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My first impression from this episode? That's one dumb Smoke Monster.

Why? You may recall I wrote this sentence last week: "Apparently [Widmore's] task of sacrifice for Desmond is going to involve him going deep into the bowels of the Orchid or some other hot spot beneath the Island."

And what does the MiB do with Desmond after going through all the trouble of sending Dark Sayid to steal him away from Widmore? Puts him precisely where - theoretically - Widmore needs him to be. Good work there. We call this the opposite (mirror image) of situational irony.

Speaking of mirror images, where were they this episode? Did you notice any? I saw lots of photos of Hugo, such as that great Mr. Cluck's poster with the tagline, "It's like a Walkabout in your mouth!" but no reflections. I watched it twice and missed them… after seeing three in the previous episode.

Thinking about the significance of this and how it has been so obvious all season but now halts with a Hurley-centric episode has my own brain flashing back to "Dave," which you might remember from Season Two. Among other things, "Dave" involved Hurley and Libby kissing as she talks him down from the cliff (we see Hurley's mind flash to that when they kiss on the beach), Libby convincing Hurley he's sane (we see the reverse of that this week), Hurley seeing someone on the island who may or may not be there, or might be in his head (he sees Michael this week, though we'll cover him later in this recap), Dave offering his hand and "a walk" to a seated Hurley just as Flocke does to Desmond, and perhaps most importantly, Dave trying to convince Hurley the whole "show" basically was all taking place in his head inside Santa Rosa, even using the line, "This is it, dude! The big finale! The answer to all your problems. A way for you to wake up, snap out of it."

The thing about mirrors is, they usually tell us a truth. If we avoid looking in them we can avoid certain truths we may not want to face. Are no-reflections all of a sudden a clue that it is all in Hurley's head? Oh, and "Dave" also just happened to be the episode with the big reveal that Libby was also in Santa Rosa, and by some counts was Episode Number 42 of LOST (read more about the possible significance of "Dave" at this excellent site)…

And there was Desmond this week, showing up as Mr. Cluck's order No. 42 to set Hugo on his happy way. Let's get on our happy way as well.

SIDEVERSE, a.k.a. The B.A.U.

"Ah. So what's her name?" - Desmond Hume to a depressed Hugo Reyes (yes, what is her name? We still don't know her last name, for Jacob's sake!)

One of the first things we like to do is take a look at what's the same, and what's just slightly "off" (as Libby puts it so well this week) in our "Bizarro Alternate Universe" (as Hurley puts it so well this week)…

Constants: Hugo is rich from lottery winnings; he does seem to recognize / anticipate the numbers (like when order 42 is about to be called); he's a great guy, a real humanitarian; his mother still views him as less than a success because he's not married; he loves chicken; he eats when he's depressed; he loves Libby; as confident as he is, he's still "afraid" to talk to women; nobody in LA ever seems to call him Hurley, even though he once told us this was his nickname "back home."

Variables: Did he play "the numbers" to win the lottery (if so, where did he get them in this timeline)? He owns all Mr. Cluck's franchises, not just one; Mr. Reyes (daddy Cheech) is not around; we've already previously heard him refer to himself as the luckiest man alive instead of as "cursed"; he's never been in a mental institution; Libby (apparently) was not on board Oceanic 815. I suppose she could have been, since she can leave the hospital when she likes, but this seems highly unlikely that she would have been traveling internationally).

Another former episode I flashed back to was, go figure, "Everbody Hates Hugo," the clear opposite of "Everybody Loves Hugo," which began with that dream sequence where Hurley was pigging out on food stash in the Hatch, where the pic of "missing" Walt appeared on the milk carton, where English-speaking Jin and the Mr. Cluck's chicken appeared to him and told him, "Everything's going to change." And that's also very interesting considering one of the Room 23 phrases that briefly appears behind Jin (coincidence?) a couple weeks ago: "Everything changes." And indeed it does, as our B.A.U. makes clear. Thing is, it also makes clear that the more things change, the more they stay the same, which is a bit paradoxical, but hey, so is the idea that free will and determinism can be going on at the same time.

