IGN's Top 50 Lost Loose Ends (Season 3 Spoilers for irsih Viewers)

SoSueMe

IGN.com have compilled a very intesting list of all the loose ends in Lost.

Here is the link and feel free to comment...

http://uk.tv.ign.com/articles/745/745595p1.html

wba88

very interesting good find OP

tired of life?

how much of it can i read without spoilin it? im watchin rte1........

Basq

None of it.. it deals with stuff up to the most recent episode in the US.

PullMyFinger!

Great article.

Im at 33, so far the best IMHO

#33: Jack Tossed from the Plane

In the first shot of the "Pilot" episode we watch Jack's eyes dilate after waking up, lying in a forest. We find out from here that the plane has crashed and Lost is kick-started… but our question is how did Jack get thrown from the wreckage? While everybody that survived was busy running around on the beach, Jack quietly wakes up far off in the distance. Was Jack moved or placed in that position? Why did his pupils dilate? Some believe that the dilation was in fact the reflection of the black smoke flying into the air away from him -- which seems unlikely, but you never know.

Another question that we found in this situation stems from how Vincent (Walt's dog) comes from even deeper in the woods to Jack's position. So why was Vincent walking around so far away from everybody on the beach? Was he with the somebody who may or may not have dropped Jack off in the forest? And finally, do you remember when the tail section crashed? Ana Lucia mentioned that the way she knew that Goodwin was an Other was because of the fact that he came from the forest dry as a bone. So since Jack entered onto the beach the same was as Goodwin, does that make Jack an Other (with amnesia -- induced or natural)? Or is this all just a coincidence?

ixoy

Very good article and in-depth. Unfortunately it seems to show up just how much of a corner the writers are putting themselves in - I can't see even half of those questions being answered to any degree of satisfaction. What a great show it would be if they could pull all 50 though..

Basq

ixoy wrote:

What a great show it would be if they could pull all 50 though..

And believably too!

stevejazzx

great article

I think they can all do 50 answers...but I'd be happy with 10 of of them before season 3 finsihes

Steoob

eh they seem to forget the biggest loose end.. wtf is with penny witmore and the portuguese guys at the end of season 2?

quazzy

Steoob wrote:

eh they seem to forget the biggest loose end.. wtf is with penny witmore and the portuguese guys at the end of season 2?

oh yeah. ..

I completely forgot about that scene at the end of S2.

Let's hope it leads to something good ( story-wise ).

Also, Is there anything about Libby and why she was in the home in the top 50. I didn't read it all.

FrankGrimes

didnt see any mention of the map on the hatch lockdown door. it did mention libby being a mentalist.

in fairness though, tis a good show and all, but when you see it laid out like this, with 50 loose ends still open, and more that could make that list, it does look a bit ridiculous, especially since some of these loose ends are open for over a year and half.

If they balanced the give and take a bit more, and answered some stuff at at least the same rate as new quesions arise, it'd satisfy the viewer more and give them more faith that its worth sticking with. At the moment I'm one of those who reluctantly watches it in hope it'll soon start delivering on its massive potential.

stevejazzx

Steoob wrote:

eh they seem to forget the biggest loose end.. wtf is with penny witmore and the portuguese guys at the end of season 2?

Yeah its most probably something like this

Desmond is in Charles Widmores bad books. When he gets out of prison Widmore pulls up in the Bently and we learn that he has been stopping all the letters Des wrote to Penny. Charles doesn't want Des in the Family.
Penny tracks Des down to some stadium. She cries, she still loves him. Des doesn't tell her about the letters. She is supposed to get married.

'How did you find me?"
'With enough money and contacts you can find anyone' she replies.

Desmond wants to win Widmores boat race for pride.
This information becomes known to Widmore probably innocently through Penny. He has Desmond marooned on the Lost Island by arranging it with a contact from Hanso/Dharma since his company is one of the majors financial contributors to hanso org and it's Projects.
Penny somehow finds out or suspects that her father has interfered with Desmonds fate. She manges to gain enough information on the DI to know that it is a Pacific Island masked by a Huge Em sphere.
She sets up the the Monitoring station.

lostexpectation

FrankGrimes wrote:

didnt see any mention of the map on the hatch lockdown door. it did mention libby being a mentalist.

in fairness though, tis a good show and all, but when you see it laid out like this, with 50 loose ends still open, and more that could make that list, it does look a bit ridiculous, especially since some of these loose ends are open for over a year and half.

