SPOILER ALERT – Lost Season 6 “Sundown”

Sayid’s Choice

There seems to be a theme on Lost about making choices, and that theme was painfully present in “Sundown.”

The Lost characters have made several choices throughout the series, involving getting off the island, getting back onto the island, saving their friends, and saving themselves. Sayid’s choice in “Sundown,” however, was the ultimate choice; it appears that he has sold his soul to the Devil to bring Nadia (the woman he loves in both realities) back to life (or perhaps to kill Sayid so he can eternally be with Nadia). Not only did he sell his soul, he sold out his friends, and he might have sold out all of humanity.

In the new reality (or flash-sideways as everyone else calls it), Sayid’s life isn’t much better than it had been in the reality we are familiar with. In both realities, he regrets the person he was and the torturing he did. In both realities, he wants to be good. In both realities, he ends up making choices that force him to question whether he truly is good or evil. In the new reality, he punishes himself by not allowing himself to be with the woman he loves because he doesn’t believe he deserves her, which suggests that he believes he is evil. In the reality we are familiar with, he chooses to be with her even if it means the end of all good in the world, and he does this after he proclaims that there is good in his soul. In both realities, he kills because he believes the murders have good purpose (avenging the death of Nadia in the reality we’re familiar with, and helping his brother and Nadia in the new reality); and in both realities, he kills even when that good purpose ceases to exist (after he succeeded in helping his brother and Nadia in the new reality, and after he sold his soul to The Smoke Monster in the reality we are familiar with).

Sayid’s battle between good and evil within himself might have been lost in the reality we are familiar with due to forces that were beyond him. Before he came back to life and became “infected,” and even at times after, Good appeared to be triumphing over Evil. When he realized avenging Nadia’s death lacked purpose, he did stop – he did choose to try to lead a good life again.

The Darkness

This episode was difficult to watch; it lacked the warm fluffiness of all the other Lost episodes. I’m sure you’re all saying, “What? Yel can’t possibly be talking about Lost.” Despite my exaggeration, however, this episode really was a lot darker than other episodes have been.

The evidence is becoming clearer and clearer that Fake John Locke/The Smoke Monster is the Devil, particularly since Dogen told Sayid that Fake John Locke is evil incarnate. I maintain a healthy modicum of doubt regarding the Good v. Evil nature of things. Dogen also confirmed that The Smoke Monster is (or was) trapped by Jacob, and explained that since Jacob is dead, The Smoke Monster/Fake John Locke is now free and will annihilate everyone on the island. Of course, we had to witness this, as The Smoke Monster, like the Angel of Death in the Passover story, came through the temple, and murdered all who could not escape and all who would not go with The Smoke Monster/Fake John Locke off the island.

This darkness is beginning to shed light on what the purpose of the island might be. Perhaps The Smoke Monster (the Devil) was trapped on the island because perhaps that is how Jacob (G-d) contained evil, in order to keep the world safe from evil. Perhaps this was foreshadowed by the Swan confining the powerful electromagnetic forces emanating from the island in the reality we are familiar with. When, Fake John Locke/The Smoke Monster rhetorically asked Sawyer in “The Substitute” what the island needed protection from, I think we all muttered aloud (or I did anyway), “From you, Smoke Monster – from evil.” Perhaps Jacob – or whoever takes over his job of Protector of the Island – protects the island from the evil forces of The Smoke Monster/ The Devil (and/or Man in Black), and, thereby protects the world from his evil forces by detaining him there on that bizarre island.