I suppose the biggest question this week's opening scene has me asking is: why a Paleontology wing at the Natural History Museum? Why is that what Hugo has chosen to donate? It's got to be more than a way to get Dr. Chang some screen time. And as you might expect, I have some theories on that.

This is now the third time we've had a reference to a museum we've never even visited. Miles set Sawyer up with his father (Chang)'s colleague (Charlotte) who worked there… Daniel was visiting the museum when he fell in love with Charlotte at first sight… and now Hugo is being honored there, and given a trophy of a dinosaur. A dinosaur…

Remember that odd line Hurley spoke to Jack when they visited the caves earlier this season? The one about "Adam & Eve" possibly being "some of us" if we time traveled, like, "back to dinosaur times"? That line's never set well with me. Why would "dinosaur times" have been necessary when the 1970s - a time period they already traveled to - would have sufficed just fine to produce those skeletons? That was weird enough. But then they kept throwing subtle references to ancient history at us. Things like references to paleontology, things like Flocke asking Desmond if he realizes just how ancient that well is, things like episodes with titles that are Latin for "from the beginning of time," Egyptian hieroglyphs and Edenic symbology. What could it mean? Is the island somehow eternal or otherwise outside time? Is it just really really really formation-of-the-world old? Have the same souls been playing out similar events on it from time immemorial as a way to "pass the time"? I'm still not sure, I'm only sure that I think ancient history is going to be of more significance than I have previously.

Was that a Seinfeld shout-out when Hurley mentioned to Carmen that the next benefit he was scheduled to attend was for "The Human Fund"?! Whether intended or not, I laughed. Love me some Costanza. How I would have loved to see how George would have played into the world of the Island… (note: as of 2005, there really IS a legit organization known as The Human Fund, but for me it'll always be tied to Festivus).

Carmen cites "fear" rather than "busyness" as the reason Hurley is still single. Fear is established as a big theme in both our timelines this week.

At Spanish Johnny's, Hurley's blind date Rosalita does not show, but Libby does. Man, was it good to see her! And what's her first question for him, asked as she takes his hands? Essentially, it's whether he believes in soulmate connectivity. He does. This jives in part with the introductory love-related questions Charlie and Daniel each asked Des last week. What's not the same is that where Desmond had flashes triggered by touching Penny and by seeing Charlie's hand underwater on a pane of glass, touch and just seeing Libby don't do this for Hugo. It's possible that not just love but also circumstance has to be a "constant" across timelines to start the memory train in motion. For Hugo, he needs Libby's kiss. For Daniel, perhaps he really did have a love-at-first-sight encounter with Charlotte in both worlds. What about the déjà vu it appeared Kate had for Jack at the airport? Well, it involves seeing Jack, and it involved Kate being on the run from the Marshall, something that probably happens in every possible timeline. Even Charlie quite possibly had his brain kicked into motion not by seeing Claire on the plane (though perhaps he did), but by the parallel of heroin-in-the-airplane-bathroom.

Also interesting to note what triggered Libby's memories: 1) when she first got to Santa Rosa she felt like she had been there before, 2) when she, just a few days ago, saw one of Hurley's commercials, she felt like she knew him, had a history with him, and like he too had been in Santa Rosa before. I was reminded of how watching something strangely familiar on television also caused an odd reaction in Daniel Faraday once upon a time, too… Libby describes her experience "like being hit over the head" (we've talked about levels of consciousness being significant before), and she is said to have "issues with reality." Yet another excellent way to put it. Hurley episodes are always like Forrest Gump's mama, having a way of putting things so we can understand them. It goes part-and-parcel, I think, with the informal-talking dude who knows comic books and how they explain the world…

