Just finished going back through Season Two. Here are some things possibly worth pointing out now that we have the Final Season filling in the blanks.
*The whole quarantine arrangement remains significant. “Quarantine” was written on the inside of the Swan hatch door. Desmond, Claire and Aaron all received inoculations against it every nine days. When they first meet, Desmond asks Locke, “How many of you are sick?” In the final season, it seems that Sayid has indeed become “infected.”
*In the orientation film, reference is made to an “incident” back in the 70s. This is what resulted in the system in which the button must be pushed every 108 minutes to discharge the electromagnetic build-up. The “incident” was the explosion of the hydrogen bomb as instigated by Jack in Season 5. All of this—the leaps in time, the Swan Hatch, the Dharma Initiative—are all attempts to repair time anomalies or paradoxes. If you mess with time travel, complications inevitably ensue.
*Locke holds the book Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge by Ambrose Bierce. This is a short story about a Civil War soldier who experiences a false reality in the split second it takes for him to fall while he is being hanged. Another note of interest is that the author himself disappeared and his demise remains a mystery to this day.
*Sayid and Hurley pick up a radio signal that is playing Duke Ellington and Glen Miller. Hurley jokingly says the signal could be coming from anywhere or any time.
*When Ethan brings Claire into a nursery prepared for Aaron, there is a mobile above the crib that plays the tune, “Catch a Falling Star.” This is the same song Claire’s father (Christian) sang to her when she was little. It’s the same song Claire was singing in the pit at the temple. It’s the same song that was being played as BadLocke led his crew away from the aftermath of the temple after he and Sayid killed everyone there.
*When Jin takes a home pregnancy test, the box says “Widmore Labs” on it. Charles Widmore and procreation and special children and inoculations and ageless people (Richard). These are pieces on the table, but I don’t see where they go exactly.
*When the lockdown occurred and the blast doors dropped in the hatch, a prerecorded voice gave a countdown just before it happened. Shortly after, a food drop was made by parachute. Clearly there is some kind of secure system of interaction between the island and somewhere off the island. If the island is so hard to find, how did a plane just slip in and make the drop?
*When Hurley asked Libby if it was possible he could change (as far as drastic personal changes), she got a strange look on her face. This of course led up to the flashback in which we see Libby as a patient in the same mental facility as Hurley was in. While on the island, he kept saying she looked familiar. I don’t know if this is a significant loose end, but I suspect it will remain a loose end—something they would have been tied up if the show had been given more time to tell the story. Libby was also the one who gave Desmond the boat. She dies just before Desmond returns in that same boat. If she hadn’t been killed off, she and Desmond would have realized they had met before and this would have possibly opened up several revealing flashbacks. Libby’s connection with everyone feels unclear and unresolved. We know she was rich and also that at some point, she was insane.
*Bernard takes his wife Rose to a healer named Isaac in Australia. It’s the same man who performed a psychic reading for Claire. Isaac says that there are certain spots on the earth that have energy (like magnetic forces), obviously foreshadowing the island. This reminds me that any final explanation will have to be at least somewhat earthly, despite any supernatural elements they may introduce as things come to a close.
*After John is disillusioned by the film which claims the Swan Hatch is merely a psychological experiment, he says, “We’re like rats in a maze without any cheese.” Mousetrap comes to mind.
*Shortly after capturing Michael, the Others take a blood sample from him. Again this seems to corroborate a genuine “infection” of some sort.
*One of the Others asks Michael if Walt has ever appeared in a place where he wasn’t supposed to be. (ie. Shannon and Sayid spotting a “vision” of Walt in the jungle). Michael doesn’t have any clue, but we do. It is important to the Others whether or not Walt might somehow experience some form of displacement.
*At one point, Desmond failed to enter the numbers in time, causing an electromagnetic event, which he claims caused Oceanic 815 to crash. Yet, now it is Jacob who apparently crashed the plane. Are they the same thing? Is Jacob the electromagnetic force that must be contained? Or is he some kind of being that translates as an electromagnetic force?
*For what it’s worth, the two men in the remote station monitoring magnetic anomalies (they work for Penny) are playing chess. Black vs. White.
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