling. LOST is not about simply answering plot questions – if it were it’d be like every other banal scifi show. It’s also not just about characters – if it were, it’d basically be greys anatomy or anynother sort of drama. It’s about an artistic combination of these thngs in order to express the shows thematic core, and this episode, more than any other, did that. Yes, it raised some logistical questions about the island and the people on it, but those don’t need to be answered – this is not about satisfying the trivial plot mysteries that people seem to love, but is, ultimately, about expressing an idea, some view of the cosmos and our place in it. Tonights episode, with its depiction of the suffering and violence that links Jacob and the man in black to the castaways in a very real way, begins to draw all the story’s thematic threads together, and we begin to see that perhaps not every question should be answered – maybe that’s ultimately the point. This is the light scifi or character drama – it’s art. Unfortunately, most people seem to want the former.
Are you kidding me?
I personally think that this was an AMAZING episode and I absolutely loved every minute of it.
But I guess I just love mythology. People who were into the show only for its other aspects I guess can be disappointed.
Also, I didn’t feel the kids playing Jacob and his brother acted badly. Yes, the kid who played Jacob was a bit of a dork. But I have no doubt that it was intentional. Jacob was an innocent child and later a man. That is until he killed his own brother. He was innocent, and therefor uninteresting. I think the kid who played little Smokey was pretty good.
Anyway I think that episode rocked!
@Lior: I love Lost for its mythology and that is precisely why I disliked this episode. It had nothing to do with acting. It had everything to do with not providing the types of answers that are worthy of the investment the viewers have put in over the years. An answer that is only good if you don’t think about it too much is the opposite of the type of writing that made Lost such a wonderful show.
I really think if you hated this episode you’re just being intellectually lazy. I’ve watched it three times and there is a ton of information in it.
Sorry, I don’t buy two things mentioned in the replies to my questions.
The explanation that the music cue indicated they were translating the spoken parts to English? Way too late in the game for that. LOST has never done that in 6 seasons, and it’s “breaking the rules”. It would be like watching The Godfather and during the climatic scene suddenly break into a musical or have the Corleones attacked by flying saucers. They’ve established a consistent narrative. Whoosh sounds when we flash back forward or sideways is one example. You just don’t drop that with 2 minutes left on the clock.
The second point I disagree with is that Jacob didn’t kill his brother. He bashed his head in, sent him face down in water over a waterfall. I’d like to see you argue in court that it wasn’t murder. “Your Honor, I didn’t kill Nell. I just tied her to the railway tracks. It was the train that killer her!”
Also, it’s been pretty well established that the Smoke Monster can only replicate dead bodies. MIB, Locke, Christian, Eko’s brother. Also, Jacob buried his “family”. The human MIB was the Adam of Adam & Eve. What we’ve seen of MIB since then was Smokey in human form.
Historically, how long was Smokey in MIB form? We don’t have a time period for human MIB’s death, but based on the use of Latin it would probably have been over 1,000 years ago. Historically, the last time we saw MIB/Smokey was when Richard arrived in the 1860′s.
@Emily: What answers exactly are you missing regarding the story of Jacob and MIB?
Of course they didn’t answer a whole lot and even presented new questions, but you have to ask yourself, like the other mother said, wouldn’t an answer lead to more and more questions? Would it help if they told you that the bright light was, I dunno, God?
I agree that there are questions they definitely should answer, and I hope that they will answer at least some of them in the next 3 hours. For instance, what exactly is the Black Smoke, in terms of is it a being that existed before MIB or that was created only when MIB was thrown into the light? What is that powder the people in the temple put on the ground to keep Smokey out? Why does he have a weakness for it? How did Jacob learn all he did about how to watch the candidates (the lighthouse) and did he build it on his own?
I got more of those.
But I think sometimes giving an answer is worse than not giving one. I think if they told you exactly what everything was and how it worked it would be like “oh, ok..” and it would only be disappointing. I want answers for the big things. The things that I can’t figure out on my own in a way that will satisfy me.
Yeah I am not totally satisfied with this episode…and we still don’t know Smokey’s name!
I think there is a significance though Sayid’s last words, “It’s going to be you Jack”, eerily similar to the “Other” Mother’s words to Jacob..coincidence? I don’t think so
correction
I think there is a significance though *to* Sayid’s last words
He doesn’t HAVE a name.
I think we have not learned his name for one of two reasons.
1. His name is to significant.
Or
2. He never had a name.
and why was only he able to see his mother? there has to be some significance to why some people see lost ones and others don’t…
I think the point is that Evil doesn’t need a name. It just is.
Smokey’s name is irrelevant, because Jacob’s brother is DEAD (dead is dead). The person we’ve been seeing over the years is ONLY the smoke monster (who can inhabit the forms of our dead castaways). This Smoke Monster, in essence, is a Jinn (genie). That golden cave, his bottle. Only one soul can occupy the bottle at a time. So now, the MIB’s soul is in that bottle while Smokey is out. Prediction is that the show ends with the castaways tricking Smokey to return to the “bottle” and MIB going free.
Erik, I agree with you. Said the same thing about Smokey just taking dead brothers form. And tricking it back into the bottle is genius. Trapping the “monster” and allowing the “Man” to leave would be a fitting end.
good point, erik but what body would he use?
Smokey`s name is Aaron, folks. There`s no other name that cna be his. Think about it. he was raised by another hence why Aaron the baby must not be raised by another (or he`ll end up like Smokey). But than, Smokey himself tells Kate that he ended up like this because he had a crazy mother and that Kate should take care of Aaron because his mother, Claire, is crazy. And lets not forget that Claire came up with the name on the island. Not a coincidence since everything on the island is connected somehow. Finally, Aaron is supposedly special enough for The Others to want him, for the prophecy to be issued and for Smokey to care which woman will raise him. Smokey was special too.
One more thing. The twins mother is obviously a Roman woman (has a typical Roman name and speaks Latin), yet gives her firstborn a Hebrew name. Wanna bet that Alison Jenney gave the secondborn another Hebrew name? On Lost, everything comes in pairs. The name is Aaron, folks. You`ve heard it here first.
BTW, totally emotionally uningaging episode. I couldn`t care less for those characters and the actor who plays Jacob grates on my nerves.
disagree. MIB’s body is gone, yes. but that is his soul in there. I don’t think he was lying to ben when he said “I want to go home.” We learned last night that it wasn’t a matter of this Agent Smith-like creation that is fed up with its island job. He has wanted to go home since he was a child. As to the nature of smokey, maybe it is evil. Maybe Jacob is exaggerating. I know he killed people but so did other mother, ben, richard, etc. all in the name of the island. I wonder what mama’s reaction would have been if Jacob had wanted to leave and not MIB.
Went back and watched it about 15 times, pretty sure Sayid says, “It’s good to be you, Jack.”
Tipsy: Very insightful. You are a GENIUS!!!!
To tipsy: The twins’ mother was speaking Spanish, not Latin. Their other mother (allison janney was the one speaking latin).
Tipsy — I like your theory, but your reasoning makes very little sense.
Lockeness — No. He says “it’s going to be you,” end of story.
My two cents on the episode: the writing felt rushed and incomplete. I very rarely ask for more from the show, but in a big-picture backstory episode at the tail end of the final season, it was ponderously paced and revealed surprisingly little. And what it did reveal — about the light source — sounded suspiciously like bad science fiction writing.
Both women were speaking Latin.
to molly:
I’m from puerto rico, born and raised, fully bi-lingual in spanish and english, and the twin’s mother, Claudia, was definetely NOT speaking spanish.
Right on Tipsy. Of course. Why else would they keep it a secret?
Apparently, the language spoken was Swedish. That’s per Doc Jensen.
Claudia and mother were speaking Latin, not Spanish. Agreed that she is supposed to be a Roman woman, given her language, dress, and name.
MiB, Flocke, Smokey whatever they call him please give him a name.
I reckon his name is significant somehow.
I thought that when MIB kills his Other Mother, she calls him Jose. . . But I know that’s not right, it’s just what I heard! And I’m calling the doctor today to get my hearing checked! And is it possible that Other Mother is similar to Smokey in that she was able to do all of that damage to the camp and to fill in the future Orchid Station so quickly?
Both brothers are named Jacob.
Or not.
Just a thought.
@Molly – after years of Catholic school as a reference, let me assure you,utriusque erant narro latin (both were speaking latin)>
I realise you didn’t get the answers you wanted, but are you happy to be alive?
so now they’re all smokey? the adoptive mother, the vision of the real mother and MiB.
If this wee Star Trek, Spock would just tell Captain Kirk that this monster/computer/whatever is yanking everyone’s chain, and they’d all get together with the engine room with the klingons and have a good laugh. or a mind meld and outwit it.
don’t you get it? ABC is creating a series with no hero. just lots of killing. all of this is simply designed to lower the threshold for senseless violence and pointless plot diversions even more..if that’s even possible at this point.
This episode was just awkward, for such revelations. Don’t get me wrong, I’m a L O S T lover not a fighter. I mean we saw The Island’s life force, a little about the rules, the EM, saw the donkey wheel, found out who the skeletons are (touching flashback), saw the birth of the Smoke Monster. Still the answers lead to more questions. Here is one in particular: who took up on the reconstruction of the tunnels and donkey wheel?
I agree: awkward and unsatisfying. Here’s a thought though: Maybe the smoke monster isn’t really the brother at all, but the brother just gave him some sort of form to use?
MiB himself?
I guess so. Had enough time to. These are the tunnels underground that we’ve already seen, right? They are all connected? Was the temple built over that island heart?
the Dharma Intiative?
Charles Widmore. He finished the donkey wheel. He has a POST right where it dumps you out. And I imagine the Dharma people also sent the polar bears through.
I completely agree with Laties’ sentiments.
An episode not with out a some merit, but wholly lackluster.
I pray that Lost doesn’t try to leave these deus ex machina techniques employed in this episode.
Things were explained… and yet they weren’t!
There’s a magical (and come on, sort of cheesy) well under the island that is the source… ok but what really is it.
The mother made it so they can’t hurt eachother (which was emphasized with a cheesy reveal noise), but why and how?
What is the real deal with these rules, and the nature of island guardianship?
We see how the smoke monster was made, but HOW WAS IT REALLY MADE?! and what is it really?
I think seeing them as kids was fine, but it went on too long and the acting was pretty weak. Even the main action left me wanting.
Its like things were told, but not explained. And time is running out fast.
I think we are just going to have to accept that Jacob was able to just figgure out a lot on his own. They were speaking latin at the begining, a dead language (I like the sudden switch to english, like “you get it and we are not going to make you read the whole episode”), which means Jacob has been there a LONG time. Given that much time anyone could figgure out many misteries of the island and become as wise as Jacob seemed to be.
Just led to way more questions for me. She never told Jacob anything really so how does he know so much? Who built the lighthouse and the temple? Why is Jacob apparently magic?
I thought Alison Janey was horrible. The death scene just capped a bad performance.
The writers tell us during the scene with Allison Janney and the real mother, “I can answer your questions, but it will only cause you to ask more questions.” They were speaking to us! Also, is it possible that Locke was ‘infected’ with Smokey since the crash. Watching the Adam and Eve flashback, reconfirmed that feeling for me.
This is to Ne Oublie:
I was wondering that about the Temple construction too–it makes sense, since the healing pool seemed to be lit from beneath and it was considered a holy spot to the Other Mother–Jacob would have wanted that spot to be protected and revered.
i can ACCEPT this episode. i can accept and my mind can make since of almost any question i can make for anything lost now. i can accept that the “other mother” has possibly inherated the job from someone else, and they from someone else, and she is now entrusting the job to her “son” jacob. BUT, i have faith they will answer the question, the only question lost really is now. what the heck is the island. we know what its supposed to harbor. this well of golden watered life. apparantly it is life, death, rebirth on the island. but why? why this island specifically. who originally gave responsibility for someone to guard it. who put it there. what is it supposed to do? please tell me why!!!!!! why does the light get absorbed into man in black when he is thrown into the water and then turn into a dark cloud of smoke. but maybe its like doc said, maybe we are not supposed to understand.
After Sayid was placed into the water in the beginning of the season, and came back to life, it made me think of the ancient Egyptian game “Senet”. This is the same game MIB and Jacob were playing on the beach in tonight’s episode. If you look closely at the game board, the Egyptian symbols on the board, each stand for something in the game: House of Rebirth, House of Happiness, House of Water, House of Three Truths, and the House of Re-Atoun. In the game, if you land on the “House of Water”, you have to move back to the House of Rebirth (sound familiar?). The game goes back thousands of years, and one was even found in King Tut’s tomb with him. The game is so old, that no one can really agree on how it was truly played back then. I forgot about it because I thought there was now way Damon and Carlton could tie it in to the story. Even now, I’m going through trying to figure out how each square on the game board might relate to the characters or the story line. Maybe somebody smarter than a lowly elementary gifted/talented teacher like me can figure it out.
We learned Jacob was an unimaginative weird kid, and maybe a bit MRDD. MIB was the smart one, but dumbo Jacob killed him for killing his fake mother, who killed their real mother.
Some questions will not be answered because they only beg other questions… We may have to accept the fact that the Other Mother is where it starts and we shall see how it ends.