So, all that being postulated regarding what it takes to jar memories loose, what in the world could Desmond have been trying to do by running over poor substitute teacher Locke? I'll admit my first thought was that Des somehow "remembered" him as the guy who threw him down a well, and so he was getting some revenge, or perhaps even trying to eliminate him, keep him from doing that, maybe. But that didn't set right at all, either in the plot or with Desmond's character. So my current theory is related to what I mentioned above about parallel-circumstance constants. After all, Locke's "love," is here, with him, in this world, in Los Angeles - Helen. He would have no "love connection" to the island world for Desmond to help him locate. What would be a constant of sorts for him, though, is a major vehicular collision that leaves him lying on the ground looking up, and I'll be danged if Locke's eyes in that final scene where Ben is tending to him didn't look to me like he's… seeing something, having flashes of memories… Desmond also, whether he intends to or not, has probably put Locke on his way to St. Sebastian's for his "consult" with Dr. Shephard. Perhaps that nice Dr. Linus will even ride with him in the ambulance. What are the chances Jin and gunshot-wounded Sun-and-child end up there too? The gears are in motion…

Back inside Santa Rosa, things are pretty much as we've seen them before. Dr. Brooks is there. He has that soothing photo of an island on his office wall. The inmates still play games (Connect Four) to pass the time, and draw interesting island-ish chalk figures on the board. Pausing the screen on the game of Connect Four revealed that red had a connect-four from the top right going down, and black had a connect-four from the bottom-left going diagonally. There was also a vacant spot on the 4^th row into which either red or black could have broken that tie if either had played there. But alas, the whole game gets dumped and rebooted by the loony who is playing it… hmm…

And that chalk drawing which the inmates continue to work on while Hurley and Libby converse - it contains a moth emerging from a cocoon… and it shows an island and something that looks one heck of a lot like a "monster" (kinda alligator-ish) drawn very smokily. If the producers of LOST don't want me to keep going back to the "It's all in Hurley's head inside Santa Rosa as some sort of experiment akin to the plots of Identity and Shutter Island" theory then they're doing a poor job of it!

Hurley and Libby finally get their date on the beach… and Hurley remembers to bring the blanket this time (if he hadn't, would some jerk have shot Libby?). Hurley brings six kinds of cheese because, well, everyone likes cheese, right? I'll admit I laughed not only at the awkward humor, but because last week when writing about the Love connections I wondered whether LOST was going for the "cheesy" ending. And here now we're told about six varieties of cheese, the same number of candidates/numbers? Six different love stories? Silly English major Shawn reading too much into things again?

Hurley and Libby's dialogue, such as "You're doing fine," echoes a lot of their original dialogue from their island days. I'll admit, for a lot of these B.A.U. versions of our Losties, it's hard for me to think of them as leaving this timeline behind when they seem happy, less fearful, more content, etc. Heck, Jack even has a son in this timeline. But that just makes me more convinced that what we're leading to isn't an abandonment of one timeline for another, but more of a merge. And maybe that will result in the utopian "it only needs to happen once, everything until then is just progress" vision Jacob has for everything?

So many possibilities. But until then, at least, as Dr. Chang says, there's one thing we can all agree upon… "Everybody Loves Hugo."

CAMP HUGO

"Maybe she died just to show us to stay the hell away from dynamite." - Jack Shephard

We flash into our island timeline looking at Libby's grave fresh off the line from Carmen that "we'll find someone who does" love you, Hugo. Island Hurley appears to have tended to not only her grave but the entire "Boone Hill" cemetery, putting up fence posts around it and pulling the weeds. He even brings bright red flowers to Libby's grave (see some new thoughts I have on "red" at the end of this post in the Q&A section). But he's still bummed that Ghost Libby never shows up to hang with him (even though he had previously told Jacob back in the taxicab that his dead friends "Charlie and Libby" sometimes visit him).

