M.I.B has been ‘the man behind the curtain’ since the beginning
This is something i thought about recently, after thinking about what we saw of Jacob in last seasons finale.
He seemed to be a kind, peaceful, gentle and spiritual person (if he is a person). He never showed any anger and never forced anyone to do anything they didn’t want to, right up until the point that Ben stabbed him. He told Ben that he had a choice, Ben still chose to kill him and Jacob just stood there and took it. When Jacob met Hugo in the taxi and gave him the guitar case, again he stated that he had a choice about going back to the island and that he didn’t have to do anything he didn’t want to.
Does he sound like someone who would send people out with guns to take children from their parents?
Does it sound like someone who writes lists of people that they needed to take and hold hostage in cages for whatever reason?
Would he order a young man to wipe out his whole community including his own father?
In fact, would he even be the type of person to lead a bunch of weapon carrying commandos?
I don’t think Jacob seemed like the type of man to give anyone orders full stop.
M.I.B on the other hand…
What if all along M.I.B has been giving these orders under the guise of ‘Jacob’? I believe Richard is a big part of the game going down and i think hes either working with M.I.B or has been duped by him. Better yet, just like everyone else, hes just a chess piece, a middle man between the two who has no power of his own. When Ben first took Locke to meet Jacob, we were introduced to some sort of possibly supernatural malevolent being that shook the cabin and made stuff fly about agressively, again doesn’t add up with the Jacob we now know. Could that have been M.I.B before his little ‘loophole’ came into play, before Locke had ‘helped him’?
Again Richard must have known this, as in the finale when Locke and Ben went to see Jacob, Richard knew exactly where Jacob really resides right? Are the others aware of M.I.Bs existence, or have they been blindly following what they thought were Jacobs orders?
I think M.I.B has been the ‘man behind the curtain’ the whole time, and Jacob has been waiting patiently for the inevitable, for M.I.B to find a way to kill him and get the upper hand, but the losties returning on flight 316, going back in time and causing whatever they’ve caused at the end of last season is in fact Jacobs ‘loophole’. Thats why Flocke looked so worried when Jacob said ‘they’re coming’ as he died.
I have to disagree with you about Jacob. From that scene on the beach, my impression of him was of a smug little s***. With his little smirk and body language, I wanted to slap him so I can understand MIB wanting him dead if he had to put up with that for a while.
His ‘touches’ also seemed to be quite manipulative, he knew exactly how and what to say to each of them, kind of the way Ben works people he is using. And if Jacob wanted them on the island and the touching somehow ‘marked’ them, then he didn’t really give any of them a choice did he?
He didn’t even give Ben a choice. He could have calmed the situation but instead went out of his way to make Ben feel small and pointless, what else was he going to do, he wasn’t really offered anything to choose from – don’t kill me even though your life as leader has been a lie and I never felt you were important enough to meet? Not really much of a choice.
Even his words to MIB and what they imply, he brings people to the island even though he knows they will fight, corrupt and destroy all for the sake of progress. Doesn’t sound kind, peaceful or gentle to me, as well as seemingly in opposition to a loving respect of the island. I think the writers have cast the sweet, blond, dressed in white guy as the perfect cover for what is really going on.
Oh, but I do agree with you that Richard seems to be more aligned with MIB and has possibly been leading Ben ‘up the garden path’.
you could be right, things are never as they seem and it could turn out that that the light side and the dark side are actually the other way around.
I also agree with you that the writers may have set Jacob up as a ‘niceguy’ to trick the audience, and Jacobs offering of choices could just be masterful manipulation. I believe that M.I.B killing Jacob was part of the overall acheme of things and Jacob knew this. Heres a thought, what if both Jacob and his nemesis are bad guys?
As it stands at the moment though, Jacob doesn’t seem the type to order guerillas to do such dastardly things.
That is how it appears, but in this show ………..
I agree that Ben thought ‘Jacob’ was in the cabin, but the cabin resident seemed more like Smokie than any other.
Richard looked surprised in a not good way when Ben said he was taking John to see Jacob. (Perhaps he knew John wouldn’t be fooled.)
I’m beginning to feel that we can’t come much closer to the truth(?) on our own. I can’t want till Lost starts again and we get to know more about Ben, Richard, Jacob, MIB, … 🙂
*wait
I agree with a lot of your theory, not all of it, but a lot of it. First off, Ben knew that Jacob wasn’t in the cabin, he was just as surprised by what happened in there as Locke was, but he didn’t show it because he was still his manipulataive self. (also, is it just me, or does the voice that asks Locke for help in the cabin, sound like MIB?)
I think Ben has been bieng manipulated by MIB this whole time, and he knew it wasn’t Jacob, but I don’t think he knew exactly who was manipulating him either.
I agree that Jacob doesn’t seem to be the type to command kidnapping and such, but MIB may.
I think Richard is still loyal to Jacob, but Jacob has become somewhat of a hermit in the past few decades. Perhaps he told Richard to go along with whatever Ben said, and allow Ben to think he was manipulating Richard, in order to give Ben and MIB a false sense of security.
Afterall, if we’re going to compare the show to a chess game, sometimes a good strategy is to let your opponent take your queen so that you can hit him with your other pieces. If we assume that Jacob is his own “queen”, then maybe he is allowing MIB to kill him, and it will somehow lead to the pawns and knights, bishops, etc… (Losties, Richard, Others) to somehow win the war against MIB. Perhaps the act of killing Jacob followed by the discovery that Flocke is not Locke will cause Ben to realize that he is being manipulated and he will turn on MIB.
Who really knows, I can’t wait for the next season to start!
LilBoyBlue42, why you think that Ben is aware that someone beside Jacob is meddling with the island? I can’t think of any point when Ben or the Others referred to someone else running the island. They seem to think of Smokey as something you can summon rather than someone/something that exerts power.
And handing out judgements, of course.
i think that Ben has been getting the lists of people and some of his info from MIB, possibly appearing to him as his mother. i think we’ll see it in a flashback or something. i don’t think that any of the other people that have been following him know this though… they all think that he is talking to Jacob, but i believe ben when he gets mad a jacob for ignoring him. still, i don’t think he was acting entirely on his own either. he saw his mom once before, who’s to say she hasn’t continued to appear to him and guide his actions? she would tell him that she’s not acting on jacob’s behalf, but on her own. and since he has so many childhood issues, i’m inclined to think that he would trust her implicitly.
that being said, happy holidays everyone!