I think it was a great episode. I also agree that we should just understand that Other Mother is probably not the first protector of the ‘light’ and our current candidates will either take the mantle or end it all….
A couple thoughts
1) It’s obvious that there was no pre-smokey influencing Other Mother and that because she raised two twins to take her place as keeper of ‘life’ that they would become polar opposites. I think if Jacob would have been thrown in the light that he would have become something more, must i say, angelic? Does being thrown in the light become a manifestation of your soul?
2) Because Kid In Black was the first to see dead people and Jacob was unable to, what does that say about Hurley? Is this some random gift or is Hurley deep down really evil?
To paraphrase Freud: Sometimes a smoke monster is just a smoke monster.
Oops, sorry, I was trying to reply to Luke, and clicked wrongly. Liked both posts.
I accept that the Other Mother is where it starts, but I wanted more answers about where it went, if that makes sense. I guess I thought this episode was going to answer WHY and WHAT is being protected on the island. Janney’s explanation was too vague (basically just ‘This light is everything’) (Oh LOVED her performance and loved her in The West Wing) And I still have the same main questions I came into this episode with and plenty new ones, too. What are these rules and how are they enforced? (I guess just cuz Mommy said so and Jacob drank some wine?) What IS the smoke monster? (A dead person that went into the light?)How come the smoke monster can take on the form of dead humans? (Cuz MIB could see dead people in his real life? Oh! That makes me think Hurley will be the final candidate. It seemed Other Mother wanted him to be the protector anyway and Hurley and MIB share the ability to speak to the dead)What the EFF does ‘It only ends once’ mean and HOW does Jacob know that? It would not have killed them to add a two minute conversation that goes like, ‘One day, I’ll get you’ ‘No you will not.’ ‘Well, you know there will be a big showdown, cuz {insert amazing revelation} and then we will know who wins.’ How can Jacob do ANY of the things he does? How could he travel off Island to touch all of these people, but MIB can’t leave? Who built the four-toed statue? When Jacob gave Richard the wine, wasn’t he basically doing what Other Mother did without saying some weird spell over it first? And if she needed to say words, why did she not teach them to Jacob? How does Jacob know Korean? WHY do I like MIB more than Jacob at this point? And if smokey is not MIB anymore, cuz he’s dead, how come he still has his human desires? And MIB said Jacob took his body, not his life, so is he still his human self, just trapped as a smoke monster? Is the smoke monster separate from MIB? Have they merged? Is there internal conflict? What did the Others know about the smoke monster? Where did the Others even come from? (Wasn’t everyone dead when Richard got there? If Others came post Ab Aeterno, why did they not accept non-aging Richard as their leader? Did Jacob choose? Why? How come his approach to choosing a replacement so much less save than his ‘Mother’s’ Where did the lighthouse come from? Other Mother wasn’t looking at a mirror to find a replacement. Well, at least I know who Adam and Eve are. If I really think about it, that is probably the question I’ve been a-ponderin’ the longest. Everything was just too ‘This is how it is.’ MIB simply KNEW to build a frozen donkey wheel and his people just figured out that harnessing the energy could get them off of the Island? There is not a lot of Lost left, and I am terrified that there is simply not enough time to answer ANY of these questions. For the very first time I am disappointed with an episode. I am frustrated and actually AFRAID that this will not end with me saying ‘This is great.’ I SOOOOOOO hope I am wrong.
@Lattie:
Other Mother already explained this “every question I answer will simply lead to another question.”
Ugh. If I accepted that as an answer, I wouldn’t have spent 5+ years on this show!
@ lattie – i totally agree with all your questions!!! one more: why did other mother wait 30 years to kill all of mib’s people? why didn’t she do it when they got to the island?
All the questions this show has raised are not going to be answered. That’s a foregone conclusion. Am I the only one who thinks the ride was as important, if not more important, than the destination? Wasn’t puzzling over unanswered questions the main allure of the show? Wouldn’t a great gift from the writers be to leave some stuff unanswered, thus the puzzling and theorizing can continue long after the show is gone?
That’s just life. Sometimes things don’t get wrapped up as neatly as we would like.
Lattie, I think that is the point. It is a commentary on faith and mythology. The show itself is what it is trying to comment on. I think it was maybe Evangeline Lilly that said in an interview this week or maybe it was Michael Emerson, either way, one of them said that the anger over the show and it’s lack of answers is exactly the response the creators want to elicit. You are the castaways more than ever at that point.
Didn’t love the episode, but didn’t hate it either. I thought the two kid actors were pretty good, however once Pelligrino and Welliver showed up everything improved. It was an interesting attempt to explain the mythology of the island without someone just making a list of reasons why it is a “special” place that has to be protected.
See, see, I think it ISN’T a well of life. It’s a font of EVIL. All Other Mother said was that it holds something in vast supply that we all have a “little bit” ourselves.
Think about it. Why would plunging MiB inside a font of life turn him into an evil smoke-being? And wouldn’t that make keeping it contained that much more important?
Justin and And There It Is… I get it. Everything isn’t going to get answered. The whole show has been about faith vs reason (or science). That’s fine. Unfortunately, this episode was poorly written and acted. I wasn’t invested at all, and I got the sense that the actors weren’t either. Religious folks often use faith as an argument (excuse) to justify their world view. Lindecuse are doing the same thing. They can now use faith as an excuse for bad writing, missed plot lines and any other sins of the show. And, though I’ve mostly enjoyed the Lost ride, that’s where I call BS.
Skeeter – absolutely agree. I was terribly disappointed in the episode, for all the reasons you gave. Just like the Numbers, the Whispers and Christian, the answer to Adam/Eve does not hold up to scrutiny. When Jack found the bodies, he said the clothing was about 30 or 40 years old. Why did the writers have him say that if they knew the bodies would end up being centuries old? Because it was yet another mystery created before they knew the answer. At this point I’d rather have no answers than lame ones.
Thank you, thank you Lattie, for all those questions which are my own (and I hope DrJ reads ‘em and comments). A few more among the hundreds more inside me: Was the Mother maybe also a smoke monster? How else did she kill and burn all those villagers, and didn’t it look just like the temple aftermath when Smokey moved through? Why did Jacob seem like such a simpleton throughout this ep? If dead people only appear to the “special” ones, WHY DID SAWYER SEE GHOST CHILD JACOB?
Also, JJ says “they’re not gods,” but if they’re immortal, then they sort of ARE. Mom/sons never die and have special powers. Call ‘em demigods if you like… ?
I am completely upset that because Jacob was “the good kid”, couldn’t lie, always made the right choice, etc., and he was portrayed as weak and stupid. I hate that. KIB was selfish and still was the favorite. That aside, I thought the episode showed Jacob’s humanity when he finally did get angry and did something he shouldn’t have. I think he unleashed Smokey, and yet tied his fate to Smokey. Hence his wanting to kill Jacob. Makes you wonder, did the island make them polar opposites? Would they have been light and dark if they had been raised by their real mother? Maybe that explains why he could see his mother…she wanted him to leave because she knew his fate. OR he could see his mother because he was looking for something, like Hurley (acceptance, answers, etc.)I don’t think that makes Hurley evil. Another thing, fake Mom was confused when two babies were born. I think she was looking for one to take her place and when two were born, she didn’t know what else to do except raise them and see if the answer presented itself, which it did.
I am loving the above post that Smokey is named Aaron. Interesting.
“Mother” realized from his birth that there was something different about the 2nd boy (that’s when she suddenly killed the mother). Could he have been stillborn and “inhabited” by Smokey?
Why would KIB insist on “going home”, saying he didn’t belong there when he was born on the island?
I think “Mother” killed MIB, she told Jacob she had to let him go, and it was Smokey, posing in MIB’s body who killed “Mother”.
What about Walt? That’s the story I want! Walt was also “special”…just like MIB. In the mobisode they showed all the dead birds outside his holding cell and we were also shown that the others were scared of him. But he made it off the island. I want to know his significance. How does he factor in?
Donna Rose, Other Mother wore the same dress for 30 years with no apparent signs or wear, so my thinking is that their clothing just didn’t age (or deteriorate) normally, which would throw Jack’s estimate off!
I haven’t seen this mentioned yet but the smoke monster is not jacob’s brother. Smokey was able to take the man in black’s form because he died when Jacob pushed him into the light. Smokey also took the form of Jacob and mib’s real mother. It manipulated the mib into joining the other group and to eventually killing his other mother.
What did I just write?
I get you, and that’s what I was thinking too. We can feel sorry for the brother because he’s not the one doing the evil! It’s the smoke monster using his body.
Luke.. you are so right. At least it sounds like you could be, esp about how Smokey existed before to kill the other mother. But wait, does that mean other mother = smokey? and she wanted to be killed?
That thought occurred to me, too. I still can’t get the idea of the ‘duality of man’ out of my mind either. Did part of MIB live on in Jacob’s conscience or being?
I think you may be onto something, Luke!! I need to ponder this for a bit…
Did MIB die when he was pushed? B/c the whole time we’ve been told it’s “against the rules” for Jacob and MIB to kill each other. But I’m with you: something (Smokey?) took the form of Claudia. So…we still don’t know what Smokey is or how it originated. Right? Or are we asking for too much?
MIB said that Jacob “stole” his body. Which leaves me to believe that MIB is Smokey.
Luke-I agree with your theory, except for one problem. If Smokey is not Jacob’s brother, why couldn’t he(in the form of Locke) kill Jacob?
I think he was transformed, not killed, when he was thrown into the stream of light. His body simply remained. There are some other interesting theories in this section suggesting the light was the smoke monster and it was released when MIB floated down into it.
Luke, that’s a lot of speculation going on. Why couldn’t the smoke monster have just been created when Jacob’s brother floated into the Light? What could make you think it manifested itself into a mother and raised 2 children in some elaborate scheme to keep itself on that island?
I hear ya. I’m just staying with the premise of the “long con”. I think smokey was held at bay by Alison janney’s character. He plotted to kill her so he could escape. So smokey manipulated young mib so he would leave her and set the stage for him to kill her. Smokey is the one that filled the well and killed mib’s peeps. Only before mib killed her she’d already chosen Jacob as her replacement so smokey still couldn’t leave. So he had to start the long con over again to kill Jacob. Maybe the “rules” are smokey can’t kill the island’s protector.
Crap…nosebleed
extrapolate it a bit further!
Smokey took possession of the second baby as it was about to be birthed because it was stillborn! He can only possess the dead. Thus he was free to roam the island for the first time. That is why no babies were born later, to prevent him from claiming another infant’s life. When Jacob killed him and threw him into the light/watery cave, smokey was forced back out in his real form, pure smokey evil!
The devil, if you prefer…
@Caleb-your comment was awesome!
Claudia was the real Claudia ghost…just like michael, or the last time richard talked to his wife. Or Jacob talking to hurley. It’s just apparitions, remember? The island has a bunch of trapped souls. And smokey is the MiB. You guys are overanalyzing so much your mixing up the facts and logic with nonsense.
Caleb, that’s some nice thought work there.
My guess is that all people that die inside the island are trapped in it (their souls or whatevs) thats why hurley and MIB can talk to them. I also think MIB ( now smokey) can only transform into people who died OUTSIDE the island but whose dead bodies are INSIDE the island (thats why he took christian and locke’s bodies), therefore i don’t see how the “smokey tricking mib into joining the other people” could work since the real mother died IN the island… my head hurts a little
Caleb – Interesting ideas, but there were babies born after that on the island (eg. Ethan Rom). They couldn’t be born only after the ‘incident’
I wish Jacob let MIB walk into the light on his own instead of throwing him in. It would have been a more meaningful way to show how he “became” the smoke monster. I thought they couldn’t hurt each other??? Now I kind of hate Jacob, AND I’m more confused about the rules. The time for us having to make assumptions should be over. This was THE episode to finally tell us everything–temple, statue, donkey wheel, lighthouse, how Jacob gets off the island and “recruits” people (and who told him how)–and they gave us none of it. But hey, at least we know who Adam and Eve are!! (honestly, a fun thing to learn, but c’mon) Stop d!cking us around already. I’m sick of feeling “backed up” after these blu ball inducing hype-isodes. Had such high hopes for this one. The time for being C-teases is over fellas—I demand satisfaction!
I think Smokey was the Other Mother. She orchestrated the whole thing so MIB would kill her so she showed up as the real mother. She split the job up. Jacob is the islands protector and he is in charge of finding the replacement. MIB is the enforcer.
Like the idea “Jacob and Ben” described, it’s helping me think through this very thick ep. The story did validate one feeling I’ve had all along, that Jacob wasn’t all sweetness & light. e.g., I was not too thrilled with him delaying Sayid in order for Nadia to be killed. Also, if it hasn’t already been noted, Jacob handling MIB’s body after the tunnel is probably significant, as is the frustrating lack of a name for the MIB.
Are you sure that the MIB is not Jacob’s brother? If not, then why can’t he kill Jacob? Why does he need Ben to do it? Or is the MIB Jacob’s brother–his ghost brother?
Luke is right on with it. It’s not hard to follow given everything that has happened. MIB is dead, the evil/smoke took over his form. It is trying to get off the island. The “rule” is that the evil can’t directly kill the island protector. It’s not that hard to understand.
