MIB - John Locke by Jules05

Looking back over previous episodes, I've begun to think that John Locke and MIB/Smokey have always been connected in some way.

When John Locke first confronted the Smoke Monster in "White Rabbit" he came out of it enlightened. Something definitely happened then and that's when this connection really started to come together. A lot of Locke's actions after this confrontation seem to indicate that the Smoke Monster had left its mark on his consciousness/soul.

Deception and manipulation slowly become part of Locke's life e.g. in the season 3 episode "The Brig", we see Locke manipulate things to make Sawyer kill Anthony Cooper. Locke then uses this to further his own cause - becoming the leader of the Others. The Smoke Monster also played on Locke's weaknesses by manipulating Locke and others to make Locke do what was required e.g. Smokey as Christian Shepard appearing to Locke in the episode "This Place is Death".

I think that the Smoke Monster was or is actually the consciousness of MIB (who as we know, lost his original human form at some point). It is black and smokey because of the evil that he has become. Smokey has been waiting for a suitable candidate to come to the island to merge with - and that happened to be John Locke.

To make the Smoke Monster's takeover happen fully, John Locke had to be dead. The goodness in John Locke was preventing the Smoke Monster to do this while Locke was alive (a battle of good and evil).

Locke's soul which once had been filled with hope and faith was now completely destroyed with the failure of not getting the others to come back to the island (all of the other failures in Locke's life had chipped away at his soul over the years). When Ben comes across Locke about to kill himself, he inadvertedly gives Locke a glimmer of hope (a last ditch defence in the battle over Locke's soul) but that is soon quickly destroyed when the fail-safe name of Eloise Hawking is mentioned. The confusion Locke feels as Ben is killing him could be the thought "that if I have succeeded in getting one of them to go back to the island then why is this darkness consuming me?".

The mark that the Smoke Monster had left was now able to consume the rest of Locke's soul making the takeover Locke's body much more easier.