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LOST displays hidden pieces and reveals sheer genius.

The season finale of LOST opened with a weaver at work on a tapestry long, long ago. We finally see the weaver of all the chaos and drama that permeates the Island: Jacob. He later boasts that he even makes the string himself. We certainly see him shaping the lives of our favorite Islanders as the flashbacks unfold through the episode. He has groomed these characters, primed them to play a role on the Island.

In the second scene, we see him wearing a white shirt on the beach. A ship—the Black Rock presumably—sails toward the Island in the distance. Another man joins Jacob. He wears a black shirt. This subtly suggests the traditional use of white to represent purity and black to represent darkness, good verses evil. But the events that unfold leave mixed signals, bating us. Who really is good and who really is evil?

The conversation that follows flows with undercurrents that satiate the entire length of the LOST seasons.

“Still trying to prove me wrong?” the man in black asks.

“You are wrong,” Jacob responds.

“Am I?” his opponent counters. “They come. They fight. They destroy. They corrupt. It always ends the same.”

“But it only ends once,” Jacob replies, both philosophically and detached; unafraid for the people about to be lulled into the game he is playing. “Anything that happens before that is just progress.”

The other man grows tense. “Do you have any idea how badly I want to kill you?”

“Yes,” Jacob states, unconcerned.

“One of these days,” the other threatens, “I’ll find the final loophole, my friend.”

As the man in black walks away, we see they were at the base of the statue before it was demolished. It is the statue of the Egyptian goddess Taweret. She was regarded in the Old Kingdom as the protectoress of motherhood, pregnancy and childbirth. The demolition of her statue could of course be the reason that the Islanders all lose their babies and die in childbirth. Ben tricked Juliet, a fertility doctor, into coming to the Island to help with the Others because they all lost their children in childbirth. Strangely enough, Danielle did not. She gave birth to Alex on the Island. Taweret later became known in Egyptian culture as the goddess who held the ultimate powers of evil at bay.

We now finally see the supreme powers at war with each other on the Island, outside of Dharma, outside of the various survivors, outside of Widmore, Ben and Eloise. We see the supreme powers that have been manipulating players in a game that sails past the borders of any of the pawn’s imaginations. Not even Richard Alpert kens the boundaries or even the scope of rules in this competition.

The conversation suggests that Jacob is working toward some greater good. This is underscored with his reading material as he waits for John Locke to be pushed out of a window by his father: Flannery O’Conner’s “All That Rises Must Converge.” Among it’s many themes, O’Conner explores the idea of a son
trying his best to gain independence from his mother. Instead he discovers that his motivations are actually propelled by her, in a complexity of dependence, even as he tries hard not to be like her. In the pain of their relationship and his struggle to rise above the base prejudices of the past, he must come to terms with the idea that she is still his mother; her pride and arrogance are his own. The theme of parental influence tying people to who they are certainly resonates through several of our characters: John Locke, Kate, Sawyer, Jack, Juliet, Dan, and Ben. I could go on, but you get the idea. Flanner O’Conner’s story gave us a glimpse into a mother and son caught in the midst of social progress, but not necessarily a moment of progress for the mother and son. So my question becomes, does Jacob have in mind an ultimate progress that makes the pain of so many individuals necessary or is he really a power of evil, playing out a sadistic game.

Flannery O’Conner also uses the term, “Meet yourself coming and going” over and over within her text. Certainly our characters flashing through time have met themselves coming and going.