I am more inclined to believe in the “long con” idea as well… I think the rules apply to the protector and Smokey, not Jacob and MIB. It was pretty clear that the brothers could hurt each other. Smokey appeared as Claudia to con MIB into killing his mother because Smokey couldn’t do it himself. That would also draw parallels to how Smokey played on Sawyer, Kate, Claire, etc.’s desire to leave the island, just like it did with kid in black. The problem I have with this is, if the “long con” theory is true and Smokey just took MIB’s body, what is the “fate worse than death” that the Mother referred to, and also if it’s true, there seems to be very little time left for the show to explain it to us, and what exactly Smokey is. Essentially, it’s too late in the series to be posing more questions; answers would be greatly appreciated. We shouldn’t have to be speculating on so many issues that should have been addressed in full in “Across the Sea”.
I was thinking along the same lines as Luke and Caleb. I think the Smoke monster was released when Jacob sent his brother into the “light”. I think Smokey came to young MIB as their Mother. I do think it is interesting that young MIB could see the dead and not Jacob. This explains why Flocke could see young Jacob. As for earlier theories about Jack and Sawyer being the ultimate replacements for Jacob/MIB it was somewhat reinforced knowing that both Flocke and Sawyer saw young Jacob. I liked the episode and am excited/sad to know that it is almost over.
I put this in at the end, but I am starting to agree. The real MiB is dead just like the real John Locke. Smokey downloaded Jacob’s memory of his dead brother and has since been using it to manipulate him. What?
I agree with this theory the most. To clarify, I think there are two “rules” in effect here. The evil (smoke monster, etc.) cannot kill the guardian/protector directly (but can manipulate others into killing). MiB and Jacob also cannot kill each other as per their’s mothers rules. The “fate worse than death” might be disintegration of soul and body and integration of soul with the evil (which can be considered a form of hell or a fate worse than death). The evil, which spawns from the source, can take on various dead people’s forms. Similarly, the guardian (now Jacob) can make up his own rules about how to use humans to keep the evil in check in a proactive manner (an idea suggested by Richard).
Among the candidates, they all have potential to become either part of the evil or become a guardian. So that would explain various people seeing dead people (which could also be Jacob and evil manipulating them).
The”Adam and Eve” comment by Locke is actually off since it’s mother and adopted son.
And of course, this “system” to keep the evil in check is passed on and on, ad infinitum. It would be nice to know the first event, but this might be a chicken and egg question.
@michelle j: why did Flocke see a young Jacob? he didn’t die when he was young. And why did Sawyer see him?
Luke (and all who follow): Great theories, but I just don’t see how they can set up another complicated red herring/mystery with only 3.5 hours left. There is simply not enough time to reconcile all your conspiracies AND resolve the main story of the casdtaways. From this point on, we either take things at face value (as it were) or resolve ourselves to the fact they will never be solved
I don’t think MiB was dead when he floated into the light. But I do think when the smoke was released it took MiB’s body with it and dumped it. Jacob did find him in a position that suggested he was dropped.
I feel so sorry for “naive” Jacob and “tempted” MiB – oh we should just call him Adam!! They did love each other, and only by a snowballing series of events did it turn ugly. They sure can hold a grudge!
I think the only way MiB can leave is if he is killed – I agree with earlier posts that the Other Mother was also the smoke monster…how else could she slaughter that village…or she knew how to control it.
I thought it was a wonderful episode and I am not caught up with the kid actors, or answering questions with questions stuff. I know the producers want us to come up with our own conclusions about a lot of things…they can’t answer everything! I loved the flash to Season 1 in the caves, I got goosebumps!! And I cried, I don’t know why, probably because something actually came full-circle on the show, and it is The End.
No no no. MIB became the smoke monster not the other way around.
As much as it makes my head hurt to think about a paradox, I think Luke is on the right path. The story of the island has probably been going on forever, but our story, the one since flight 815 crashed, started last night. I do think the Other Mother was the Smoke monster because the death of that camp looked just like all the other mass killings we’ve seen the smoke monster mete out. Because LOST is a fundamental story of love, I think only someone who loves the smoke monster can kill him (or in this case her). And when it dies, it becomes ‘Locked’ (pun intended)onto the island (genie in a bottle) unless it gets a new lifeform. In this case, MIB was ‘fed’ to the cave and thus became the new lifeform. But then again, the Other Mother told Jacob now he was ‘just like her’ so my own theory doesn’t quite hold water. ACCCKKK I think I just had a brain bleed. If you strip away all the stories and look at it in it’s basic form: it is that MIB wants off the island to see what else is ‘out there’. Jacob wants to keep him there because he’s evil, no longer the MIB but the MIB’s desire is with the Smoke monster. This time around Jacob was killed, but I think he’s come back in the form of Desmond so while the LOST story tellers are making us think it’s Jack, is it possible that the real showdown is between Desmond and Smokey? The sad thought is, we started with two (MIB and Jacob) and we’ll end up with two so the story can start all over again. I don’t know who the ‘two’ are yet, but we’ll end up with two. How Widmore fits in, I don’t know. How the sideways world fits in, I don’t know that either. But that’s ok – we still have a couple of episodes left. Gosh I love getting LOST in this show (and I’m going to miss it).
You’re all forgetting the comment Allison Janney made to Jacob when warning him never to enter the cave: “Will I die?” “No, something worse than death”…or something to that effect. What that suggests to me is that MIB is not dead, but something worse than dead, that MIB’s soul left his body and became the pillar of smoke, with the ability to temporarily assume the physical forms of people whose dead bodies are on the island (including his own, presumably–which would explain the multiple times we’ve seen him after this transformation, i.e., the end of Season 5). Perhaps it’s also why he can’t leave the island, until of course he PERMANENTLY assumes another physical form (Locke). I thought the episode was disappointing in other ways, mostly the production design…kept feeling like I was watching an episode of Xena Warrior Princess or something. Production design has been pretty bad all season long, actually…
Regarding the ‘Other Mother’ making it so they couldn’t hurt each other, I suspect she made it so MIB couldn’t hurt Jacob. My guess is she didn’t think Jacob was capable of hurting MIB because he was the ‘good one.’ She also made a point of admitting she was a liar.
Hey Luke – you are right and hit the nail on the head. I went to sleep last night thinking the same thing. The MIB who was Jacob’s brother no longer exists so what you said made perfect sense. But it is Lost so I can understand your confusion. lol.
And the appearance of the twins mother was just a manipulation by Smokey to do his long con to set into motion his plan or plans whatever they may be. We think it is to get off the island but that was the original MIB’s plan. What are Smokey’s true desires anyway? He seems to take on the desires of others and make them his own for his purposes. I think a lot was gained from last nights ep but it started kind of slow due to the child actors. It was a fair episode in my opinion…not the best not the worst.
Mib’s soul transformed into the smokey leaving his body behind. I believe that their mother was the protector keeping smokey in the cave, and Jacob let it out when he threw his brother in there.
MIB and Smokey are the same entity – they are not separate. How do I know this? Because Michael Giacchino used the Smokey/MIB theme music when MIB was born, and anytime you saw MIB in this episode. MIB very clearly became the Smoke Monster when he was flung into the source. He just left his mortal body behind as he is now primarily smoke. You guys are over-thinking this.
They described the light, as sort of a beginning and end of all life, almost like a collection of the stuff that souls are made from. I agree that Luke is over-thinking. When MIB’s body was sent into the light, his soul left his body, and became the smoke monster. I don’t think it’s any more complex than that. Isn’t that complex enough.
I disagree. I’m (fairly) certain that Smokey didn’t exist until Jacob pushed his brother into the…spring? “Mother” told them that if you went down there, you wouldn’t die, you would be worse than dead. To me that implies you would still exist somehow, but not in a way anyone would want to exist. (My lack of complete certainty is because I don’t know how she knew this with prior experience of a Smokey-like entity).
I agree 100%
I don’t think smokey was created when MIB went into the light, I think he has always been there and manipulated MIB to go with the others and ultimately kill his other mother. It had smokeys prints all over it….The monster just didn’t know that by that time Jacob was chosen as the replacement and so the monster started another plan of how to get rid of Jacob.
More proof that smokey is just MIB in a different form. He told Richard – “The devil betrayed me, he took my body, my humanity”.
I like the idea that the dark twin was possessed by the smoke monster when he was stillborn – this would fit with the ‘rule’ that we’ve witnessed that the monster can only assume the form of those that have come to the island dead (Yemi, Christian, and Locke), and supposes that the monster pre-existed Jacob’s arrival, as part and parcel of the light source, maybe.
Alternatively, it could be that the MIB was transformed into the pillar of smoke when his body was sent to the light. This would be in agreement with the Mother’s comment that entering the light was ‘a fate worse than death.’ Maybe when he transformed he became a manifestation of his ability to lie i.e. assume the identity of others in order to promote a false perception. This has proven very troublesome on the island and would be even more so off-island.
I liked the episode and thought they did a pretty good job dealing with a mythological time, considering it’s television. I am looking forward to the finale, but have felt at times disappointed by some of the mystery revelations. By the same token, I was extremely disappointed by George Lucas revealing the Force as a cellular organism in Episode I, so I’m happy to have certain mysteries left unanswered.
And when in last night’s episode did you see a smoke monster BEFORE Jacob pushed the MIB into the light? The smoke monster came out of the light AFTER MIB went in. So, how did the smoke monster manipulate the teen-age MIB, when it wasn’t around until he DIED?????
I was also disappointed. I feel like they could have covered the important information in about a third of the time. I can’t believe we only have a couple of episodes left. I fear I’ll be disappointed…
Allison Janney guarding the leprechaun’s pot of gold at the end of the rainbow? That was weird.
I hope the Producers don’t think they could put crap together and us DIE hard LOST fans will accept and enjoy it. We won’t!!! I’m worried about the finale.
Totally disappointed. It was contradictory, pointless. It really was a waste.
I never want to see that cave of light ever again! It was so cheesy. Unfortunatly, I think were going to see alot more of it in the finale.
With last week’s episode and this one about the ‘guardian’, I really think all this is about / for Jack as the replacement and everyone else is disposable. Very bad ending, but what’s left to tell with only 3 hours remaining?
Reply @ Forrest, I agree that the end game is coming too soon, really, to do much more. I felt this mythology ep came too late and was a momentum killer given how little time we have left. Allison Janney’s character was pretty nutso, she didn’t seem like much of a mastermind. I really wonder if we’ll find out what is the Island’s ultimate intelligence. Is it just nature/physics or is there a godly consciousness in there as well? This ep was also distracting in that last week it seemed that Flocke was evil but now again we can really see his point of view. Makes for good ethical education but muddy drama.
It hurts me to say it, but last night the emperor showed up on my screen completely naked.
Don’t think the ep is pointless. Not to the point of Jack’s tatoo / Bai Ling’s mess. But it definitely can be shorted to 20 mins. 2 weeks left and you really can’t put this kind of ep right before finale. You shouldn’t introduce yet another new character.
As far as island backstory, this episode was monumentally important and I thought they did a great job of cramming in the important stuff into just the time they had – the nature of Jacob and MIB, the using of religious dogma to control/manipulate them (and all of the others before them), the establishing of the fact that it’s scientific properties, not some spiritual “specialness” that makes the island important.
I’m surprised how many people don’t simply don’t understand what was revealed last night and/or seem to actually be disappointed that Jacob and MIB aren’t “gods.”
Does anyone know what the mother was rubbing on her legs and why????
If they aren’t gods, what are they? They live forever and cannot be harmed so they are some type of charmed or supernatural beings.
I think the Mother was rubbing her leg to ‘twine’ or tangle the fabric into string.
CRAP. POO. GARBAGE. YES, yes yes it is LOST but nothing was answered, more questions appeared and, dare I say, I can’t wait till it’s over.
Hear hear. It’s a big circle all right, circle jerk.
Concur with all of the negatives. AND it is completely contradictory with the other two Jacob/MIB episodes. How does MIB come back in his original form to chat with Jacob? Why does he STILL want to leave if he’s already dead? How can Jacob grant immortality? How can Jacob see the future? How can Jacob leave the island (and MIB can’t)? DUMBDUMBDUMB! Worst episode ever!!!
@torifan. I’m sure MiB can come back into his original form because he can kinda do that with dead people on the island…yes? no? And he probably likes his own self best. MiB needs his soul to die, that is the only way he can leave – but he has to make sure that Jacob is dead and any replacement is dead too. If there is only one person left, then they take up both roles..like the Other Mother. MiB can’t leave now because his soul is trapped (re: the whispers) As for Jacob and his ‘powers’: it was the magical loopdidoo wine. That’s it. Like it, hate it, or come up with your own idea…it likely won’t get answered here.
You sure can tell the people who prefer science over faith. Well this show gives you a mumbojumbo load of both and a little bit of crazy too
I totally agree, I can’t wait until it’s over. Not a good investment!
so relieved to see others disliked it. I was very disappointed. I thought the acting and writing were below par and the explanations were way too simplistic. If this were the pilot I never would have watched the show and I am a HUGE fan. Way too elementary, the child actors were terrible and to be blunt – the writing seemed like a twelve year old did it. Not happy at all.
