Damon Lindelof joins Doc J for a discussion about The Constant.
WHAT REALLY HAPPENED TO DESMOND?Doc J then goes on to theorize without the aid of Damon.
In ''The Constant,'' Desmond became ''unstuck in time'' after flying through a thundercloud crackling with strange electricity. He experienced something like time travel, though not bodily time travel; instead, his consciousness shuttled between two different time periods, Island present 2004 and Desmond's past 1996. But here's the tricky twist: Desmond's Island-present mind wasn't the one doing the time traveling. When Desmond got hit with Island magic, his consciousness got knocked off-line and was replaced by his 1996 self. It was this older Desmond consciousness that toggled between present and past throughout the episode. Once Desmond '96 completed the errand of getting Penny's phone number so he could call her on Christmas Eve 2004, Desmond's present-day mind came back online, but rebooted with the new memories created by his time-travel adventure. I know: tricky stuff. But I had the chance to run all this by Damon Lindelof -- and he says this interpretation is correct.
THE MINKOWSKI EXCEPTION
Desmond had the time-warp blues, but freighter freak Minkowski had Marty McFly Mania: Due to his own exposure to electromagnetic magic, he began psychically commuting back to a pleasant day on a Ferris wheel. He died desperately trying to zip-line back to this happy day one more time. Coldly poignant, I thought. Notice: Unlike Desmond's time-travel story, Minkowski's present day consciousness was making the trip. Lindelof says this difference was designed to make a very important point: ''As Faraday explains in the episode, the effect is random. Sometimes a person can be displaced by minutes, other times, years. And the direction of the effect is equally unpredictable. Our way of demonstrating this was to give Minkowski a wildly different experience than Desmond was having.'' Lindelof says none of this is arbitrary; exposure to electromagnetism or radiation plays a role. But he adds: ''Looking for specific rules for how all this works will lead you down the path of insanity.''
PARADOX R/X, or ''HOW COURSE CORRECTION WORKS''
To be clear, Desmond's past was different before ''The Constant.'' Before his time-travel adventure, Desmond never met Faraday at Oxford, never got Penelope's digits. As a consequence of changing the past, Desmond's personal history has been ''course corrected'' by The Powers That Be, beginning from the moment he walked away from Penny's apartment. Lindelof says this interpretation is also correct. But here's a Big Question: since scoring Penelope's phone number, has Course-Corrected Desmond lived his life knowing that on Christmas Eve 2004, he MUST be on a freighter in the South Pacific in order to make a call to Penelope if he wants any chance of having a future with her? Lindelof says this is indeed a matter we should be mulling. Perhaps in the future, Lost will give us an episode that replays Desmond's backstory (getting the boat from Libby; killing Kelvin; meeting the castaways) from the point of view of this knowingness.
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ATTENTION: Only discuss spoilers mentioned in the article itself. New spoilers should be posted in the spoiler thread in the forums. Failure to comply will result in banning.
Doc Jensen's column sucks (although it didn't before).
Two spoilers on the first page this week. What a tool.
I'm never reading anything online about Lost again. It's fucking redonkulous.
I believe that in "Flashes Before Your Eyes" that Desmond was pulling a Minkowski AND would have had an brain blast - However he in fact found a constsnt!!! And that constant was CHARLIE!!!! Also that maybe why Desmond actually tried to save Charlie all those times to help him survive his "unstuck in time" until he could get to the freighter and "course correct" by reaquiring his true constant - Penelope.
I've been trying to reconcile the possibility that Desmond has been time-jumping more than we've been told. I haven't decided for myself if 2004 Desmond was going back to 1996 Desmond in FBYE or if 1996 Desmond was flashing forward like in The Constant.
Also I've been meaning to go back to Man of Science, Man of Faith to see if Desmond's encounter with Jack was actually a case of "future" (post-The Constant) Desmond going back to past Desmond to affect the way Jack's future unfolds. Read this dialogue against after considering The Constant:
DESMOND: Right. Just one thing -- what if you did fix her?
JACK: I didn't.
DESMOND: But what if you did?
JACK: You don't know what you're talking about, man.
DESMOND: I don't? Why not?
JACK: Because with her situation that would be a miracle, brother.
DESMOND: Oh, and you don't believe in miracles?
And now this, from Orientation:
DESMOND: You're a doctor, right? There was this girl -- you were worried -- you said, you said you failed her. That was you.
JACK: It doesn't matter.
DESMOND: Was she okay, the girl?
JACK: It doesn't matter.
DESMOND: What happened to her?
JACK: It doesn't matter.
DESMOND: How can you say it doesn't matter?
JACK: I married her! [Jack breaks down crying.]
DESMOND: Right, and you're not married to her anymore, then?
It's almost as though in some point in the future, Desmond ends up back in stadium-Desmond, meets Jack, and has foreknowledge of the future. Then jungle-Desmond meets Jack and has a deja-vu moment because he barely remembers this encounter taking place (200? Desmond's consciousness was in control, remember) and is now trying to verify his deja-vu was real.
I don't think Desmond needed a constant in Flashes Before Your Eyes because I think he experienced that particular time jump all at once. He must have because in the future he's just lying on the ground unconscious. He doesn't wake up until the entire experience is over.
I was assuming it was His AWOL trek to Faraday that caused Desmond to be court martialed, but since it was his 96 personality, he would not know this during the episode.
No adam, he would know - The Constant was almost entirely 1996 Desmond, which is of course left behind in 1996 to carry on. Its hard to say how much future knowledge he had, other than being on a boat with an Iraqi in 2004.
I have a wacky theory that's just waiting to get destroyed, so here goes it.
What if Desmond, Eko, and Locke never survived the swan hatch implosion/explosion (after all, who could really survive something like that, I know it's TV, but come-on!)
What if Dharma, or the others had developed a teleportation device (i.e polar bear in the Tunisian desert)and somehow grabbed those three from another point in time and dropped them near the swan immediately after the explosion.
I don't have the foggiest idea why they would do this, but maybe it has something to do with changing the course of man, or something of that sort. Perhaps those who possess knowledge of the Valenzetti Equation know that if Locke, Eko, and Desmond didn't die at that exact point in time the world would be saved as a result. I don't know!?!
Now, I know the immediate flaw in my theory happens to do with paradox. How do they grab them from another point in time, like say the past or something, and still expect them to be on the island in the present? Good question! Here's a way around it, if there is a teleportation device, perhaps its the kind that downloads data from the original passenger, destroys that original passenger, and then sends the original passenger's data to be reformed as a copy at another point in space/time, then maybe it's possible. Could this be the "magical box", that perhaps, wasn't really a metaphor after all.
Maybe, Maybe, Maybe....
A little addendum to my theory above:
What if the copy of Desmond was from the future and that is why he has precognitive abilities from already living it the first time through, and then remembering it as it presently happens.
I just love DocJ's analogies between Lost and TESB!...even down to the wormhole!
Ok, call me a Star Wars dork...I can take it.