What the final twist on LOST might be: V.2 – with other important answers too by Sawyer's Optician

INTRODUCTION
You can see my original post here:
http://theoriesonlost.blogspot.com/2010/02/what-final-twist-in-lost-might-be-by.html

In my opinion that theory was poorly written and had one huge gaping hole, which I hope to fill with this post. There have been a few posts since then where I see people building on what I said originally, but none satisfied my thoughts. So, for those who didn't read it, there was a cartoon I remember watching as a child. I can't remember what it was called, but the details of the story I remember vividly, mainly because it scared the hell out of me.

It was about a girl who was playing with a ball near some caves. At some point the ball goes into one of the caves by accident so she runs to the cave, but is stopped from going inside when she sees that in there is a really old guy with a long beard. She asks him to pass her the ball, but he refuses and tells her she has to get it herself. He manages to convince her to enter the cave and while she's picking up her ball, he runs out. When she tries to run out she is stopped by an invisible field blocking the entrance. The old guy then explains that he's been trapped in the cave for hundreds of years, for there must always be one person in the cave. He tells the girl that she will be trapped in the cave until the day she manages to convince somebody else to enter the cave.

This is what I think is the basis behind the story of LOST. The island, for whatever reason, needs two beings – one light, one dark – to keep its balance. The two people must take their posts through free will, and most recently these two posts have been held by Smokey (who has admitted that he wants to return home) and Jacob (who, dispite being dead is still wondering around the island giving orders and playing the game).

THE GAME
The people who take these roles must do so at their own will, so what Jacob and his old friend do is bring people to the island in order to play people into relieving them of their possition. The conversation on the beach when the man in black says: 'Still trying to prove me wrong, aren't you.” - this a man who has seen many failed attempts of convincing a candidate to take their place so many times, that he's all but given up. Jacob remains an optimist: „You are wrong.” - because he knows that it's just a matter of time. Every attempt at seducing a candidate is just progress. He's improving his game and convinced that the day will come. What we will have been following for 6 seasons is one long attempt at convincing a canditate to take the place of either Smokey or Jacob. OK, so why all of this when no doubt Ben would have willingly become Jacob? Well, I think that first of all it's the vetting proccess. It has to be somebody of unrelenting faith. Somebody who had att! oned their sins and had a tabula rasa. Also I think that the person who takes the role has to take it for purely selfless purposes. Ben, for example, would take the role of Jacob or smokey with selfish intent, considering that most of what he does is pretty selfish (he killed Locke because he was jealous, he got the oceanic 6 back together so he could get back on the island, he got rid of Widmore, he stabbed Jacob just because he felt ignored, etc.) I think that person has to go into the role with not only 100% free will, but also 100% conviction that they are doing it for the good of the island. Why? Ask the midichlorians.

So why the game? Why don't they work together? Why did smokey want Jacob dead if they have the same goal? Well, that's the game. In any game there can be only one winner. Whoever wins, be it smokey or Jacob, will be the one released and the other will have to stick around for the next game.

THE NATURE OF SMOKEY AND JACOB

So, when a candidate takes their part they are given certain powers. This part will hopefully explain everything about their powers and also answer this what means by being 'claimed'.I'll start with Jacob, who we assume is the white player, and what he's able to do.

Jacob can leave the island. As somebody who commented on my last theory pointed out: how can he be trapped if we've seen him off island. Well, like I replied to them, just because he's off the island doesn't mean that he's free from it - remember Michael?
We know that he's got the abilitly to heal – or at least we think he has – he cured Juliet's sisters cancer, I'm guessing he cured Locke's back and Rose's cancer. On top of this I think that he has the power of 'time'. He can travel between times and dimentions and use his touch to affect things. What's his touch? We'll I think that his touch is how he picks his main players – the 'untouchables' in his game. What happens if one of these main players is killed by the other team? A new timeline forks off from that point, complicating things further. I can't be sure what the consequence of the fork in time might be, but I'm sure that it would probably give the white side an advantage because he, being able to travel between times and realities, would have sole access to a load of duplicates of his candidates. That is why it is against the rules to kill certain players – Widmore, Ben and Alex. The timeline we see in the flash sideways is the line that began not after ju! ghead exploded (it didn't explode, by the way), but rather it is the timeline created somewhere before Des came to the islan, when the wrong person came to the island. It was created somewhere after Dhama and before Des anyway. Another one may have been created after Keamy killed Alex at the barracks, which is why Ben muttered: „He changed the rules.” That's why smokey was so angry with his men. Not only because Ben called him from his grot-hole, but because Keamy had just made things even more complicated in his attempt to get off the island. Remember all of Jacob's lists? These are his main players. Why so many lists? He wants to confuse smokey. The numbers of LOST are the numbers that show the real candidates.

OK, so Smokey. He can't leave the island at all. There have been hints that he can – the one that comes to mind right off is the one when Jack's in the hospital fixing the smoke alarm and sees his dad sat on the chair. This was a red herring from the writers. I might suggest that it wasn't smokey, it was Christian Shepard from another timeline, brought across by Jacob somehow. But the that seems a bit far fetched somehow, even for LOST.

Anyway, to stop myself going of on a tangent here, Smokeys power is the ability to travel between the world of the living and the world of the dead. Hence his ability to take on the form of the deceased folk on the island. This is where the 'claimed' thing comes into it. I suggest that when a person dies on the island, Smokey has a chance to meet their fresh soul as it passes in the afterlife and make a deal with it. The deal being that he will return their soul to their body on the condition that they will serve him on the island. This is what's happened to Sayid. He's currently Smokey's inside man.

Alright, so why Sawyer? Why does he want to go home with somebody? Because, he's got no body. When Smokey took his position, this involved him leaving his own body behind and actually becoming the black smoke (this is where the candidate's real commitment is tested). He takes the form of the dead because he no longer has a form of his own. He needs to go home with somebody because he needs to take a 'live' body to travel in. For example, Smokey might take the body of Sawyer and use it to go back to the real world, and Sawyer's soul would be kicked out of his body and take the form of black smoke.

Where do Ben and Widmore fit it?
OK, these guys are our Obi Wan and Darth Vader of sorts. They're old collegues who followed different paths. Widmore was seduced by the dark side, whereas Ben stayed loyal. Hawkin's, with how much she goes on about time, you would think that she's on team Jacob. Perhaps she was touched by Jacob and given the ability to travel time and dimensions (remember when she met Des for the first time?). Then she defected and now she travels around trying to tidy up the mess of the alternate timelines created by the death of Jacob's main pieces.

OK, so Darlton have said that the story of LOST will end when the character's story ends. As somebody on my earlier version of this mentioned, how can the story end if two – or one – of our losties is condemed to a new game? Well, they also said time travel didn't play a part. I trust Darlton as much as I trust Flocke. In fact I don't trust anybody who goes by a name which is a combination of two other names. They said that there'll be no sequel or something but, look, Disney own the rights to this and they will do what the hell they want to make money. They certainly won't let the series end with the island being destroyed forever, that's for sure.

Thanks for being so kind with my last theory and for your patience if you have read all of this lot. Please be kind. I'm not claiming that I'm actually right here, but the fun isn't in being right, is it? This is the first TV that I know of in which the imagination is given carte blanc to do what it wants with the story. I love LOST for that. And for Andy here for making the best site for any TV show that I've seen so far, thanks mate.