What’s with the MIB kid looking like an emo High School Musical star? Distracting…
I’ve seen NOTHING to indicate that MIB is any more “evil” than Jacob (or their “other mother”).
Other Mother killed MIB’s entire group so he couldn’t leave the island (and supposedly she’s “good”).
MIB tried to blow up everyone in the sub, but if he had “good” reasons how is that any worse?
The Other Mother was someone crazy to some degree; She could be lying about some things she said, and just be wrong/crazy about some other things.
Choosing to do what she asks (like the unbelievably incurious Jacob) versus wanting to learn more (ie, eat from the “tree of knowledge”) like MIB is either good, naive, bad, or stupid, depending on your point of view.
I really loved it. It’s sad that so many people have set their expectations so unreachably high that they can’t just relax and enjoy a well-told story.
I don’t think it’s fair to judge this like it should have been good enough to be a pilot episode. It wasn’t written to be a pilot episode.
Look, I was hoping for a bit more clarity than LOST gave us this week, but I also am pretty sure that a bunch of this will be addressed in the next two episodes. I think that this episode was just supposed to show the core story behind the conflict between Jacob and MIB.
On May 24th, we can all come back and really evaluate how it all ended.
@captac: MIB kid looking like a HSM star- I thought the same thing! Nice hair for a kid with no hair stylist.
Consider: Something keeps mucking with the forces of chance in order to bring people to the island. It happened before Jacob, so it was either The Other Mother (and now Jacob’s doing it having been heir to the world’s most unsatisfying job) or it’s something else. Certainly seems odd that if the Cave of Non-Specific Light needs to be protected, and its protector is apparently (one dagger notwithstanding) immortal, why would it bring people to The Island?
-
Now, if the Oceanics were only brought by Jacob, did he know he was going to die? Was his term up? Was he sick of the job?
–
And is MIB actually Smokey (his consciousness or soul) or did Smokey just take on MIB’s shape after He Who Shall Not Be Named died? Or, is the answer somewhere in between? See, The Other Mother (TOM) seemed to be the one who set ‘the rules’ and made it so Brother Black and Brother White can’t directly kill each other — but they sure can bloody each other up.
–
All in all, I saw the episode as just Jacob’s origin tale. And while it didn’t answer much about everything else (MIB/Smokey included) without posing more questions, it at least tells us where blondie came from and how he got The Job.
I agree….I feel sad that I’m so terribly disappointed by this episode, esp so close to the end. Too many pat, simplified, non-expository statements. Just sort of, “Here’s the way it is; your questions don’t matter; accept it and move on.” Very, very disappointed.
This episode was one STEAMING PILE OF CRAP. Very disappointing.
Miss you Mr Eko!
I thought for sure everyone would be gushing over how great it was. I’m very happy to see that most thought it was as bad as I did. I’m going to be naive Jacob though and assume it’s all a part of the show’s master plan.
Mr. Eko, I bet you’re just happy to have been killed off before the show started to really suck
I am still confused about how Marsellus Wallace’s soul from the briefcase in Pulp Fiction showed up on the island.
After all the combination for the briefcase is “666″. Bazinga!
LOL! Can’t believe i didnt think of that sooner!
Wasn’t Wallace one of the potential candidates’ names? Whoa.
You beat me to it, but that was the first thought that came to mind. That, and Raiders of the Lost Ark.
Wasn’t Wallace one of the names in Jacob’s lighthouse?
Wallace was #108…
hahahahahahahahahahah made me spit on my monitor!
Weird: It’s Marsellus Wallace’s birthday today. I’m not kidding.
haha awesome
lmao…had the same thought about wallace AND about Raiders. too funny!
In the midst of all these complaints and negative comments, that was, for lack of a better word, spectacular. Comment of the week, right here.
lol bazinga
Freakin Hi-LARIOUS!
this show is not going to give you easy “good or evil” answers. it’s a show about characters and their choices. you are in for a disappointment if you are waiting for LOST to provide meaning for you–it’s given you some of the best acting in the history of television and, like life, it’s the journey, not the destination that counts. Awesome series that we all will be re-watching for years even after we know the “answers”.
I have to agree. It’s the journey that counts. I’m still digesting the episode, but the more I’m thinking about it the more I like it.
I totally agree with you. However, I guarantee you that the majority of the people who bother to post on this site will be disappointed in whatever the finale turns out to be. You give answers and they complain. You don’t give answers and they complain. I feel people just like complaining about the show.
Sorry, nope. Love the show and everything it stands for…and this was crapola! IT MADE NO SENSE AT ALL!!! With no guidance, how does Jacob learn to leave the island? How does he pick/find the candidates? Why are there candidates when Jacob/MIB were random? This was just plain dumb!
I completely agree! Anyone who knows this show, knows it’s NOT OVER YET!!! There is still time for answers, and I beleive we’ll get them! I have a TON of questions regarding the candidates, their ultimate demise, and how that helps MIB’s goal to “leave the island”…but, I also have faith in the creators. They’ve done a phenomenal job with this series!
As far as how Jacob leaves he island? Though not confirmed, it would seem that he has tapped into the “source” that his “brother and gang” discovered. The time-travelling gig. I was soooo put-off by the whole “light in the tunnel” thing, until I saw MIB’s scene w/’other mother’ and the donkey wheel in the corner. Whew! Redemption. Jacob clearly utilized the time-travelling source.
And, let’s not forget…we’re quick to judge the light in the tunnel…blah, blah, blah. But, perhaps that’s the “eye of the island” that Locke saw in Season 1. The most beautiful thing he’s ever seen. Perhaps that was the beginning of the transisition between Locke/MIB?
I’ve compleely enjoyed the best TV shoe ever but I really want one real explanation of the origin of the Island. I was hoping that MiB and Jacob were aliens deposited on a created island that was their prison.Each was tasked to try to determine if humanity was worth saving and the one that proved our worth, either worth saving or obliterated by the aliens, would be restored to their alien world as a free, reformed creature.Please tell us if the island is eternal, created by some God or a physical anomaly that simply is.Where did the special powers of MiB and Jacob and crazy faux Mom come from? Science or faith?
I really enjoyed this episode, some answers, but so many more questions. Really looking forward to see the finale, although there is something I fear, and if it happens, my TV will suffer the consequences. For some reason I am thinking Smoky Man’s name starts with a “J”
We learned that Jacob was an honest, loyal kid who loved his flawed mother figure and his “brother”. He didn’t buy that people are evil by nature, he observed and came to his own conclusions. He didn’t agree with MIB but visited him anyway. Most people are capable of doing wonderful things and terrible things, according to the circumstances. This episode illustrated the complexity of human nature.
I want to hear about Walt? That’s the story I want! Walt was also “special”…just like MIB. In the mobisode they showed all the dead birds outside his holding cell and we were also shown that the others were scared of him. But he made it off the island. I want to know his significance. How does he factor in?
Lost is just another James Ford long con. We’re being played for suckers. This show really has nothing to tell us.
I totally agree! In fact i agree with all the fans who said this episode sucked. It only confirmed that Jacob and MIB are brothers, and were raised by a psychopathic priestess. Considering these are the ALL IMPORTANT, ANSWERING episodes then why am i being left with even more questions than the first bloody season! I truly feel i have wasted hours of my life investing so much time and faith in these writers. I always suspected Jacob wasn’t the “good guy” he was made out to be and this episode vindicated my Support of MIB! Lost has lost My respect and KNOW that the last episode will not be “beautifully sad” like Jack said it would be.
its a pity the writers led us true fans on only to leave us with nothing! Jerks.
@Lost My Support: You are Ben Linus / Richard Alpert responding to Jacob’s snub / death, respectively.
Well said “we are lost”. What were you people looking for? Some sort of enlightenment? A way to cope with all of life’s problems? MEANING? It’s a TV show, not a religious experience.
I’ve loved this season so far, but I thought tonight’s episode was unwatchable. The acting and writing were terrible. (Both the acting and writing reminded me of the more stilted moments in the generally poor Star Wars prequels.) By the end of the episode, I didn’t care about Jacob, MIB, the island, or any other mystery on Lost. What a waste.
I kept asking myself if it was because of the kids, but I also got a Star Wars prequel vibe. I was okay with most of the writing, but the acting really got to me, especially considering the typically wonderful acting Lost usually gives us.
HELP!! I am so confused. I guess now I know why the show is named Lost. Because I don’t know where to say I get it now or to say what a minute it can’t be about the light. I am leaning towards the later but hoping for clarity with accepting that I do get what the light is, but really what is it. We can’t be left hanging. I need to know why it is the light and what really is the light. Something worse than Death, but life and death and….I don’t know. I am so LOST!!!! Help Doc, please help us to understand more tomorrow with your recap.
Maybe the “something worse than death” thing has to do with being a LOST fan and waiting six years to end up only having more questions than answers. Maybe wasting so much time caring about a television show is the fate that is worse than death.
I liked the episode. I was riveted the entire time. Some people here complained about the kid actors. Really? They weren’t that bad, and it’s Lost. Good acting not required. It’s always been about the story. What is more important is what everybody actually said and did.
Glad for the answers: black&white rocks, adam&eve, origin of Jacob&Blacky.
What WAS LAME:not telling us MIB’s name. Of course he had a name people. Did other mother&jacob just call him dude? Darlton just thought it’d be funny and cute if they just didn’t tell us. (probably cause they couldn’t think of one). I like these informative episodes. But A.Janey felt a little stiff at the beginning, took a bit 4her to get her groove.
Ugh, thank you! I was so annoyed that we didn’t find out what MiB’s name was! He had to have had one, especially since he was his “mother’s” favorite. Like a previous commenter said, maybe his name was too significant to reveal at this point?
Think about it, if he is “evil” what would you think would be his name…wait for it…wait for…okay – Damon (son of satan).
At the end of Across the Sea, I pounded my fist on the table that MIB’s name was not revealed, but I am sure it was deliberate and cheeky. I think it will be stunning when it is revealed. Or not. The revelation of the skeletons was an excellent ending, especially with the overlay of Jack, Kate, & Locke in the scene when they discovered them.
I’m pretty sure since the writers ascribe to many of the themes in classical mythology they’re mindful of the notion that real names carry great weight in the spiritual world. Ergo, part of defeating Smokey/MIB is to find that true name and use it to their advantage.
The problem is that there’s no way in he ll that the reveal of his name can ever live up to all this suspense. I’m hopeful but I don’t see how it could. Very annoyed that they didn’t tell us last night.
And people who say he didn’t have a name are just crazy. (by the way, was Jacob even a name at that time?)
am i the only one that felt cheated with the overlay of jake and kate discovering “adam and eve?” the min i saw mib stab his “mother” (use that term lightly!) and jacob walked in on it, i knew they were going to be “adam and eve.” any lost fan would either remember or stumble across that info. we didn’t need to be shown, we can figure that one out on our own. they wasted precious mins showing the jack and kate scene. we don’t have much time left! quit wasting time and answer some questions!!!!
RE: the name. I keep thinking about the moment that the birth mother said, “But I only picked one name.”
Why is it so important that he doesn’t have a name? Is it that when he joined the other group that he just became “one of them”? His name and individual identity was not important and he wouldn’t gain those unless he came back to reclaim his place as being “special.” Was he just a pawn to get Jacob to release the smoke moster?
I agree with Junebug. I figured out Adam and Eve without the flashback footage. It seemed like unnecessary handholding.
Overall, I liked the episode. I’m not sure what y’all were expecting. I feel a Sopranos-style backlash coming. (I was fine with that ending too.)
Not revealing MIB’s name was so painfully contrived and obnoxious. So, everyone constantly calls Jacob by his name, but they can’t be bothered to call MIB by his name in the same breath?? He’s only ever “your brother”, “him”, “he”, and “hi”??? Give me a break! And according to Kristin at E!Online, MIB DOES have a name, so this was just ridiculous and condescending on Darlton’s part to think we would buy this.
Why do I have a feeling MIB’s name is Kris Allen? (Idol/Lost fans, back me up on the reference)
Big Walt, ummmmm the Old Testament? You may have heard of it. Jacob, father of Israel. Yeah, that name is about as old as names get.
@ RyanK – Yeah and I’m sure it was spelled and pronounced just like we do today.
i don’t know what his name was before he was floated down the river but after they found his bones his name was adam. whether he wanted that name or not.
There was something missing here–do they think they’ve answered some questions? A little too strange and I think sort of half-baked
I thought women couldn’t give birth on the Island??? Hold on to your hats folks, we’re about to be disappointed by the biggest TV hoax since Bobby Ewing turned up in Pam’s shower and his whole death as well as the evnts that occured after it were all a dream. Better yet, remember when Twin Peaks started out really good and intrigueing, but then after a year it had so many overlapping questions that the writers just wrote themselves into a big confusing mess that they couldn’t explain themselves out of? Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to LOST, the Twin Peaks of the 2000′s.
Get your facts straight. Women couldn’t conceive on the Island, they could always give birth on the Island. Claire gave birth to Aaron, all the way back in Season 1. Rosseua gave birth to Alex. And Pre-Incident, Ethan Goodspeed (Rom) was conceived and birthed on the Island… Have you been watching at all? But i do agree with you, tonight made feel like the Long Con is on Us. No wonder they’re gonna go on Radio Silence. How would they comment/explain this mess of a corner they’ve painted themselves in…Lost me tonight.
