Lost, Season 6 – “Across the Sea”
From the time we were introduced to the warring duo of Jacob and the Man in Black in the Season Five finale, I always suspected they were brothers. What I didn’t expect to find out was that they were mortal, or at least they were at first. What this week’s episode gives us is the story of the two mysterious figures, giving us more information as to who they are and how they received their respective roles on the island. In true Lost fashion, however, the answers we received brought up a whole new batch of questions which will hopefully be at least expanded on by the series finale, which has now been expanded to two and a half hours.
“Across the Sea” touched on a lot of the recurring themes of the series, such as surrogate motherhood, sibling rivalry, and the clash between faith and the search for facts. We still don’t know the Man In Black’s real name, and if we haven’t been told by now, we probably never will. My biggest question that has yet to be touched on is why Jacob and MIB seem to have switched positions when it comes to outsiders coming to the island. If Jacob was raised to stay away from them, why then did he make it possible for Richard, The Others, Dharma, Desmond, and Oceanic 815 to come to the island? Perhaps what he told Richard in “Ab Aeterno” is true and that the Smoke Monster really does want to do something terrible to the rest of the world and Jacob is trying to stop him by finding someone worthy enough to convince him not to do it.
One thing that “Across the Sea” really succeeds in is that it successfully debunks many of the speculations about which side is “good” and which side is “evil.” As we’ve seen many times on the show, both sides have done some horrible things and neither one could be considered “good” in the purest sense. That’s a relief to me, because I was starting to get worried that such a complex show was going to devolve into a simple battle between good and evil. The big answer we got in this episode was the reveal of just who the “Adam and Eve” skeletons are, which makes us wonder just who the Smoke Monster is, then. We found out that Jacob’s nigh-immortality has something to do with the wine bottle he carried around, which was given to him by his mother (Allison Janney) before her death at the hands of his brother. The question from this episode that everyone will no doubt be asking is just what the glowing light is in the tunnel and the well. It still remains to be seen whether this will be revealed to us in the series finale or whether it will wind up being the biggest Macguffin in history. Regardless, the next two episodes should make for some memorable TV. Despite not being the revelatory episode I expected it to be, “Across The Sea” gets 4 out of 5 Stones To The Head for giving us at least a few big chunks of information.
Loved this episode too, Ben! I liked the whole “good” vs “evil” thing because, looking on both sides of the story, both did logical good things and evil WTF things as well!
Spoiler warning for anyone who hasn’t watched, as Ben’s review doesn’t reveal this.
The smoke monster is still the MIB – he’s able to take the form of bodies on the island (Jack’s dad, Locke), and since his body is on the island he took his own form after being turned to smoke.
ok, im thinking its more like MIB is dead and when Richard showed up he was just a ghost/smoke monster but wasn’t able to touch or do anything to anybody including Jacob. So in order for MIB to actually kill Jacob he had to get inside a body (Locke) and convince someone to kill Jacob.
Jacob is immortal, MIB is the ghost trying to leave the island and Jacob feels guilty over what he did so he has to live with that for the rest of his immortal life. It definitely felt like that to me last night. The glowing well at the end of the tunnel signified whoever enters either light or dark. MIB was mad at the time and had killed his own mother so he came out dark/smoke monster.
But the mother told Jacob that nobody could go in… so it might have been like something terrible could come out and that being the smoke monster.
Im hoping im right, but these next few weeks are going to be heartbreaking.
^ That makes me think of the cave from Empire Strikes Back, where there’s nothing in it but “only what you take with you.” That’s a pretty cool theory, MDG.
I know there are things that won’t be explained, that just have to be taken on faith (one of the show’s recurring themes) as “just part of the mythology”. Even if they had another 6 seasons of just answering questions, there are things that still would never be explained.
The smoke monster? After MIB floated into the light (I think he was still alive, just unconscious), it came soaring out, and his body was discovered later? That’s explanation enough for me. It think it’s his soul. If they go into more detail, if they spell it out, great. I won’t be pissed if that’s all we see.
It’s a better explanation than the ending to “No Country for Old Men”.
The light? It’s supernatural, obviously. Should we get a better explanation? It’d be cool. It’s not necessary. Will anyone really be satisfied if it’s explained as Heaven or Hell or Purgatory or “The Light of the Universe”? No, they won’t. They’ll want it explained further. Fake Mom’s chant before handing Jacob the wine? People are gonna be asking about that. Where did she come from? What about where Jacob & MIB’s real mom came from? Etcetera, etcetera. I don’t see things like that being explained. I don’t. And I don’t have a problem with that. Unless the show goes back to the creation of time itself, there are a billion questions that are never going to be answered about this show.
I still hear people asking for explanations on the polar bears. If you can’t come to your own conclusion with the clues they’ve given us, this is not the show for you to be watching. Go pick up a children’s book, because this kind of storytelling is obviously too advanced for you.
