First, while not episode-specific, co-worker Lynn had a good question that’s worth sharing here. She wonders, if Christian is Jacob, then what was it that asked for Locke’s help at the end of Season Three? Remember the first scene in Jacob’s cabin, with Locke and Benry, but only Locke could hear him? That’s a good question. I’m committed to the idea that Christian is Jacob, and this would seem to contradict that.
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But here’s my theory. The invisible man was also Jacob. When he manifests as Christian, he has physical presence and people can see and hear him. In this scene, he didn’t take a physical form because he didn’t want Benry to hear him. He’s actively locking Benry out of communication. That’s serious rejection right there.
Don, of spunkybean fame, wonders if Widmore could actually be the good guy, since Benry and Christian keep lying. At this point, I have to disagree. Widmore implied that he left the Island by turning the wheel, and that Benry tricked him into leaving the Island. We now know that he was leaving of his own volition on a regular basis before he was finally banished via submarine. That’s really more of a lie of omission than anything, but it casts some doubt. And I remain convinced that he didn’t want to get the Oceanic Six back to the Island – he claimed to want the same thing Benry wanted, but Benry’s the guy who actually put everybody on a plane. And remember, Benry could have physically returned to the Island without the Oceanic Six – he didn’t pass through time like they did. He got on a plane that went down over the Island. Benry could have gotten on that plane by himself, so I think he was actually trying to give the Island what it wanted by returning the Oceanic Six. At the very least, Widmore is out of step with what the Island wants. Also, you can’t forget that he sent the freighter to the Island with two purposes: Bringing Benry back and killing everybody else on the Island. I can’t trust that guy one bit.
Also, a few people have asked me why Dharmaville is trashed in the present. It’s hard to keep track, because I have a really hard time wrapping my mind around the layout of the camp, but at the end of last season, Keamy and his friends shot up the whole place, blew up some houses, and killed a bunch of nameless Lostaways. That was mostly around Benry’s house, but as we saw this week, his house is right next to the Orientation Center. (Which actually makes perfect sense, since they both have easy access to the dock.) That’s pretty much all we’ve seen of the place, at least in the present.
Several people have suggested that Benry still might have taken out some members of the Hume family after getting tossed in the water. (I’m especially chilled by Julie’s suggestion that what’s left of them is inside the big metal box.) I’m giving Benry more credit than that – I think he had a moment of authentic humanity when he couldn’t bring himself to kill Penny. At least, that’s what I’m hoping. By the way, when he shot Desmond, was Desmond uninjured because the bag of groceries stopped the bullet or because “The Island isn’t done” with him yet? White Oracle said that to him, and that was exactly the same thing Tom said to Michael, who was unable to die until the Island let him.
Don has another interesting point. He suggests that Alex is to Benry as Charlie (Pace) was to Desmond. Per Widmore, the Island demanded that Alex die, and maybe Benry spent decades defying it and keeping her alive. Desmond could save Charlie over and over, but eventually he had to die and in the end, there was nothing he could do. And further, maybe that’s why Benry’s so kill-happy now: he’s realized the futility in disobeying the Island. This is a cool idea. At the very least, it brings us back to the idea of events repeating themselves with minor variations, this time with both Benry and Desmond fighting a losing battle to keeps somebody alive.
There are suspicious fingers pointing to everybody these days. Even poor Frank is not immune, as spunkyreader Julie suggest that he’s “Widmore’s Ethan”. As much as I like Frank, it’s hard to ignore that he was working for Widmore the first time around, though how much he knew is in question. And frankly, Widmore had to have noticed when all of the Oceanic Six ended up on a plane together. Could he have pulled some strings to make sure his guy ended up flying that plane? That seems plausible, although I hope it’s not true. I like the idea that Frank is just not wrapping his mind around all this weirdness. But if he turns out evil, consider yourself warned.
The shadow of the statue was a popular topic. Both Julie and Sara suggested that Ilana is working for Benry and knows more about what’s going on that we might think. I feel like she has to be working for him, though whether or not she knows it is up for debate. She told Sayid that she was hired by the family of the man he killed on the golf course. Since there were no witnesses, his family wouldn’t know Sayid from a hole in the ground. Clearly, Benry used her to get Sayid on the plane, but she may not know who signs her checks. And the fact that she waited to go all crazy until Benry left the Hydra Island makes her even more suspicious.
“What lies in the shadow of the statue?” is almost definitely a code phrase, since that’s weird phrasing for a question. Could it be that Benry had a bunch of people on the plane, and that phrase is how they identify one another? (It’s not without precedent on Lost. Kelvin and Desmond questioned newcomers to the Hatch with “What did one snowman say to the other snowman?” to determine if they were the replacements. Maybe they were ordered to lay low until Benry left the smaller Island, and then go to work. (The possibility remains that they’re planted by Widmore as well, but since I’m not convinced he wanted anybody to get back to the Island, I don’t see him hiring somebody to get Sayid there. And as Julie points out, if Frank is working for somebody, Ilana is working for somebody different, since Frank couldn’t answer the question.)
