(S05E16/S05E17) "See you in Los Angeles." - Jack

I'm not really sure where to begin, but I think this is a pretty good starting point: holy crap. Just like every season finale before this one, Lost has once again left us all with our jaws on the floor and our brains on overdrive. This changes everything. The big question? How does it change everything? Is it January yet?

It's tough to say what comes next. The idea that we've actually met Jacob is still incredibly fascinating. The fact that he was on the island before The Black Rock crashed is even more intriguing. Finding out that he had been checking in on Kate, Sawyer, Sayid, Illana, Jin, Sun, Jack, Locke, Hurley? The man (is he a man?!) can leave the island at will apparently and it's starting to become clearer what "coming war" Charles Widmore was referring to.

So let's start with the flashbacks, first addressing Jacob's origins. We don't know much, other than he was on the island, living in the giant Anubis statue, weaving tapestries, and catching fish for dinner. Life seemed pretty simple. However, there was one other guy on the island, an adversary to Jacob, who's name we never caught. I'll just call him TW since he was played by Titus Welliver. TW disagreed with Jacob continually bringing people to the island to see how they would survive, interact, and evolve - the latest instance? The crew of The Black Rock. TW thought it did nothing but lead to corruption and death but Jacob saw it as progress. TW then said he wanted to kill Jacob but couldn't and that once he found a loophole, he would. OK?!? Sounds to me like this is the war.

After that, Jacob visited all the people I previously mentioned at extremely key moments in all their lives, especially for Kate, Sawyer, Sayid, Jin, Sun, Locke, and Jack. However, his visits were different for Hurley and Illana. In Hurley's case, he met him after Norton got him outta jail. Jacob told Hurley he wasn't crazy, gave him the guitar case, and suggested (not commanded) that Hurley get on Ajira 316. We obviously know how that played out. What's in the guitar case is still unknown. As for Illana, he met her in a hospital where she was being treated for what I think were facial burns? Anyway, they knew each other and Jacob asked Illana for help. She agreed. What does his request mean? Well, Jacob seems to have some sort of clairvoyance - he knew something was coming, but the question is how much did he know? Considering how the ending played out, it would seem he didn't know it all.

So what happened in 2007? Locke got his way - Richard brought him, Ben, and everyone else to the remains of the Anubis statue to meet Jacob. Once inside the statue, Locke handed a knife to Ben, with instructions to kill Jacob and you have to admit, Locke's argument for Ben wanting to kill Jacob was pretty damn good. That's when the jaw droppers started. Locke wasn't Locke, but rather some form or reincarnation of TW, who had finally found his loophole - he can't kill Jacob, but Ben can and did. When Illana, Bram, and the rest of the "what lies in the shadow of the statue" gang dumped Locke's corpse out of the steel crate, I was floored.

Thoughts on all the flashbacks and 2007 action:

• Does anyone have a translation for what Richard said to Illana?
• OK... so this means that the John Locke we've been dealing with since the end of "The Life and Death of Jeremy Bentham" wasn't ever Locke. It certainly confirms Richard and Ben's proclamations that they've never seen the island reincarnate someone. But how exactly does Fake Locke/TW have Locke's memories coupled with TW's motives? Illana posed the biggie question: what are we dealing with?
• If Ben had been lying to Locke the whole time, is the cabin really Jacob's? If not, who was living there and why was the circle of ash surrounding the cabin broken?
• Is Jacob really dead? Or can he do what TW did and come back as someone else in a different form? For that matter, are we sure TW died to be able to do what he did?
• What is Lapidus a candidate for? Was that just Bram's code for showing him Locke's corpse?
• Why didn't Jacob try and fight off Ben? He just stood there. Maybe he didn't think Ben had it in him since he considered Ben to be so worthless?

OK, on to 1977. As we all expected, Kate, Sawyer, and Juliet changed their minds and got off the sub. They were able to intercept everyone else on the way to Swan before Jack set off Jughead's plutonium core. This led to one of the best scenes in the series to date - the confrontation between Sawyer and Jack.

The realization that they both had motives rooted in love (Jack wanted to erase it all because he lost Kate and couldn't stand the pain; Sawyer wanted to stop him because he found love with Juliet and couldn't bear to lose her) was powerful stuff and the resulting fistfight led me to believe for a brief moment that one of them was going to be the big death. However, everyone finally agreed to help Jack, despite Miles asking the million dollar question: what if Jack is about to cause the exact thing he's trying to prevent? Personally, I don't think that's what happened.

Once the drill hit the energy pocket deep in the island's core, anything and everything metal began to fly down the drill well - just in the same fashion as when Desmond forgot to hit the button. Jack chucked Jughead down there, but it didn't blow and that's when jaw dropper number two occurred - chains ensnared Juliet and pulled her down. Sawyer couldn't hold on to her and she gave up, being sucked into the drill well.

Her profession of love to James was so heartfelt and yet part of me was prepared for it. We knew Juliet was going to die. If we learned one thing from Jacob, he visited you if you had a key role to play. In Juliet's one flashback (when her parent's divorced), we never saw Jacob. It might be loose to consider that foreshadowing, but that did it for me. Plus, I had a pretty good feeling that if Sayid's gunshot wound was going to be fatal, he would've died on the spot. Having Sayid croak at the very end wouldn't have been a very big deal.

But Juliet survived the fall! Buried under metal objects of every kind, bloodied, broken bones (and heart), she picked up a stone and began to smash the hell outta Jughead. Boom and fade to, not black, but white...

Thoughts on 1977 and some final observations:

• It would seem safe to assume that Jughead's detonation did indeed work. Why else would the nuclear fail-safe have been built into the final Swan designs?
• Now Richard told Sun he saw them all die, presumably on his way back with Ellie from the tunnels. But we know Radzinsky survived the explosion and so did Chang. So what happened to Jack, Kate, Sawyer, Miles, Jin, Hurley, and Sayid? I don't think they died, but I would assume they flashed in time again? Also - could this mean Juliet isn't dead either? She's injured, but could she have made the jump too? I'm guessing they're who Jacob was talking about when he said, "they're coming." Either way, I think Jack is gonna be disappointed.
• The return of Rose and Bernard? Touching, but not necessary. If anything, it just made Sawyer and Juliet wish they had done the same thing. The "we're retired" comment was funny.
• So how does all this tie back to Ellie and Charles' motives? Are either of them on Jacob's side? We still don't know Illana and Bram's affiliation or what anyone's endgame is.
• All the references to season one and the pilot were very cool, especially Jack's flashback to the day he nicked the dural sac and learned the "count to 5" technique from his father. Speaking of Christian... could he be TW too? Can the guy take multiple forms at once?
• I really hope that Jack's comments about Locke aren't the only reason that Richard continued to believe in John. It takes away some of his mystery if he needs answers like that. But maybe that's the point, that Richard really isn't as omniscient as we all thought. Being duped by Fake Locke/TW would certainly support that.
• Richard said he was ageless because of Jacob. Doth the fountain of youth runneth dry with Jacob's death?

That's all I got. I'm 100% positive I'm probably forgetting some key bits of info, but have at it in the comments. I can't wait to read what everyone else thinks this all means. Any theories on what's gonna go down in the final season? In closing, the one truthful thing Ben Linus has probably ever said:

"I'm a Pisces."