Who does show up is Michael, in his Kevin Johnson (speaking of which, that was another example of misleading identity) garb. That Michael is here is interesting. He didn't die "on" the island. He didn't even die within the "dome" of the island, as the freighter was beyond that radius when the island moved. This opens up all sorts of possibilities for me to explain things like how Ben's mom's ghost appeared to him on the island and inside the sonic fence. Seems like maybe you don't have to have died on Island to be a Whisperer?  What you have to be, apparently, is someone who died with an incomplete redemption story, such that you are now, effectively, yes, let's all say it together - in Purgatory. "Unable to move on." Not in Hell, per se, as that's kinda sorta under the Island, maybe, but more like on Hell? And Hurley's ability to see such spirits doomed to walk the earth (or at least the Island) comes in handy in giving us a hasty explanation for the Whispers.

What I'm still lost about, though, are some lines that still jangle around in my head, such as the time Ben, after kidnapping Alex from Danielle, told Rousseau that if she wanted to live, any time she ever heard whispers, she should run the other way. I always took that to mean the whispers indicated getting too close to where the Others lived. Or even that the whispers were dangerous. But neither seems to be the case… I'm also not sure why it seems the Whisperers can leave the Island. Whispers have been heard on the Freighter, and back in the real world, and Hugo saw the ghosts of his friends back in the real world, too.

What does seem constant about the Whispers is that they are the voices of the dead-but-not-moved-on (so, as in, not everyone who has died necessarily becomes one; others may be in heaven or hell. Libby may actually be one of them, having appeared to Michael on the freighter). The Whisperers seem to have some rooting interest in how things go on the island despite their status as dead. The ghost of Ben's mom prompted him to see another path. I have also long thought that when Harper appeared to Juliet about needing to head off Faraday and Charlotte at the Tempest that it was the Whispers (though this also has never made sense to me, as Faraday and Charlotte were neutralizing the gas that could have killed everyone (but might have also left the Island protected, of course).

Sawyer and Jack once upon a time each heard Whispers that contained audible messages like "It'll come back around" and "Let it go" that helped them in their journeys. And now Michael appears and in a straightforward manner tells Hurley that blowing up the plane is not the way. He's honest, quite obviously apologetic for having killed Libby (what about Ana? No such remorse for her?), and willing to point the way to Flocke's camp. Beyond that, it doesn't seem like he can get involved. It also seems like Whispers show up when they recognize someone else who is "lost," such as when Sayid began his trek back to the beach from Danielle's bunker, or now, when Hugo admits to Jack that he has no idea where he's going. Also noted - Michael calls Hugo "Hurley," though nobody in Los Angeles ever seems to. He also seems to tell Hurley he's pretty much Moses now.

Vacating the leadership role so that Hurley can take over is poor Ilana. I have heard from several of you who realized what was going to happen to her the minute they let us peek inside her bag at that 4 sticks of old crusty dynamite, but I was not one of you. Just three days ago I was counting along with people about backstories we have yet to see… Hurley, Ilana… And then boom. I also don't think my brain wanted to let me believe they would just "Arzt" a character in Season Six who seemed to have so much more purpose than she now, in retrospect, appears to have had.

Will we ever see why she and Jacob were so close, and what she was actually training for (I say yes, in a Jacob flashback)? Will we see if she somehow went wrong on her intended path/purpose and was therefore allowed to explode? Will we find out if Ben is right, and "The Island" (Locke and Desmond also speak of it in this episode as a cognitive, conscious force) was done with her (I don't like this because it means that all she ever really did was get Sayid to the island, burn down the cabin, lead a very minor rescue of a few people at the Temple, and tell three people of their candidacy)? And also, right before Ilana blew up, she mentioned needing to get to the outriggers to get across the channel, and I thought this meant we were finally going to get to see that time flash sequence where Juliet-Sawyer-Locke and Co. get chased by another canoe! But no! BOOO! For the record, I think Ilana's fatal flaw was making the Seasons 1-2 mistake of saying that rushing headlong into action guns ablazin' "is the only plan we have." Um, no. Rookie. Noob. Everyone else has learned through experience that patience and/or communication (Hurley's eventual plan) tend to be much better plans.

