[US/IRL] 6x15 - "Across The Sea" [** SPOILERS WITHIN **]

Necronomicon

The timing of this episode was horrible. The ending of last week's episode absolutely screamed 'the battle lines are drawn' - to not carry that momentum, but rather completely skew the pace with an origin story that should have been at the start of the season was highly irritating.

I'm still holding out hope of a satisfying ending, so I can look back in retrospect at this episode and say it was good; because I don't think the episode was bad, it was just misplaced within the season.

The Adam and Eve explanation didn't enrage me unlike most others I have to say. What actually annoyed me way more was the lolbad donkey wheel explanation. "Yeah, we made this system, where we, like, channelled the light and water to create an opening..."

Not really sure how to feel - if I had to put it in a word though, it'd be conflicted.

Wreck

1

Right, I'm majorly pissed after that episode, confirms what I suspected from the first few seasons, that they have just been making it up as they go along. I'm not going to enter into a long rant on this, or point out any of the myriad flaws in the story, I really just want to register how disappointed I am.

bob2oo7

2 Questions if you dont mind...

1) Is the Kid that Flocke was seeing in previoius eposides this season the "young" Jacob that was in this eposide (just cannot picture the face)

2) Didnt Jacob give MIB the While Stone from the Game at some point after the death of MIB and Mother? Yet the White Stone was left with the bodies and subsequently found by Jack in Season 1?

Obvious answer for no 2 is that Jacbo gave MIB a different white Stone?

Handsome Bob

4

Daith wrote: »

If Mother wanted to kill MiB why bash his head in the drag him out of the well? Unless she just wanted MiB to get angry, kill her and let Jacob smokify him?

I really wish they kept Smokie seperate from MIB/Jacob and was just another Island mystery.

I miss Dharma and the pseudo-science stuff. Magical light can piss off.

I was a fan of the spiritual side of the show, but that was destroyed in one fell swoop with this episode. That light, jesus christ did that look tacky as ****.

SteelyDanJalapeno

bob2oo7 wrote: »

2 Questions if you dont mind...

1) Is the Kid that Flocke was seeing in previoius eposides this season the "young" Jacob that was in this eposide (just cannot picture the face)

2) Didnt Jacob give MIB the While Stone from the Game at some point after the death of MIB and Mother? Yet the White Stone was left with the bodies and subsequently found by Jack in Season 1?

Obvious answer for no 2 is that Jacbo gave MIB a different white Stone?

1. Yes, its the kid that Flocke saw in previous episodes, young Jacob.

2. There were more than 2 stones, i presume it was another one.

Aldebaran

7

Necronomicon wrote: »

The timing of this episode was horrible. The ending of last week's episode absolutely screamed 'the battle lines are drawn' - to not carry that momentum, but rather completely skew the pace with an origin story that should have been at the start of the season was highly irritating.

Completely agree. The problem for me was not that this was a bad episode but the fact that it should have been placed much closer to the start of the season. It really did spoil the momentum. There is nothing in it that would have spoiled subsequent episodes, they could have just gotten it out of the way and then concentrate on what I suspect most viewers really care about, the characters we have invested in since season one.

The main thing I have learned from this episode is that I don't really care about the mythology of the show, I'm much more concerned about the characters. The reason I will be watching the last couple of episodes is to find out how the story of the survivors of Oceanic flight 815 ends.

I'm just annoyed that the writers abandoned all the main characters for a whole episode so close to the finale.

randomchild

7

My main gripe with the episode was that they did not reveal the MIB's name. Seemed very artificial for everyone to go around calling him you and brother, especially with that whole "I only came up for a name for one of them" bull****. Other than that it was fine, except it probably should have been placed if not at the start of the season, somewhere near the middle. I can understand the logic of placing it here, to build up to the run in to the finale, but all it really did was kill the momentum. I also felt that the whole "flash forward" to jack/kate/locke was rather pointless, as I think we would have all knew that they were adam and eve the second he put the stones in the bag...

podgemonster

5

Firstly did anyone think that when they saw the shimmering water and debris and the start that Lapidus would pop to the surface and shake his hair and say something witty like 'well that was close' or 'Ok, now I'm mad'

I taut this was an episode that is essential to the story of the Island, thought it could have been alot more. Still found it interesting. Its a 6 from me!

How Mother destroyed the lil village really interests me and might show what powers the Candidate is capable of.

As for MiB, i feel that while his body is dead, the evil in his soul lives on in the smoke monster.

He went into the cave unconscience not dead, the light accepted part of him but the bad aspects of his soul were rejected and now stuck forever in a powerful mass of smoke and electromagnetism, ' a faith worse than death'.

