I’d like to welcome my cousin Michelle, who does such an awesome job summarizing her theories on Lost and presenting ideas on some of the unanswered questions, that I’d like to share it with you guys. Enjoy!
The earth exists as a living thing and there is a point where all the energy that allows life comes from. This is the island. It is the ‘heart’ where all the energy, life force, (electromagnetism) exists. This was the light that had to be protected. Just like in acupuncture there are certain parts of the body that when pricked can stop pain etc. There are hot spots on the earth where there is more energy than others. This is what the psychic was talking about to Rose and Bernard when they were looking for a cure for her cancer. She said that she couldn’t be cured there but there was another place that she could (the island).
The island is also where all time exists or comes from like The Dark Tower (Stephen King’s series). Time does not pass there at all or in a different way that is why babies could not be born. At certain points in our time (when the series began for instance) the island appears. Like in Star Trek 2009, Nero had to wait years for Spock to come out of the wormhole, when the time periods lined up. This is why it was necessary to build the pendulum in the church to find out what time and place the island would appear. The church itself may be a hot spot, which is why the pendulum works.
The island does exist physically, it is real and the time our characters spent on the island did happen when they were alive. People (like Widmore/Dharma) believed in its existence and were able to create the pendulum to find it. Just like people have always been searching for Shangri La, Eden, Fountain of Youth etc. Once they found the island they discovered the energy and electromagnetic effects that it had. They began doing experiments to see if they could harness this energy. When they realized the dangers involved, they created the hatch/station with the button to help contain places that they accidentally drilled/released.
They also knew about the island being the center of all time (or that it was only existing at a static point) that was where the bunny experiments came from. They also experimented on other animals (hence the cages) including polar bears. Widmore had a picture of a polar bear on his wall, so he was the one who brought them to the island.
They also began doing psychic experiments. That’s why they wanted Walt, because he had some kind of psychic ability. There were also other people who had psychic abilities like Milo being able to hear dead people and Hugo see/talk to them. I think the psychic storyline was a red herring, something Dharma hippies in the 70′s would be into or simply something intesting to add. The writers incorporated many different philosophies, mythologies, religion, science and that would include things like psychic abilities and numerology.
Desmond is special because he is able to live through exposure to large amounts of electromagnetism. I think it could be like a natural immunity or like why some people are able to live after being hit by lightning. Widmore knew about this and that’s why he wanted to bring Desmond to the island to help him harness this energy. This is also why Desmond was the only one who could open the cork of the island because it was the place of largest concentration of electromagnetism. The cork was keeping the energy from ‘exploding’ and destroying the island and the earth. When Jack went down to put it back, he knew he wouldn’t survive the exposure, that’s why he gave the duty to protect the island to Hugo. The whole point of taking the cork out was to allow Jack to kill the smoke monster. During that period, the island was no longer providing its healing powers so the monster became mortal in Locke’s body. Jack had to put the cork back to save the world and contain the energy again. This was his destiny, which he finally realized.
Like Adam and Eve, Jacob and the Man in Black (and all the protectors of the island) were human. The island has been around forever-exists at all time- that is where the statue and hieroglyphs came from, ancient people that had found the island.
When Jacob put the Man in Black into the light, it killed his mortal body (from exposure) but it released his soul (Terry O’Quinn’s theory on Jimmy Kimmel), which became the black smoke. The smoke was often referred to as the security system; this could be a reference to the fact that he was originally one of the people to potentially protect the island. Why he became smoke, I’m not sure of but would suppose it had to do with the fact that he was ‘bad’, had just killed his mother. He also was not ready to ‘move on’, he wanted to live. He didn’t go into the light voluntarily, he was murdered by Jacob. He always also wanted to leave the island and the only way that he could do that was to become mortal again (by possessing Locke’s body). He was the one who was always speaking to Ben, not Jacob and he was the one who convinced Ben to kill everyone in the Dharma Initiative and to kill Locke and bring his body back. Like the devil, he would promise things like making Ben head of the island, giving Sayid Nadia back etc. He didn’t plan to keep these promises; he just wanted to use them to get off the island. He also hated the island and wanted to destroy it. He didn’t know that destroying the island would destroy the rest of the world (that he wanted to return to), that is why when Desmond released the cork, Jack told Locke that they were both wrong about what was going to happen.
The black smoke was the one that was appearing as dead relatives. He wasn’t physically taking form but he was able to hypnotize or make Jack and the others see what he wanted them to see. Once he was smoke he was able to do things like show them their lives (like Echo), ability he may have gained when he was in the light.