Question: why didn't Miles try to commune with Ilana's "body" (such as what was left of it), or Hurley with her ghost? They're sitting right there. Wouldn't that have been helpful, find out what she knows, who Jacob is, and all that?

All told, it's probably a good thing nobody gets to blow up the plane. For one thing, they have to get home somehow, and Lapidus is still there for some purpose (hint: it has something to do with his profession). I also think it remains part of the MiB's plan to gather all the candidates onto the plane, make Widmore think the MiB is on it trying to leave the island, and therefore get Widmore to blow it up. Candidates go bye-bye, MiB got someone else to kill them since he can't do it himself, and all is right with the world according to him.

I sure miss the days of calm, cool, collected Richard. Chicken-with-his-head-cut-off Richard annoys me, especially with how he won't trust the guy who not 24 hours ago gave him the gift of communicating with his wife after like 140 years apart.

Before Ilana disintegrated, she did leave us with one final reminder that "that Thing is evil" and "God help us all" if it ever got loose, because... (here's another reason why I wish Miles or Hurley would have stepped up. Go find out how she was going to finish that sentence, please).

Now that she's gone (does Ben seem genuinely sad? I like to think he was developing a little crush on her), Hugo does what any respectable man does - rummages through her crap. He finds two interesting items:

1. Ilana's Book: Notes from Underground (Russian: Записки из подполья), by Fyodor Dostoyevsky. From Wikipedia: "Also translated as Letters from the Underworld… It is considered by many to be the world's first existentialist novel. It presents itself as an excerpt from the rambling memoirs of a bitter, isolated, unnamed narrator (generally referred to by critics as the Underground Man) who is a retired civil servant living in St. Petersburg. The first part of the story is told in monologue form, or the underground man's diary, and attacks emerging Western philosophy… The main issue for the Underground Man is that he has reached a point of ennui and inactivity… The first part also gives a harsh criticism of determinism and intellectual attempts at dictating human action and behavior by logic… one cannot avoid the simple fact that anyone at any time can decide to act in a way which might not be considered good, and some will do so simply to validate their existence and to protest and confirm that they exist as individuals. For good as a general term is subjective and in the case of the Underground Man the good here he's ridiculing is enlightened self interest."
2. Ilana's black pouch. Hurley has a look inside… and suddenly has a plan that involves trust and getting rid of the dynamite. What did he see in there? How did it spur him to action?

Some thoughts on the above - I hardly feel like I need to comment on the Russian novel. Speaks for itself regarding Lostian themes and specifically who the Man in Black might be, at least archetypically. Also makes sense that Ilana would be reading this to study up on her enemy and his philosophies.

The pouch? Ilana collected Jacob's ashes in a pouch like this, but we already knew that. Why would Hurley need to see it? All I could think of was that it reminded me a lot of the one found with Adam & Eve. And it sounded to like there might be stones inside. And this would definitely qualify as something that would get Hurley's attention and push him to act. Whether it's just the ashes, whether Hugo realizes it's the ashes, or whether it's something else entirely, apparently it's going to be important (again. Beyond how Miles already used them it to prove Ben killed Jacob). In fact, I don't think Hurley was present the time Miles used those ashes previously, so they are new to him. He does know, however, from having visited the cabin and the Temple that ashes and Smokey don't mix. So perhaps that's all there is to it behind his plan to go visit Flocke.

Richard wants to get more dynamite. But it's all gone after Hurley blows up the Black Rock, right? Wrong. Seems like I remember Claire had a big crate of the stuff back at her hovel. I also wondered what it was doing there. Maybe now we see that it will come into play after all? Not yet, though, as Richard leads his demolition men Ben and Miles off to the barracks for some ammo.