We see that MiB wasnt all bad, he loved his brother, he was remorseful in the harming of mother. Yet his jealousy of his brother, his resentment of his mother, his disconcern for human life and his ambition to leave the island still live on in him in the smoke monster.

Jacob conversations with MiB after these events are different, for while what he is talking to is the spirit of his brother it is all the dark aspects of his soul represented in the man in front of him.

What intrigues me now is how does Desmond fits in to all this, is he being sent to the cave? Maybe Des has the power to restore the goodness in ones soul like he did with Sayid. Sayid's body lived without a soul (i feel nothing) but suddenly changed once his meeting at the well.

Maybe Desmond will reunite MiB with the goodness within his soul thus destroying the monster and allowing MiB to rest in piece, his last words could possible be 'Thank you'

Also did anyone think the twins actually mother was seriously hot!

slave1

9

Firstly did anyone think that when they saw the shimmering water and debris and the start that Lapidus would pop to the surface and shake his hair and say something witty like 'well that was close' or 'Ok, now I'm mad'

yes, for a split second, then I copped on to what was happening, I miss the poor ole wookie

homerun_homer

5

Jay Ru wrote: »

How did Jacob know what to do after his mother died? How did he discover that he cud bring folk to the island. How does he bring people to island. How did he know how to build the light house. How did he discover that the ash was a problem for MIB. If Mother was lying about the brothers not being able to hurt each other and killing each other why the hell didn't MIB just kill Jacob in the meantime. I don't need all of those answered but just one good answer wud be sweet.

So what was that ash?

Jacob knew what to do cause the mother said a prayer/spell on the wine before giving it to him. A Deus Ex Machina spell.

The ash will come back into play but it may not be answered given the way things are going so far.

cooker3 wrote: »

I consider a good explanation of Jacob MiB backstory. Although the whole not naming him thing is really waring thin. I am not sure quite why they are doing that.

Maybe he wasn't given a name, it was obviously implied since they never said his name ever. I don't think a name will have any relevance now that we know they are not characters from the bible or any other text.

Sid_Justice wrote: »

I always felt the scoring system was almost completely worthless. There is no base line. Like you read people giving it a 9/10 or something and then listing a million things they hated. I'd wonder what a bad lost episode is. Maybe the scale should be 0,1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8.1,8.2,8.3,+.1 10.

The rating system should be 4, 8, 15, 16, 23, & 42

RolandIRL

8

homerun_homer wrote: »

The rating system should be 4, 8, 15, 16, 23, & 42

and 108 :eek:
god you forgot the sum of them :P:D
not a true lost fan, are you? :P

[-0-]

9

I really think they should have had this episode BEFORE last week's episode...to keep the momentum going into the finale.

opinion guy

5

Well I have a question. If mother like Jacob did not age and had powers with which she could smite the villagers, then why did she need a replacement in the first place ? She should simply have stayed on the island forever and instantly smote anybody who came anywhere near the place. Problems solved ? No ?

Aldebaran

7

opinion guy wrote: »

Well I have a question. If mother like Jacob did not age and had powers with which she could smite the villagers, then why did she need a replacement in the first place ? She should simply have stayed on the island forever and instantly smote anybody who came anywhere near the place. Problems solved ? No ?

Probably because she was fed up of it all. Which is why she said thank you to MiB when he stabbed her.

Sad Professor

8

opinion guy wrote: »

Well I have a question. If mother like Jacob did not age and had powers with which she could smite the villagers, then why did she need a replacement in the first place ? She should simply have stayed on the island forever and instantly smote anybody who came anywhere near the place. Problems solved ? No ?

Yeah, but I don't think she was able to, nor wanted to. Human beings aren't meant to live forever. She was already crazy and was only going to get crazier. She thanked MIB when he killed her.

I also had a theory earlier in the season that the protector draws their power from the energy beneath the island, but over time it takes from them and they gradually lose their humanity. So eventually they must seek a replacement.

We know from Richard's episode that Jacob was well able to handle himself. But he made no attempt to restrain Ben from stabbing him. Either he was gambling on Ben's redemptive qualities, or (like Mother) he was just tired and didn't want to protect the island anymore.

homerun_homer

5

Sad Professor wrote: »

We know from Richard's episode that Jacob was well able to handle himself. But he made no attempt to restrain Ben from stabbing him. Either he was gambling on Ben's redemptive qualities, or (like Mother) he was just tired and didn't want to protect the island anymore.