If they balanced the give and take a bit more, and answered some stuff at at least the same rate as new quesions arise, it'd satisfy the viewer more and give them more faith that its worth sticking with. At the moment I'm one of those who reluctantly watches it in hope it'll soon start delivering on its massive potential.

did that map cover both islands? as it marked the underwater hatch?

where is the underwater hatch, between the two islands?

The Volt

The end of season two, are you's on about the bit where the guys are in the antarctic? What's with that?

stevejazzx

I just explained it above!

SoSueMe

I thought I would re-introduce this tread considering in light of the other thread present and the fact that there seems to be a lot of questions answered that people were complaining about.

doonothing

so roughly how many did season 3 shed light on?

pickarooney

I would say

25 of those questions have been partially addressed and at least something new revealed
17 are completely resolved
8 have never been mentioned

doonothing

and probably fifty more created in the last 4 weeks

ixoy

pickarooney wrote:

I would say

25 of those questions have been partially addressed and at least something new revealed
17 are completely resolved
8 have never been mentioned

K which ones have been partially or fully answered then

I reckon there's also a bunch of new ones so we could still easily do a "Top 50". It's just less frustrating right now because they're fresh as opposed to old.

ZiabR

On 25 now, very good reading

Clareman

That site is blocked for me in work, don't suspose someone would mind copying and pasteing the list, pretty please

ZiabR

Clareman wrote:

That site is blocked for me in work, don't suspose someone would mind copying and pasteing the list, pretty please

Here is the first 10 in reverse order, enjoy.

#10: The Disease

We first learn about a sort of disease, a sickness, when Sayid meets Rousseau in the first season. When the two characters meet, she alludes to something that caused her crew to become ill, forcing her to kill them to save herself and ensure that things didn't get worse. Other characters we've met, such as Desmond, have also had direct contact with notions of a sort of sickness. The very first time we meet him, in the second season premiere, he injects himself with the vaccine in order to save himself from it. This same vaccine is found in a Dharma shipment which, falling from the sky, is later given to Claire to be used on her and her baby, Aaron.

Though the cause of the island-based illness is unknown, the nature of the illness seems to be known to The Others, especially Ben, who briefly talks about it while captured. Ethan, in flashbacks showing him, seems to have known about it as well, since he injects Aaron, while still in the fetus, with what appears to be the same aforementioned vaccine. Whether or not the Others and the Dharma Initiative are one and the same is an important question to ask here. If they are, it would reveal that, since the Others are aware of a sickness and have the means to combat it, that it comes directly from the Initiative itself.

Could the word "quarantine" be in reference to the sickness, as well? Does Desmond have the disease, since he was in a hatch marked as such? Could the same be said of anyone who was in any of the Dharma hatches, including The Pearl? And furthermore, are the two inter-connected? Is Dharma responsible for the disease? As usual, more questions rather than answers come out of close analysis of the situation, but one thing remains certain - the sickness that scares many on the island may not be real at all. Just ask Kelvin before Desmond kills him, free of the protective outfit that he tricked Desmond into thinking he needed. Is it all a farce, or is it real?


ABC

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#9: The Healing Powers of the Island

Over the course of the past two seasons it has been revealed that some unknown force has mysteriously cured certain characters' ailments. In "Walkabout" we learn that Locke cannot walk but on the island he is able to do so immediately after the crash. Off the island, Rose was dying of cancer but after the crash she feels different and believes that the island has cured her. Some even believe that Sawyer's quick recovery from the gunshot wound he received is the island's power at work. It's also possible that the island itself is responsible for allowing there to be so many survivors after the crash of Flight 815.

Even though we have seen instances of the island's healing properties there have been a great amount of people who have not benefited from them. US Marshal Edward Mars was dying from the wounds he received after the plane crash and with no hope of recovery; Jack shot him as an act of mercy. Boone died from the injuries he received in "Deus Ex Machina" and several Flight 815 survivors die from other injuries sustained during the crash or afterwards. It's possible that the island only heals those who serve a purpose that they have yet to fulfill or it may be that it only heals ailments developed off the island. Also, most of the injuries on the island were due to forced trauma (i.e. gunshot wound, injury from the plane crash). Maybe the island can only cure disease? However, this doesn't explain why Shannon still had her asthma on the island. We won't know for sure until we learn why Locke can't walk.