Um. Claire gave birth to Aaron on the Island. Like way back. It was a big episode. Big event. We even saw it from a different perspective when they started time jumping. Aaron is around a lot. And also Rousseau. She gave birth to Alex on the Island.
The key is that the mothers came to the Island already pregnant. That’s why Sun had to get off the Island to give birth to her daughter – she conceived with Jin on the Island and it would have killed her and the baby to give birth on the Island.
If you conceive pre island then your ok. If you get knocked up on the Island, then you die.
I believe Ethan was conceived and born on the island. Aaron was born on the island safely (but not conceived there.) I think something happened after Ethan’s birth which made it so women who conceived on the island could not give birth. Maybe the 1977 bomb Jack set off?
I completely agree with your analogies, especially Twin Peaks. Loved that show like I loved this one…until season two. And to all those that say “oh, its not about the destination, its about the journey”…no, in some cases its about the destination. Like having one. And knowing where it is. And arriving…
So, you’re saying there’s pie involved?
@ humme – get your facts straight, they could conceive but the baby and mother would die during the pregnancy. And that was only at after a certain point in the late 70′s early 80′s.
Worst episode of the season so far. I’m sorry to all who thinks getting “answers” is at the core of the lost experience. To me nothing will be better than the feeling I had throughout season 2, and I lived thru that without much if any on the way of answers. Can’t say benching the main players was a good idea. I loved the little intro with the 2 characters at the beginning of “The Incident” but I have no emotional investment in these. I don’t care if they live, die, fart or cry. I cared a whole lot about Jin and Sun, about Sayid’s sacrifice, about how that broke Hurley in half and will take all of Jack’s new found wisdom to get them thru what’s to come. Also the light gimmick felt very “TV” to me – cheap or cheesy are other adjetives that come to mind- and I had never felt Lost was Just TV, to me it has always transcendent. I still have faith in the last 3 hours but that’s manly because I’m ceartain that we’ll be dealing with beloved characters – Des, Sawyer, Ben- and peripheral but mithology enrichen one’s – Richard, Widmore, MIB. I frankly couldn’t care less about who built the frozen donkey wheel or how the man in black Came To Be, ’cause in the episode got one thing right – just like with any mystical, religious or spiritual pursuit- question only begets more questions. I’ve always been ready to acept the island as a mystical mithological place, no questions asked. Tonights half baked explanation only did loads to cheapen the whole thing. Extremely disapponted by it. I agree with Doc, the children were awful as they usualy are but the adult performer also had no clue what to do with the cheap dialogue. I’m qn actor and I could almost read the disappointment and frustration transpiring through as they professed the text. It was like Welliver and Pelegrino were thinking: “Why Darlton? Why?” – such rich myth lessened by poor choice in writing and execution. Those who ask “how would you do better?” – for one I don’t know that we ever need what was given to us here. So we know who Adam and Eve were. Does that effect the castaways and 5 2/3 seasons worth of conflict, drama and mythology? Not really. We know that MIB and Jakob are two sides of the same coin. But didn’t we already know that? So they are fraternal twins. So what? The writers said that only answers that pertain to the characters and effected their path/plan/survival/progression would be addressed. To me the episode wasted an hour addressing completely peripheral material that the characters would never care either way about. So what and for whom was it for. It seemed it was tailor made the quench the answer for answers sake crowd. To use a mythological pertinent anology if the island is a cork and the world of lost the bottle “across the sea” is boxed wine.
The Island is a Cork. Lost is Fine Wine. And “Across The Sea” is Cheap Boxed Wine
That’s an insult to Franzia and other boxed wines. This was nothing better than Boone’s Farm.
Thunderbird
Charles Widmore. Is he like the people MiB pulled into his plan? Wasn’t MiB’s plan to go into the glowing thing he eventually went through? Wasn’t that his initial plan for getting off the island? He needs to go to Rome or . . .
Worst episode ever. Told us hardly anything. How can Jacob be so good when he kills his brother? How can the producers think we are so stupid as to not remember Adam & Eve in the cave that they have to spell it out? Last week I was excited for the end, now I am worried.
I liked this episode, but I couldn’t agree more about Jacob. I’ve never been convinced that Jacob was good, and this made me less convinced. I was annoyed that they made MiB out to be such a bad guy – even his “mom” said he was a liar – but in this episode, he didn’t lie one time! In fact, Jacob was the only one I noticed telling a lie (telling his brother that their mother didn’t know that he was visiting him). Plus, like you said, he murdered his own brother! And he also supported his mother after he knew she murdered his birth mother. (I know, he was completely manipulated, but still.)
Jacob of “Across The Sea” is hundreds of years apart from Jacob of current day. We do many things in anger and regret them later. There are very few who are simply born pure and yummy and stay that way unchanged. Most of us have to journey through and learn from our mistakes. It’s the hero’s journey, and most of us consider it a moving tale to see a good man fall into madness/despair/evil and then struggle to find redemption. We listeners, readers, and watchers have been captivated by the notion of a redeemed hero for a long time. The Jacob of ‘today’ fits that notion perfectly, especially knowing he was responsible for the demise of his brother — which again happened hundreds of years ago. Anyway, it all works fine for me, but I’m Joseph Campbell nut, so it’s just my perspective.
Totally agree with this. Before this, I kept seeing comments like “if it comes down to good vs. evil, I’m going to be angry”. It seems that after this episode, that is NOT the case. MIB doesn’t seem evil, and Jacob isn’t perfect or all knowing. But now for viewers this is a problem as well, apparently.
I liked the episode. It does open the door for more questions, but as the OtherMother said, “any question I answer would lead to more questions”. It’s not all going to get wrapped up with a little bow, people. “Why are we here? Is there a God?” These are questions people have struggled with forever, but you need to know what EXACTLY is the light? How was it made? I doubt we’ll get these answers. Some of it is just going to be left up to your imagination.
Scraps – I don’t think they made MIB out to be a bad guy at all. They made him out to be relatable, flawed, like us.
I’m a huge LOST fan, but at this point I feel a little cheated-we have 3.5 hours left and we get this? Every time LOST has built up a mysterious presence around someone who we think actually knows whats going on, it turns out they don’t actually have a clue. This happened with the ‘others during seasons 1/2 then with Charles Widmore, Benjamin Linus, Richard Alpert, now with Jacob. All these people who seemingly seemed to have some super-knowledge but later turned out they were just as clueless and unwilling to be on craphole island as the rest. I really want to be amazed by the finale but I just have a feeling that the producers have bulit up this aura of mysteriousness to such a point that what we see may be a let down. I don’t blame them-maybe its my own fault for being so invested in the show!
If this hadn’t been a ‘Lost’ episode, but had been a standalone show on SyFy, no one would have noticed or cared. TERRIBLE episode.
Weird episode, where did Their Mom come from? More questions that won’t get answered. I liked that we saw the origin of Smokey and who Adam and Eve were. Wow, Jacob was a big Baby when he was a young adult. Can’t wait to get back to the End Game. I loved the Preview with The Doors, “The End” Classic!
The Syfy analogy is apt. Thanks for putting to words my reaction to the episode.
Well, they addressed who Adam and Eve was so much so by adding the clip of Jack et al just in case viewers didn’t click about that. The mother as a character who causes her sons to be cruel is getting boring in tv story lines. Smoke monsters come into being by entering the light. I guess that the ‘mother’ was also a smoke monster by her ability to wipe out a tribe of others and fill in a well. She got killed by the knife that Dojan gave to Sayeed and therefore smoke monsters can be killed if stabbed in the back so will Flocke die if stabbed in the back?? The source is stupid for needing to be protected by beings.
I’m thinking maybe that source of light is kind of like the Ring from LOTR. She wasn’t protecting it so much as hoarding it and keeping others away from it. Maybe that’s what the cork reference is talking about. The island is a cork holding in all the light that could save the world or something. That’s how MIB knew everyone wasn’t dead at the end of the last episode, the light wasn’t released.
Absolutely LOVED the scene with Jack, Kate, and Locke in the cave being inserted. It made me love the episode for those few minutes. That was really good storytelling there.
Not that she’s hard on the eyes now, but how hot was Evie back then!
Sawyer wil be the new MIB. Since Season 1, he was the one who wanted to leave the Island (just like MIB), but always gets foiled. Remember the raft, the helicopter.
There’s no “new MIB”. There’s no need for a new MIB. Unless he goes through the light waterfall and becomes a smoke monster himself but that doesn’t make him the new MIB.
Epic fail. That was the lamest excuse for a folk tale origin I’ve ever witnessed. Romulus and Remus, in between laughing, said to call their agent.
That was the worst episode in the history of LOST!!
While maybe not the best acted, I think the story answered a few questions. It showed that MIB was removed from his body to become smokey. He can also take the form of dead people which leads me to think that anytime Ben or the others thought they were communicating with Jacob, without seeing him, it was probably MIB influencing their actions for the ultimate end game of somebody killing Jacob and his candidates. The kid in the jungle also makes a lot more sense now reminding smokey of the rules.
Take a step back and rewatch and you might just catch something you missed because you were so narrowly commenting on the acting.
I was bitterly disappointed by this episode, and it had nothing to do with the acting. We only really got answers to two questions: who Adam and Eve are (interesting but hardly central to the mythology, and totally inconsistent with what Jack said about the age of the bodies in Season 1) and who the boy in the jungle is (most people were already guessing a young Jacob). The answer you give–MIB being removed from his body to become Smokey–is being debated on every Lost message board out there. Half the people seem to think it was MIB’s “soul” (or whatever) being separated from his body; the other half seem to think Smokey lived in the light and was set free by MIB, and then Smokey took MIB’s form because he was dead. So really, if the producers intended to answer that question, they failed. I will reserve final judgment on this episode until the series is done, but right now I feel like this was an episode that could have-and should have-been amazing, but in reality was only mediocre at best.
That was the worst lost episode ever.
The whole world is falling; most everything went crazy last night. Especially if you are also fans of American Idol (insane song choices, poor performances) and LeBron James (the Cleveland MVP played just about the worst basketball of his life–another curse for Cleveland fans). Nothing good can be on the horizon.
i feel bad for ya man. all that and you gotta live in Cleveland too.
The storey of Lost: People are like the island. We all have life, death, rebirth, good, and evil within us. Like the island we have a stopper to keep the evil within us bottled up. The world will try to corrupt us. Like the island we each have a “Jacob” a “deity” a religion a philosophy that we choose to help keep the evil from getting out.
Not me, I don’t have a religion or a stopper. I guess that means I’m PURE EVOL! Muwaaa ha ha haaaa!
What we really need at this point in the series (2 episodes left) is more questions! The finale will wind up being 8 hours long at this rate.
actually no…..2 1/2…..with commercials….so…2 hours and 10 mins.
Mother could turn into smokie. She would have had too, because she filled that hole and wiped out the others in very little time. Plus if you look at the death scene it looked like smokie went through. When she took Jacob to the light and told him never to go in there, he would listen and she also knew MIB would kill her so she set Jacob up to take MIB to the light and throw him in and therefore MIB could take the place of mother like she wanted him to all along. She set up Jacob just like MIB tried to set up the castaways.
Since the MIB wanted badly to leave the island, she had to change the rules. Add one that Jacob would stay there forever (unless a suitable candidatewas found) to keep MIB there. That was why Locke was so perfect, he was very much like Jacob, he did what he was told.
Seemingly a waste. Didn’t answer clearly that MIB was evil – he was just a kid trying to find the truth, wanting to get off the island. No explanation about why he’s special. The “step” mother was the evil one, killing their mother. Details were bogus – Claudia’s hard prego belly didn’t go down at all; killing her then was stupid – she was needed to nurse the babies. How did Janney do that? It didn’t answer exactly where is the light cave and how it’s hidden.
Eh, it was ok i guess, at this late in the game why have an episode that begs more questions then it answers?
this episode was truly horrible. now that we know it all began with two brothers raised by some crazy lady, everything else seems to make less sense and to matter less. who was the Dharma Initiative? what were they trying to do in 1979? Who knows? who cares?
for a series that had made it seem like some source of cosmic energy was at stake, this was the mother of all letdowns. why is the birth of two people the beginning of the story? shouldn’t we first see whoever first tapped that energy source, and why so much is at stake? then the story can come down to the personal.
the list goes on of questions which now seem to make almost no sense anymore, and which don’t matter even if they do make sense. why can jacob appear to all the Losties in the past? what are the numbers? Who knows? who cares? the answer is now, because some crazy person says so. or that it’s magic. no explanation, nothing.
Awesome episode
worst
Great Episode! Loved the flashback!
L A M E !!!! Just like this season. What a colossal disappointment. I suspect the finale will be just as contrived. Can you tell I’m just a little upset? Talk about predictable. Again, LAME episode.
That flashback was actually a flash-forward, eh. …Or a flash-forward-back…
Gotta say that I was bored through most of this. So what if tptb revealed who Adam and Eve are? It’s not one of the big mysteries. I felt like I wasted a lot of time and learned very little. Also, if Jacob’s brother DIED, and Smokey took on his form, why in the heck couldn’t they tell us Jacob’s brother’s name? Zzzzzzzzz.
