Occam's Razor (A simplistic explanation) by Gorgonops

Alright, so with the show rapidly nearing its end, I’ve put together this little summary to try and make sense of the plot as whole for myself. Now since it’s pretty clear that a lot of the mythology isn’t going to be fully explained (left up to our own interpretation so to speak) I’m going to try and make the simplest and most straightforward assumptions about non-fully resolved mysteries as possible, hence the theory title. I should make clear that almost nothing in here is original thoughts by myself, just an attempt to put a number of great theories together in a coherent whole.

Okay, to start off with, it appears that what makes the island special is “the light”, or “electromagnetism” running through its centre. I do not expect, nor do I personally feel the need for an explanation of the island’s special powers. At some point every story has a foundation with no explanation. (There is magic in Middle Earth. Why? Because that’s the foundation of the story.)

This special island has had a long line of protectors, people who try to prevent shipwrecked humans from fucking with “the light”. The people most relevant to us, Jacob and MIB were made immortal by their false mother to a) take over the role of protecting the island (Jacob) and b) releasing her from her own immortality (MIB). Perhaps in light of the fact that both mother and Jacob were killed, we’ll say they are immortal except at the hands of someone who is their follower/disciple, etc. When Jacob, in a fit of rage floats his brother into the light, he creates a paradox – MIB is immortal, but the exposure to electromagnetism should kill him. So instead he becomes Smokey, a sort of immortal walking death. He is still MIB, not a John Locke type of impersonation, because his soul is trapped between the world of the living and dead. His body, however is very much gone. (Adam and Eve) This related to….

Mystery One which I have no clue how to solve: Why is MIB’s escape from the island so dangerous? Not really sure about this one. I’m leaning towards the fact that he has “merged” with “the light” in some way to be key, but I definitely want more of an explanation about this before the show ends.

So Jacob now has two tasks, to protect “the light” from humans, and to protect humans from MIB. For his part, MIB still just wants to leave the island. He is not evil per se, he just doesn’t really understand/believe how his leaving the island will be catastrophic. Jacob is attempting to find possible replacements, while also trying to convince his brother that humans are not so terrible. He makes several attempts to do so. The Egyptians (who predate, but also existed at the same time as the Romans) are pulled to the island and create much of its architecture, before they are wiped out by MIB. A similar thing happens many times over, including with our folks on the Black Rock. Jacob’s acceptance of Richard as a disciple leads to the formation of our modern group of others. While Jacob tries to guide the others, he is powerless to stop MIB from killing or influencing them, so in effect Jacob’s people always become pawns in the games between the two. Another group, the U.S. Army brings an atomic bomb to the island. They are killed by either the Others or MIB (or both), but their bomb remains. Time-traveling Losties convince them to bury the bomb.

The Dharam Initiative, founded by Alvar Hanso and the De Groots somehow discover the island, and want to use it’s powers for scientific research. Jacob tolerates them for some time, possibly hoping to find candidates. However, Our time traveling Losties show up again and set off the Bomb. The energy released by the bomb is contained somewhat by “the light”, and the explosion sort of exists in a frozen state, needing to be released every 108 minutes. Hence the Swan station. The radioactivity that leaks from the half-explosion makes it difficult/impossible for healthy children to be born on the island. (Pregnancy issues) The bomb also creates a time paradox, leading to the creation of another timeline, the ALT, where our Losties never come to the island. Of course this leads to…

Mystery Two which I have no clue how to solve: Why is the island under water in the ALT? Because they’ll explain it in the finale. That’s why.

The Others save Ben’s life thanks to the healing powers of the pool, and he becomes the Others inside man among Dharma. Eventually Jacob decides that the D.I. is messing with “the light” too much so he has them purged, with the assistance of fifth column Ben. Ben eventually pushes out Widmore, for having an off-island relationship, and eventually Eloise follows him. Widmore and Eloise try to return to the island, or to send people under their influence because a) they are worried about causing a paradox (why Eloise sends her own son back in time to be killed) and b) They fear Ben may be ultimately harmful for the Island and is in no condition to be a proper leader of the Others. This does lead to….