Then there is the Benjamin Linus, who has a tumor on his spine. An ailment not developed by force or trauma and something that the island seemingly cannot or will not heal. Why would the island cure Locke and Rose but not Ben? Maybe because Ben was born on the island and that prevents him from being healed or it's possible that he has simply served his purpose. Then again, maybe the cancer has a purpose itself? Remember, Locke lost the ability to walk for a short period of time, which led to Boone's death.

One last note: Jack's wife, Sarah, was also healed in an operation that had no chance of success. How far does the island's "will" extend?

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#8: Locke's Legs

We just covered the overall healing powers of the island in Loose End #9, but we feel that John Locke's situation is a Loose End by itself, as he is one of the series' central characters. Not only do we not know how Locke gained back the use of his legs on the island, but we don't even know how he lost use of his legs in the past. So far we've seen five flashbacks to Locke's pre-island life, and only in two first-season flashbacks (in his first, during "Walkabout," and briefly in "Exodus, Part 2" as he was boarding the plane) have we seen him in a wheelchair. When did Locke lose the use of his legs? Based on the flashbacks we've seen so far, it was after Locke got conned him out a kidney by his father, worked as a home inspector, and lived on a marijuana-growing commune, among other things. The incident that put Locke into a wheelchair happened sometime before he worked at a box company (for Randy, who was also Hurley's boss at Mr. Cluck's Chicken Shack) and decided to go on a walkabout to Australia. Does the fact that the island healed Locke's legs mean that he's a "good" person and people who aren't getting healed, like Ben, are "bad"? Perhaps Locke's paralysis prior to the crash wasn't physical at all but instead psychological, which would explain why Locke briefly lost the use of his legs in "Deus Ex Machina."

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ABC

#7: Dead Characters Appearing

Just when things couldn't get any stranger on the island, Lost shows us images of dead people. So far we have seen Boone, Christian (Jack's Dad), and Yemi. All three of these characters have died, yet somehow come back to taunt the characters of the show - Boone came to Locke, Christian came to Jack, and Yemi came to Eko. Is it that their ghosts are able to manifest on the island, or is it that the island has brought them back to life? Personally the best explanation for the unexplainable appearances that we have heard so far has been that it was the black smoke taking their figure. The cast and crew of Lost have mentioned that we have seen the black smoke a couple of times this season without even knowing it, leading many to believe that the smoke is taking the shape of things that have strong relevance to a characters thoughts. For instance Kate saw a horse when thinking about killing her father, Hurley saw Dave when he was hungry, Eko saw Yemi when he was thinking about taking over his church, Jack saw Christian when he was thinking about his father, and Locke saw Boone when thinking about continuing his journey that he started with Boone's help. It may be a long shot, or it could be a good explanation, either way we can't wait to see Lost's reasoning for bringing back dead characters. Oh and this could mean that we may see Mr. Eko again this season… one can hope.

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#6: The Polar Bears

We first saw a polar bear on the island way back in "Pilot, Part 2," when Sawyer, Boone, Sayid, Kate, and Shannon ran across one in the jungle. The altercation ended when Sawyer shot the bear. A polar bear popped up again, a little later in the season, trapping Walt in a tree in "Special." In that same episode, Walt was seen reading a comic book featuring a polar bear; we later discovered the comic was owned by Hurley, who was reading it on Flight 815. The Walt-comic book connection at first seemed to point to a supernatural explanation for the polar bears' existence -- was it one of Walt's mysterious powers that made them appear on the island?

But now that Walt's out of the picture and Kate and Sawyer are being held in cages that "bears" used to reside in, the commonly held belief amongst Lost fans is that the polar bears were being held for scientific experiments by the Dharma Initiative. That explanation still seems a little lacking, since nothing's been shown that indicates there were any accommodations made to help an animal used to living in arctic conditions survive on a tropical island. But perhaps that's part of the experimentation -- modifying polar bears' fur and bodies to be able to live in a hot and humid environment. But for what purpose? How have the polar bears survived in the jungle? Are these your average, ordinary polar bears or some kind of highly intelligent warrior bears, like Iorek Byrnison and the other armored bears of Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials novels? Huh. That last option would actually be pretty cool.

