I figured it out! J.J. Abrams wanted to create a TV show packed with every genre feasible, so he produced LOST! It began as an action-packed thriller, which morphed into mystery, became a bit of a romance, and then it added science-fiction. I think it is now fair to say we can add religious allegory to that catalog.

One of the biggest questions of The Island was answered last night; the question of who/what is ‘Smokey’. Jacob’s companion, a.k.a. Fake John Locke, is the smoke monster. “I hate that you had to see me like that,” he tells Ben after killing Jacob’s would-be protectors. Now the next big question I think is, ‘Why does Smokey want to go home, and where is home?’ He says this about John Locke, “I want what John Locke didn’t want… I want to go home.” John Locke was a depressed man off the island, but once he came to The Island he didn’t want to leave. His life off the island was pitiful and pathetic, yet Smokey wanted that.

Jack tells Locke Oceanic lost his father because they can’t locate his coffin. Locke tells Jack Oceanic has no idea where Jack’s dad is; the airline lost his dad’s body, not his dad. In the LDS/Mormon religion it is believed that there is a pre-mortal existence where all of us lived with our Heavenly Father before coming to earth. There we decided that we wanted to come to earth, and be tested. To do this we needed a body so that we could experience these things. Lucifer, satan/the devil, wanted to come to earth as well, but he wanted to make it to where everyone would pass the test and return to our Heavenly Father, and he also wanted the glory for making sure all returned. One crucial problem with his plan; you can’t just force everyone to do what is right and have them learn and grow. Another problem was that he wanted all the glory for his actions. He was cast out of Heaven along with 1/3 of the host of Heaven that wanted to follow Lucifer, never to have a body of flesh and blood. He’s the devil, trapped on The Island, and he wants a real human body. This might also explain why he was sorry, that Ben had to see him like that, he’s embarrassed. Or not.

We’ve had flash-backs, flash-forwards and now flash-dimensions. Whether we’re seeing alternate realities or somehow the past will lead to the present is still murky. The differing memories make an eventual convergence of the timelines unlikely, but there are quite a few differences that I noticed on the ‘new’ flight.

• Hurley professes that nothing bad happens to him. He’s the luckiest guy in the world.
• Desmond is on the plane, but only briefly.
• Shannon is not on the plane.
• The coffin was never put on the plane according to Oceanic Airlines.
• The plane flies over The Island, which is now underwater and they’re not 1,000 miles off course when this happens. When they crashed, they were 1,000 miles off course.

I always had a sneaking suspicion that there might be other others, but I long ago waved that notion. I shouldn’t have, because now we have this group living at the Temple, led by a bonsai-growing, martial arts expert who “Doesn’t like the taste of English on his tongue.” Oh, and Oceanic flight attendant Cindy is there; the cute one that gives Jack some Vodka. These other others are ready to kill our survivors until Hurley proves they were sent by Jacob. Obviously they are the servants of Jacob, which I personally feel is the ‘good guy’ in this epic.

Thoughts and Theories?