In all of the backstories of this episode we realize Jacob truly has been at work, shaping these characters into the strings of his elaborate Island tapestry. Jacob appears to our various survivors of both flight 316 and the Ajira flight. In each appearance (except for one) he offers a gift of some sort. For little Kate Austen, shown with her childhood friend and his infamous toy airplane, he offers to bail her out of trouble when she gets caught shoplifting. To young James/Sawyer/LaFluer he gives him a pen to help him write the note that will rule the rest of his life until he reaches the Island and allows it to float into the wind. To Jack, he offers a candy bar stuck in the machine at his hospital. He interrupts a fight between Jack and his father that occurred right after his father gave him the fear trick of counting to five seen in the very first episode of Season 1. To Sun and Jin, he offers a blessing on their wedding day, giving them everlasting love. To Hurley, he gives a guitar, assurance that he is blessed and not cursed, and information to get back to the Island. To Alana from flight 316, he offers an important mission and we assume he heals her from severe injuries in order to send her on the mission. (Only Alana, among all the back-stories, indicates that she already knows him.) To John Locke, he gives the gift of life when John’s father pushes him out of the window. Jacob waits outside, knowing John is about to be pushed to his death, brings him back to life, and then apologizes that this had to happen to him. But Sayid does not receive a gift. Instead Jacob takes the life of Nadia, Sayid’s wife. Clearly Jacob is a god that can give life and take life away. Richard also reveals Jacob gave him the gift of continuous youth.

(Spoiler alert)  I could not possibly do a review of this episode without also sharing how the other man, the man in black has spent his time. The Ajira team, headed by Alana, marches into the jungle with LePetis. They enter Jacob’s cabin, she gathers information, then tells her team that someone else has been using it. We know of course that Christian and Clare appeared there as well as a spirit that appeared and threw things at Ben and John.

Then the Ajira team heads to the statue. They meet Richard and Alana asks, “What lies in the shadow of the statue?”  Richard answers in Spanish, I believe, but I do not speak it, so I’m left to wonder. Alana then shows Richard the body of John Locke and we realize that whoever is in the temple with Ben and Jacob is not the man we thought. Jacob knows this because he tells the impostor John, “You finally found your loophole.” We suddenly know he is the other man, the other supreme power at war with Jacob. If this power can take any shape, he could have easily been a host of other people we have seen on the Island: Jack’s father Christian Shepherd, Locke’s father who also turned out to be the real Sawyer, and Alex who appeared to Ben and told him to do everything John Locke instructs. As John Locke he could not kill Jacob directly, but as Alex he could convince the conniving Ben to do the dirty work.

Only Juliet’s back-story does not cross paths with Jacob. Thematically, I almost think of this as a mistake, but then maybe the producers are presenting her as a lose thread that Jacob or the man in black does not expect. They show her as someone locked in the beliefs of her parents—the belief that two people can’t stay together even when they love each—but desperately wants something more, just as O’Conner’s character desperately wants to move past the bigotry of his parents and believe that all people are equal. Juliet has a choice, even as she dies in the debris of the accident, vomiting up her own blood, she has a choice, to die with despair or to detonate the bomb and give everyone a chance to start over. As Sawyer tells Jack, “A man does what he does because he wants something for himself.” Juliet makes her decision because she wants something for herself even when all hope seems lost. The decision resonates with the powerful performance by Elizabeth Mitchell.

Ben also makes his decision based on what he wants for himself. He wants respect, notice, a reward or revenge. Since he is not given reward, he seeks
revenge.

The end is possibly the most magnificent cliffhanger of all time. Ben kills Jacob and Juliet detonates the bomb. When the title appears, the typical LOST printed in white on black background has been reversed to black on white background. A significant turn of powers has taken place, presumably good has grown more powerful, but how and why?  Has the man in black arranged the loophole through time or has Jacob? Has Juliet, the fertility doctor sent thirty years in the past, prevented what Ben will do or were the travelers to the past (all summoned by imposter Locke via real Locke, but many encouraged or captured by Jacob) merely a part of the man in black’s loophole? Has the explosion actually caused the accident (as Miles suggested) that will lead to Ben killing Jacob or has Dan’s plan succeeded?

Jacob’s last words, “They’re coming,” leave us chilled. He and the other man may be powerful, but they also may be gatekeepers for whatever power
established their game. With Jacob’s demise and the fall of Taweret, will evil overcome the world? This is writing, directing, acting, musical scoring, special effects and producing that excel all expectations. Bravo!

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