The people in the Dharma initiative were the ones who built Jacob’s cabin as a way of protecting themselves from the black smoke. They referred to it as Jacob’s cabin because Ben thought it was Jacob speaking to him, not MIB. Some people believe that you can protect yourselves from evil spirits by putting ash (across a doorway/in a circle like in the movie The Skeleton Key). I think that is why the ash was around the cabin. The black smoke was trapped in the cabin for a period and that is why he told Ben to kill everyone in Dharma, so he could be released. The Dharma people (who became the Others when Ben took over) obviously knew about the smoke, that’s why they had the sound poles surrounding their camp. The cabin appeared/disappeared because it was built on top of a spot with a high concentration of electromagnetism, so it flipped through time.
The island’s electromagnetic energy is what caused things to crash there (a la Bermuda Triangle). Jacob had a way of manipulating it, that’s why he kept bringing people to the island, to find a replacement/protector. The Dharma people also had found the wheel of time that the Man in Black had started and they got it to work. This wheel allowed the island to be moved to so it could be lined up with a specific point in time. This is how Jacob was able to leave the island and visit our castaways during their lives. It was also how the real Locke was able to get off the island. There was always something special about Locke, which is why he was the one who could be possessed (perhaps it was his faith in the island) by MIB. MIB couldn’t leave until he had a mortal body again.
Just like God put humans in Eden, he put humans in charge of the island. Because we are all human we can make mistakes so there were probably good guardians and bad ones. The guardians are the ones who made the ‘rules’ that is why, Hugo told Ben that they could change the way that the island was run.
The show was always about the characters and their journey/destiny as well as debate over science and faith. Jack had no faith in the beginning, so one of the main points was that he gains faith and ultimately realizes he had a destiny. All of the characters were ‘lost/broken’ in some way and they all needed to come to terms with the wrongs in their lives before they could move on. The final season’s alternate timeline was a purgatory/place that they created to help them live the lives they wanted to live, fix mistakes etc. Once they had done that they were able to move on/go to heaven/ the next world/dimension etc. I interpreted it as them going to heaven but they left it open. In The Dark Tower they were in a world that had ‘moved on’, so depending on your belief they could have moved on to another existence/world/dimension.
They all died at different points but they were all able to meet in this fictional life. They were all important to each other, their experiences on the island (and off for oceanic six) were the most important time in their lives and that is why they needed each other to move on. Jack was always afraid of dying alone (We live together or we die alone) but his father tells him that no one dies alone. This reminded me of Star Trek V when Spock tells Kirk that he shouldn’t have been afraid that he was going to die because he was ‘never alone’.
I believe that Sayid and Shannon were together because they were members of the original crash and those were the people that were all coming together. Also it was a place that they created to finish things that they hadn’t had a chance to. Sayid and Shannon never had a chance to get together because she died before him. Another reason why Shannon may have been important was that she was the one who allowed Sayid to love again. He came to the island a broken, ex-torturer, she allowed him to regain some of his humanity.
Aaron appearing at the church as a baby could also be a result of it being a place that they created (fictional) and Claire and Charlie had only seen Aaron as a baby so that’s the way that they would remember him. It could be that Aaron was able to be born on the island because he was ‘special’ like Desmond, somehow immune to the effects of time. Or there is a certain limited amount of time that the island exists in which includes the few months/weeks that it took for him to be born. Other babies could not age or come to term a full nine months.
After I had written this, I woke up and remembered that Ben and other people did age on the island (Ben grew up there). There were only certain people who were guardians (drank the “blessed” water) that were immortal, like Richard, Jacob and MIB. This means that my theory about the island being stuck in time as the reason for babies not being born is wrong. On the pre-show finale, the creators said that when Jacob touched our heroes during their lives that protected them and meant they wouldn’t die. I don’t see how that could be true because our characters could and did die. But that would be a possible explanation as to why Aaron and Claire survived his birth. As long as they were candidates, they were protected.
My other thought would be that babies couldn’t be born because of either the electromagnetism and/or the closeness to the light/source of all life. I liked my other time theory much better and was really disappointed when I remembered about Ben.
I do think that the creators had a plan and knew what they wanted the final scene to be. But I also think that in order to fill six seasons they had to come up with new mysteries all the time, so that’s why a lot of “mini-mysteries” were left unanswered.
But then I could be wrong about everything too. 
My thoughts on why babies couldn’t be born:
Each of the people who made their way to that island were there for a purpose–the vast majority of them were there because they were candidates, and Jacob had specifically brought them there for that reason.