Ben gives us a few things to chew on when he mentions that Ilana:

1. Was hand-picked by Jacob
2. Was trained to protect you candidates
3. Told you who you were (identity?)

He then goes on to suggest something none of really ever wants to talk about - the mirror side to the purpose/faith/miracles theme we've discussed so often in our recaps here. But if you consider that everything has positive and negative aspects to it, then ceasing to be useful, ceasing to believe, and ceasing to see special inexplicable events are the dark side of this worldview. In other words, if a higher power is through with you, you're on your own. The Purpose-Driven Life, indeed…

Miles asks Hurley why he did what he did. Though he asks "Who?" when Hurley cites Michael, I believe Miles recollects who Hugo is speaking of. He remembers that guy on the freighter who he told, "Your name's not Kevin. Don't worry, I won't tell." I did find it odd that Miles of all people seems shocked that Hurley would listen to the things dead people tell him. But Hurley simply responds that they are more reliable than the living. Probably true. Nothing at stake for them = less reason to lie or mislead. And sure enough, even when asked, all Michael wants from Hurley is: Don't get yourself killed, and tell Libby I'm very sorry. He wants to see the candidates succeed, and to work towards his redemption / forgiveness. These are his only concerns and requests.

Richard, on the other hand, calls Hurley's bluff about Jacob because "Jacob never tells us what to do." No? Didn't he just tell you to stop the Man in Black from leaving through Hurley through Isabella? He also reminds us yet again that if the MiB leaves, "everything" is over. I still struggle with this concept, because hell unleashed/chaos and complete emptiness/non-existence seem counter-intuitive to me…

Jack shares with us how he has arrived at being such a man of faith. "The point," he has decided, is to let go. Stop fixing, controlling, acting. You aren't in control, so leave the illusion behind. You hear tell of how many surgeons have god-complexes, and our Jack was no different. He blames himself for Juliet's death, but he has also realized that's in the past, he needs to move on, and he can't change it. Unless of course he can, somehow. Hurley worries that maybe Jack shouldn't be giving up control so easily. But Jack won't go back to where he's been. "Trust," he says. It's about trust.

CAMP SMOKEY

"How do you break the ice with a Smoke Monster?" - Hugo Reyes

When the MiB was carving that stick it was a tough scene for me because it felt so much like old Locke for a minute, the guy who liked to play with knives and sticks and wait for inanimate objects to commune with him. My next thought was that we'll see that stick again for some evil purpose, as the MiB says he will know its use "when the TIME is right…" (this quote not only caused me to remember our time theme in the show, but also to reflect on this passage from Galatians)…

Kate and Sawyer, neither of them patient by nature, aren't fans of waiting around. Thing is, though, Flocke knows he can't go get the remaining candidates. They are going to have to choose to come to him. And he tells James that's precisely what he's waiting for, never mind Kate's protests about the likelihood of that happening. He practices faith, too.

Sayid has brought back Desmond (anyone else wondering how Sayid and Des got back to the main island? Sayid didn't have a boat; he swam over after riding with Flocke). Des is still the same "anything goes" happy guy he was at the end of last episode. Never having encountered the Smoke Monster, and never having been told that John Locke died, Desmond believes that's Locke.

Desmond has nowhere to run, which Flocke says is "the best argument against captivity he's ever heard." He quizzes Desmond on why Widmore brought him back there, but Des is none the wiser. All he knows is electromagnetism had something to do with it. We know Smokey doesn't like sonic fences, and I'm assuming from the metallic and clanking sounds he makes he probably doesn't like electromagnetism too much, either. He plans to do away with Desmond, offering his hand and to take a walk. Unlike those before him, Desmond takes the dark man's hand. This may be Flocke's first sign that Desmond is not afraid. And that, he just can't abide. Even though those other folks didn't take his hand, it was because they feared him. And those who fear can be controlled.

Flocke and Desmond agree on one thing - "The Island" has it in for all of us. They, just like Ben, have referred to the place as a sentient entity, even though the MiB has also called it a "God-forsaken rock" and said there is "nothing special about it." Seems a bit confused, he does.

