time travel in lost explained

How Does Time Travel Actually Work In Lost?

You know the joke: "Lost" isn't just the title of the show, it's how you feel after you watch it. Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse made TV history with "Lost," creating an epic and mysterious story the whole world seemed to be invested in. But fans and casual viewers are still bound to come away with a few questions, even after finishing  all six seasons . "Lost" had fantasy and sci-fi elements from the start, with a mystical smoke monster that seemed to attack plane crash survivors and an island that simply wouldn't let them leave. However, the show really upped the ante (and the potential for confusion) when it introduced time travel.

Much of "Lost" can be explained by looking at its central, ideological push-and-pull. John Locke (Terry O'Quinn), who was healed by the Island, is a man of faith who believes destiny drives our actions. Jack Shephard (Matthew Fox) is a troubled doctor driven by logic who refuses to believe in the Island's power. In some ways, both men are right. Many of the miracles Locke witnesses are actually side effects of time travel, a scientifically explainable phenomenon. Still, the rules of time travel in "Lost" seem to dictate that anything that was meant to happen will happen, no matter how many complicating factors are thrown into the timeline. In that sense, fate does exist, with time travel partly responsible for the predetermination Locke believes in.

Let's Let Daniel Faraday Explain (Sort Of)

Look, I can't explain time travel. That's above my pay grade. But I do know someone who can. The Island's resident spaced-out physicist Daniel Faraday (Jeremy Davies) studied time travel long before parachuting onto its shores. Way back in 1996, Faraday was making lab rats' consciousnesses travel through time. Faraday got much of his science from the  Kerr metric , a complicated real-life equation involving black holes that is pretty much the closest anyone has come to understanding theoretical time travel.

Faraday explains all of this much more simply to Desmond (Henry Ian Cusick), though, when the poor lad starts bouncing around in time in Season 4. "The Constant" is one of the show's most heartfelt episodes, but it also contains a most succinct description of time travel. At Faraday's urging, a temporally displaced Desmond finds the scientist at Oxford in 1996. Before Faraday even begins to demonstrate his time travel experiment, he tells Desmond something that underlines the "Lost" philosophy of time travel: "You can't change the future."

Faraday explains that the equations that can make time travel happen are random and chaotic, but he also says that "Every equation needs stability. Something known." This doesn't dig into the specifics of the Kerr metric, but it does explain the way time travel works in "Lost." The show clearly values hitting the right emotional beats over explaining the right equations. In this case, Desmond has to find a "constant" to keep his mind from falling into permanent confusion as his consciousness zooms back and forth in time. That constant is his girlfriend Penny (Sonya Walger), who he connects with on an emotional phone call later in the episode. If he can find her — no matter  when  he is — that will create stability in his timeline.

The Future Informs The Past, The Past Reinforces The Future

Daniel Faraday doesn't go too deep into the specifics of the principles of time travel, though he does mention electromagnetism a lot. The Dharma Initiative tried to study and harness that electromagnetism and also built a pendulum contraption that was meant to help figure out where the Island is moving in time and space.

One thing is for sure: It's clear that "Lost" subscribes to the idea that anything one does in the past is already firmly a part of the future. In Season 5, the Island's survivors aren't creating multiple timelines by wandering around in the 1970s. Instead, they're contributing to elements of the timeline we've already seen, creating a closed loop.

For example, when Jack finds out the Dharma Initiative plans to do experiments that he thinks will eventually cause Oceanic Flight 815 to crash, he tries to stop them by detonating a hydrogen bomb's thermonuclear core (seems like a cool and chill thing Jack would do). However, it turns out Jack's bomb helped cause The Incident, a vital moment in Dharma history that led to the creation of The Swan Station that Desmond eventually (although for us viewers, it was in an earlier episode) calls home. So any attempt to alter the past to fix the present will result in the same present the survivors are already in.

Whatever Happened, Happened

The best way to explain time travel in "Lost" is by explaining what it's not. This is not "Back to the Future." Hurley driving a Dharma van won't lead to him slowly disappearing from his family photo. It's also not like, say, the movie "Looper" in which getting hurt in the past leads future characters to suddenly develop new scars. In "Lost," time travel is cyclical and, at times, frustrating in its perfect ability to course-correct. This comes up again when Faraday attempts to warn six-year-old Charlotte that she will die if she ever returns to the Island. As an adult, Charlotte (Rebecca Mader) travels back to the Island to better understand where she came from, but her curiosity leads to her demise. Feeling the Island's effects more acutely than most, she dies in Faraday's arms.

