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The Lost Report - I get from a poster on the ABC Lost forum:

My Serious, Logical Thoughts on The Beginning of the End

TITLE
Refers to a comment made by Ben in Through the Looking Glass that if Jack made the call that it would be the beginning of the end.

FRUIT TEASE
The opening scene contains no eyes! Instead we see a neat arrangement of melons. We hear birds and in the background it looks like the ocean. This is to make you think that this is the island, but then the melons are blown apart by a vintage Camero. We are in Los Angeles. The truck behind the melons contains the ocean scene, and the truck reads Los Angeles organic produce.

MY FATHER THE CAR
At the beginning of the show you see Hurley driving alone in a vintage seventies Camero. This car has been shown before. Hurley and his dad were working on the car shortly before his father left him when he was a boy. Because the car is a rare classic, Jack immediately recognizes it and knows who is driving it. That is why you hear him curse when he sees it on TV. No mention is made of the money of Hurley.

THE SECRET (not the one in the book)
When Hurley is asked by the cop if he knows Ana Lucia he says no. He cannot say he knows Ana Lucia because as far as the world is concerned there were only six survivors, and everybody else died in the plane crash. The rest of the survivors are still on the island. The mysterious Matthew Abaddon probably represents a group of people interested in the island and is not from Oceanic. Why would an airline try to give an upgrade to a man in a mental institution? Yes, if he was suing them it might be a way to soften him up, but I do not think so. Matthew asks Hurley if they are alive meaning the people still on the island. It all goes back to when Naomi crashed on the island and said that flight 815 was at the bottom of the ocean.
How is it that the plane is on the bottom on the ocean, but also crashed on the island? The only answer is cover up. Nefarious and powerful people outside the island know that flight 815 crashed on the island and somehow concocted a gigantic scheme to make it look like the plane really crashed and went to the bottom of the ocean. Initially they said there were no survivors. The six people rescued might have thrown a wrench into their plans, but the six made a deal with them to keep quiet about them and what they are doing and go along with their cover story that everyone else was killed in the initial plane crash. In return, these six people were rescued. Evidence for this theory comes from the fact that Hurley denies ever meeting Ana Lucia. Hurley cannot tell he met her because the cover story is that she and everyone else besides the Oceanic six died in the crash. It also would explain why when Jack comes to see Hurley in the mental institution it was to see if Hurley was going to go nuts and tell their secret.
Hurley sees a dead Charlie talking to him. Was Charlie really there or was it in the mind of Hurley? If it was all in his mind then how did the mental patient see him? You might think that it is then proven that the apparition of Charlie was physically there unless you consider that both the mental patient and Charlie were in the mind of Hurley. This is not the first person to appear to Hurley who was not really there. Remember Dave? This appearance mimics the ones we have seen on the island such as the father of Jack, Walt, the brother of Eko and others. By the way, the mental patient looked like one of the stars of the TV show Alias Kevin Weisman.

SURE IS COLD THERE
Why is Hurley drawing an igloo and a man dressed in a heavy coat? Seems similar to the two guys who apparently work for Penny Widmore who detected the electromagnetic activity from the hatch on the island. We saw these men in the season two finale. These two men were also in a cold place like the arctic.

GO WEST YOUNG MAN (to the island)
Although while visiting Hurley Jack says they will never go back to the island we know that later on he will very much want to go back. The flashforward sequence in the episode Through the Looking Glass reveals a bearded Jack yelling we have to go baaaack. Why the turnaround? We get a peek at the reason when Hurley implies that the island will do everything it can to get them back. We know Hurley has seen dead Charlie show up and ask him to help the people remaining on the island. Soon Jack will also start to see dead people like Charlie who will try to convince him to return to the island. Maybe he will also see Boone. He may also see others. His father? Ana Lucia? That might explain his comments about his father in Through the Looking Glass. Whatever the reason, Jack will turn to medication for help. That is why we see him pill popping in Through the Looking Glass. By that time, Jack has seen his share of ghosts who appear to teach him the true meaning of Christmas. Notice also that Hurley is on medication in this episode and happily takes down a pill. While being in police custody Hurley sees Charlie swim up to a two way mirror underwater and break the glass. Water then comes gushing in. Yes, that was Charlie swimming up to the mirror. Yes, Hurley gladly returns to the mental institution and his meds. We can only imagine what horrors Jack will see. Look for these in future episodes.

HOUSE(not the doctor)
When Hurley spies through the window of the house, a careful examination shows that there are two people in the house. One in a rocking chair and one who comes up to the window. Who owns the eye that comes up to the window to shock Hurley? I thought Jacob was alone in that house of his. We know Locke has a special connection with Jacob because he heard him speak. Was Locke also inside the house then? Locke did suddenly appear to Hurley right after this incident, and we did see the door to the house open. That still does not explain how the house can appear and disappear.