On their walk, they come across that crazy jungle kid again, the one most fans assume to be Kid Jacob. Is it just me or does he look a bit older this time? Desmond can see him, just as Sawyer could (Richard could not). Is Desmond somehow a candidate, in the same way that Frank could possibly be a candidate as speculated by Ilana once? Flocke says to ignore the kid, who just gets a big grin on his face. He seems to be enjoying this little game. I'm thinking his appearance served to again remind the MiB he can't kill this one either, which is perhaps why Flocke just dumps him down a well instead of squishing him into Scottish cheese.

About that well…

• It's not the same one the Orchid is built over. This one seems a bit shallower, and sounds like there is water at the bottom. The MiB also says it's "not the only well."
• Des wondered how deep it was, says Locke "read his mind." Literally? Quite possibly. This is what the Smoke Monster does, after all.
• Those who dug it dug it by hand, and were not looking for water, but answers.
• They didn't find what they were looking for (according to the MiB's version anyway)
• Places like this used to make compasses spin
• Charles Widmore "doesn't want answers, only power." Quite possibly true. But Desmond doesn't really care if it is or isn't. He just isn't buying that THAT'S why he's being shown this well.
• When Desmond asks what the point of being afraid is (why, it's controllability and susceptibility and worship, don't you know that, Des?), Flocke goes through some awesome facial expressions before he flushes him furiously

When Flocke returns to camp and Sayid asks, "How's our friend?" they lost a golden opportunity to have Flocke say, "I hear he's well." Then again, that might have been a little too James Bond-ish for LOST.

That's when Hurley shows up with "Um, hey." And of course the requisite "S.O.B." from Sawyer. I love the identity confusion when Hugo starts with, "I don't know who you are or what you want." All that matters is that Hurley would really prefer some parlance and protection for everyone rather than carnage. Flocke hands over his knife as a sign of good faith (but where's the spear stick?).

Jack on the other hand? He looks worried. That creepy staredown between him and Flocke has me concerned. I get the sense that Jack feels they shouldn't have come here, and that the Smoke Monster is at this moment reading Jack's memories as they lock eyes…

Checking in on Q & A

From now to the end of the series in this space, we'll be taking notes on how the show is doing in answering the questions we posed at the midpoint of Season Six in this blog, as well as those posed or expanded upon since then

Answered

The Whispers - are they related to ghosts/spirits, Smokey, the Others, Jacob... who? Sometimes it seems like the Others are using them (like when Richard's group attacks Keamy's), other times it seems more like it has to do with the island or possibly spirits on it.

The Whispers come from spirits who live on the island in some version of Purgatory. It's unclear (to me) whether they had to have lived and died on the island to be there, so there could literally be millions of them there. The Whisperers, if they have an allegiance, don't seem to be on the side of evil. Perhaps this is because they are all efforting to earn redemption. From what Michael tells Hurley, they definitely don't want the candidates dead even though if the MiB gets free and the cork gets popped, wouldn't that spell their freedom, too? Did the producers lie to us when they repeatedly denied theorists from Season One who wondered if our Losties were in purgatory? No, because our Losties weren't dead. They weren't in purgatory.

Why do some compasses work just fine on the island, and others (like the one Locke once gave Sayid) don't?

There are hot spots on the island and probably on the earth (Ayers' Rock?) where, as Flocke tells Desmond, compasses used to fail to work. Answers were sought below at these "magical" locations. Probably has more to do with the spot on which a person is standing than the compass.

Expanded Upon

Libby Stuff: What was Libby doing in Santa Rosa? Will Hurley ever figure out where he knew her from? What is her last name? What was she doing in Australia in our original timeline (reason for travel)? Did someone send her to "coincidentally" meet Desmond and offer him her boat The Elizabeth for his race?

We still don't know her last name or why she was in Santa Rosa the first time around (but I assume it was voluntary then too). Desmond observes her and Hurley together on the beach; does he perhaps remember her as the woman who gave him the Elizabeth?

What is the Island?

AND

So, the island is corking Hell?

