Man.. too soon to process it all. I wish I had DVRed it so I could watch it again now. I think the newspaper article may have been somewhat visible at the beginning to find out who that was supposed to be. At the very least I'm sure there's clues as to who it could be. The coffin seemed official short.

Anyway, my other thought is that possibly they are trying to trick us? At the very end it appears the supposed "flashbacks" are really in the future after getting off the island, but then why the hell was Jack trying to write prescriptions in his father's name? He also asked the new head surgeon (Mike from Vegas!) to bring his father down here and see who was more drunk. That leads me to believe this was actually in the past and that Kate and Jack knew each other before the plane crash. They kept calling him the hero who saved some people from a car crash, but wouldn't you think people would recognize him as that guy who crashed on a remote island and lead the survivors to safety after 3-4 months? I would think that would have been all over the news. But at the same time it's post-divorce with his wife and he and Kate talked about using "the Golden ticket" to fly wherever he wants, whenever he wants, which sounds like something an airline might do for survivors who were standed on an island for several months. So, could they be talking about something completely different? Could Season 4 be caught back up with real time (2008) and have the survivors going back to the island to finish something they started? I highly doubt they'll do that but it would be a ballsy move. It would basically change the entire playing field for the show. But then again I hope they don't pull something where this was all a dream of Jack's while they waited to be "rescued" from the call to the ship.

I heard the actor who plays "Ben" on the radio this morning and he wouldn't say much (obviously) but he did say the brewing battle between the Losties and the Others would finally happen and there would be lots of blood and casualties. Boy, he wasn't kidding. Sucks for Charlie, but we knew it was coming. There was no way they could just suddenly say, oh ya Desmond's flashes have been in his head and he was wrong. I was actually expecting them to kill Jack off as well this episode (they finally broke the mold of killing off the person who was the focus of the flashbacks) and I had Juliette as a strong possibility as well. Hurley and the bus was friggin fantastic, though I wish they had held onto Tom a little longer. Beat the crap out of him, get some info, and then have him mouth off to Sawyer to get the reaction we saw.

For what started as a mediocre season, it definitely finished on a strong point. I'm sure there will be people who will find things to pick it apart, but it definitely felt like the old Lost we remember and missed was back.

-edit-
Oh ya.. and Walt! Wiskey Tango Foxtrot. Is that a hint that Michael and Walt could be back next season? I suppose it could be Smokey manipulating events again as I've speculating in previous threads.

Yeah, the references to his father was definitely hinky, but I can think of two explanations, one being that Jack was stoned out of his gourd and didn't know what he was saying when talking to the chief ( or maybe implying that his father was drunk 'up' in heaven) and when he tried to use his dad's scrip sheet he said not to bother calling because his dad wasn't there (cause he's dead).

Or,

By coming back, they mucked up the space time continuum and changed their realities, and in Jack's case his dad is still alive.

What put future jack over the edge? I would guess Juliette's death.

Easily the best season finale of the season, and that's topping BSG and NCIS, who both had fairly decent ones of their own.

And this begs the question; who's funeral did Jack miss?

My bold predictions, some of which are completely unsubstantiated:

Jack and Kate were actually rescued, along with the rest of the survivors who wanted to leave.

Next season will begin primarily with present-day events surrounding the rescued survivors' lives, with bits of information about the island gradually creeping into the plot. Instead of flashing back to pre-crash events, most of the flashbacks next season will deal with what has happened to the survivors since the rescue.

Much of the next season will deal with the island's ongoing pull on key individuals, like Desmond, Alex, Jack, and a few others. Some of the crash survivors will be trying to get on with their lives, while others will feel compelled to return.

Ben's the guy in the coffin.

Jacob chose Locke as the island's new leader. Locke is the only crash survivor that stayed behind. He's now in league with Richard and company.

Will is actually back on the island, but Michael is not.

Rousseau stays on the island.

New factions will be introduced, each based out in the real world, and with their own particular interests in the island. One will end up being the group that has ties with Penelope and those researcher dudes we saw in the Arctic setting at the end of season 1. Another will be whatever agency/organization/individual was financing the activities of Ben and Co. Another will be whoever sent the boat with the parachutist that ended up rescuing the survivors. Maybe they're all the same?

Hell, I have no idea. I can't wait to see how they resolve this stuff, though. It's safe to say that I've invested enough time in the series that I'm sure I'll see it through to the end.

Yeah, I figured Locke is going to stay behind no matter what. His character is so hard to read and understand that it would make sense for him to say he has to not be rescued because it's "not his time".

Now having digested the show, I came here to post basically everything you just said. I was thinking it would be an interesting twist to have a season showing them back in civilization and the flashbacks will be from when they were on the island. And these flashbacks will flesh out some of the things that happened on the island that we haven't seen yet. Well, maybe half a season. They would need to get back to the island. Them being on the island is Lost and it won't be the same with them rescued.