And Sara pointed out that the temple could lie in the shadow of the statue. In the timejump when they saw the completed statue, it was near the temple. And in fact, the Orchid Station and the wheel were in that vicinity, too. Of course, when we saw the completed statue, the Orchid didn’t exist yet, but at least the wheel did. Considering that Benry sent the Others to the temple right as things were going crazy and we haven’t seen them since, the temple is going to be important. And if somebody builds a wall around a temple to keep people from seeing it, you know it’s got to be an awesome temple.
Then there’s the mystery of what’s in the big metal box. If either Benry or Widmore had a big group of followers on the plane, that opens up the possibilities. That would indicate that whatever it is, it’s something that somebody specifically wanted to transport to the Island. Possibly something that they’re going to be bringing to the temple? I don’t think it’s a box of guns or weapons, because Benry already had plenty of guns on the Island. Heck, he had about six of them in his office. What would you transport in a giant metal box, though? Something very precious, perhaps? I honestly don’t have a good guess right now, though.
In a theory that makes me nervous to even recount, spunkybuddy Amy is worried about Locke. She thinks that Smokey took the form of Locke. He does seem to know an awful lot about the temple now, right? And the Monster didn’t appear to Benry until after Locke had left to look for a rope, and it disappeared right before Locke returned. (And how ironic was it that Locke had to throw Benry a rope? Their last encounter involving a rope did not go so well…) This is a little upsetting, because it’s plausible. However, I still believe that Locke is alive rather than being a monster manifestation. As far as we know, Smokey can’t travel to the Hydra Island, so I have to think that was really Locke at that point. Considering that Benry lost track of Locke, who then came out of the jungle with directions to the temple, it could be that the real Locke is hanging out and wondering where everybody went while Sun and Benry follow Smokey through the jungle. I will say that the one other time we actually saw Smokey judge somebody (Mr. Eko), it wasn’t at the temple. So it wouldn’t have needed to get Benry to the temple in order to do its business. Still, Locke’s appearances and disappearances throughout this bit are definitely suspicious. And Locke does seem to have a lot more of a hands-on knowledge of the workings of the Island these days. Like I say, this theory makes me nervous.
Finally, we have the hieroglyphics. It could take forever and a day to crack everything we saw on the pillars and temple walls, but there was a nice long focus on one particular panel. The panel right above the smoke holes has some interesting images. Along the left of the screen, there’s something I can’t quite make out, but it sort of looks like the image that people cite to claim that aliens built the pyramids, and below it is what appears to be a wheel. The magic wheel, perhaps? Along the right are more images that I can’t quite make out, but at the bottom right is a coiled snake. This is an image used to depict royalty. In the center is something that’s badly worn, but could be an eye. This could mean a lot of different things, but it’s also a nice tie-in to the long-time gimmick of opening each episode with a close up on somebody’s eye. The panel is dominated by two figures, the jackal-headed Anubis and an angular creature facing it.
Chicago Rachel was good enough to bust out some Egyptology for me, and it turns out, Anubis fits in to Lost mythology pretty well. Anubis is traditionally pictured holding an ankh, much like a certain statue we all know and fear. This image doesn’t seem to have one, but the hand that’s up against his body is pretty worn. Anyway, Anubis determined one’s worthiness to enter the realm of the dead. Hey, that thing with judging people sounds pretty familiar.
In addition to being the ruler of the underworld (and having some really messed-up parentage), Anubis is the patron of “lost souls and orphans”. Well, we’ve got more than a few of those on this show. Lost souls all over the place! And as far as confirmed orphans go, we’ve got Walt, Benry, and Sawyer. Almost everybody is missing at least one parent, though. So yeah, Anubis is an excellent fit for Lost.
The jagged creature, I think is Smokey. That just seems to me to be the way that primitive people would indicate a creature made of smoke, especially if they’ve seen him do his Slinky-style chase. The way they’re facing each other would seem that they’re communicating. Between the two is a curvy line that I thought was a snake, but is more likely the pictograph for water. That could be a reference to Egyptian culture ended up on the Island, back in prehistory. The art might suggest that Smokey does Anubis’ work, while separated from him. Or perhaps it’s meant to parallel them, as they fill the same duties on their own sides of the ocean. Whatever it means, it certainly indicates that Smokey’s been around for a long time.
All right, that’s enough for now. Up next, we’ve got Miles, Dr. Marvin Candle, a mysterious body, and a gun-wielding Radzinsky. This should be delightful!