"Lost's" attitude towards time travel is best summed up by one of the series' most oft-repeated phrases: "Whatever happened, happened." This phrase comes up several times throughout the show. Once again, Faraday puts it plainly: "If we try to do anything different, we will fail every time. Whatever happened, happened." There are no do-overs here. In the end , "Lost" took a more heartfelt, less neatly tied-up approach to the Island's nature than many fans expected, but the series has always used its more out-there elements as a means to an end.

The end? Human connection. On "Lost," you cannot stop death and tragedy, but you can use the chance you have to show love. We see it when ill-fated rock star Charlie (Dominic Monaghan) sacrifices himself and when Miles (Ken Leung) meets his father (François Chau).

When it comes right down to it, we should stop pulling our hair out trying to fill in the gaps in the way "Lost" explains time travel and start thinking about how it serves the show's core messages about mortality and togetherness. On this island, as in life, whatever happens, happens — even if it sometimes happens in the most confusing order imaginable — so you'd better make it count.

Time travel/Theories

• View history
• 1 Time travelling is the cause of much of the island strangeness
• 2.1 " Because You Left "
• 2.2 " The Lie " and " Jughead "
• 2.3 " The Little Prince "
• 2.4 " The Life and Death of Jeremy Bentham "
• 3 Time-traveling triggers
• 4 Lost is a Very Simple Story Told from the Perspective of the Most Confused Characters
• 6 The need for sedation to go to the Island is related to the effects of Time Travel
• 7 Time Travel and Flashbacks are different levels of the same condition.

Time travelling is the cause of much of the island strangeness [ ]

When the 815 survivors crash on the island they begin to encounter all kinds of strangeness. What they don't realize is that much of what they are seeing are the after-effects of their own time travelling, which they haven't yet experienced.

• Destiny: we are told numerous times that you cannot change the past. Whatever happened, happened. Consider this in the context of John Locke's time travelling. He travels to 1954, two years before his own birth, and nothing can change that. Whatever happened, happened. Therefore, from the time Locke is born until the time he fixes the Frozen Donkey Wheel and teleports off the island, he cannot be killed. This is why he was able to survive being born so prematurely, why he survived the 8 story fall, why he survived being shot by Ben. If he had died at any point in his life he would not have been on the island when Ben turned the wheel and would thus not have been on the island back in 1954. But he already was, and that can't be changed. In effect, the result of the time travelling created a situation in which these people's future had essentially already happened. Locke was on the island in 1954, which cannot be changed. Thus he had to be on the island in 2005 when Ben turns the wheel, which means he had to be on flight 815 when it crashed, and so on.
• Immortality: as described above, the effects of the time travelling can cause a sort of immortality. Consider Michael and his failed suicide attempts. The reason Mike could not kill himself, or be killed by any other means, is because Jin was with him on the freighter trying to defuse the bomb. But immediately after Jin leaves the freighter, then Michael can die, and does so. This is because after seeing Michael on the freighter, Jin travels back in time. While Jin is in the past, he had already experienced this meeting with Michael on the freighter. If Michael had killed himself in 2004 he would not have had that meeting with Jin on the freighter, but Jin back in the 1970's had already experienced that meeting. That meeting was in Jin's past and could not be changed. Whatever happened, happened. Thus Michael could not die until this meeting occurred, but once it had occurred he was, as Christian said, free to go.
• Charlie: given the two examples above, Charlie's destiny becomes clear. Charlie had to die because all those who travelled back in time knew that he had died, although none of them had experienced his death directly. Only Desmond experienced Charlie's death directly, and he didn't travel through time with the rest. Therefore, the people who went back in time knew Charlie died but did not know exactly how. This established that Charlie must die, but left it vague as to how. This is why when Desmond began to have visions of Charlie's death, he was unclear about how it would happen. It was destined that Charlie must die, but the manner of his death was not part of that destiny.
• Island crashes: there are several instances of people "accidentally" crashing on the island. Desmond's sailboat, Yemi's Beechcraft, Rousseau's boat, the Black Rock, and of course flight 815. The cause of the 815 crash is known: Desmond's failure to press the button caused an electromagnetic surge which pulled 815 into "island space" and caused it to crash. We see similar electromagnetic surges or flashes every time Locke and friends travel from one time to another. Is it coincidence that Locke flashes to the same point in time that the Beechcraft crashes? Is it coincidence that Jin flashes to the same point in time that Rousseau's boat crashes? The electromagnetic surges caused by the Frozen Donkey Wheel being off it's axis are not only moving Locke and friends through time, but are also causing these island crashes. The time travelers jump to several times which are unidentified, one of which brings them to a point where the Tawaret statue is still intact. It seems likely that these flashes are what cause the Black Rock and Desmond's sailboat to crash on the island, and may even be responsible for the Roman ship crashing on the island.
• The DHARMA Initiative: when Locke and friends travel back to 1954 they tell both Richard and Eloise that they travelled through time from the future. It is likely that Charles would have found out about it too, given his relationship with Eloise. The DHARMA Initiative went to the island for the express purpose of tapping into the island's time travelling abilities, all the other scientific and humanitarian goals of the Initiative were merely a cover for their real purposes. It seems possible that the DHARMA Initiative initially learned of the island's time travel properties because Locke and friends travelled through time and told people about it. We know Charles was spending time off-island and thus would likely be the source of this information. So it becomes entirely possible that the presence of the DHARMA Initiative on the island came about as a result of Locke and friends time travelling.
• Island moving: Eloise explains at the Lamppost station that the island is always moving through time and space, thus requiring the complex Lamppost equipment to find it. Ben and Locke are instructed by Christian to move the island, and upon doing so the island begins moving through time and space, as shown by it's sudden disappearance while Frank Lapidus is attempting to land the helicopter on it. When Ben turns the Frozen Donkey Wheel, it is this which causes the island to always be moving through time and space as Eloise describes. While it may not make sense given that the island was moving long before Ben turns that wheel, but such is the nature of time and time travel. Once Ben turns that wheel to move the island, it creates the condition where the island was always moving. Dislodging the island from time dislodges it from all time, not just from one point in time forward.