Is it possible that he never had a name at all?
I disagree, I think Adam and Eve was one of the BIG questions people had. And I thought it was cool that they were someone NO ONE expected (most people were saying Sawyer and Kate or Bernard and Rose). So I found that revelation pretty sweet.
But, wildecat, in the end what did that answer do for us? Not much… Just like this episode, sadly. Not much. Aside from Adam & Eve and the fact that Jacob & MIB are brothers, we were simply left with yet more questions. Who is this “mom,” how did she get there, what’s so special about her, what are these damned “rules” anyhow, etc., etc.
Shaun, it simply answers, “Who are Adam and Eve?” A mystery people have wondered about since Season One. Why does it need to be any more than that? People have said they want answers. Boom! They get one. And it’s pretty cool. I don’t get why people are so irritated with this episode.
Shaun – you might as well quit watching because we’re not going to get all the answers. TONS of answers in this episode. The answers to the origins of Jacob and the Man in Black. Why MIB wants off the island. We learned that this cycle of people being drawn to island predates even them. The knife belonged to MIB and it CAN kill one of these “demi-gods” if used before they can utter a word. “mom” is special because she was the island’s protector before Jacob. She arrived on the island just like everyone before her. Dude. Chill out and enjoy it cause there’s not a better show on tv.
The mother even said it in this episode. “Any question I answer will only lead to more questions.” I for one thought this was a solid episode and one that was necessary to tell before the end.
I thought it was a good episode. I think every one has to realize that Jacob and MIB’s fake mom said something to the audience>>”Every question I answer will simply lead to another question.”
And that is the story of “Lost”
These “answers” were either things we already knew, or just completely sucky. The adam and eve mystery was NEVER essential to the plot, and owrst of all, the answer was something we NEVER could have guessed! Eve was a character literally introduced this very same episode! That’s a total cop-out!
Oh, but really great to know that the basis for the island, all the “magic” and all the time travel (remember season 5? anyone?) and all the interest in the island is… a gold light in a tunnel. Great job guys, thanks.
What’s in a name?
JJ – You think the writers would be giving us the origin of Jacob and MIB now if they weren’t essential to the story. And you don’t think the Island possessing the key to humanity’s existence as being essential or find that it is “sucky.” Interesting. And you said it yourself that the identity of the skeletons wasn’t important, but you slam the writers because you don’t like who the skeletons really are. (And come to find out it IS important as it relates to MIB). Great job JJ.
Who cares what his name is? Okay it’s Nathan. Does that help? Does knowing Jacob’s name better help us define who he is? At this point a name would be arbitrary and essentially, irrelevant.
…That which we call MiB
By any other name would smell as Smokey.
AND…the donkey wheel was built by some “really smart people” (seriously????) who existed pre-electricity? And they were what? The original Dharma folks? Huh??? What, they dig, find light and say: “Lets build a donkey wheel to move through time”???? DUMB DUMB DUMB
Ya, ain’t gonna get any satisfying answers w only 3hrs left, 3 lost hours at that, gonna be the samo stuff but overall, it’ll be awesome…we r all lost lovers just some of us are wounded children who seem hateful because they’re scared as hell its gonna suck…producers are human guys, ain’t no new answers, just more joseph campbell 101
People are missing the big picture of this episode. This episode was not meant to reveal all the islands secrets and mysteries. If it was what would be left for the last two episodes? No this episode did exactly what it meant to do. It showed us who Jabcob and the MIB are.
Light and dark are common themes on this show, but the reality of good and evil is very much in shades of grey. Jacob is (was) human and is flawed. While he seemingly stands for good, the way he goes about getting some things done seemed flawed. Now we know that is BECAUSE he is human. Not some freaky god or angel or whatever.
In the same vein the MIB/Smokey is supposed to represent evil. We don’t know the full extent of Smokey yet, but for MIB’s part he was a dreamer. Unlike Jacob he questioned and wondered about the nature of things. As he came to find out the nature of his origin, he reacted not unlike many people would. His desire to leave the island would eventually consume him. He is a sympathetic character, but all great villains are. All the best villains are driven by human motivation. Because we can see ourselves taking the same greedy roads. Assuming MIB/Smokey are the same thing, he later comes to kill a lot of people. He is a corrupting influence.
As far as the mystical properties of the island and such people seem to want answered? I’m sure we’ll learn more as the series closes, but we will not know everything. People bash this episode because they take it for what they wanted it to be and not what it is.
Of course nobody could guess who Adam and Eve are. The Eve character had never been introduced on the show before. It would have been much better had it been two characters we already knew. I think both kids names were Jacob. Jacob1 and Jacob2 Wait, unless he’s called brutha??
I could have sworn that at one point she called him Milo, but I may have been hearing things.
She called him ‘my love’. My daughter also heard that as Milo.
to Shaun: Throughout the 6 years of LOST, getting answers only led to more questions. So, we got the skeleton answer, but did it matter? No. Was it great to know? YES.
Torifan…your comment made me laugh out loud. I was thinking the same thing during last night’s dumb episode, watching it with my mouth gapin open in disbelief. Couldn’t believe how ridiculous it was.
Why wouldn’t Smokey have known that Adam and Eve were MIB and Other Mother? If MIB is Smokey that is? Or is Smokey the soul of MIB but has forgotten his mortal self as he leaps into Flocke?
Having the answer to the Adam & Eve mystery be a character who is inserted for the first time in the same episode is LAZY STORYTELLING!!! As is most of this season— lame, half-hearted answers.. like a checklist being clicked off one by one…
If you remember, his biological (birth) mother said she had only chosen the one name, i.e. Jacob. Of course, it is unrealistic to think that the child would never have had a name, but perhaps the theory that MIB’s name is Aaron is the right thinking. I thought the episode was great and I love the theory that the second twin was stillborn. Perhaps the adopted mom killed the birth mom to save her from a host of problems and anguish if she were to be the one to raise the children after the second born child became “infected” ala Claire and Sayid and as what Rousseau went through when her shipmates and husband became “sick”. It stands to reason that adopted mom was also a Smokey and that is how she killed the original “others” and how she understood that by going into the light was a fate worse than death. She obviously entered it at one point and that is how she became a Smokey. With her being killed, by Jacob throwing his brother into the light, he suffered the same fate worse than death as his adopted mother. Maybe she could see the bad part in MIB just as Dogen could see it clearly in Sayid. On another front, the similarites Lost has to the Judeo-Christian faith are patently clear. The adopted mom asks Jacob to “take the cup and drink” just as Jesus did at the passover/Last Supper. After he drank, she told him “Now you’re just like me”. I think this somehow ties to the light being a sort of “tree of knowledge”. Satan told the biblical Eve that the reason God told her to not eat the fruit of that tree was because God knew that if Eve did, she would become just like God. I want to develop this theory a bit further, but I need to re-watch last night’s episode and a few of the other Jacob/MIB episodes.
Great episode!!!! I felt so sorry for Jacob and the MiB for being raised so horribly.
I Knew it! BROTHERS!
but those are quite some big family issues!
Adam and Eve!
It’s kinda weird, too. In the analogy, the Other Mother is Eve, yeah, but the MIB is more like a Cain than an Adam. Calling the son and his mother “Adam and Eve”…feels a tad bit incestuous.
hey, Jacob is the one most like Cain, he’s the one killing bro’s here. and then there’s just Adam and Eve (post-apple bite party Eve)
and Cain. somebody had to sleep with mom or future sister to get the population boom started, ya see. we have a bit of incestuous lineage in our own history.
I really thought we would at least find out what the “rules” were relating to the candidates, etc.
Was this episode showing us though that the rules don’t work? We saw Jacob beat up MIB twice and then essentially worse than kill him (according to Other Mother). Didn’t she say she set it up so that they could NEVER hurt each other (not kill, hurt)? That was a lot of hurt that I saw. Maybe the rules are just something that they are enforcing in their own minds.
If you ever had an episode that explained what the rules were, you would be bored out of your mind. All that explanation would prove to be the worst hour of television ever. I was pleased with the episode. I learned a few things, and I’m okay without knowing all the answers.
And who in the heck “taught” Jacob the Island secrets then??? I’m thinking this…the CrazyMamaLady(CML) said he wouldn’t die if he went in, but indeed it would be worse than death. He knew he couldn’t kill MIB, so he tossed him in. Is Jacob, then in fact responsible for releasing Smokey (whom I’m saying is NOT mib, mib was just the first form he adopted)? Then, did Smokey, using MIB’s identity TEACH Jacob things, thinking he would help him escape…until Jacob figured out this guy was up to no good, and kept him trapped. Ok that was way too long, but it begs another question…How does Jacob so easily leave the island?
After his Magic Metal Magnet Moment with MiB, Jacob would know there was something special about the Light and how it pertained to MiB’s planned exodus from the island. After MiB murdered Other Mother, I thought Jacob threw MiB in the Cave of Wonders to be rid of him and give MiB what he wanted – a potential means of getting off the island. Didnt quite work out as either had anticipated (enter Smoke Monster).
Maybe them MIB is upset because he is the second son and they never say his name….it is all Jacob, Jacob, Jacob!!
WORST EPISODE EVER…
I don’t know about that, but it was ONE of the worst. So, ‘mother’ didn’t want ppl finding the island, ok. But why couldn’t MIB leave??? Just let the guy go. He wasn’t going to find his way back and by this point, he wasn’t evil incarnate yet. I actually feel some sympathy for MIB now. Guy just missed his mom and wanted to go home. But psycho mother wouldn’t allow it.
Agreed about the MiB. With this episode, he seems even less evil than tptb obviously want him to be. He’s just desperate and out of options by 2007…doing evil things, but I don’t think he’s evil.
I don’t get why they had to go through so much trouble by killing Sayid Jin and Sun to show how evil MIB is, and then in the next episode they show something that lets you have sympathy for the smoke monster.
Makes no sense to me at all(((
I liked MIB much more than Jacob in this episode. Jacob seemed like a mama’s boy and a real wuss.
@lostie-I agree.
lostie – Jack has been the main character in this story since day one and ultimately the focus comes down to him. he’s going to be the last one standing, just like the “mom” tonight.
@NYTeach – I agree. Just when we figured MIB was evil and Jacob was good, we get this episode trying to make us sympathize with the MIB. I just don’t get it.
If he leaves the island, doesn’t the light go out of the world?
Jacob and MiB haven’t ever been portrayed as wholly good or evil. They are flawed, and that has been a persistent them in Lost. Ping Ponging between animosity and sympathy towards MiB is well within the boundaries of Lost’s storytelling method.
@pasta – the producers said last week the point of killing those people was to show that MIB was evil.
I have to say though at this point I really don’t believe anything anyone involved with the show says in interviews.
Is smokey MIB or is MIB’s soul stuck in smokey and Smokey is the evil part.
Agreed. Rest assured that I was on the Internet within minutes, registering my disgust throughout the world.
Excellent reference.
The internet is going to blow-up on the 23rd!
Haha classic
it was kinda bad. i just wanted to know how the names got on the cave. mib was a ghost when he said he wanted to kill jacob? why was jacob at 43 talking like a little kid? i’m p.o.ed that there are only 3 and a half eps left.
Hm. On an island with only your mom who teaches you selective things, I would say he’d be quite innocent. Like a child. Think about it buddy.
LOL… I thought that was funny how Jacob was grown and still talked like a child. Poor Jacob.
I loved how Jacob talked like a kid. I actually laughed when he was arguing with his mom before drinking the wine, because I thought it was fitting. Like Mo said, he’d still be quite innocent.
yeah – he didn’t just sound innocent as much as sounding…..slow? especially considering he’d see mib often and mib was much more developed.
I wouldnt say that but is was lame
I think only time will tell. This might be a very crucial puzzle piece to the whole story… or this was the Jumping the Shark moment. But on immediate impact, I agree with you. Bad acting (the worst so far) and just really cheesy execution (seemed like a bad SyFy channel mini-series).
people throw the term jumping the shark around so much it has no meaning anymore. for it to truly be what you mean by jumping the shark, it would have to be widely reviled as a plot point. and it’s obviously not. just bc u didn’t like it, does not equal “jumping the shark”
People keep saying the acting was horrible, particularly the kids’ acting. I disagree: the kids were good (and A.J. did a fine job). But the episode was not great, true.
Well said, Kevin. I couldn’t believe they tried to roll out a “ooooh, the light, we must protect the light” back-story . Even Legend of the Seeker wouldn’t roll that way.
Allison Janney was miscast as other mother. Her acting was wooden and one dimensional.
This ep made “What Kate Does” look like Shakespeare…
Totally agree.
LOL, totally. And Jacob is the dumb one.
Agreed. This is worse than anything from Season 3 too.
Hell no. I rather have an ambitious episode that doesn’t totally succeed than a bland, event-less episode like that. Get real.
And thats sad but I agree!
I AGREE. yOU HAVE THE lost APOLOGISTS WHO SAY THEY DONT NEED ALL THE ANSWERS. COME ON WHY ARE YOU WATCHING A TV SHOW FOR? ITS ENTERTAINMENT. WE NEED CLOSURE NOT A LESSON IN BUDISM.
