At Tara in this Fateful Hour

"What if you could go back in time and take away all those hours of pain and darkness and replace them with something better?"

--Donnie Darko



If only fools are enslaved by time and space, then I am a fool. I have nearly run out of time to write my final thoughts before the last season of LOST begins, and I only have a tiny space in which to write them.

I want to begin by saying that I have been almost completely spoiler free until right now. And I hope that I can continue to avoid them for the next 8 hours. Nothing is worse than being spoiled at the last minute. And I want to be surprised now, more than ever.

I say that I have remained spoiler-free, in case anything I write here will actually make sense later.

This all started a few weeks ago, when I was searching online for screenplays. I was told, in order to improve my own screenwriting, to read scripts of films I love and then to read scripts of films I'd never seen. At the same time, I had become bored with re-watching LOST because I thought I had gleaned every last piece of trivia from every episode and I was jaded. In my mind, The Incident made it clear that details didn't matter anymore. Everything that once seemed so important was really just part of some cosmic game of chess. Every character that seemed so real was just another pawn.

One night I decided to read the script for Donnie Darko, a movie I had dismissed many years ago when my "cool" uncle Peter begged me to watch it. Honestly, I'm such a bitch sometimes... I never learn. Even my husband had to convince me to watch LOST, I had so much disdain for it at first.

The script for Darko was so amazing and so peppered with LOST references, I knew there had to be something more. It was released in 2001, well before Pilot Part 1 was written. To wrap up my tale, let me just say that I've seen the film about 4 times now, and everything is starting to make sense. I'm seeing season 1 in a whole new light. I think I'm starting to understand the Big Picture, and the motivations of every character, especially Jacob and (as I like to call him) Fakob. I believe that, for the most part, I get it now.

I highly recommend reading The Philosophy of Time Travel, which was a major plot device in the movie script, but isn't actually a real book. The author is a minor fictional character in Donnie Darko, much like Bad Twin's Gary Troup was a fictional author on board flight 815. I think Bad Twin was supposed to help explain LOST, but Damon Lindeloff and Carlton Cuse have hinted at their disappointment with how the book actually turned out. Philosophy's teachings explain everything you need to know to understand Donnie Darko, and in my opinion, LOST as well. I really think that if you read this book, everything in the LOST universe will suddenly become clear. Well, almost everything. There are still a few loose ends.

Let me explain further, and afterward, I would love to hear from anyone reading. What do you think?

{To read The Philosophy of Time Travel, click here. It's basically a six page document that you can complete in 15 minutes, tops.}

The book was "written" in 1944. The events of the film take place in 1988. We all know that 4 & 8 are part of the Valenzetti equation.

The book begins by describing a Tangent Universe, which occurs "when the fabric of the Fourth Dimension becomes corrupted". So, while Time (the 4th dimension) is usually pretty stable, sometimes, for reasons that are not quite clear, it can "break" or "tear". It can become damaged in some way. What causes this to happen is only hinted at in Donnie Darko. We're left with the impression that there must be some higher power at work. In the season 5 finale of LOST, we see two supernatural beings discussing human nature. We can see that one of them is supposed to be Evil Incarnate, he's dressed in black and threatens to kill the other person, who we know to be Jacob. I'm just going to say that I really believe Jacob is "the good guy". I've noticed that there are a lot of biblical references surrounding him, and I think they've purposefully written him as a Jesus Christ-type of character. So I'm just gonna say it. I think Fakob is evil and, to destroy the world and win his "game" with Jacob, he created a tangent universe. I think all 5 seasons of LOST that we've witnessed have been the events that take place in a Tangent Universe. If you've ever watched the Back to the Future series, you know how bad TU's can be. Everything is wrong, people aren't who they're supposed to be and if you are unlucky enough to find yourself at the center of this universe, bad things will keep happening to you and yours until you fix the problem. Why would Fakob do this? Because he's evil and he wants to win. It's the eternal struggle, right? Good vs. Evil. He's got to kill Jacob, destroy humankind and we know he's had lots of time to develop a plan. He seemed pretty clever, too. Go read the book of Job in the Bible, it's all right there...

Okay, I think that at some point in our favorite Lostie's lives something went terribly wrong. One day, the Primary Universe was zipping along and Fakob creates a massive tear in the timeline. The Primary Universe is on pause for years while the Tangent Universe takes over and things just keep getting worse. In Donnie Darko, we're given a few weeks to make things right or else the universe "will collapse upon itself, forming a black hole within the Primary Universe capable of destroying all existence." Donnie's given a series of numbers to remember:

28 days, 6 hours, 42 minutes, 12 seconds.

Or in our case, 4, 8 15, 16, 23, 42.

We seem to have a lot more time in LOST. We don't even really know what each of the Valenzetti numbers represent.

But what I do know is that someone has to step up and be the hero, has to figure out what went wrong and how to fix the corrupted universe and get everything back on track.

The way to do this is to locate The Artifact. According to Philosophy, "Artifacts provide the first sign that a Tangent Universe has occured. If an Artifact occurs, the Living will retrieve it with great interest and curiosity. Artifacts are formed from metal, such as an Arrowhead from an ancient Mayan civilization, or a Metal Sword from Medieval Europe. Artifacts returned to the Primary Universe are often linked in religious iconography, as their appearance on Earth seems to defy logical explanation. Divine Intervention is deemed to be the only logical conclusion for the appearance of the artifact."

I've been trying to think of what we've seen in LOST that could be explained this way. There are a lot of things that have just appeared without any explanation, that seem to fit. Tiny things, like a dart that Sawyer stepped on in Seasons 2 & 3...and enormous things like the statue of Taweret. There's Hurley's meteorite, a hydrogen bomb named Jughead, Flight 815 itself, a mysterious DHARMA drop from season 2 that just seemed to appear from nowhere. I'm not sure about what LOST's Artifact could be, but it will have to be a major part of this last season if I'm right. And what will have to happen is that someone very special will have to find this Artifact and guide it "into position for its journey back to the Primary Universe."

This Special person is also known as The Living Receiver.

"No one knows how or why a receiver will be chosen. The Living Receiver is often blessed with Fourth Dimensional Powers. These include increased strength, telekinesis, mind control, and the ability to conjure fire and water. The Living Receiver is often tormented by terrifying dreams, visions and auditory hallucinations during his time within the Tangent Universe. Those surrounding the Living Receiver, known as the Manipulated, will fear him and try to destroy him."

At first, I thought this sounded like Locke. And that was disappointing! But, the more I read, the more I believe him to be one of the Manipulated Dead. I'll come back to that another time. For now, I have to say, I think Jack is the Living Receiver. Actually, I think there may be more than one. I think Aaron might be another...candidate. Maybe Ilana and Bram thought Frank was "Him".

Who knows?

Now I have to be honest, just as soon as I think I completely understand this book and how it corresponds to the show, it all unravels in my brain and I've got to rest and go think about it some more. I'm glad I got to post this now, because I hope I can return to it later. I'm going to try my best to blog my thoughts after each new episode, because it really helps me keep track of them and keep them in order. If you were able to make it this far with me, I thank you.

See you some Other time.