LOST: "The Candidate"

Read at your own risk. In this blog, posted less than an hour after LOST ended on the U.S. East coast, I discuss details of "The Candidate." This episode is pivotal to LOST. If you haven't seen it and don't want to be spoiled, don't read the blog now.





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“The Candidate” isn’t as obvious a title as I assumed before watching this episode. I thought Jacob’s successor might be revealed more obviously by the end of the hour. Instead, two characters—Locke and Jack—seem to be “the candidate” in their separate universes.

Once again, after a notable lapse as leader while exploring what it means to be a follower, Jack tries to take charge, especially when it comes to explosive charges. Once again, trust issues cause conflicts. Perhaps the bomb would’ve gone off anyway, but the way the story unfolds makes it seem that Jack is right in his understanding of the way Evil/fLocke works. More and more, Jack is aligning with the force of Good—right down to saying he’ll stay on the island, no matter what. If that’s what it takes to keep Evil/MIB/fLocke from escaping, so be it.

Once again, Jack is associated with a symbolic key (to a briefcase, to a house, to a cage). He symbolically as well as physically sets his people free, although he denies that they’re “his” people. He stands up to MIB/fLocke, who threatens to kill him but doesn’t. More and more he’s sounding and acting like Jacob. Although Locke is “the candidate” for a progressive new procedure in the altverse, perhaps “the candidate” most likely to succeed Jacob is Jack.

In their ongoing island-based struggle, Man of Faith Locke and Man of Science Jack were at odds because Fixer Jack thought the “Locke problem” would keep him from getting off the island and saving his friends. By the end of the story, perhaps Jack will have become that Man of Faith who can succeed as the island’s representative where Locke could not—he understands both perspectives and has changed more than other characters. He believes in people getting a second chance, and he hopes that everyone will work together, because otherwise they just die alone. He mourns those lost, but he can’t always save them. He can be manipulative but also compassionate. He’s learning to let go. Yep. Definitely sounding more like Jacob every hour.

In the altverse, Jack saves Locke (coincidentally when his dural sac ruptures, just like Jack’s first surgical patient in the original timeline). On the island, Locke (through his admonition that Jack return to the island and stay there) saves Jack from fLocke’s temptations. In whatever guise, in whatever ‘verse, the two seem destined to oppose each other in a cosmic balancing act.

I would be remiss if I didn’t say farewell to the many who die in this episode. (Petty aside—If I were an actor whose character survived from day one until 19 days before the finale is broadcast, I would be mightily peeved. Chances are I’ll feel even worse for more actors/characters in the next few LOST hours.) Some dead characters, like Widmore Plane Guards #1 and 2 (plus more unnamed shooters who fall to Smokey’s wrath), may seem like collateral damage, but once again, LOST allows death to offer redemption to key characters.

Sun wants to save Jin, who wants just as much to save her. The island truly gives them a second chance to redeem their marriage. The emphasis (and numerous close-ups) on their wedding rings in this episode underscores their bond, one that ultimately isn’t broken even in death. Is the image of the separation of their joined hands a cruel irony or foreshadowing?

Conflicted, complicated Sayid—-torturer and tortured, murderer and savior, undead and dead--sacrifices his life to save those of his friends, but perhaps his greatest contribution toward the finale is his parting words to Jack.

Sayid, who knows fLocke well, tells Jack that he’ll need Desmond and explains where to find him. If Desmond holds the key to understanding the island, then Jack will need that knowledge soon. Sayid seems to understand Jack's significance beyond that as the castaways' leader.

Remember, too, that Desmond once held a key to an important part of the story--he uses the fail-safe key to release the Hatch's overload of energy. He accidentally helps bring people to the island. It sounds like he and Jack have some things in common, despite his name being off the candidates' list. What role might he play in Jack's island future?

We began by seeing the story unfold through Jack’s eyes. I’ll be disappointed if his vision doesn’t come full circle by 2300 on May 23. Jack must be the key to unlocking LOST.