Jacob's enemy orchestrated the Time Flashes to manipulate John Locke [ ]

While at first the time periods visited seemed random. This is because we were learning about them primarily through the eyes of several different survivors. However, when focusing on John Locke 's experiences only, and using current insight regarding the events of the Season 5 finale, a pattern begins to develop: John Locke's experiences during his time-traveling better serve to enhance his faith and his connection to the Island, and these experiences were a direct result of the manipulation of time traveling by an outside force; conceivably and specifically, Jacob 's enemy . Let's look at John Locke's final moments on the Island:

" Because You Left " [ ]

• Meeting with Richard. And guess who else? Jacob's enemy in John's body, and Ben listening in the distance. Jacob's enemy manipulated Richard to go over there. The words that Richard used to persuade John were the words of Jacob's enemy. He was minipulating all of them. John's mission is to leave the island, retrieve the Oceanic 6 and Ben and bring them to the island for some unknown purpose. This is also where we learn that John might have to die to accomplish this. So the flaw in logic is that the man impersonating John Locke after the return to the Island on Ajira 316 would have to know that John would die, and that the success of this plan would somehow lead to the events of "The Incident" for all parities involved. He would have to know the future. However, conceivably an enemy that had the ability to time travel might know a thing or two about the future or the past.

" The Lie " and " Jughead " [ ]

• Meeting with Richard, part 2. Part 1, technically. John makes his way into camp and meets with a version of Richard who is meeting John Locke for the first time. We know that John has a history with Richard. We know that Richard visited him in the hospital the day he is born, and that it was this future/past John that suggested he do that. Richard visited him as a boy, and was always telling John how special he was on the Island. Richard has a ton of faith in John. I think that this is the direct result of this experience. My belief is that the individual who is causing the time travel is using this particular experience to manipulate Richard Alpert. He will listen to whatever John Locke says to him. John always speaks the truth, and Richard recognizes this through all of his experiences with John over the years. So when Jacob's enemy comes to town in John's body, no matter how outrageous his demands, Richard will always obey.

