Ab Aeterno ("From Eternity")

Well, I know from Facebook and Twitter that Shaun and Pat were fans of the long-awaited Richard-centric episode, and I'm happy to add myself to that list.

And who knew that we'd get Black Rock & statue loose ends tied up all in one!?

There was plenty of fodder tonight for a lot of different factions -- those who say the island is purgatory, that they're all dead, that it's hell, whatever... and for the part of Mr. Camp that thinks Jacob may be the bad guy after all. :) But, while it was looking shaky for a while there, I'm sticking with Jacob as Good Guy (if there is such a thing).

It was a lovely, pretty well self-contained episode... almost poetic. (A little reminiscent of "The Other 48 Days" or "The Life and Death of Jeremy Bentham" or... I feel like there have been others.) It elevated itself to another plane.

I am reminded of Dante's three-faced Satan chained at the center of the Earth (which I know only from Wikipedia):



I loved the priest's line about Richard not having time to do anything. If only he knew. :)

Ah, penance.

Alpert's epoch-spanning romance (reinforced by the name of his beloved (Isabelle), some of the dialogue, and some of the tree imagery) reminded me of The Fountain, one of my favorite films. (Please see it.)

Lost has so many romantic couples. Heck, Adam & Eve could be Richard & Isabelle! How? Who knows!!!

(Do we know one's a female? Could it be Jacob and the Monster? No, because Jacob was cremated. Ben and Widmore? The Monster and his mother? Jacob and his lover? Will we never find out? It now seems like Season 5 would've been the time to settle that.... or else it'll be the series finale....)

We got a nice explanation of why Jacob was drawing people to the island, and a nice metaphor for his role, and the role of the island -- the cork to stop the darkness' spread. (Is it going too far to suggest the possibility of the inference from the cork metaphor that wine is maybe a wee bit evil? Haha OK never mind. Also, could I have added more qualifiers to that sentence?)

There are some very interesting parallels that have emerged... the Swan was built to cork the pent-up electromagnetic energy. And the Incident sort of released evil into the world and, by eventually bringing down Flight 815, sent the Losties to "hell," which is what Jacob said would happen to everyone if the Monster were to escape.

Is that something happening in parallel, or are they one and the same? The Incident led to the crash of 815, which eventually led to Ben killing Jacob, which now looks like it could lead to the Monster's escape.

In the alternate universe, what became of Jacob and the Monster? Is there a connection between the tidal wave that brought the Black Rock inland and the alternate universe flooding of the island?

Also, how exactly is Jacob bringing people to the Island? He didn't pull 815 out of the sky, he just made sure the right people were on it.

And Jacob & the Monster and Ben & Widmore are our two dueling pairs, and for some reason none of them are able to kill their nemesis. But now Jacob's dead and Ben seems to have given up or run out of steam or something, so it's Widmore vs. the Monster. Weird. And the Monster is trapped on the island, and Widmore was trapped off the island....

Also! I'm trying to think of other instances of an evil character luring others with the appearance of loved ones. Argh, it's on the tip of my tongue! There are so many examples, but they feel just out of reach....

Now, run along and don't get into mischief -- if only to prove the Devil wrong. :)