Lost Ending: Explained
I just watched the series finale for ABC's hit television sci-fi/drama. Like the rest of you, I'm sure, not all of the mysteries that I wanted solved were covered. Surprised? I'm not.
As I had expected, the final episode only invoked more questions on it's viewers. Especially with it's ending scenes, we were all left to wonder what exactly the "flash sideways" time line represented. While everyone has their own theories, I'd like to take the time to quickly express mine.
From the beginning of the show's final season, the recurring flashes that took place in every episode appeared to be happening in a universe parallel to the "island present" time line. We were led to believe that this was the result of the nuclear blast that ended the previous season, and it had somehow torn time into two separate paths, one exploring what would have happened had Oceanic flight 815 never crashed onto the island. By the end of the series finale, this theory was flushed down the toilet.
In one of the final scenes, Jack finally acquires the memories of his life on the island as he touches the coffin of Christian, his deceased father. Jack then opens the coffin only to find it empty and Christian standing behind him, very much alive. When he is asked by Jack how such a thing is possible, Christian simply reminds Jack that he is also dead. In fact, Jack had died from his stab wound in the "island present" time line after restoring the light in the cavern.
Christian continues to explain the "flash sideways" time line by telling Jack that everyone from the island had died at some point, whether it was before Jack's death or after. The world in which the plane crash had never taken place was a system set up by our characters to find and remember one another. He also added that the time that Jack had spent on the island was the most important time of his life.
From this, we can only assume that the "flash sideways" time line is our characters' afterlife, or possibly a "waiting room" of sorts before moving onto their afterlife. Notice that not all of the Lost characters were present in the church reunion that happened at the end of the show. These characters, like Jack, valued the time they spent on the island as the most important time of their lives. They wanted to be together in the afterlife, so they set up the circumstances to make this happen.
Why they couldn't remember each other to begin with is another one of those bits of information the Lost writers threw in there to drive us crazy. I could go on to guess that there were some kind of rules in the making of this afterlife, possibly from a higher being. If this is the case, they figured out a loophole. If not, the genius' behind Lost have definitely given us fans a way to keep the series alive through our own predictions, discussion boards, and possibly more?
Let me know what you think of my version of the Lost finale explanation. I look forward to hearing yours.