" The Little Prince " [ ]

• Back to the Future The survivors travel through time again. Probably to now. It is a time after Ajira 316 has crashed on the island. They are persued by unknown assailants. They travel again, out of harms way. It's 1988 and Danielle and her team of Scientists are living on the island. There are a series of jumps through time before John finally makes it to the Orchid station to complete his task of leaving the Island. These time jumps do appear to be more random in nature, but the rapid pace with which they occur begin to take their toll on the individuals involved. Charlotte, Miles, and Juliet could be dying. People everywhere are lost and alone. John is the only one who can stop the turmoil. While the current events of the time periods visitied may not have any direct impact on the storyline of John Locke, the well-being of everyone on the Island is his priority as leader. They arrive at a modern version of the Orchid Station, before quickly being transported to an earlier time where they find a well that John Locke enters. While John is going down the well, the group is taken to a time before a well even existed. The result of this is John ending up at the bottom of the well with a broken leg. Very similar to what happened during "Because You Left", John is injured (in the leg), and meets with an eerie individual who instructs him further on his path. This time it is Christian Shepard. We don't fully understand yet who Christian is working for, or the how or why. He has stated in the past to John that he represents Jacob and his desires. We don't know what's going on with that. But he has the information that John needs to return to the island after he has fulfilled his mission. He also tells him how to leave. John leaves with the assistance of a big wheel.

" The Life and Death of Jeremy Bentham " [ ]

• John travels to the modern day in our dimension to reunite the Oceanic 6 and return them to the Island. John is a failure in his mission and is filled with self doubt. He discovers that maybe Richard was right. We know what happens after that. John dies. This new guy takes over John's identity. For what greater purpose, we cannot know, yet. Part of that plan involves manipulating Benjamin Linus to kill Jacob, with some assistance from Richard Alpert. Things that have been set in motion for some time, but at least begining with the time traveling.

Time-traveling triggers [ ]

• This has a lot to do with electromagnetism and the fail-safe key and the times when Desmond spoke to Mrs. Hawkins.
• Desmond flashes back to the helicopter without being in contact with metal. Neither does he touch the tap water. Red herring.
• The triggers are that Desmond doesn't want to be in a certain situation. He time travels when he is scared on the helicopter and just wants to be with Penny. He time travels when he is being yelled at by the army officer, when he is pushed by the other soldier and in other situations when he wants to be elsewhere.
• Faraday, Ray and Widmore all have an understanding of ways that time travel can be triggered.
• The numbers are triggers. It will be discovered that some of the the flashbacks and flashforwards are actually time travel.
• Although the triggers seem random, there are mathematical solutions. Time travel works like a pendulum in motion. Desmond is the ball swinging back and fourth from two different positions (1996 and 2004). Desmond (and Minkowski) are basically stuck on five-ball pendulum, except on a larger scale that involves space, time, electromagnetism and gravity.
• It was revealed in the official podcast that the Desmond from 1996 is the one doing the time skipping. Therefore, when Desmond was in the helicopter and it veered a bit off course, it essentially pulled the Desmond from 1996 into 2004. The very first time skip was when 1996 Desmond (who was probably sleeping at the time) went forward into his body in the helicopter for a few seconds--just long enough to realize that he was in a helicopter. A few seconds later he was back in 1996, now fully awake but thinking that maybe what he just experienced was a dream. The odd thing about all this is the comparison between what's happening with Desmond and what happened with Eloise. Both Desmond and Eloise experienced something that acted as a trigger that sent them into the future, but while Eloise's trigger was in her PAST, Desmond's trigger was in his FUTURE. So a trigger can either SEND or it can PULL.

Lost is a Very Simple Story Told from the Perspective of the Most Confused Characters [ ]

Time travel is the key to understanding the plot of Lost and is used in much the same way as amnesia was used in Memento to play with the chronological order of the story. Conventional plots take the linear progression of time as a given, so cause follows effect allowing mere mortals to understand and contribute to the plot's development. In Lost, however, there are two characters whose perception of time is seemingly non linear possibly this enables them to time travel or vice versa.

Jacob and the MIB's actions are inexplicable to those of us who experience time as a linear progression. Why put a list of names in an Ankh in the 1970s? Because in 2007 it'll be needed to prevent the Oceanic survivors from being shot. Why build a Great Big Temple here? Because 2,000 years later it'll be needed it to shelter an obtuse Japanese man and his hippie friends. Why lay several items on a table and and asked John to pick one? Because 50 years in Richard's past and 50 years in Locke's future he'll give Richard one of them. The only people who understand what's going on in the Island are Jacob and the MIB as they can travel in time.

All other characters do not know what's going on. Each character who has been introduced previous to Jacob has appeared to hold the secret of the island only to be shown to be as confused as the survivors. Ben who once was presented as the mastermind behind the secret was in fact talking to an empty chair and receiving orders from slips of paper and lists. Richard's recent crisis of faith stems from him placing his belief in Jacob who he trusted no doubt because only he and the MIB know how things'll work out.