When Kate became a mother, taking care of Aaron, Jacob crossed her name off the wall. She was no longer a candidate, or at least not one that he intended on focusing on.
Perhaps the reason babies couldn’t be born is because Jacob intentionally made it that way–in the same way that Jacob’s mother made it impossible for Jacob and MIB to kill each other. The guardian of the island sets the rules.
The reason Jacob didn’t want babies to be born on the island is because taking care of a child could be a higher responsibility than protecting the island. Jacob made it so that mothers who became pregnant on the island would die, as they were no longer able to fulfill their purpose–to become the island’s guardian.
The same logic could be used to justify the healing properties of the island as well. Jacob made it that way because he didn’t want to lose candidates to the effects of random ailments. He wanted to narrow the candidate field based on their ability to make good choices to survive and protect the island.
I thought Claire was able to have the baby because she conceived it off the island, and Sun had to leave the island to give birth to Jiyeon because she was conceived on the island.
Anyway. I’m 99% sure the only thing they planned was the final scene with Jack dying and Vincent next to him. The rest was just made up as they went along. I don’t think it’s even possible to explain all the unexplained events without a shitload of contradictions. J.J. Abrams is notorious for his lack of forward thinking and writing himself into corners, and Lindelof and Cuse seemed to be even worse at it.
I don’t watch so I can’t comment on the LOST stuff, but I saw several Dark Tower references while scrolling and I LOVE THAT SERIES! It’s my fave series ever. SO GOOD.
Alright. Here’s a couple more:
At some point in the series, Walt comes back to shush people. Then we don’t see him again. Oh, and why was his dad (What’s-His-Name) unable to kill himself?
MIB did take over Christian Shepard’s body before he took over Locke’s.
Frenchy killed her friends because they had Teh Disease!!! No one else did, unless you count evil Sayid, which wasn’t the same thing, because he proved himself capable of being good in the end.
Right?
Wow after spending 3 days writing this out, I guess I was hoping for some ‘that’s a cool idea (even if I don’t agree).
But as Sawyer says ‘oh well’. This whole thing was just the way I interpreted it, I wasn’t trying to say I’m so brilliant I figured it out.
I think ‘the rule’s that Jacob was allowed to make could explain practically everything, including the babies. I don’t see him as the type of person who would do it but it’s possible and interesting idea.
If the preshow was right about Jacob’s touch protecting them from death that would explain why Michael couldn’t kill himself. I don’t think MIB actually took over Christians Shepards body, I think he was just making Jack see him. His body was lost before they crashed, right?
But as I said, I could be wrong about everything. I just thought some people who watch the show would be interested but I guess I was wrong. Sorry Craig!
I missed this one. I’m not a Lost watcher but I have to say your example of them being “lost” not lost (like Gilligan) was pretty insightful. The way you describe the smoke seems more like a ghost story (which is sort of sci-fi I guess). It does suck though when our neat and tidy theories get shot to hell, by our own logic.
For all the abuse Lost took in the last couple of years for getting so pointless it really had it’s die-hard fans and maybe coming up with theories yourself is half the fun rather than being told everything.
Enrico – you should check out the Dark Tower graphic novels Marvel and SK are producing. They’re about Roland’s childhood and his original ka-tet. Sort of like a prequel to the books.
I basically gave up on Lost after the first season, so I don’t know what 90% of this post was about. (What was in the hatch? Did Sawyer survive getting shot on the raft?) I do know that it gave J.J. Abrams enough industry clout to make Cloverfield and Star Trek, so I won’t mock it too much. I’m also starting to enjoy Fringe.
Michelle — all I can say is WOW! You really thought this through! I think a lot of your ideas are spot-on; some of them I don’t agree with but they are all really fascinating.
I 100% agree with you about the “cork” — that had to be removed in order to temporarily “turn off” the island’s special powers, which did make Locke mortal and was the only way to kill him. I would like to believe that this was Jacob’s plan all along.
I am tempted to believe your idea that it was the MiB who had been feeding Ben orders all along, because that would help explain why The Others often seemed so evil. But if that’s true, then how do we explain that Richard knew Jacob and — I thought — was feeding orders to Ben from Jacob? Was Richard also fooled by the MiB somehow?
I honestly don’t know what to make of the cabin. When Locke saw the vision of Horace building the cabin, was that really a vision of something that happened in the past or was it another one of the MiB’s tricks? If it was real, then (a) the cabin was never something that the Dharma Initiative knew about — it was a private thing just between Horace and his Wife, and (b) it’s weird that it would *ever* have been referred to as Jacob’s cabin and also weird that it would have the ash (how would Horace have known about the ash? He was a Dharma person and not an “Other” — The Others knew about the ash, as evidenced by their use of it inside the temple, but Dharma wouldn’t have known, I think). The cabin seemed to move around — which is consistent with it being Jacob’s. I still don’t know.
