I see your point, but I still didn’t really care for it. If Des was so special, why was Jack pretty much able to do what Desmond was able to do regarding the cork? And like you said, in the afterlife time didn’t exist. Was Des really needed to bring everyone together there? I think you raise a good question about that.

I agree though. As much as I actually liked Across the Sea, it came too late. The final impact would have been MUCH more anticipated if we had seen the events in that episode at a much earlier date. Imagine the theories and speculations that would have had time to surface if we had an entire yeat to ponder “the light”. Remember, people were constantly talking about Jacob and MIB’s beach conversation for an entire year. Oh well.

Desmond was special, in respect to mattering in the end, because he could withstand electromagnetic energy like no one else. Then we found out how Smokey was created in “Across the Sea”, and you start to think, maybe what’s making him what he is is down there somewhere; if only someone could get to it.

I thought those pieces of the story came together nicely. My only semi-complaint would be that “Across the Sea” came a bit too late in the series. I think it would have been better placed perhaps earlier in Season 6, but who knows.

You have some really good logic to your argument, but I still can’t believe it because I tend to believe (without evidence)that MIB just did not have power to raise the dead, mainly because he was a false-resurrection himself. Only the island had the power to raise dead (again without evidence), because the light source itself was life + rebirth. That power was somehow transferred to the water. Here’s my huge theory:

Sayid was a candidate, and candidates can only be killed resulting from the action of another candidate. Sayid was shot in 1977; that could have happened before he became a candidate. I realize from Sayid’s perspective, that happened AFTER he became a candidate, but perhaps time traveling to 1977 somehow allowed the rules not to be fully enforceable.

So when he came back to 2007, he was fully a candidate, but still suffering from a 1977 injury. He fully died of course. The temple water recognizes and is a representation of Jacob’s rules. If the water was clear, i believe Sayid would have been instantly healed or resurrected.

Since the water was dirty, took some time..
But because Sayid was a candidate, even unclean water works..

This was demonstrated with Hurley drinking the dirty water from the stream to “become” like Jack..

Hehe mine’s much longer, and your’s makes more sense and more believable, but i thought i’d post it anyways..

About number 5….yeah, there’s a LOT retarded with smokie. I still can’t believe the way “it” dies in the finale. SO unepic, it wasn’t even funny. I mean, I understand that we weren’t supposed to understand what Smokie was, or how it COULD be killed. But they still failed to really put anything interesting into it when it mattered most at the end. It remeains a mystery what the hell smokie ever was. Smokie being the devil is about all I got…..