"The Incident"

Another season of LOST is over and now we only have one left. I'm still not sure what I think about this season as a whole but I am intrigued with where the show will go next year. Unfortunately, there is that pesky eight month hiatus! As far as finales go, I liked it but so far nothing has topped the shocking ending of the Season 3 finale. I suppose it is fitting that the end of Season 3 was the plateau since it was the middle of the series. But what about this season?

STOP READING NOW TO AVOID SPOILERS!!!!!

Like I said, I enjoyed this episode more than the past few this season, albeit it was still frustrating especially with the way that it ended. I thoroughly enjoyed the way that the episode started, but I am terribly perplexed by the interaction between Jacob and whoever the other guy was. Are we to assume that the ship out in the ocean is the Black Rock or is the other guy from the Black Rock? And why couldn't the other guy kill Jacob?

I loved the flashbacks showing Jacob's interaction with our characters throughout their lives. It was fun trying to figure out who the children were in the flashbacks before it was revealed (i.e. Kate, Sawyer). It seems that those visited by Jacob were always destined for the Island, but it makes me curious of those characters who have died along the way and if they might have also been visited by Jacob. I guess it doesn't matter since they served their Island purpose, so to speak.

It was nice seeing Rose, Bernard and Vincent again. I like their attitude about life now that they have been stuck in the 1970s for three years. I especially liked the comment about how they can't believe that the Losties keep shooting at each other after all this time. Very great point! So does this mean that Rose and Bernard will likely end up as Adam and Eve in the caves from Season 1? Maybe, but there would still need to be an explanation of the black and white stones in their pockets.

Jack stayed on his mission to detonate Jughead at the site of the Swan Station. In the process he did and said the stupidest thing that he has uttered on the show to date referring to his relationship with Kate and his rationale for detonating Jughead: "If it's meant to be, it's meant to be." He thinks that by blowing up the bomb and erasing the last three years, he and Kate, who will never meet in the alternate future, will somehow manage to live together happily ever after. Stupid!!! If I ever need a spinal surgeon, I hope he or she will not try to intellectualize too much and just worry about fixing my spine! I'm very glad that Miles brought up the idea that Jack setting off Jughead could actually be what causes their fate, not what will prevent it. I think we have all suspected this for a while. Pretty much everything that the Losties have done since arriving in the 1970s has set in motion things that would ultimately cause them problems in the future. It's like the Room 23 brainwashing film said: "We are the causes of our own suffering."

I was pretty worried about Sayid. In fact I still am. He wasn't in very good shape at all after getting shot in the gut. Since I'm not sure what exactly happened at the end of the episode, I'm still not sure of his fate, but I was thinking that he was not going to survive throughout most of the episode. And what of Juliet? It was no surprise to me that she was going to die, or at least appear to, because of her casting in a remake of V this fall. That kind of info comes out so early it makes keeping a surprise like that nearly impossible. But she somehow managed to survive her fall down the shaft and presumably detonate Jughead with a rock. I suppose what I found most interesting about the final "LOST" title screen is that it was a negative image with black letters over a white background. I really hope this doesn't mean that the plan was successful and that we have entered some sort of new reality where things are inverted. I only hope it was felt that this was the best way to segue into the final credit after the blinding white flash.

All that was very important and the obvious source of the title of the episode, but I think that the more important incident happened in 2007 on the beach at the statue. It seems that something is very different about John Locke since the Ajira plane crash: he is most certainly dead. I have to hand it Roxi; she knew what was in the box as soon as Ilana and Bram showed it's conents to Frank Lapidus. I didn't believe her until we both saw it at the end of the episode. Kudos to Roxi as she also figured out the shocking twist early on in the season finale of Fringe this week. She's two-for-two in J.J. Abrams produced show finales this year! So if Locke was not resurrected, who have we and everyone on the Island been seeing as Locke? Based on what he and Jacob discussed at the end, it sounds like he is the spirit of the man who could not kill Jacob at the beginning of the episode.

So here's my thinking: Christian Shepard has been seen walking around the Island since the beginning of the series but he was dead before the crash of Oceanic 815. We have seen him helping Locke get off the Island both with the frozen donkey wheel and with directions in Jacob's cabin...the same cabin that Ilana ordered burned because "someone else has been using it." It is my contention that the spirit that Locke heard ask for help in Jacob's cabin was not Jacob, but rather the guy who wanted to kill Jacob in the beginning of the episode. Somehow, the ring of ash was keeping him in the cabin, but with Locke's help, he was able to leave the cabin and inhabit Christian and eventually take the place of Locke. And now that entity has managed to get Ben to presumably kill Jacob.

So where do we go from here? Well I'm not sure what to expect from those Losties that were in the 1977, but I don't really expect that they have changed the future. As far as "Locke" and the Others, I think that Ilana and her team are the "good guys" as Bram put it. My theories are based on the answer to the question, "What lies in the shadow of the statue?" Richard finally gave the answer, in the Latin language of the Others, which translates to "He who will save us all." Now depending on how that answer is interpretted, it can only be one of two people. Either Locke, who's lifeless body is currently lying on the beach by the statue, or it is Ben who is an admitted liar and is currently in the statue. My first inclination is to go with Ben who has lied so long but always for the good of the Island, or so he says. It is hard for me to say this, but since "dead is dead," the Locke that we know may be gone for good. I mean, of course we will still see him in the show (how could we not?) but it may be as this coniving "evil" Locke that just had Jacob killed.

It's certainly a lot to think about over the long hiatus. There were a couple of things I was disappointed about not seeing this episode. The first was Desmond. Like Ms. Hawking said earlier in the season, the Island isn't done with him yet so I was hoping for him in the finale. The other is the outrigger canoe pursuit that we saw when Locke et al were flashing through time earlier in the season. I was sure that we would see this last flash get resolved in the finale but I suppose we will have to hope for both in the final season of LOST. It's certainly going to be a long summer and fall!