A “Lost” Season Finale of Lockeness Proportions: Secrets Revealed & Analyzed

I’ve been a little disappointed in season finales as of late. It’s a general rule of thumb that all that anticipation and excitement built around one major event will inevitably fall short of expectation. I can say that after enduring 2-hours of repeatedly asking myself “Huh?” while watching the “Lost” season finale last night that I’ve been humbled into making this particular season finale the exception.

Warning: Don’t read ahead if you you’ve TiVoed and haven’t yet watched. This is a post-analysis of last night’s season finale.

So here’s why I’m still in awe, even 12 hours later:

1) There were no flashbacks in last night’s episode. Rather, we catch a glimpse into life after the island as Jack struggles to come to terms with his own and his desire to go back to the island. In the future, Jack’s become an alcoholic, abuses painkillers, takes trans-Atlantic flights in the hopes that the plane will crash, and he’s still hung up on Kate as his sole connection to the island. We learn that someone (presumably from the island) died and that no one other than Jack bothered to attend the funeral. When Jack confronts Kate on this mysterious person’s passing, her reaction is, “Why would I go?” leaving us all to think that the dead person is Ben and he clearly makes it off the island. In the future, Kate pities Jack, but has moved on leaving Jack behind. There are clear 9-11 allusions going on here as well.

Jack’s fate leaves us with the open-ended question: Were Ben and Locke ultimately right about the island and Jack’s rescue mission being the worst thing for his people? It clearly was the worst decision for Jack.

2) Walt=Jacob? I’m still unclear as to whether or not Walt was an apparition or has some sort of special connection to the island, like Locke. Either way, it would appear that Walt harbors supernatural abilities and his uncanny timing with regards to stopping Locke from committing suicide and getting him to walk again. Is Walt Jacob? More likely, he holds some connection to the island’s force.

3) Charlie dies, but WHY? I’m glad Sayid, Jin, and Bernard survived but I felt Charlie’s death to be superfluous, yet inevitable. On a more existential level, the Charlie dies storyline carries out the fate vs. individualism metaphor carried out throughout the show. After initially objecting to dying, Charlie subscribes to Desmond’s prophetic spells/visions that he must die so that the rest of them be rescued. As being rescued is the objective, Charlie sacrifices himself. But Jack’s fate leaves us to think that perhaps Charlie sacrificing himself was in vain, at least as far as Jack goes. In back-to-the-future flash-forwards, Kate also seemed a little hardened around the edges, but perhaps she too was torn out of obligation to an old friend/former love? and her desire to move on from the experience of the island.

4) Has Sawyer’s experience killing Locke’s father and the man responsible for his mother’s death turned him into a killer? Sawyer killed off Tom in last night’s finale without flinching leaving Juliet and Hurley a bit blown away. (no pun intended) And even Kate commented on Sawyer’s withdrawn behavior post-Locke episode. Will this have a long-term effect on the former con with a heart of gold? Has the island transformed him into a killer with a heart of stone?

5) I’m super glad Locke didn’t die, but still questioning if him killing Jack wouldn’t have made for a better ending to the season finale. We know that Locke represents island/fate and Jack represents rescue/reason and given all this a showdown was necessary. But with everything that lies ahead, the ending leaves you thinking: Maybe Jack would have been better off dead? Of course the beginning flash-forward featuring Jack wanting to jump from the bridge also follows along with this theme.

6) Jack/Sawyer/Juliet/Kate Love Quadrangle: Jack has always loved Kate (he tells her so in the season finale), but she clearly loves Sawyer. In the future episodes, he is not with Kate, but hung up on her in some capacity, even if it is just the island connection. We don’t know about Sawyer and Juliet, but Kate alludes to a “he” waiting for her in the future sequences so perhaps she ended up with Sawyer. I don’t think Jack and Juliet ended up together. Maybe Juliet died, but since he didn’t really love her I guess it’s a non-issue.

That’s if for my AM-after-finale notes. Feel free to add your own comments here. I love to think about this stuff.

On an end note, what I really enjoyed about the way “Lost” ended the season (and the show on a whole) is that it delves a little deeper. For example, it doesn’t leave you thinking life is always preferable to death or to elaborate, that death has to be the end- more that it can act as a portal or perhaps even if it doesn’t function as that, it’s how you spend your time and were able to resolve your issues while you were on “earth” that really mattered. I don’t know if I buy the whole island as time-space continuum theory, but I like that the shows gives a little humanity and breath to this subject. It f*cks a little with societal conventions and ideas about mortality and right/wrong and for that I’ll miss this show dearly over the course of the next 8 mos.

How bout you?