Mystery Three which I have no clue how to solve: Why is Eloise able to talk to Desmond about what he must do while he was experiencing the past? Why did Charles want him to go to the island? Chronologically something doesn’t quite fit here. Hopefully we see Eloise again.

For some reason Desmond is manipulated by Widmore into travelling to the island, where he takes over duties at the Swan. By ultimately almost letting the numbers count down, Desmond is responsible for making 815 crash. For a while our Losties run around trying to find food, etc., and MIB begins to manipulate people to see if he can somehow use them to escape. Appearing as Christian is one of his methods. He has also been using Horace’s cabin to influence the others by pretending to be Jacob. Eventually the Losties find the hatch, and let the numbers count down. (Thanks Locke) Desmond turns the failsafe key, letting the bomb fully explode, which causes a massive flash. This is what makes Desmond special, I believe. The flash makes the island visible to outsiders, Penny and Charles Widmore both detect the island. MIB tries to slowly manipulate Locke into taking over the Others. He may have also been the one to give Locke back his ability to walk.

Widmore sends the freighter to a) fulfill Faraday’s destiny of coming to the Island, and b) capturing Ben. I don’t think for a minute Widmore wanted to kill everybody on the island, he just picked some pretty fucked-up people to do his job for him. Claire is killed when Keamy’s team attacks, (Miles reaction to her) but she is quickly resurrected by MIB who is then able to strongly influence her, causing her to walk off with him by appearing as her father. Many candidates are killed when the freighter explodes, and the remainder are saved by Penny. However, MIB also manipulates Locke into pushing the Donkey Wheel, knowing that he will likely die during his mission to bring the other candidates back. Ben’s pushing of the wheel leads the island to skip through time, until Locke himself pushes the wheel. Locke’s death is easily forseen by the MIB who has scanned Locke and knows that he will likely kill himself (being the depressed guy that he is) when he fails to bring the candidates back to the island, and his death will in turn bring all the candidates back. He is counting on Eloise and Charles to help the candidates back to the island and he is hoping they will do so because they know the 06 are “candidates” and they are assuming that this is what Jacob wants. This leads to….

Mystery Four which I have no clue how to solve: Why the Ajira flight flashed through time. No idea why this would happen at all. Hopefully this will be explained relatively soon. Not expecting it to be though.

What is important for MIB though is that fact that he can now impersonate Locke, the leader of the Others, and using Locke he can convince Ben to kill Jacob. Ben can kill Jacob because he was one of his followers, in the same way that the fake mom could be killed by her own son. With Jacob dead, MIB now just has to kill the candidates in order to get off the island. He corrupts a resurrected Sayid in order to kill Dogen so he can finish off, or appropriate Jacob’s followers (the Others) and manipulates the rest of the Candidates onto the sub where he ALMOST kills them all. Widmore, who somehow knows Jacob is dead, brings Desmond to somehow thwart MIB, probably having to do with their mutual exposure to the light/electromagnetism.

Meanwhile, the ALT timeline Losties gradually acquire their memories of the OTL and…well, we still have some time left, don’t we?

WHEW! Okay, so I know there are probably a lot of holes still in there, but I think this is a relatively coherent picture of the overall plot so far. During the hiatus, which is when I first started visiting fan sites, I think I was really sucked into the false expectation that “everything on Lost happens for a reason”, or “the writers have the entire plot coherently planned out”. Season 6 has made it abundantly clear that a lot of things have been made up as the writers go along, which honestly, we should have always figured would happen. Making sense of the show will require some leg work, and some ignoring of details that don’t fit. However, I think once we give up the idea that everything was planned from the beginning, it is amazing that the show makes as much sense as it does. And we still have 3.5 hours left! So thanks to Darlton for giving us a solid9/10 show, even if they occasionally made us believe we were watching a flawless 10. Lost isn’t perfect but it still rocks, and can even make sense….sort of.