As for Charlie's death I'd have to go back and watch it again, but I'm pretty sure the door swung to the outside. They should have had one of the girls at some point make a comment about the door being broken and it wouldn't latch properly from the outside at the beginning of the episode. Then at least it would make Charlie's move plausible. It's also possible he just did it because he knew it had to happen to save Claire and the baby. If he had escaped this time there would just be another time and Desmond couldn't be there to save him forever.

There is a bit of logic to having the door open from the inside of the chamber, since a breach of the hull would keep the door shut.

Alright, I know I'm going to screw everything up by applying real world physics, but if Charlie was to leave the door open, wouldn't the water level stop rising once the blown window was completely submerged? By my reasoning the air above the window would have nowhere to escape, thereby restabilizing the interior pressure and giving them a nice air pocket to use while putting on the diving gear.

That said, I really enjoyed the episode. I was cheering when Jack finally grew a pair and beat the snot out of Benry and then threatened Tom. And, it goes without saying that I was glad to see that twit of a hobbit get smacked around and finally done away with. The flash forwards and potential change of direction for the series are cool just as long as it doesn't turn into The Nine.

Question: How much of this is Ben's orchestration? We know he is a killer, but he faked the executions of Sayid, Jin, and Bernard. Why? Was it just to see how far Jack would go?

Hurley's VW kill FTW!

I think I'm with what seems to be the consensus opinion here on what happened and where it's headed. A few thoughts.

I have NO problem with the Mikhail thing at all. He's clearly one of those people who gets essentially supernatural healing/force/whatever from the island.

I think the hallucinations/jacob/locke/where'd dad come from/wierd beast smoke monster part of the plot still has a LOT of resolving to do. The idea that we just flash forward and skip a bunch of that only to get it in flashbacks -- I dunno, that rings a bit hollow.

All in all though, I wavered on lost quite a bit this season. Totally hooked back in now.

They did, he's dead. He had his hand pressed to the glass with the message and then he suddenly pulled away from the window and went into convulsions. Then they showed him still and floating around in the chamber.

I also don't think Mikhail survived either. I think he was dying, but not quite dead yet, so this was his last act to try and stop Charlie. It looked like all he had on was a mask, not a scuba tank and rebreather or anything. Plus, he held the grenade up to the window until it exploded which wouldn't have been pretty. Even if he had dropped it and tried to swim away the under water concussion of that probably would have knocked him unconscious.

But then again, as Hoopa's wife pointed out, this is the kind of show where if you don't see a body, they probably aren't dead. And even when you do see a body, sometimes they aren't quite all the way dead.

Ben did order them to fake the executions. When they warped back to the beach immediately following the scene with Ben and Jack, Tom was complaining about having to follow Ben's orders with the other grunt (can't remember his name) reasserting that it was important that they do so. I believe the writers intent was to make us believe that Tom hadn't wanted to kill the prisoners but then the camera swings right and you see them all alive. (Meaning that Tom, in fact, HAD wanted to defy Ben's orders and kill them)

[edit - or what oldmanscene24 said ;)]

Loved the epi - best of the season. I think Charlie made absolutely no attempt to try to save himself simply because he knew that he had to die in order for Claire and the baby to get off the island. I believe he locked the door so Desmond wouldn't/couldn't attempt to save him. The scene was well done, and even though I wasn't a huge fan of the character, the death was touching.

The ending leaves me a little concerned, but it's far too early to be worrying about the direction of the show.

I was sad to see Charlie go. I've been dreading his demise since the beginning of the whole "oh by the way, Desmond is precognitive" plot thread. I think Charlie's death was likely a self-fulfilling prophecy. He pushed the button, which is all he really needed to accomplish to save the Losties. He could have then escaped and been rescued as well, but Desmond told Charlie that he saw him die, so Charlie believes that his death is necessary, so when the moment came Charlie wouldn't take any action to save himself. It was a totally needless death in my opinion.

I doubt that the chamber is airtight. There are most likely vents linking it to the rest of the installation's air supply (otherwise anyone working in that room would have to open the door every half hour to let fresh air in).
Even if the chamber is airtight, air is much less dense than water. The Looking Glass also looks to be several hundred feet below the surface which would increase the water pressure even more, these two facts combined would compress the remaining air supply to the point where there probably wouldn't be sufficient space to actually breathe it without also aspirating water.

Exactly. He didn't want to screw up Claire leaving the island with her baby, so he didn't even try to fight it.

Ok, quick question. I just finished watching this episode, but it stopped for me right after we see Walt and he tells him he's got work to do. Is this a double-length episode? Cause there's gotta be more then that! I've intentionally not read anything in this thread as I'm afraid of spoilers, but if anyone can answer me, I'd appreciate it.

I don't know just how spoilery it is for the future, but here's an analysis of the news article Jack was holding. It reveals what possibly could be the day that the flash-forward sequences take place (see also the Nirvana reference) and could reveal who it was in the coffin that made Jack want to kill himself, too. Oh, check out this fun fact: