Last year As I Lay Dying guitarist Nick Hipa mentioned to Axl that, like the editors of MetalSucks, he is a huge fan of the show L O S T (cue dying giraffe noise).With the final season of one of television’s great serialized mysteries debuting tonight on ABC, Axl and Vince thought, “Hey, why not ask Nick to do a series of columns about the show’s final episodes?” Luckily, Nick agreed! And so, without further adieu…

Hello fans of extreme metal music. My written word appears before you for one sole purpose: to share information, ideas, insight, and theories on ABC’s mind-melting TV show, LOST. In many circles, LOST is regarded as the Master of Puppets of prime-time television; hence, it is worth discussing on a metal blog.

Season 5’s finale, “The Incident,” aired ages ago, on May 13, 2009. A lot of life has happened for all of us since then, and I’ll be the first to admit that in the roughly eight months that have lapsed, I completely forgot about some of the mysteries and questions the show has posed. Thankfully, a few hours spent on LOSTPEDIA has completely rekindled my flame of enthusiasm and fanaticism for this show. If you’re in the same boat, I suggest checking out the Season 5 recap and The Mystery Portal to prepare for the onslaught of awesomeness that awaits for you tonight at 8/7c on ABC!

Those of you who are up to date are already aware that the writers have chosen to start taking the “supernatural being” approach to account for many of the mysteries they created in the earlier seasons. With it being made known that ageless Jacob has/had a nemesis with an agenda this entire time, a lot of the previously unexplained can now be chalked up to being “means to an end” – the “end” being, as we come to find out at the end of the “Incident,” the murder of Jacob by his Nemesis via the appearance of John Locke’s manipulation of Benjamin Linus. Hopefully they don’t use this as the complete explanation for everything (which would definitely be a cop out), but as a partial piece of the puzzle, it lends itself to some pretty interesting interpretations.

Here is my rough interpretation of the theories I have read regarding Jacob and his Nemesis:

In the first conversation we see between the two, Jacob (dressed in a white shirt) is depicted as optimistic with regards to the inherent good of mankind, where as his Nemesis (dressed in black shirt) maintains a more negative and cynical viewpoint of how people “fight, destroy, and corrupt.” Nemesis Dude then issues a threat that he will someday find a way to kill Jacob, which is successfully executed by the episode’s end. This violent conclusion confirms the gravity of the conflict between these two seemingly ancient-yet-ageless-figures-of-authority on the Island, with Jacob’s dying words of “They’re coming” insinuating that things are still far from being over. The relevance of this last episode, specifically this feud, is to suggest that the survivors of Oceanic Flight 815 have in some way been pawns in the battle between the two.

In “Pilot, Part 2,” John Locke gives an explanation to Walt on the rules of backgammon: “Two Players, Two Sides, One is Light, One is Dark.” A few episodes later, in “White Rabbit,” we find two decomposed skeletons (referred to by Locke as “Adam and Eve”) each possessing a stone… one white, one black. Throughout the remainder of the seasons we have seen a ludicrous amount of black and white observations which have been noted and documented here; and in a shell of nuts, I think the point is that the writers have been foreshadowing the culmination of the two sides finally clashing together in what will hopefully be something epic and savage in Season 6. This makes sense to me, which is why I am supporter of the Eternal Backgammon Theory and also the theory that Nemesis Dude is actually the Smoke Monster.

The Smoke Monster has frequently been referred to as “the Island’s security system.” Taking that literally, we can only assume that as a security system, Smokey will eradicate any form of threat posed upon the Island itself. Everyone who has met their end by the death grip of Smokey was in some way a bad or potentially destructive person to the Island. The Pilot, although he was probably a good dude in real life, could have been identified as a threat based purely on the fact that he crashed a huge plane and destroyed a lot of lush foliage. Eko was read by Smokey to have a vicious and evil past (for which he refused to repent) and therefore identified as another potential threat, which unfortunately let to Eko getting vigorously taken to pound town. Mayhew the Mercenary was obviously a threat because he had a huge machine gun and was killing people. Jacob, however, would be the biggest threat of them all, in that he has the ability and desire to bring people to the Island. Assuming Nemesis Dude is Smokey, it makes sense why he would want to kill him so badly.

I believe Smokey and Nemesis Dude are one in the same, based on the fact that Jacob acknowledges the False-Metal-Locke we see beneath the statue of Tawaret as his enemy incarnate. The confirmation that Nemesis Dude can manifest himself in the likeness of a dead body on the Island (Locke) is consistent with the FACT that Smokey can do the same. Smokey also has the ability to read peoples lives/memories/intentions, which, if I am correct about him being Nemesis Dude, would explain why False-Metal-Locke had real Locke’s memories of being murdered by Benjamin Linus. This would also explain why False-Metal-Locke disappears when Ben seeks to be judged by the Smoke monster: False-Metal-Locke returned to his form as Smokey, appeared before Ben, then transformed into Alex (yet another dead body on the island) and told him to absolutely obey False-Metal-Locke or suffer the lethal consequences. This was the icing on the manipulative cake that Nemesis Dude has been baking since day one. Every manifestation of a dead person we have seen on this Island has been Nemesis Dude’s best efforts at gerrymandering the survivor’s wills to his own, with the ultimate goal being the annihilation of Jacob. I could go on, but I would essentially be repeating even more of what is already included in the links I have provided; so if you are interested, please read them to get a more thorough explanation.

As all things LOST go, there is still plenty of mystery to be explained. The most urgent of them all, at least for me, is who the “they” in “they’re coming” are. Also, it hasn’t been mentioned on a lot of the sites I’ve checked out that Claire’s “miracle baby,” Aaron, is still not back on the Island. Some heads up info that I’ve weaseled out of people (though never ACTUALLY confirmed) leads me to believe that an adult version of Aaron will be seen in Season 6, and he will be a valuable piece to the puzzle. Perhaps his conception off of the island and his birth on it could entitle him to some sort of authority, value, or reconciliatory quality to Jacob or his Nemesis. I have no idea – that’s just a shot in the dark.

As stated earlier, the goal here is to encourage and facilitate awesome LOST discourse. If any of you have rad theories of your own, cool links to check out, or any other crucial nuggets of information please share! I look forward to hearing what all of you have to say!

-NH

As I Lay Dying’s new album, The Powerless Rise, will be out this spring on Metal Blade. While you’re awaiting its release, why not get L O S T on AILD’s MySpace page?