They are not equipped to understand because their ability to travel in time is severely limited if not nonexistent.

• The date on the boat may actually be Dec 26. Minkowski said the communications equipment had been destroyed 2 days earlier and no one had been in the communications room since to mark the calendar
• Or part of the time anomaly that has not been explained.
• Reason : With all the talk of black holes and such, the perception of time depends on one's relative velocity. The helicopter, which moved at a slow speed away from the island appeared to take days to reach the ship to the people on the island. The projectile traveled much faster and took only 30 minutes. The phone's data traveled at the speed of light and arrived instantly.
• Reason : When Desmond calls Penelope from the freighter she says during the conversation that she has been looking for him for the last 3 years. This would suggest that time is moving at the same rate due to previous information pertaining to Desmond being on the island for the last 3 years.
• Scientific Support: Time dilation is an accepted scientific theory that is a central part of Albert Einstein's Theory of Relativity .
• Time moves at the same rate, but time between any two points on & off the island is not in sync. Thus a zone of distortion exists around the island bridging the time difference. The distortion of time changes depending on the position where one encounters it (a non-uniform 'time field') by heading back at the same speed and heading as one entered the 'field' you would be shifted by the same amount of time ( +30 mins on the way in, -30 mins on the way out). Going at different speeds and directions will cause you to arrive in a different time then you left ( -10 hours on the way in, +5 mins of time on the way back out).

(see Black hole (theory) )

• The missile loses 31 minutes traveling to the island.
• The helicopter loses a day going back to the freighter.
• The amount of the time dilation is likely related to the bearing used and the speed of the object moving.
• Energy/Matter moving at, or near, the speed of light is not subject to the time-field around the object
• Reason : Sayid mentioned to Frank that they left the island at dusk, and when they arrived on the freighter it was in the middle of the day.
• Reason : No one actually confirms what day it is off the island.
• Desmond left and crashed on the island in 2001, so it's still 2004
• Surely Penny is looking for Desmond before Oceanic 815, maybe since she saw him last time or since he disappear at the race around the world (she knows something about it by her father). That's why she have an listening station at the pole and look for Des by radio, heard by the freighter.
• The calendar date should not be trusted. When the writers go to the trouble of having a character point something out (Sayid's mention of how close to Christmas is it), it is almost never an idle comment; there's more to the dates and times than we're seeing.

The need for sedation to go to the Island is related to the effects of Time Travel [ ]

The mixture Richard Alpert gave Juliet was to prevent time-split mind. The mixture was simply a sedative. If a person is without a consciousness at the moment they cross the barrier then their consciousness cannot time-split.

Time Travel and Flashbacks are different levels of the same condition. [ ]

When entering and leaving the island, people suffer from disorientation and can become unstuck in time. It seems this only occurs if you are hit with a large amount of radiation. The disorientation can cause aneurysms and eventually death. People who are already on the island experience flashbacks. No character that has never been to the island has ever had a flashback. Perhaps coming and going without the influence of radiation causes the relatively minor problem of having lucid flashbacks. These flashbacks are almost always accompanied by a character looking thoughtful or introspective… but these looks also often constitute a rather dazed expression. Perhaps the mental effects of time jumping (brain aneurysms) are suffered during flashbacks on a smaller scale (quick headaches or minor disorientation).

• 1 The Man in Black
• 2 Benjamin Linus
• 3 The Numbers

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Time Travel in Lost: The Metaphorics of Predestination

