Let's face it, Jacob's a dick. He sets people up to be stranded on a weird, magic island they can't leave, gives them no assistance or guidance on how to survive, never says or does anything when his whole "plan" goes horribly wrong, and it's apparently all just to prove a point to a guy he's been stuck with for centuries.
Now I know you're all thinking this is a biblical allusion, with Jacob as God and the island inhabitants as Job. But there's some problems with that. For one thing, Job had unswerving faith before God tested him, none of the people Jacob brings to the island have any idea he's there or what he wants to prove, nor does he ever enlighten them.
Also, Job got everything back when his tests were over. All you seem to get for staying true to Jacob is either live forever (Richard) or spend your life on the island serving someone you'll never meet nor will you ever know if you're doing anything right (Ben and his predecessors).
Finally, Jacob's complete lack of interaction with his supposed "disciples" leads directly to the very violence, suffering, and death that he's attempting to prove won't always happen. If Jacob had just sent word to Richard to pass along to Ben that he should be nice to these newbies or maybe just leave them alone, Jack, Kate, and all the rest wouldn't have had a fraction of the problems they've had. Actually, those kinds of issues predate Oceanic 815, since the Dharma people had problems with the Others, and the Others were always armed and jumpy whenever Sawyer's group encountered them while time-travelling.
So, this god-like being Jacob spent who knows how many years causing more problems with his amazing powers than he ever solved (especially for his special, chosen few), and while he might have been "like a father" to Ilana, he's been a horrible curse to almost everyone else.
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I have always thought of Jacob and MiB (or Smokey, if you prefer) as two sides of the same coin. I have never thought as either as all good or all bad, but Smokey just seems to be a little worse, making him the "villan" and Jacob "the good guy". The producers even said that they had to have Locke/Smokey kill a couple of castaways we really cared about (i.e. Sun/Jin) to prove that he is the true bad dude of this season and this series, possibly (this statement lead me to say, "Really, you mean throwing Desmond down the well, killing all those people at Jacob's statue and at the temple, etc., etc, etc, didn't prove it already? What do you think, that we have to have a big blinking sign pointing at Fake Locke saying 'Bad Guy here!' to prove that he's the villan? Huh? One their statements that lead to me think that all the praise is starting to get to the producers/writers heads, and making me worry about how they are going to end this series, but I will get to that after your next post). But as you pointed out, Jacob hasn't exactly been Mr Sunny all the time, and really hasn't helped his candiates at all. In fact, thanks to his chosen Others, he seems to have made it harder on them. And he's the good guy? With a hero like that, who needs a villan? Which has always lead me to think that neither Jacob or Smokey are all good or bad, they just are, but Smokey maybe's a little worse, so we can't let him get out in the real world. But then again, if it's Jacob who has always wanted to keep Smokey on the island, maybe he just needed a playmate. Maybe nothing will happen if we let Smokey go home. Maybe
ReplyDeleteOK first off, on blogs the latest post comes up on top, while previous posts are pushed beneath it. So, you meant "previous post," not "next post."
ReplyDeleteAlso, if the producers really did say that, then they're just stupid. They expect us to stick around for six seasons of moral amiguity, time-travelling, alternate realities, flash backs/ flash sideways, questions that will never get answered, and general weirdness; but we need to have our hands held when it comes to figuring out who the villian is? Morons.
As for Jacob and Smokey, they seem to have a ying/ yang thing, with neither being wholely good or evil, yet they oppose one another in all things nonetheless. Also, if one exists without the other, things become unbalanced, hence the need for a candidate to take Jacob's place. However, since Jacob set up for the candidates and pretty much everyone else to come to the island in the first place, he is both planning for and causing his own destruction.
So who really knows what happens if Smokey is running around free where there are few polar bears, not as many people carrying guns everywhere (except in Texas), and we're all just going to the super-market for food, not hunting wild pigs and foraging? I mean, he made Clair crazy and Sayd a zombie, but that was under specific circumstances, and they've both turned on him in their own ways, so maybe his powers aren't really all that much. Hell, maybe in the normal world he won't have them at all; he hasn't even been able to get off the island for hundreds of years, so he can't be that much of bad-ass.
Here's a thought: maybe being stuck with Jacob and whomever he felt like dragging to the island against their will just slowly drove poor Smokey off his rocker. Maybe Jacob's the realy villian and Smokey's just gone stir crazy. Maybe once he's free he'll just settle in the suburbs, get a nine-to-five, and have the boring life he's always wanted.
Just a thought.