I think that Jacob fought back strongly because he had not lined up a replacement, and probably hadn't considered it until that point. No doubt this was the point where he decided he needed to start picking candidates to replace him. So when Ben went to kill Jacob he wasn't as worried since he still had a few candidates in line to replace him and had faith that things would work out, especially since he can still talk to Hurley while dead.

opinion guy

5

Yeah why is it people can talk to dead people anyhow ?

Sad Professor wrote: »

Yeah, but I don't think she was able to, nor wanted to. Human beings aren't meant to live forever. She was already crazy and was only going to get crazier. She thanked MIB when he killed her.

See I don't accept that she's crazy. UnLocke said she was crazy, thats it. From what we saw of her in this episode she knew what she was doing the entire time. She was calculated at every step. She wasn't crazy in the way Claire is crazy.

FortuneChip

5

It kept me somewhat interested for forty odd minutes.
With regards to MiB's name, I don't think he'll be given one, not to keep him mysterious, but because of hype. There's not going to be a Eureka moment when we learn his name. "Of course his name is *****, it all makes sense now", or whatever, so why open that can of worms.

What annoyed me about the episode is, as others said, the timing. In Ab Abterno, we got Richards back story and it served to show how he came to make a choice in present day. When he went searching for MiB to take up his offer. Rather than using old footage, they should have shown us something present day with MiB.

With the way it played out, it seemed like an over elaborate ploy to explain how Adam & Eve got there. A "question" that really is over hyped. I'm quite shocked how six seasons down the line people still cared about two unidentified dead bodies in a cave. Sure, initially there was some intrigue as to who they were, as we believed only people from the plane were on the island. We then discovered The Others lived there, the Dharma Initiative, the French crew, Desmond... There was a point last season when I thought it would have been interesting if it was someone from 815, due to the time travelling, because even though predicted by many, it would have been a twist. But two people that lived on the island, and died, and were placed in a cave is really not that big of a deal when you consider how many people have lived on that island and at the time we were led to believe they had been there 40 years or so.

I was far more hoping to learn about how Jacob selects candidates, and how he brings them to the island. The "mom" gave no indication that she brought the pregnant lady to the island as Jacob has brought people. So I'm curious as to how Jacobs methods work.

Anyway, it was a nice episode, well worthy of a 6

TonyD79

6

Killing people and then pretending to be a mother certainly goes down as crazy in my book! You dont just have to look like Worzel Gummidge!!! Also Cliare was allways a bit OTT on protecting her baby in season 1 so it was ovbious what losing him would do to her mental state!

opinion guy

5

TonyD79 wrote: »

Killing people and then pretending to be a mother certainly goes down as crazy in my book! You dont just have to look like Worzel Gummidge!!! Also Cliare was allways a bit OTT on protecting her baby in season 1 so it was ovbious what losing him would do to her mental state!

Well obviously that is not normal behaviour. But that doesn't mean its crazy either. There is a difference between doing something with intent to achieve some goal or other versus just being a crazy loola with a trigger finger when the whim takes you. Mother seemed very much the first whereas Claire seemd the second (oh and she has crazy hair).

Seems like Mother's murder of Bio-Mom was more evil than crazy. No ?

Otacon

7

At the start of the episode, was there any significance to the fact that half-way through the conversation between the two women, they switched to English? Was it simply for the benefit of the audience and we are to imply they are in fact still speaking in Spanish [or Latin or whatever]? Or was there another reason?

homerun_homer

5

FortuneChip wrote: »

With regards to MiB's name, I don't think he'll be given one, not to keep him mysterious, but because of hype. There's not going to be a Eureka moment when we learn his name. "Of course his name is *****, it all makes sense now", or whatever, so why open that can of worms.

If he has a name and they are holding it for a reveal it will be as useless a trick as Tarantino not giving the audience the name of the Bride in Kill Bill.

MisterAnarchy

3

Otacon wrote: »

At the start of the episode, was there any significance to the fact that half-way through the conversation between the two women, they switched to English? Was it simply for the benefit of the audience and we are to imply they are in fact still speaking in Spanish [or Latin or whatever]? Or was there another reason?

Simply for the benefit of the audience,they were speaking Latin .
English didnt exist then.

demolitionman

4

Saw this on another forum thought it was worth a post:

But I'd definitely say that the Producers were going for a Biblical reference here. First they release the promo Posters, of the last supper. And now, after watching Across The Sea, it has confirmed it.

The Island is Eden, the Cave of Light was the Tree of Temptation. MIB took from the Cave, and has released the sin of man. Jacob plays a type of God character whilst MIB is the Devil, or Good & Bad, Light & Dark. It's obvious that the Producers have taken influence from different Sci-fi novels, films, ideas, but also from Mythology and Religion.