LIKE A BRIDGE UNDER TROUBLED WATER
At the mental institution, why does Hurley apologize to Jack about going with Locke? At the time, his reasoning seems to make perfect sense. He is going by the warning his friend Charlie gave him about the boat people. Also Hurley says that he believes they made a mistake when they left the island. If that is true then was he not correct in going with Locke? Locke did not want them to be rescued. What is up with this?

OCEANS SIX
Who are the Oceanic six? We have three confirmed members: Hurley, Jack and Kate. There is a hint that Sawyer might be a member when Kate says he will be wondering where I am in the episode Through the Looking Glass. Rose and Bernard may also possibly be members because Rose stays with Jack when the groups separate. But then again Rose is supposed to die if she leaves the island. That would make it the Oceanic Five. If Rose and Bernard stay on the island, which is more likely, then perhaps the final three are Sawyer, Jin and Sun. Sun did remark about wanting to have her baby in a hospital. Perhaps each of the remaining six will also be haunted by visions of the dead. Will the series finale include these six returning to the island to save the day? (The Oceanic six should not be confused with the New York Four. You know who I mean.)

ISLANDS IN THE STREAM OF CONSCIOUSNESS
The island seems almost like a person. Take the scene in Through the Looking Glass when Walt tells John that he has work to do. That was not Walt but the island talking to John. But is there really something there speaking or is it all in the head of the listener? The monster may be able to transform itself into the appearance of different people. See the Michael Crichton novel Prey in which a swarm of nanobots takes on the appearance of a human. But if that is true then it must be able to fly off the island to LA and impersonate Charlie. That seems less likely.

WHAT DO YOU MEAN I GOT SHOT?
How is it that John can function so well after being shot? He talks and walks around with no problem. By now he would have lost a lot of blood. Would he not be dead? Perhaps the island or Jacob healed him in a very short time. After shooting John, Ben says I hope he is able to help you. Meaning Jacob. Is this a slight hint that Jacob does have the power to heal?

AND NOW A WORD FROM OUR OCEANIC
In the premiere of Eli Stone there is an Oceanic commercial in which Oceanic introduces the golden pass which can take you anywhere in the world any time you want to go. Jack mentions having one of these passes in the episode Through the Looking Glass. He says he got the pass from Oceanic. He did not have to pay for it. This may have been part of the court settlement they made with the airline for the crash. The commercial is intermittently interrupted by a man speaking with an Australian accent. He says not to trust them and that they have found Oceanic flight 815. Then you briefly see an Oceanic plane at the bottom of the ocean. This implies that Oceanic is in on the cover up. This is kind of a surprise since it was an accident that the plane crashed on the island. Oceanic did not plan it. Is Oceanic working with the nefarious people Naomi was working for? A deal could have been struck between the two after the fact. Oceanic agrees to the cover story in return for perhaps money or something else of great value. The footage of the plane under the ocean could have been faked. It is easy to do now days. Just look at the movie Titanic. Or how about Beowulf or Final Fantasy the Spirits Within? The technology exists to fake footage of a plane underwater. They could even have gone so far as to plant one of their own planes underwater and then film it or let it be accidentally found and filmed. During the commercial you see the website flyoceanicair.com. For a few seconds this website is replaced by another find815.com. If you go to www.flyoceanicair.com you will see a longer message from the man interrupting the Oceanic commercial. His name is Sam, and his partner Sonja was on the flight. She was a flight attendant. The message seems to have been made shortly after the flight crashed as he mentions that the search is being called off and everyone is presumed dead. This probably would happen after about three weeks of searching I would guess. The website find815.com seems to be a work in progress. It will have an interactive journey for you to search for clues.

SORRY I KILLED YOU DUDE, I THOUGHT YOU WERE THE BAD GUYS
Hurly says that since everyone thought he was dead that the money would be gone when he got home and he would be free. Sadly though Hurley is imprisoned by the memories of those left behind on the island and the call of the island to return. Like the sirens, the island beckons Hurley to return to help those on the island. This may include helping other Oceanic passengers plus the group known as the others. Look for the others to now become the good guys in their battle against the nefarious boat people.

OTHER OBSERVATIONS
The survivors split up into two groups: those who went with Locke and those who went with Jack. Again it was the Man of science versus the man of faith. Light versus dark. It may also echo the beach people versus cave people argument we saw in season one.
What would be cool is if we saw flashforwards of the people left behind on the island.

For those of you interested in my book. You can see it at www.qcms.biz. It is called Chaotic Planet: Origin.

Until next week,