There’s going to be alot of whiny, bitchy people after the finale, regardless of how satisfactorily it ends. There are too many “science” viewers of this show. This is clearly not a show about science. It’s a show about science vs. faith, and when to accept one over the other.
Locke: “Why do you find it so hard to believe?”
Jack: “Why do you find it so easy?”
Locke: “It’s never been easy!!”
*waits for people to start accusing me of being “satisfied with subpar writing”*
I thought the episode was okay. I guess I was expecting more. I called everything that happened before it did, so honestly I was kinda bored. I was waiting for the episode to surprise me, but it never did. Still, it wasn’t bad by any means.
“Every question you ask will only bring more”
The writers just told us, rather flatly, that we’re only getting the answers we get. Ask whatever you want, it’s only going to get you deeper in. You might as well ask where life came from in the universe as a whole. We don’t know. Was there a big bang, or did God do it? And if there WAS a big bang, why? And if it WAS God, where’d IT come from? At some point, you just have to stop asking, because you’re never going to know anything.
With that said, we did get SOME good answers here. I agree that the smoke monster is MiB’s soul released, but further, I believe it is a collection of all the souls on the island, to some extent. I just think MiB is in the Captain’s seat.
What’s his name? He was never given one.
Why’d Jacob start WANTING people to come to the Island? Because some day, he’d have to find HIS replacement, just as his “mother” had to find hers.
My biggest single gripe with the episode? A magnetic field that ripped MiB’s blade right out of flight was so easily overcome by Jacob. Sure, he struggles for a second to pull it free, but then there’s NO indication that it’s still tugging at the dagger. Minor? Maybe. But it took me RIGHT out of the moment/show.
I agree that most of the questions brought up by this episode will never really be revealed, and I can definitely see the writers leaving most of the mystical stuff up in the air. I’m just hoping the last two episodes provide some thrilling TV and end the series on a strong note.
I just wish they’d reveal MiB’s real name. The “mother” kept saying Jacob, but never said the MiB’s name. That just seemed off. If she was calling Jacob by his name, why not call the MiB by his? It just felt wrong, and unnatural. It was like they sacrificed more natural dialog in favor of teasing the viewer, and to make sure not reveal it.
Again, I don’t believe he HAS a name. His mother only named Jacob. I don’t think his “mother” bothered to give him a name.
Magnets: how they fuck do they work?
@Kerouac: Yeah, I wondered if the MiB has a name. I just think that if he didn’t, it would come up in this week’s episode. He would have said something like “you don’t love me, you didn’t even give me a name” or something when they were arguing.
I totally agree with the comments about not asking too many questions. I think that just being a conscious, inquisitive human being means that we could always find another question to complicate any answers given. However, I do think that the constant lack of information (mostly at crucial times in the episode) is due to the writers not yet wanting to reveal too much, and so keep the viewer perplexed. Wouldn’t it be a shame if at this late in the game the writers let too much slip and gave it away? I think everything in the episode was meant to be as we saw it. The MIB has no name yet because his name is of great significance. We can assume that merely knowing his name at this point would be too premature and reveal too much. They don’t want us to know; not yet anyway.
I agree that the ‘Smoke Monster’ is indeed the MIB (obviously not in physical form), and that he was only able to take physical form once with Jack’s father (correct me if I’m wrong, whose body was originally on the plane), and secondly with Locke (who’s body was on the second plane).
This might have already been discussed elsewhere, but there seems to be many similarities between Jacob and the MIB and the story of Cain and Abel.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cain_and_Abel
References to ‘the original Adam and Eve’, the pure light from within the island (“the light that shines in all man”). Is the Garden of Eden contained within the island? Could the smoke monster be considered more of a serpent? In the Jewish story of Cain and Abel, Cain, whose name means ‘ from the evil one’ or ‘of the evil one’ was considered to be the first born to the serpent from the garden of eden….. Again, more questions ;o)
I don’t for one second think that LOST is a simple interpretation of a religious story,but there does appear to be common ground.
Any ideas on the next episode? I’m guessing that we will stick with the story of Jacob and the MIB for now as the title ‘what they died for’ suggests an explanation for how and why (scrap the how, I don’t think that will be explained until right at the end) Jacob began to bring people to the island. To prove that man could be good? To what end? Man’s redemption? Did Jacob make a deal with the devil? ;o)
I would guess the next episode will maybe explain the significance of the deaths that happened on the Island? I’m thinking some flashsidewaysness will happen, too.
this episode was painful, boring and an insult to all that had gone before. It was so cliched, filled with embarrassing clunky dialogue. I thought i was watching something along the likes of “the Adventures of Hercules” or “Xena” or bloody “stargate” but not “LOST”!!!!! Not the king of the mind fuck sci fi!!!! WHY are the writers doing this – none of it had to be exolained – but now they’re joining up the dots like a frantic school kid!!! It’s going to do what “battlestar…” did and be brilliant up till the end of the last season and then bow out on a stinky, obvious and deeply unsatisfying ending. HOW AWFUL!!!!