Your idea about time and the babies was intriguing, but yes, you are right that since (most) people do age on the island, that theory doesn’t seem to work.
I think that the writers did just make a lot of stuff up as they went along and that there is no “right” answer to most of these things, and in fact it will be close to impossible to make up answers that are consistent. Some things are probably just screw-ups. (The video Craig posted before covers some of those.)
On the whole, though, a very masterful and fascinating post!
Very insightful post, Michelle. I’d love to hear your take of the series Carnivale.
I’m impressed – A+ and gold star. It makes my head hurt to try to explain away the plot holes/unanswered questions from the series. So I’m going to go with your theories (I agree with most of them, but feel that quite a bit of Lost was made up as they went along).
And, yes – Desmond is special. Yum!
Now can you explain about Hurley and the ranch dressing?
Having never watched and episode of Lost, I can’t really comment on this post too much. BUt in general I can say that this is an increbly well thought out and reasoned post. I didn’t read a lot of it, cause I didn’t know what the hell anyone was talking about it. But it was clear Michelle DID know what she was talking about.
Man, you put more thought into this series than I have into all the TV series I regularly watch. Course, most of the stuff i watch is silly and superficial….kinda like me.
You should get Michelle to watch, think over and write reviews of other TV shows (*cough* Torchwood *cough*) or books (*cough* torchwood series of books *cough*). Her take on other things (*cough* Torchwood *cough*) would be pretty damn interesting.
HUGS…
Torchwood has a subtext?
Speaking of silly and superficial, I have my own guilty pleasures in that regard. One of them I’m not even sure I can call it a “pleasure” unless it’s a masochistic one — or maybe some sort of sick voyeuristic one, like the impulse that makes those people rubberneck accidents as they drive by, hoping to glimpse a blood-bespattered body on the pavement — I’m speaking of course of the 9-years-and-counting trainwreck known as Smallville. It is astonishing to me that after all these years, Tom Welling STILL CAN’T ACT!!! His acting skills STILL consist of nothing more than shifting his weight from one foot to the other and furrowing his brow and trying to look serious. And of course the ridiculous plots and characters and idiotic teenage drama (even though they’re all years past college now). Not to mention that the real Superman was a genius and Tom Welling’s version is borderline “special needs”
Nonetheless, I just can’t stop watching (and no, not because I find Welling attractive: he honestly isn’t my type; neither is Justin Hartley, though I admit I don’t mind seeing them with their shirts off).
That’s about as silly and superficial as it comes.
Justin, I’ve been watching Smallville on DVD. I made it through the first three seasons rather easily, but halfway through the 4th, I got bogged down. Some stupid crap about Lana being possessed by a French witch from the 14th century, and the search for peices of…something, and a surprise trip to China (with no passports, VISA, translators, what have you), yeah, that one kinda sealed the deal for me.
I’m hoping to get through them, at least until the Green Arrow, Aquaman, Cyborg, etc, characters show up, but it’s just so cheesy, i don’t know.
I swear, it’s only the blatant and gratuitious shirtlessness of the actors that makes the thing even watchable!
HUGS…
That was quite an impressive writeup Michelle! I don’t own a TV (does that make me the anti-Craig?
), so I only watch a few TV shows with my mother when I visit her. While she does watch Lost, I never felt that I had the time to invest in a TV series like that. I tend to mostly watch mini-series, short run cable series, and PBS Masterpiece shows. Perhaps that is just my fear of commitment showing. 
I think I have learned the most I have ever learned about Lost from reading this post! When a show introduces implausible story arcs I have been known to say that the writers are pulling it out of their ass. Perhaps the Lost writers did some ass extraction on some sub-story lines. However, based on your essay it sounds like there was some underlying structure and plan to the big picture.
Michelle, sometimes you just have to wait a little for the comments to roll in. Us dancing Monkeys are getting older, were not as quick as we used to be.
Justin: From reading Polt’s tweets I have learned that Smallville is all about the shirtless guys, apparently.
I’ve never seen it.
And of COURSE, Torchwood has subtext!!!
HUGS….