Fans of the hit TV series Lost are awaiting the big event next week: the premiere of Season Six on Tuesday night. The show is famous for its mysteries and plot twists, so this year has a special status: it's the final season, where everything that's going to be revealed will be revealed. That might not be absolutely everything, but it should be a lot. Lost has always played with time and narrative -- characters' backstories were told through elaborate flashbacks, lending a richness of nuance to their behavior in the main story. But time travel as a plot device was established as a central theme during Season Five. One happy consequence was the invention of Lost University , through which fans could learn a little about physics and other real-world subjects underlying events in the show. Naturally, scientifically-minded folks want to know: how respectable is the treatment of time travel, anyway? We are, as always, here to help. My short take: Lost is a TV fantasy, not a documentary, and it doesn't try all that hard to conform to general relativity or the other known laws of physics. But happily, the most important of the Rules for Time Travelers is very much obeyed: there are no paradoxes. And more interestingly, the spirit of the rules is obeyed, and indeed put to good narrative effect. The potential for time-travel paradoxes helps illuminate issues of free will vs. predestination, a central theme of the show. And what more can you ask for in a time-travel story than that? Details below the fold, full of spoilers. (Not for the upcoming season, of course.) See also discussions from io9 , Popular Mechanics , and Sheril . The way that time travel works in Lost can be analyzed on three separate levels: physics, logic, and metaphor. (Or by ignoring all these high-falutin' ideas and just enjoying the show, but where's the fun in that?) Physics Make no mistake: the point of Lost is not to present a realistic depiction of time travel according to the laws of physics as we know them (or ever expect to know them). As explained in Chapter Six of From Eternity to Here , a remarkable feature of Einstein's general relativity is that it provides a context in which we can sensibly talk about the idea of traveling in time. Space and time are curved together, and the amount of time elapsed between two events is affected by motion and gravity. Traveling near the speed of light, or lingering in a powerful gravitational field, you will "move into the future faster" than someone floating freely in empty space. It's easy to imagine -- likely impossible to construct, but easy to imagine -- curvature so intense that you can hop in a space ship and come back before you left. One particularly evocative mechanism for dramatic spacetime curvature is a wormhole, a shortcut through spacetime through which one could easily reach tremendous distances or wildly separated times via a relatively short journey. But it would still be a journey, involving relatively conventional means of transport; no flashing lights, no dematerializing and popping into existence elsewhere or elsewhen. The tremendous amounts of energy and spacetime curvature necessary to maintain a realistic wormhole don't fit easily into the island milieu of Lost . So the show simply doesn't bother with such details. Characters, not to mention the island itself, do indeed pop randomly from one time to another. Even more divorced from realism, Desmond and other characters have their consciousness travel through time ("temporal displacements"), appearing in their physical bodies with all the memories and feelings of their future selves. Neither Einstein nor anyone else suggests any way that could happen in the real world. Which is fine; it's a TV show, not a science documentary. It's an invented world, not the real one. But the writers do nevertheless hint at a scientific basis for time travel within this invented world, one that borrows from real physics. I probably was not the only viewer to laugh during Season Three when one of the hated Others was shown deeply engrossed in A Brief History of Time . More directly, in one of the Dharma Initiative orientation videos "Edgar Halliwax" (Dr. Chang) explains that the island contains a pocket of exotic matter , perhaps sustained by the Casimir effect, which lets them conduct unique experiments in space and time. That's all on the right track. Even though general relativity lets us talk about wormholes, under ordinary circumstances we wouldn't expect them to be useful for purposes of time travel -- even if a wormhole were created, it would collapse to a singularity before anyone could cross it. A hypothetical way out is to invoke exotic matter , which would have a negative energy density and prevent the wormhole from collapsing. And how can we get negative energies? Perhaps from the Casimir effect , which arises when materials alter the energy contained in quantum vacuum fluctuations. Again, it's not a full-blown respectable and realistic theory of time travel; but I'm happy that the show nods in the direction of real ideas, which will hopefully inspire the occasional viewer to dig more deeply into them. Logic It's much more important that time travel in Lost makes logical sense -- it's consistent and obeys rules, even if the rules are not those of the real world. Most fundamentally, you can't go into the past and alter the future; there are no alternate histories or any such cheap ploys. Daniel Faraday says at one point, "What happened, happened"; Sawyer just says "What's done is done." Dr. Chang, confronted in the video above with a worker who jokes about going back and killing Hitler, reacts in anger: "Don't be absurd. There are rules!" And the main rule is that things happen in a unique way at every place in space and time. If we