I’m watching a TV show to be entertained. I don’t need all the answers to enjoy the ride. Filling in every little blank for me, like I’m an idiot with no imagination who can’t think for himself? If I wanted that, I’d watch “Two and a Half Men”.
I bet you enjoy reading mystery novels that have the last 20 pages ripped out. Hey, why be spoon fed answers when you can just write one in your own head?
brian, maybe you need closure, but that’s obviously because you’ve got some psychological issues you need to work through. See a therapist. Docs instant reaction was totally accurate. There’s nothing wrong with the show, too bad the same thing can’t be said about you. You need serious help.
Brian, is Budism the study of Buds because, if so, we can be some. Since Buddism is spelled with 2 d’s
and i know you aren’t the kind of guy who would make fun of other people’s beliefs then you must be looking for buds. And since you are so in a hurry to get the Cliff-notes version of Answers to Lost i can help. Think of your own religion. Black book that tells stories about seeking the light, Parents killing their children, seeing dead people walk around, parting the seas so you could just walk back to Los Angeles. and no questions!! only answers. be this. do this. don’t think-it’s all written here. and on the last page, all is revealed in bold like you type. on the last page it says ****religious spoiler alert here**it says—Property of Motel 6. and shows a map to the capslock on your computer. glad to help.
It was confusing, enlightening, and terribly tragic. And I still don’t know his name!
its was meh i just expected more. I dont know what but I expected more.
I agree- I was expecting a jaw dropping episode not a head scratching one. Seemed like that story could have been told in half an episode. And there’s only two weeks left…ugh
I totally understand where you are coming from, I mean only 2 episodes left before the finale and they give us this! I am so disappointed, especially after last weeks heartwrenching episode
Glad to see I’m not alone on this. I said to myself, either this overhyped episode was kinda lame or I was half-sleep. Turns out I was right about both. I do plan on giving it a rewatch this weekend – hopefully I won’t fall asleep.
I thought I was watching a bad movie = the kind I watch when stuck in the house on a snowy day after a blizzard and the only thing to make me forget that I’m trapped in my house is to turn on the SyFy channel and watch swamp thing.
My thoughts exactly.
Ok I understand that they don’t want to give MIB’s name away but the fact that they said Jacob’s every 10 seconds made me really annoyed. Just say the kid’s name already or are we just supposed to assume his “mother” never named him?
I think his name is Aaron. Not that I think he’s THE Aaron. Just that his name is Aaron.
If you look in imdb.com there is no name for the kid who played young MIB, it literally says boy in black which may mean that darlton did not even give the character a name….
Given the crappiness of the episode, what name could MIB possibily have that would matter? Jack? James? Esau? Cain? Christian? Ben? They made it seem like that mattered, but in the end it didn’t. Lame!
I heard he DOES in fact have a name, but that it’s still up in the air about whether we will learn it or not.
did you hear that or read it on e o nline?
I’m going with the latter.
Reminded me of the episode where they wanted to disguise Locke’s identity and all the characters kept refering to him as “Jeremy Bentham” for the whole episode, then once it was revealed he was actually Locke everyone went back to refering to him as Locke. Pretty cheesy writing.
yeah i have to agree, the whole jeremy bentham thing was pretty awful. what the name symbolizes was interesting, but i got the feeling that when the actors were saying it they thought it was ridiculous too, and thusforth, it was. and i think that happened a little in this episode too.
Why is everyone so surprised MIB doesn’t have a name? When he was born, his real mother said she didn’t have a name for him (didn’t expect twins), and then crazy pseudo-mom brained her with a rock. By that point, crazy mom prob figured it didn’t matter if he had a name or not, and never bothered to give him one.
so you really want us to think he’d never have a name after all those years. Dumb.
c’mon joe, don’t be so rude. this is just a friendly discussion. if you wouldn’t say that to a stranger’s face, then don’t do it here.
But you still have a name. Everyone gets a name. What did Jacob and his other mother call him for all those years? Hey you? Kid?
Reminds me of Rebecca how the reader/viewer never learns the narrator’s name -she’s just the second Mrs. DeWinter. Maybe other brother is really the second Jacob -he was born after him.
Look people, obviously the MiB has a name and for the sake of the story, we may never learn it. So what’s the big friggin deal if we never learn his name! It doesn’t matter already! Sheesh!
JZ – real mother said no such thing. Things are confusing enough without you making $#*& up.
I believe that other mom might not have named him. but after he was with his real “people” are we to believe he was never named then?
Clair – what are you talking about, JZ making stuff up? That is in fact exactly what the real mother said — that she didn’t have a name for this twin. Fine if you miss something but you oughtta make sure you caught every single word before being so rude to JZ — yeesh. I see why you chose Clair for your name… she was a nutcase too – heh heh. Get a squirrel baby why don’tchya
)
Since they made a point of constantly saying Jacob’s name; I think MIB does have a name. But for whatever reason the writers chose not to disclose it at this time. Maybe he’ll be the 4th “Charlie” but they didn’t want to confuse the audience anymore than necessary.
no one thinks its weird that smokey doesnt have a name still?!?!?!?!?!
I do. What if they never revealed it?
I think this is going to sound stupid but I’m going to say it anyway:
if they don’t reveal his name then that kind of completely defeats the purpose of not telling us his name.
Yeah. like never seeing Charlie on Charlie’s Angels– reasonless.. red herring
I am 99% sure that his name will never be revealed. He doesent even have a name. Their mother said she only picked put one name for Jacob.
I love that he has no name.. Man In Black is perfect…So mysterious.. He has no name. If they give him a name now i think it’ll suck…
I’m just going to call him Adam until someone tells me differently! lol
Your mother sucks. This episode was stupid
@Antonio…I agree! Let him go nameless. His mother didn’t name him. He is Jacob’s brother – and that is that. No big deal.
I’m going to call him Mike, just because.
Yeah, you’re right Antonio.
He’s the “man with no name.” Just like Clint.
His name is Adam, people!
I’m going to call him God.
I thought it was made pretty clear that he doesn’t have a name. His real mom said she only had one name picked out. Obviously crazy Allison Janney mom didn’t feel obligated to name him (since she herself doesn’t appear to have a name either). It’s not like he has a birth certificate or anything… why does he need a name?
I disagree…. Wouldn’t the kid MiB or Jacob ask why he doesn’t have a name? He has a name… It just hasn’t been revealed yet.
they will not reveal his name. mib is very mysterious..way better than, let’s say, stanley lol
The guy DOES NOT HAVE A NAME. Nuff said. Any abstract thinkers out there? Apparently not too many. What made you watch in the first place??? LOST doesn’t seem like your type of show.
His name is Mooby
Randy, you promised!
I don’t know, but can we call Allison Janney’s character “MOMBATS”? Pretty please?
Yeah, that’s what it is – not enough abstract thinkers. You sound like the kind of tool who admires a blank canvas for its brilliant use of negative space.
@ paris loves lost – so you’re saying that the baby from Cougar Town grows up to become the MIB?
JD – I’m an abstract thinker. What’s your point? That people go thru life with no name? That this is normal? Listen – everyone, always, since there was speech, had a name. Everyone. All people, where there were more than 1 person, had a name. “Tall One”. “Fast Runner”. “Buffalo Breath”. Everyone had a name. To wrap this plot device in the cloak of “abstract thinking” is indeed abstract – as in devoid of structure – as in lacking thought.
Just like the Janitor on Scrubs or Kramer’s first name (for a long time) on Seinfeld – it lends itself to the mystery/mythology – suspend your disbelief and just go with it. We as people just want to disect everything until we completely ruin it – we need to have more faith and trust the story. That we can’t totally do that at this point just makes us more frustrated.
There’s enough mystery to fill hours of twilight episodes, we don’t need more. Especially the corny cheesy kind.
Agreed, noname. Now they’re milking the “lost” factor of Lost far too much. The name doesn’t bother me as much. It’s just that ALL of the “answers” this episode were merely hints: vague, indeed abstract, but all together obscure. They’re over doing it.
I think MIB has a name but they didn’t reveal it because it will be significant to the story. Maybe he is an ancestor to one of the main characters or is god or something and when they do reveal his name it will answer a lot of questions or shock us. It’s funny how people on here get hung up on the most random things and won’t let it go. Just wait until the end of the show and if they don’t reveal his name, then you can all b*tch about it. It was the same thing last week with all the conjecture about Lapidus. Is he dead or alive, blah blah blah. Enough already. Patience people, please!!
MIB’s name is “Faraday”, being killed by his pregnant mom who was carrying himself in her stomach at the time + the Dharma explosion = fetus transported into castaways belly to be born as Jacob’s twin. (Or not…)
Capt AC: All you’re doing is pointing out all the other mindless dead-ends this series has bestowed upon us. Speaking of which: maybe his name is “Vincent”. Woof.
That’s the craziest idea I’ve heard in a while…it’s perfect! Honestly though, I have no pancake batter solution I want to see happen, it’s their show, not mine. At this point, after reading all of the whiners’ commentary, I hope Team Darlton cliffhangs the whole series and pisses everybody off!
whatever his name was before, it’s Adam now.
and we still don’t know MIB’s name!
WHO CARES? Of all the unanswered questions, who cares about what his name is? That is SO low priority. This episode answered questions that had the importance of a question like ‘What was the par on the golf course Hurley made?’ LAMEASS EP!
It must’ve been a par 3, since they were able to hit the “green” from the starting point, that could possibly be called a tee.
This is one I’ll need to watch again to process everything.
I agree…hopefully watching it again and reading Doc’s recap will make me less confused as to how the brother is still in his “skin” when talking to Jacob when there are obviously other “skins” he could have taken like someone from his dead tribe.
Why would he take someone else’s form at that point? It makes sense to me that he’d go with what he’s comfortable with.
Agreed… Knee jerk reaction I’m not crazy about this ep! I think there were questions, plot points that (1 ep away from the series finale) that they could have covered & covered better! Who made the rules, if he put his brother aka MIB in the cave with mother why is he talking 2 the apparition like its his brother? Is jacob crazy? Ok so maybe the black smoke is evil & he can’t let it off the island cus essentially he’s not human any longer just blackness able 2 take the form of the dead but considering how monumental this idea is 2 the conceit of this show it could have been handled better…. I’m ranting cus I am really disappointed! Grrr
Jacob didn’t seem quite right to me. I guess being raised by a crazy mom and completely sheltered from everyone else wouldn’t necessarily lead to sanity.
Jacob has never talked to MiB like it was his brother. His brother is dead as we just saw, and he knew this all along.
Jacob seemed to be a dimwit, over shadowed by his “special” smart but discontinted brother. What about the “rules”? Why could Jacob kill MIB?
This is the first episode that I’ve ever truly disliked. I’m kind of shocked by it. I’ve never been this disappointed with a Lost episode ever. With only four and a half hours of the series to go, I would rather we had spent an hour of it with characters who we’ve grown to love over the past six years. Not Jacob and what’s-his-name, whom we were only introduced to in the season 5 finale. Gosh, it was boring, and not even well acted. I actually felt bad for the actors. I normally love all three of them. Yuck.
I agree, but it was necessary. Shoehorning this story into another story with our major castaways that we love would result in a poorly implemented flashback that is misplaced and will leave us feeling sick over a series of episodes. So they condense it into a single episode and tell the story intact and whole.
They made the right choice.
I disagree. Everything we learned in this ep could have been distilled into five minutes of flashbacks. This was pure filler and more than a little self-indulgent on Darlton’s part.
I had the same response as you. I was appalled by how awful the acting was and how awkwardly the story line moved. I did think it was giving us an important piece of the larger story, but what terrible, stilted acting. I wish I felt otherwise.
I also notice that, the acting was horrible.
the acting was bad because the writing was bad. those are really solid actors, normally.
the “set” was bad too – it looked like an episode of survivor at tribal council at times
Allison Janney’s death was the worst acting I’ve ever seen on this show. The kids didn’t really bother me that much.
well said.
The acting was solid, it was the writing that was weird– but it made sense to me that these characters would talk in these short, simple sentences based on how they were raised. They were, essentially, still children, and they spoke like it.
The acting was pretty solid. I think these characters were portrayed in that manner to make the audience feel awry and uncomfortable. That’s great television you just witnessed.
Nonsense. The show is much more than the characters. The island and the mythology can be considered a character in and of themselves. One episode devoted solely to that is more than appropriate, precisely because it’s so close to the end.
I agree. Everyone’s been asking for answers about who Jacob and MIB are, what’s the nature of the Island, who Adam and Eve are, and then when an episode is devoted to it, people complain? I don’t get it. Darlton have always said the Island is a character. It’s not inappropriate, as we near the end, to take more than five minutes to answer these questions.
they complain because it sucked.
No, they complain because they want to be spoon fed. This was a GREAT episode.
Nonsense to your nonsense. The development of character is what makes us care about the people in the mythology of the show.
And we just got a dose of major character development for MIB and Jacob.
No, we don’t want to be spoon fed; we want to work for it! But this ep MADE NO SENSE! Kind of like Indy 3…It was just a bunch of patched-together junk.
@ torifan, I really hope you meant to say Indy 4 because the Last Crusade rocked.