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#5: The Unusual Connections Between Castaways

As we've seen more and more of the castaways' lives before they came to the island, an increasing amount of connections between them have been revealed to us. We don't expect all of these connections to be important - the fact that a guy named Randy was both Locke and Hurley's bosses at one point is probably just a throwaway [watch Randy now turn out to be the real power behind the Others], and the writers have said that sometimes they'll just throw in small things for fun, like Kate's mom serving Sawyer at a restaurant. But there are too many other, clearly important elements for us to ignore as just fun little "Easter eggs." Shannon's father dying in the same car accident that injured Jack's wife-to-be, Sarah; Libby giving Desmond her boat; Eko being sent to investigate a possible miracle involving the daughter of the same psychic who Claire saw. All of these connections go beyond mere small coincidences, as they are part of major, life changing events for those involved.

We are very curious if there is any meaning or eventual revelation behind these numerous connections the castaways unwittingly have with one another. Beyond the writers simply having fun connecting the characters in these ways, are we meant to believe it simply was fate that the characters would have so many previous connections before coming to the island, and that it could be taken as a somewhat cosmic or spiritual part of the show? Or is there something more ominous at work, and if a certain person, group or force was behind getting these specific people on the island, it did so with knowledge of how they were already tied together? One problem remains that the castaways themselves remain frustratingly ignorant of these connections. There are exceptions, such as Sawyer realizing he met Jack's dad, but most of the aforementioned encounters have not been discussed or analyzed by the castaways, and considering that Eko, Shannon and Libby are all dead, it makes a lot of the most important conversations impossible now. Hopefully at some point the castaways will realize how incredibly intertwined their lives are and try to figure out what it means, because we're certainly wondering.

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#4: The DHARMA Initiative

The Lost Experience may not be something everyone agrees with, and it's certainly not something all fans of Lost have had the chance to view. Nonetheless, the events of The Lost Experience show that Dharma is actually an acronym (so, DHARMA), and stands for The Department of Heuristics and Research On Material Applications. The Initiative appears to have been started early in the decade of the 1970s, and focuses on scientific studies and ventures, though it becomes intertwined with the numbers known, in the Experience, as the Valenzetti Equation. Seems that 4, 8, 15, 16, 23, and 42 mean something, after all.

But there's so much more to that DHARMA Initiative. The word 'dharma' itself means, in the Hindu/Buddhist mantra, "the principle or law that orders the universe." In essence, the word is highly philosophical in nature, and multi-layered, just like the story surrounding Lost and the exploits of the DHARMA Initiative. Furthermore, they must be a powerful, well-funded, secretive organization. They managed to essentially take over (or perhaps create) an island filled with mysteries of their own design, and experiments that no one seems to understand the nature of. Over two seasons in, and the DHARMA Initiative is as mysterious as ever. Put into play the question of whether The Others are somehow attached to the Initiative, and you have a full plate of questions to ponder on.

One thing is for certain, however. The DHARMA Initiative, though claimed to be long expired in operation (in The Lost Experience) is still very much alive. The Initiative has recently dropped a shipment on the island, and, until the implosion at The Swan, everything was in working order in their various experiments. Just what the DHARMA Initiative hopes to achieve as a result of their mysterious experiments on the island is perhaps one of Lost's biggest questions. By the end of the series, our minds will be free of this perplexing question... just what is the DHARMA Initiative, and what do they mean to accomplish?


ABC

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#3: Walt's Powers

Out of all the characters to show up in the Lost universe, it seems that Walt may be the most interesting. Being that he left the island at the end of the second season, and that the actors and producers have mentioned that neither Walt nor Michael will show back up in the third season, it would seem that they are not as pivotal to the over-arching plot as we thought, but it doesn't stop us from questioning what was going on. When Walt was on the island we saw a lot of instances where Walt showed special abilities that made him a target for the Others.