have good reason, based on memories or some other form of records, to think that events played out in a certain way, then that's what they did. There's no changing things, and more than we can imagine changing the past under ordinary circumstances; the past already happened. As far as I can tell, the events we've been shown conform very well to this principle. Of course, there are certainly mysteries, and we'll have to see how those are resolved in the season to come. There is one seeming exception to this rule: Desmond's visions of future events. He can see something happen in the future, and then take some action to prevent it (at least for a while). But as long as we're being sticklers, we have to admit that a vision of the future isn't the same as having that future actually happen. There is no paradox; only one thing ever happens in the real world, it's just not necessarily the thing Desmond sees in his vision. When Desmond shuttles information back and forth between the past and present, it doesn't conform to our ordinary notions of causality, but there's nothing inconsistent about the complete history through time. I'm inclined to grant this bit of poetic license in the cause of interesting storytelling, as it still respects the no-paradox rule. Despite the importance of this rule, fictional invocations of time travel tend to violate it all the time. Most such stories are all about changing the past, acting as if there is some narrative "meta-time" with respect to which events unfold, independently of the good old time we measure with physical clocks. (Think of Back to the Future , where Michael J. Fox does something in the 50's and conditions "immediately" change back in the present day -- erggh.) Personally I find the restrictions of logic to ultimately provide a more satisfying story structure. By the end of Season Five, Faraday has become convinced that you can alter time, and hatches a plan to donate a nuclear bomb in 1977 to ultimately prevent everything we've later seen happen on the island. Faraday is killed by his mother, Eloise Hawking, but Jack and the other survivors try to carry out the plan. The finale of Season Five ends with a bright flash of light. We don't know exactly what this means -- that's what cliffhangers are all about -- but presumably this is the "Incident" referred to in later Dharma Initiative videos. I hope so, anyway; after all this wonderfully consistent if complicated narrative, it would be a shame to throw out a universe and start all over again. Metaphor Why does time travel fascinate us, anyway? Why do we find it so interesting? Part of it is the interest in changing the past -- all of us have things we'd like to do over. But part of it is the fear of predestination. We like to think that, while the past is set in stone, we can make choices about our future -- we have free will. But if we are able to travel into the past, then our future is part of the time that already happened -- so in fact we don't have complete freedom of action. Whatever it is we do when we get to the past, it must ultimately be consistent with how we know that past ultimately evolved into the present. That seems a bit irksome, even if it does respect the laws of physics. This is where I think Lost really shines. One of the major themes of the show is destiny vs. free will, as embodied in the characters of Locke and Jack. Are there places where we are "meant" to be, or can we choose our paths for ourselves? Well, there's a balance. I can choose to turn right or left at a fork in the road, but I can't choose to simply float into the air -- there are the laws of physics to be obeyed. Lost uses the device of time travel to play with this tension -- we think certain things are destined to happen, but we don't know how. The logical restrictions of time travel are used as metaphors for the competition between predestination and choice. A great example is the idea of "course corrections," explained to Desmond by Eloise Hawking. Even if you see the future and try to prevent it, ultimately the designated fate is going to come to pass, perhaps in a different way (as with Charlie's death). As a physicist this originally annoyed me, as that's not how the laws of nature work -- things happen or they don't, but they're not teleological, working through multiple channels to fulfill some crudely-specified goal. But taking off my physicist's cap and thinking more as a storyteller, I came to really appreciate this conceit as an interesting metaphor for how we try to think about fate. Determinism and the laws of physics are not the point; it's simply that certain kinds of conditions pretty much inevitably result in certain kinds of outcomes. (Ever had two friends get together, and you knew from the start that it wasn't going to last?) In our human lives, the rigid inevitability of the underlying physical laws isn't very relevant to figuring out what's going to happen next, but there is still some degree of predictability. The battle of destiny vs. free will isn't one that has a winner and a loser; we are both constrained by circumstances, and free to make choices within that framework. That's what makes life interesting. Ultimately the idea of free will is tied to the arrow of time. Given perfect information about the present, in principle we could predict both the past and the future, without any wriggle room. But we don't have perfect information. Because of the low entropy boundary condition in the past, we can nevertheless reconstruct what already happened with a certain amount of reliability; that's why we think the past is unchangeable. But the future has no such boundary condition, and many possibilities are open. Otherwise I would tell you what's going to happen over the next eighteen episodes of Lost .