Now that we know what the Whispers are, I'm working off a theory that jives literally with Charlotte's line and episode from Season Five - "This place is death!" Consider: it holds in hell. It houses purgatory. Ghosts, zombies. The blast door map referred to the Smoke Monster as "Cerberus." The island is talked about as a being, just as Death is often personified. It's also spoken of by Flocke and Desmond as "having it in for us all," just as Death waits for us all. It is referred to as the cork in the bottle of hell, and a "God-forsaken rock," as in "Upon this rock I will build my church and the gates of Hades/Hell will not prevail against it"?

Who was the boy seen by MIB and Sawyer in the jungle, the one with arms outstretched who reminded a kneeling-before-his-feet MIB of the rules ("you can't kill him")? Was it Jacob? How, if Jacob is dead and older? Time travel involved? If not Jacob, who was it?

Pretty sure it's Jacob. We learned that Desmond can see him, too, and that he can be ignored, but this does not make him mad like it makes the MiB mad to be ignored (or not feared). It makes him smile. He also seems to be aging. Is he maturing towards some sort of re-appearance or re-birth? We should be coming up on his having been dead about three days now…

How was Widmore able to return to the island? Is he on the side of Jacob, MIB, or himself?

AND

Is it all a game?

Is it possible there are three sides, three choices? Like in the game Myst we've referenced so often? We've seen black-and-white, but we've also seen black-white-red (no, not a penguin with a sunburn, Michael), black-red (playing cards, Connect Four), red-white (the sides of the two Queens in Through the Looking Glass), and more. Speaking of Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass, I was doing some reading about these works of Lewis Carroll this past week, with some fascinating results, including especially the poem "The Walrus and the Carpenter" (which, by the way, has 108 lines and can be interpreted as two guys - one in light, one in dark - on a beach leading lots of followers to their doom through religion) and several other parallels. I may devote one of our remaining mid-week special edition blogs to other parallels with these stories, which were published right around the time the Black Rock crashed on LOST island…

Possibly New Insights/Theories

Who took the Zodiac boat from the beach? And who shoots at our time skippers from an outrigger? Why do they shoot? Did Juliet hit / kill one of them when shooting back?

My original theory was that this was Ilana's group. Sure doesn't seem like Ilana now! So who then, when there was an Ajira 316 bottle in the canoes? By killing Ilana they just turned this from a regular old question into a mystery.

WHO appeared as Christian Shephard on the freighter to Michael and at the barracks to Lapidus and Sun (while Flocke was still on Hydra with Ben) if Smokey can not travel over water or be in two places at once?

Nothing much to contribute here except the possibility that Christian was, at least at times, possibly a Whisperer/Ghost instead of either Smokey or a zombie.

Was Sawyer's boar really the spirit of Frank Duckett come to let him off the hook? And how did the whispers know to say "It'll come back around" to Sawyer? Where would they have gotten such personal knowledge? Did Smokey ever memory-flash Sawyer? Did Jack really hear Christian through the "broken" Hydra intercom telling him to "let it go"? If so, how? The whispers again?

It should be fun to go back through the show to times we heard whispers and see how what we know now fits.

Why does Claire have dynamite out and exposed in her hovel? And where did she get it?

Could now be there was a reason for this? Seemed so out of place when we first saw her with it.

Posed

No reflections in this Hurley episode? Why not? What's it mean?

How ancient does this history go? Several subtle references to the distant past now. Will that play in somehow?

Will we see any more of Ilana in a Jacob/MiB flashback? Is her story done?

Thanks for joining me on this Fajita Field Trip. On to next week… what a freaky promo. It's gettin' good!

UPDATE: I am aware that Lostpedia.com refers to Libby as having the last name "Smith." But as this has never been spoken in an episode, and only in a non-canonical memorial montage to her at Comic-con, I am still treating it as a "Jane Doe" type of monicker, and expecting to hear a different last name eventually.

Also, no, I did not catch the Bruce Springsteen shout-out with Spanish Johnny's + Rosalita. Well done, co-worker Kelly Good.