Yeah the witch digression was dreadful. And it all got forgotten later. It’s amazing the series has been sucking wind now for two seasons post-Lex Luthor. Just unbelievable. The Doomsday storyline was kind of cool — and actually showed what I considered to be decent acting by the guy who played Doomsday in his human form (which is I think an idea they made up for the series). The various Zod / Brainiac storylines were “meh” in my opinion. But just about everything to do with introducing other DC characters — the Flash (who they call “Impulse” and who’s Bart, instead of Barry, Allen), Aquaman, the Green Arrow, etc. etc. — the Legion of Superheroes from the future, and especially the way they introduced the Justice Society of America in this past season with Michael Shanks of Stargate fame as Hawkman — have all been quite fun indeed. The latest story arc has been about Kandor — and is a dreadful reimagining IMHO.
Chris — not “committing” to a TV series is hardly a vice. I spend ***WAYY*** too much time watching TV. And unlike Craig, *I* am not superhuman. I am unable to watch vast amounts of TV *and* have a full-time job *and* write a novel *and* churn out incredibly-creative blog material. So watching TV for me mostly means I’m unproductive. (I can only assume that Craig either never sleeps or has access to some sort of portal into another dimension where time passes at a different pace from that in this world; otherwise I can’t understand how he does it since I know he’s even more of a TV addict than I am.)
Nonetheless, I do recommend LOST. Now that it’s complete you know at least that it’s just 6 seasons: 3 of which are only half-sized seasons: really the equivalent of 4.5 seasons. Well worth watching.
Justin: being the comic book geek that I am, I gotta point out on the series they were referring to Bart Allen, Barry Allen’s grandson from the future (don’t ask) who was a young teenager and went by the name of Impulse. SO in that respect, at least, they were consistant with the comics.
HUGS…
Thanks, Polterz, I actually already knew that. They call him Impulse in the show, in fact. I got that info from Wiki.
Personally I’m kind of a purist and prefer the whole pre-crisis-on-infinite-earths Earth 1 and Earth 2 versions of the DC universe. It’s all become too complicated with too many reimaginings and rebootings and multiple versions of the same superheroes. I thought the Earth 2 concept did a very elegant job of explaining the Golden Age versions. Granted, the Silver Age of the 60s and 70s is precisely what was the most lame about DC, the period when Marvel really took the lead and pushed the envelope of what a comic book could do, with far more complex and nuanced heroes and villains than pretty much all DC characters outside of Batman; the Silver Age Superman was simply TOO perfect and good. It was all very bland. But I don’t know why they had to blow it all up with the Crisis and subsequent diddlings around. Plus, I really miss the Silver Age Krypton with its Jewel Mountains and Scarlet Jungle and that animal that had what amounted to a TV screen between its horns
The Christopher Reeves Superman-era Krypton as a frozen ball of ice with all the Crystal Technology was kind of cool when they first came up with it but I’m really sick of it and I really wish the various movies and TV shows would give up on it 
John Byrne’s twist on this with the germophobic Kryptonians was ok, but I’d rather have them go back to the Silver Age one with all its goofiness.
(Not that any of this has to do with Michelle’s LOST theories, but this is what happens on Puntabuthreads; we digress
)
i really liked reading your theory. and there was one thing that i read that clicked in my head saying ‘omg thats probably it’ and figures once i actually got to making this comment, i completely forgot lol. but good job
Great theories! I get so caught up in the characters and so busy in my own life that I forget about all the little details. I was so happy with the ending since it was such a character-driven ending.
Thanks everyone for the kind and supportive comments. You guys are the best and made me feel better. I get insecure about my writing.
Craig loaned me Torchwood a while back. I would have to rewatch them to write about them. But I do remember loving the first two seasons. I was unhappy with the end of the third because it seemed to go against the point of the rest of the season, which I had equated with Star trek (as usual), when Kirk told Spock the ‘needs of the one outweigh the needs of the many.’ I do hope they make more though because it was an outstanding show.
I actually really enjoyed the first seasons of Smallville especially when they introduced Bart, Green Arrow etc. I just think they are dragging him becoming Superman out way too long. I would love it to turn into a Justice League show now.
Thanks again Craig for having confidence enough in me to post on your fantastic site. And thanks to the rest of us dancing monkeys for the support.
Justin: I am SOOO with you on liking the pre-Crisis DC Universe. I loved all the different earths 1, 2, 3, 5, C, S, X, etc, etc, etc. And once the Crisis mucked it all up, the Legion Of Superheroes was never the same again!
And Michelle: I’m totally with you too on the 3rd Season of Torchwood. Horrible, just horrible. Well it was great science fiction, but it was a horrible Torchwood story, as the team was basically irrelevant to the whole tale.
HUGS….