It has been quite plain since the beginning of the show -- the writers like to use cons as a story device. Sawyer is a con man, Cooper was a con man, Ben was a con man. The episode "The Long Con" hinted at it early on, dishing out one of the most imperative themes of the show. At the root of LOST lies a con of epic proportions.
To quote The Usual Suspects, "the greatest trick the devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn't exist." Up to the season five finale, we had no reason to suspect that the Man In Black existed. He pulled a trick on all of us. We were completely ignorant of his existence, though that doesn't mean he wasn't there. He's always been there. He has always been conning.
His subject -- Benjamin Linus. Think back to the episode The Man Behind the Curtain, where little Ben sees a vision of his mother. At the time we had no idea what exactly she was. Though as soon as he told Alpert what he had saw, Alpert believed he was special. The MIB knew precisely that that would occur. That's why he took the form of Ben's mother. The MIB had found his subject in an innocent little kid who had just arrived on the island, unaware of the plotting and scheming that had been going on for years.
The MIB was Ben's mother. Remember when he told Jacob, "You have NO idea what I had to go through to get here." Well, he wasn't just referring to taking Locke's form and deceiving The Others throughout season five. He was also referring to all the forms he had to take throughout the show in order to put Ben on the path necessary to pull off his trick.
I'll attempt to put this grand scheme of his in timeline form:
Ben sees his mom --> Alpert think's he special --> Ben gets into The Others --> Ben meets Locke --> Locke gets leadership --> MIB tricks Ben into killing Jacob.
This all ties into Ben's cancer. He was never special. He was never anything. He got cancer because he was just a normal person who had been played his entire life. In fact, the MIB might have even given him that cancer, so that he would doubt his position as leader of The Others, leading Locke to supplant him.
This was a complicated plan. A long, long plan that spanned many many years and involved time travel and all sorts of other manipulations. But every move was calculated. Every move was premeditated, debated over, thought out, tested, and finally executed. Eventually culminating in the Checkmate we saw in The Incident.
(This leads me to believe Hawking is in cahoots with MIB, since she pushed so hard to get dead Locke to go back to the island. Sayid did not trust her, and he is ALWAYS right in determining people's true intentions. But that is another theory for another day.)
To quote The Usual Suspects, "the greatest trick the devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn't exist." Up to the season five finale, we had no reason to suspect that the Man In Black existed. He pulled a trick on all of us. We were completely ignorant of his existence, though that doesn't mean he wasn't there. He's always been there. He has always been conning.
His subject -- Benjamin Linus. Think back to the episode The Man Behind the Curtain, where little Ben sees a vision of his mother. At the time we had no idea what exactly she was. Though as soon as he told Alpert what he had saw, Alpert believed he was special. The MIB knew precisely that that would occur. That's why he took the form of Ben's mother. The MIB had found his subject in an innocent little kid who had just arrived on the island, unaware of the plotting and scheming that had been going on for years.
The MIB was Ben's mother. Remember when he told Jacob, "You have NO idea what I had to go through to get here." Well, he wasn't just referring to taking Locke's form and deceiving The Others throughout season five. He was also referring to all the forms he had to take throughout the show in order to put Ben on the path necessary to pull off his trick.
I'll attempt to put this grand scheme of his in timeline form:
Ben sees his mom --> Alpert think's he special --> Ben gets into The Others --> Ben meets Locke --> Locke gets leadership --> MIB tricks Ben into killing Jacob.
This all ties into Ben's cancer. He was never special. He was never anything. He got cancer because he was just a normal person who had been played his entire life. In fact, the MIB might have even given him that cancer, so that he would doubt his position as leader of The Others, leading Locke to supplant him.
This was a complicated plan. A long, long plan that spanned many many years and involved time travel and all sorts of other manipulations. But every move was calculated. Every move was premeditated, debated over, thought out, tested, and finally executed. Eventually culminating in the Checkmate we saw in The Incident.
(This leads me to believe Hawking is in cahoots with MIB, since she pushed so hard to get dead Locke to go back to the island. Sayid did not trust her, and he is ALWAYS right in determining people's true intentions. But that is another theory for another day.)