So who are the Losties? They are more or less his (Jacobs) disciples, or CANDIDATES, and he is testing them to see who is most worthy to carry on his work. They have been chosen from an early age. In fact, I'd say Jacob has already chosen who is most worthy, and that person is Jack. Why? Because he is the SHEPHERD, who guides his people, or humanity. Okay, so it's not exaclty true to the story of Jesus, but what I'm saying is the makers of this show have taken their main idea from the mythology of Religion.

Jack will be the person who looks over the Island.

and when Jacob's "mother" gives him the drink of wine, she says "you are like me now." Reminiscent of the last supper.

Basically the producers have rehashed a 2000 year old story

demolitionman

4

Here an interview with darlton post ATS.

WARNING: they drop two negative spoilers. as in confirm two mysteries that they never intend to answer.


http://www.hitfix.com/blogs/whats-alan-watching/posts/exclusive-interview-lost-producers-damon-lindelof-and-carlton-cuse-talk-across-the-sea

gigabit

Rubbish episode.

Boring, drawn out, no main cast, a pointless episode to put in 3 from the end, a complete waste of time. The way the writers are dragging this out show irritates me. The could have condensed it into 2 seasons.

http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=lost%20mad%20tv&search=Search&sa=X&oi=spell&resnum=0&spell=1

Hyzepher

Overall I thought this episode was very good and provided probably more information that we give it credit for.

Water
I think this episode underlined the importance of water and the island. We already know that MiB and water don't mix. After this episode I think we can draw out that Smokie was somehow encapsulated within the cave - probably surrounded by water. It's probably no accident that the cork in the analergy is an island given that it is surrounded by water.

Also the healing pool in the temple is significant and i would bet that before it became all mirky after the death of Jacob that it used to emit a bright light.

Mother
The most significant scene involving the mother was when Jacob took the wine. She stated that they were now both the same. At that memoment the responsibility of caring for the island passed from one to the other - or at least it was now shared. Only now was the Mother able to die (or be killed). It also made Jacob immortal. it also skes the question of how Jacob is now going to pass the responsibility to another without taking human form again

This may tie in nicely with my theory that Jacob is a living timer that manifests itself in him growing older - appearing as a younger boy - and MiB has a set time period to do his will.

It now also looks like Jacob - some time after becoming the carer of the island, and presumably after a few run-ins with smokey - devised a set of rules (or Game) - that would guarentee MiB's ability to leave the island if he won. I don't htink the conversations between the brothers over games/rules should be taken lightly especially given the history we have had over the series.

Cave/Light
Unless I am mistaken the light coming from the cave seemed to disapate after Smokie was released. This would point towards Smokie already existed before MiB entered the cave. He was also seen to go underground/underwater before smokie appeared.

Whatever the light was, it is apparent that Smokie was at the heart of it but trapped within water. MiB removing the brick to show Mother the light had no effect on Smokie as his water trap was no breached.

Desmond
Without doubt we are going to see Des enter the cave and either re-trap Smokie there or reset the island by some means.

I suppose that's long enough for now - may have more thoughts later.

Psychedelic

9

Some of the criticism here is way over the top. A lot of it is based on a complete misunderstanding or misinterpretation of events in the episode. If you just didn't like the explanations given and the stuff like the bright light than fair enough, but some criticism is just stupid.

And it seemed like some people expected answers to absolutely everything in this episode. People giving out that the main characters weren't in it - for just one bloody episode out of over 100 episodes that we didn't have the main characters!

People are complaining about things like we didn't find out how Jacob build the light house (someone else obviously built it) and the children wearing colour-coded clothes (so ****ing what).

Also, did anyone else notice the amount of new posters here who never posted here before, or rarely anyway, posting in this thread? Goes to show how strongly people feel about the episode.

Lothaar v2

demolitionman wrote: »

Saw this on another forum thought it was worth a post:

Worth a post only to highlight how bad a theory it is!

The poster is right about one thing - there are biblical references in Lost. To say the writers have rehashed a 2,000-year old story is ridiculous. Even the explanation in his post is all over the place, erroneous and disjointed!

It's a reference, and just one of many, many references that permeate this show. The writers purposely implant books etc into the show to TELL you that they're referencing different sources.

Lost is NOT an analogy for religion, or for anything else. It's its own mythology. And the show itself discusses the nature of the human condition through a mix of sci-fi and mythology.

MJRS

2

I've never seen people get so defensive over other people not liking it! Not specifically you Psych, but you can see it on every page of this thread, it's mental!