Lost is not Alice in Wonderland or the Wizard of Oz by Greg Fuhrman

So what's been bugging me for awhile are the references to Alice in Wonderland, Wizard of Oz, The Stand, etc., that many posters have so eloquently theorized are the key to Lost and/or to which parallels have been drawn.

While they're absolutely not wrong (in fact their rather incredible), I would like to reference one iconic pop-culture phenomenon which I don't ever recall seeing as a parallel to Lost - The Twilight Zone.

Rod Serling was a true visionary and The Twilight Zone has been a template for many sci-fi, things that go bump in the night stories told in books, tv and movies. So how has this parallel escaped us?

There are the obvious episodes, like "The Odyssey of Flight 33", where a plane breaks the sound barrier and travels back in time. But there are less obvious episodes, like "Five Characters in Search of an Exit", where five characters end up unable to get out of what appears to be a large silo, only to discover they are in fact toy action figures placed in a donation bin.

Or "The Old Man in the Cave", which is described on IMDB as: "In a post-apocalyptic settlement, the inhabitants' survival is dependent on the advice of an unseen man living in a nearby cave. This dependence is tested when a band of soldiers descends on their town." Sounds very familiar to Jacob or MIB in the cave, doesn't it?

Or "Death Ship", which involves a space ship traveling through time to try and "get it right" and has the astronauts trying to avoid their own deaths, which occurred in a previous timeline.

But the one episode I keep coming back to is...."Stopover in a Quiet Town." This is how Wikipedia describes the episode: "A married couple wake up in an unfamiliar house, remembering only that they both drank too much at a party the night before, and that on the way home, a large shadow had appeared over their car.

"They soon discover that the house is mostly props—the telephone has no connection, the cabinetry is merely glued-on facing, the refrigerator is filled with plastic food....The exasperated wife begins to think that perhaps she crashed their car on the way home, and they are now in Hell. They hear a train whistle and, thinking they have finally found a way out of the town, rush to the train station and board the train. As the train leaves the station, they begin a light-hearted conversation, relieved to be leaving. However, when the train comes to a stop, they realize it has only gone in a circle, and they are back where they started.

"They leave the train and return to the town, only to be pursued by an ominous shadow, once again hearing a young girl's laughter. The shadow pursuing them is revealed to be the young girl's hand. As she picks them up, laughing joyously, it is revealed that the couple was abducted by an alien giant who brought them from Earth to be "pets" for his daughter's dollhouse neighborhood."

Could this be it? Could this be the explanation? Our Losties are merely pets in a maze? To be tested and toyed with at the whim of a child like Jacob who constantly brings new pets/toys to the island?

As far as I know, the writers/producers have not referenced the Twilight Zone as an inspiration. How could it not be? Lost is like a 6 season Twilight Zone episode! Love the theory or hate it - at least take a moment to acknowledge the genius that was Rod Serling.