I felt ALMOST the same way after watching Ab Aeterno. That was a better episode, but when the show is winding down I want answers to the CURRENT island situation. You still don’t know the rules, why they can’t die, where they came from, why they can’t go, how Jacob gave Richard immortality, etc.. I didn’t need those answers, I was cool with not knowing, then they give me an episode that seems like they are going to reveal this info… and then punch me in the face. Yeah, I’m sure I’ll get some flack from the Ab Aeterno lovers out there, but that would have been better placed in another season.
… and please don’t respond with “if you’re looking for answers, watch (insert lame show name here)” Just saying don’t dangle food in front of me when I’m hungry, then throw it in the trash.
you are exactly right. This episode was patched together to (kinda) answer a few questions, but it was far from helpful explaining any of the foundation themes you mention. While we’re at it.. isn’t answering the Adam & Eve mystery with a character introduced for the first time in the SAME episode about the LAZIEST STORYTELLING EVER!?
We don’t need to know the specific rules; we now understand the important thing – that the rules are simply created by men, and that it’s only their belief in those rules that gives the rules any power. It was also made pretty clear that immortality is “given” by the performing of a smoke and mirrors ritual – the subject of the ritual then believes he is immortal, and so on the island (which enhances our natural powers of “mind over matter”) he IS immortal. Where they came from was answered in the only way that mattered – they are humans who crashed on the island. Who cares which continent they came from? And as for why they can’t go, the only thing stopping them is belief.
I feel the same way about Ab Aeterno. Great episode for sure, but nowhere near the episode most people seem to make it. It was a necessary episode that greatly expanded Richard’s character (who, by the way, is now on the ugly side of a three-episode absence), but other than that I thought it didn’t get off of the ground much.
Dr. Linus, Happily Ever After and The Candidate remain my favorites this season.
I loved it. It completely changed my view of the island and its major players.
I now root for the Man in Black. He was given a choice and he made his decision based on what he felt. Jacob, however, listened to the only voice he had ever heard and didn’t bother to question anything and took no choice. Sure, there is something to say for that loyalty, but given that she admitted to killing his mother, that loyalty is misplaced.
MIB made a choice. If LOST has taught us one thing, it’s that people can be redeemed for making the wrong choice. I sense an MIB redemption.
I agree. I’m on the MIB’s side now. Jacob was a Momma’s boy and just listened to her and did what she said. MIB thought for himself and questioned things. I feel bad for everything he went through.
other’s child services should have looked into this. Oh yea-they all got smoked.
well, the jacob we first knew seemed to take a different approach to man thna his mom did. so, he has evolved, and does not follow his mom blindly.
I’ve said a couple of times that I think Jacob’s plan is to redeem the MIB.
At the end of last week’s episode I was anti-MIB. Now I think I’m with you, which is going to cause some issues when these two camps start battling each other next week! Can I root for both?
It’s like the hatch all over again… just a sorry sap stuck with the responsibility they didn’t ask for, waiting for their replacement… their mom didn’t care which kid was the chosen one as long as one took over and the other one killed her because she couldn’t kill herself. This cycle probably goes back forever. Nuts!
Wasn’t thrilled with the presentation of MIB becoming the smoke monster… but it will do. The more I think about it the more I enjoy the episode, although Doc is absolutely right on the perils of child acting.
The show is about redemption… I think crazy mom didn’t know which kid would be the one to protect the island… but as she said at the end… “it was you all along.. i realize that now” (I’m paraphrasing)… it was not a coincidence that Jacob (the first born– the one whose real mom named him) was the one responsible to protect the island.. Remember.. the island brings people who has a purpose… and the pregnant woman had a purpose.. to bring Jacob to the island.
What if only people born on the island can be protectors (though not candidates)? That would mean Ethan, and Aaron.
Why are you assuming that the smoke monster is Jacob’s brother? I agree that the smoke monster embodies something that used to be contained in the Light, but I don’t think it necessarily has to be Jacob’s brother or even have Jacob’s brother’s personality. Isn’t it more plausible that it is some supernatural (and likely evil) force that has taken on Jacob’s brother’s form (until it takes Locke’s form of course)?
So, basically MIB/Jacob’s brother does not equal smoke monster/fake Locke. Rather, the smoke monster may be something truly evil.
Avniel, while your comment is mostly logical, there is one thing that makes me completely disagree. The MIB said in Ab Aeterno that “the devil” (Jacob) “took my humanity away.”
There are two likely situations in my opinion:
The MIB’s body has been taken from him. He has been separated into soul and body. His body, lacking a soul, appears dead. His soul is now the smoke monster.
The second is that the smoke monster is the embodiment of the darkness in humans that MIB and Other Mother spoke of. The Light separated it from his body.
I prefer the first one, because as I said, the MIB made a choice. Lost tells us that choices can be redeemed, and if the Smoke Monster – which is all that remains – is darkness incarnate – that’s not exactly redeemable.
nope, i believe crazymom liked black best. when they were sitting by the ocean she seemed proud of him because he knew how to lie like her. she didn’t crack his head until he turned against her and found a way off the island. and, although she was a really good headcracker (real mom too) she couldnt have killed the whole tribe of others by cracking heads, so she must have smoked them. so maybe her body we saw was just a “borrowed body” form some poor immigrant to the island she didn’t like. and the smoke monster passed from her to the cave and then to MIB when Jacob took up headsmashing. so, whatever name mib and crazymom had
was changed when they died to Adam and Eve. Eve may have been a lost princess on the long-swim team before smokey got to her-a decent person who was good with kids. uh-huh.
Didn’t Cuse & Lindelof just state that MiB is bad/evil in an interview. I am confused-lol!
But he isn’t Jacob’s brother anymore…Jacob’s brother (Adam) is laying in a cave with his mother. Smokey is just a mimic (like fake locke).
Ok-the nameless brother is completely dead…got it! And that evil thing took his form. And the thing uses the nameless’ thoughts to manipulate Jacob?
Ne Oublie – I don’t think that at all. I think MIB just left his body and became the smoke monster. That’s the fate worse than death Other Mother was talking about.
Um…last week the Smoke Monster tried to blow up a sub containing any remaining characters you cared about (and maybe a few you didn’t). Ya, I’d say he’s a bad guy.
see my reply above. Basically why do you assume that Jacob’s brother = smoke monster? It certainly seems more like that the the smoke monster is something truly evil that happens to take the form of Jacob’s brother.
@Avniel. When he was talking to Richard in Ab Aeterno smokey said (referring to Jacob) – “The devil betrayed me, he took my body, my humanity”. Plus he seems the exact same as he did then. His main goal is to leave the island. He talked about his crazy mother. I’d be flabergasted if he weren’t smokey.
Absolutely, N O. Smokey is EVIL, and yet now we have this whiny backstory of a boy who just wanted to be loved and “allowed to go home.” WHAT? Sounds more like an afterschool special, not something from Lost.
I fear Darlton has fallen into the Stand’s problem–awesome set up of mystical battle and then lousy and below-average storyline trying to explain the reasons behind the battle.
After last night, I would have preferred if they hadn’t even tried to explain Smokey and Jacob (and of course they really didn’t even explain the big question about the Island, only show some pretty shots of “the light from underneath.” Whatever. Bring me Jack on Locke Action (As in fight, not the other stuff).
I think that’s why MIB was her favorite. She sensed that he thought for himself. Unfortunately the thing she admired about him was his and her undoing. The episode did what it was supposed to do. I think people were expecting a steak and when he episode wasn’t mind blowing, they felt they got a Big Mac. This episode was consistent with Lost -here’s an answer or two, now PSYCHE!
You have to realize that both Jacob and MiB were victimized as children. That woman played them against each other by loving one more than the other. That woman was all Jacob ever knew and he yearned for her love and approval even though she loved his brother more. Yes, she killed their real mother but Jacob never knew her or saw her like his brother saw her ghost. So what was he supposed to do after he found this out? Jacob wanted something the boy in black didn’t and vice versa.
Another reason I’m now pro-MIB – he hasn’t really been lying as much as we thought he had. He wants to go home? True. Jacob took his body and betrayed him? True. His only “lies” have been when he takes advantage of others. Example: Richard. He told Richard that Jacob was the devil in order to get him to kill Jacob.
The thing is, Jacob is just as guilty of this manipulation as the MIB. I’m really starting to wonder if we’re not being set up for the greatest bait-and-switch in history.
Still thinking about this one, Doc. How does Jakob learn about how to leave the island and return? How does he learn about his powers and his destiny?
And who assembled MIB’s prototype wheel?
With only 2 more nights of Lost left, I’m pretty sure you can put those questions into the “up to the viewer’s imagination because we ran out of room/don’t want to tell you the answer” category. Grrr.
That, MiB could do for himself, couldn’t he? Or Jacob did it to leave.
yeah… didn’t quite picture another primative group figuring out how to harness the energy w/ a donkey wheel… or how the first group figured it out w/o knowing how to build metal ships. They really pushed my suspension of disbelief w/ this one… but i should be used to it by now
Yeah, the donkey wheel time/space travel invention.
Here is what MiB said:
“I’m going to attach that wheel to a system we’re building. A system that channels the water and the light. I’m going to turn it. And when I do, I’ll finally be able to leave this place.”
This is just cartoonish. Could we please have an answer more satisfying to adults who have been fascinated with the whole time/space continuum ideas Lost has continually put forth??
Yep, I definitely want to know how Jacob gets on and off the Island, and how the names of the candidates got on the wheel and on the cave wall. Wonder if those answers are still to come? Hope so!
I think the writers (Carlton and Damon wrote this one) provided and played us with “Every question I answer will just bring you to another question” through the woman’s reply to Claudia.
Also how did MIB know that he couldn’t leave the island by conventional means?
He tried. Same reason you can’t lease with the 305 coordinate. Because there is a cloud of kinetic/time energy surrounding the island. There in a bloody snow globe. Remember when everyone thought that coordinate was puntured as a hole when the black rock was sucked onto the Island? but that actually was proven false in this episode and is probably going to go unexplained. Weak.
I expected answers to mythological questions that didn’t border on the offensively trite — you know, answers with some sort of pseudoscientific explanation, not just “It’s the magic inside of us” Disney level shenanigans. Have Egyptian Gods figure into the plot, have the island be Atlantis, have time travelers from the future plant a futuristic device, ANYTHING but this. Because this didn’t answer anything at all. Hell, it didn’t even tell us anything about Jacob, Smokey or their “mother.”
““It’s the magic inside of us” Disney level shenanigans” – this line killed me. So, so true.
100% Agree. Lame on many levels. Not sure if I’m more disappointed in the storytelling or art direction. The perfectly ironed tunics made the episode look like a highschool production of Peter Pan and the Lost Boys…
All these years I’ve been waiting to find out the magical secret of a glowing beaver dam?? Such a terrible episode and now I’m afraid that the remaining episodes will be stained by this haphazard and corny backstory.
Ok – that was very funny.
You’re right Kevin. This episode tells us that the end of the series is going to be a major disappointment. Once again, we had to sit there while precious minutes ticked away and nothing happened. I hate that feeling while watching the show when you look at the clock and realize that 45 minutes have gone by and nothing has happened. Sadly, that is the case much of the time during this final season.
This is my problem exactly! All my thoughts and questions about the Egyptian mythology and the idea that these entities were more than mere humans were dashed away by a boring and unimaginative explanation leading to even more questions that will probably never be answered. Where did the temples come from? Where did the statue come from? And yes- I want to know what MIB’s name is- I felt cheated and so amazingly disappointed after watching this. We deserved so much more than this.
So now we know… the Smoke Monster is really Darlton. We’ve been lied to, manipulated and promised our heart’s desire if only we would blindly follow the WIB (writers in black). Now we know… Darlton has been dead for a long time, and Smokey is producing the show. I’m leaving the Temple, but I’m planning to live with Rose and Bernard. It may be the only place that’s safe. Darlton? Take your money and run, boys. The jig is up.
Across the Sea was possibly the most mindnumbing, jaw dropping, drool on your shoes fabrication of waste products in television history. We’ve been conned. I resisted watching Lost at the beginning despite the urging of friends, but finally relented and played catchup on Netflix before season 6 started. I wish I could describe how much I enjoyed the ride, coming here and to the other fan sites to read and savor the reactions to each episode, the theories, hoping for a little more insight than I could generate myself. I was able to convince my spouse to watch the old episodes so we could enjoy the final season together. After Across the Sea, I’m embarrassed that I wasted our time.
I felt as if I were watching a poorly produced children’s story, except that I’ve seen dialogue and plot in kindergarten holiday pageants that were more coherent than this. At what point did Dalton become so obsessed playing “gotcha” games with the audience that basic common sense flew down the magic cave and emerged as dark methane? I won’t rehash the multitude of problems that others in this thread have so eloquently detailed. I will simply say that I’m sorry to be so negative, but WIB has insulted me to my soul, and I’m very pi*sed off about it.
I concur. Hours upon hours of blog reading, listening to podcasts, and I even RE-WATCHED the entire series! Some shows even three times. The feeling in my gut each week as the show falls flatter and flatter cannot be described. I was such a fan, and now I am almost embarrassed to watch the show. God do I feel like the rug has been pulled out from under me. I want all that time back!!! What BS.