The abilities that we saw were: possibly manifesting a polor bear (after reading a Green Lantern comic with a polor bear in it -- but maybe not, as discussed in Loose End #6); when Michael said that he would look for Vincent when it stopped raining, it immediately stopped raining; Walt had uncanny luck at rolling dice in the game of Backgammon against Hurley; possibly manifesting a bird (after reading a text book); throwing a knife perfectly (according to where he wanted it to go in his mind); possibly manifesting a second polar bear when Michael threw his comic into the fire; telling Locke not to "open the thing" without having knowledge of the hatch; Walt projecting himself multiple times to Shannon; and talking to Michael through the computer (when normally it wouldn't allow you to do such a thing). There are other points where his abilities were in question, but these moments across the first two seasons, made us question just what was up with the kid. There are plenty of theories out there, including one that even states that it may have been Walt that took the plane down, but none of them have much validation. Hopefully we will get an answer as to what is going on, as this is just too big of a supernatural occurrence to overlook.

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#2: The Monster

On their very first night, the survivors of 815 heard strange noises coming from the jungle and then witnessed trees being uprooted by some unknown force. Since then, Lost fans have been baffled by this enigmatic creature that has made its presence known only a handful of times.

When Locke first sees the creature he says that it is something beautiful and later describes it as a "beautiful bright light." On his second encounter, Locke is attacked by the creature, which proceeds to drag him through the jungle before Jack and Kate can save him. This is the first time we see the creature's form - a floating cloud of black smoke. When Eko encounters the monster it begins to morph and replicate moments from his life within its body. Later, we discover that it has been posing as his dead brother Yemi just before the monster transforms into a giant hand and proceeds to pummel Mr. Eko to death.

In "Exodus," Danielle Rousseau describes the creature as the island's "security system" and suggests that it must be protecting The Island. If this is true, then why hasn't it just traveled to the beach and wiped out the "Losties"? Some say that the creature is a compilation of billions of nanomachines that work in unison and are controlled by an artificial intelligence. This could mean that it has a limited range and may even have to return to a station for recharging or repairs. But, if it is a machine, how was it able to recreate moments from Eko's mind? Does it use the electromagnetic force of the island to somehow telepathically link to human brains? Besides Yemi, it may also be responsible for the sightings of Christian, Kate's horse, and Dave on the island. How is it able to transform itself into human form?


ABC

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#1: The Numbers

4, 8, 15, 16, 23, 42. Nothing better encompasses the "What does this MEAN?" aspect that can drive a Lost viewer crazy better than The Numbers, or better represents our concerns that we won't learn all of the answers we crave. When Hurley was in a mental institution, he met a fellow inmate, Leonard Simms, who incessantly (and compulsively?) repeated this series of numbers over and over again. When Hurley got out, he used those numbers to play the lottery, and won $114 million in the process. Except, as Hurley would learn, "The Numbers are bad"! Hurley came to think of the Numbers as cursed, as horrible things befell everyone around him after his lottery win. Then on the island, the Numbers became a huge recurring element: Danielle revealed it was a transmission of the Numbers that first brought her to the island, and Hurley saw, to his horror, that the Numbers were on the side of the Hatch, moments before Locke blew it open. And of course inside the Hatch, we learned these same Numbers must be typed into a computer, over and over again, or something very bad would happen…

Since then, we have seen the Numbers many, many times, as they have appeared in blink and you'll miss them moments, on the entrances to other hatches and on DHARMA or Other supplied drugs Desmond and Claire were given. Clearly, these Numbers are tied into something major involving the person or people behind a lot of the strange events on the island and signify something of great importance.


ABC

Or do they? Lost Executive Producer Damon Lindelof has said the writers have no specific meaning for the Numbers, and that we may never learn any specific explanation behind them on the series. Frankly, this is a very depressing prospect. Too much significance has been given to the Numbers at this point to not be given a payoff on them. The audience is putting a lot of investment and involvement in Lost, with the expectation that the creators are taking us on a journey that they have thought through and know how to deliver on. So, please, Lost creators, take some time to figure out a dramatically satisfying explanation behind the Numbers, and let us know what is on the show. You've created some fascinating elements here that the audience loves to discuss… But eventually we need the answers to the many compelling questions that you've raised.

Let me know when your done, i will post the next 10.

Clareman

wow, thanks a million logik, much appreciated, some interesting points there that I had forgotten about

ZiabR

Not a problem