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We Finally Understand The Ending Of Lost

Since airing its two-part finale in May 2010 on ABC, the polarizing ending of the landmark television series "Lost" has been a point of fierce contention among fans. For years, those who tuned in every week to check in with the survivors of Oceanic Flight 815 have wrestled with the implications of the feature-length final episode — aptly titled "The End" — which was jam-packed with mind-bending twists and ambiguous answers that only seemed to set up more questions. 

From its very first episode, "Lost" made no attempt to hide its fondness for perplexing mysteries. But while the series' first season was mostly focused on the Oceanic survivors simply trying to stay alive in their new tropical home, subsequent seasons became increasingly more convoluted as the show delved into the bizarre history of the island, its strange electromagnetic properties, and the mysteriously intertwined histories of the survivors themselves. By the final season, the show had thrown time travel, alternate realities, and immortal beings into the mix. Suffice it to say, wrapping it all up over the course of two hours was a tall order, and fans came away with all sorts of different interpretations of exactly what the finale meant. 

So make sure your carry-on luggage is stowed, your seat backs and tray tables are in their full upright position, and that your seat belt is properly fastened because we're about to take a deep dive into the ending of "Lost," and it may be a bumpy ride.

Was the island purgatory?

From very early on in the show's run, fans worried "Lost" would end with a "they were dead the whole time" twist. Sure, creator J.J. Abrams and showrunners Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse repeatedly denied speculation that the characters died in the crash, and that the island was a form of purgatory. Still, some thought the finale's church-set ending confirmed that Abrams, Lindelof, and Cuse had been lying the whole time and that the entire show had taken place in the afterlife. Further evidence used to support this claim was footage of the original plane crash that aired over the closing credits, showing empty beaches, which some fans thought meant there'd been no survivors. 

But it turns out that the crash footage at the end was never meant to be considered as part of the finale. Instead, it was included so fans could decompress, readjust, and collect themselves as the show transitioned to the 11 PM news. ABC network executives never imagined that viewers would consider this part of the show's narrative. Further, "The End" takes pains to explicitly clarify that all the events that took place on the island were, in fact, real. During the church scene, Christian Shephard (John Terry) explains to Jack (Matthew Fox) that everything on the island did indeed come to pass. In fact, it was "the most important period" in the Oceanic survivors' lives.

What was the flash-sideways?

After five seasons filled with flashbacks and, eventually, flash-forwards, the first episode of Season 6 included something "Lost" fans were totally unprepared for — a flash- sideways , exploring an alternate reality in which Oceanic Flight 815 doesn't crash and the plane lands safely at LAX. However, the plane crash isn't the only thing different about the two realities. Instead of being a con man, Sawyer (Josh Holloway) is a cop. Instead of the strained marriage they had in the pilot, Jin (Daniel Dae Kim) and Sun (Yunjin Kim) are secret lovers. And the childless Jack suddenly has a teenage son whose mother is none other than Juliet (Elizabeth Mitchell), a woman he met on the island. 

But is this all a dream? Is it maybe a parallel dimension created by the wonky powers of the island? Or is this the true timeline, and maybe the island is just an elaborate "what if" scenario? Well, in "The End," the flash-sideways is revealed to be the afterlife, where all the Oceanic survivors are brought back together following their deaths. In a way, it is  a sort of purgatory where they each have to make peace with the struggles of their lives before they can recognize one another and move on together.

Doesn't that mean they all died in the crash?

This is where the "Lost" finale tripped up many of its viewers , who reasonably assumed that in order for all of the characters on the show to have arrived in the afterlife at the same time, they had to have died at the same time. But as logical as this reasoning appears at first glance, it doesn't hold up under close scrutiny. Not only does it fail to explain the presence of characters like Juliet and Ben (Michael Emerson), who weren't on board Oceanic 815, but it doesn't account for all of the shared memories they recover once they recognize each other. After all, if they all died in the crash, how would Kate (Evangeline Lilly) remember delivering Claire's (Emilie de Ravin) baby, or how could Sayid (Naveen Andrews) recall falling in love with Shannon (Maggie Grace)?

The explanation given in "The End" is that they all died at different times, some way back in Season 1 and others many years after the end of Season 6. But time works differently in the afterlife. To the characters, it feels as though they all arrived around the same time, even if their actual deaths were many decades apart. The only thing they all had in common was that none of the characters in the flash-sideways died during the plane crash. 

So when did everyone die on Lost?

While we'd be here all day if we tried to list every death that ever occurred on "Lost," here's what we know about the deaths of the people in the church. Boone (Ian Somerhalder) dies in Season 1, succumbing to his injuries after a fall. Shannon dies early in Season 2 after being accidentally shot by Ana Lucia (Michelle Rodriguez), and Libby (Cynthia Watros) dies toward the end of the second season after being shot by Michael (Harold Perrineau). 

Charlie (Dominic Monaghan) dies in Season 3, drowning after warning Desmond (Henry Ian Cusick) that the boat outside is "not Penny's boat." Locke (Terry O'Quinn) is strangled by Ben in Season 5. Juliet dies at the beginning of Season 6 after falling down a shaft and detonating a bomb. Sayid dies midway through Season 6 saving his friends from a bomb, and Sun and Jin die later in the same episode, drowning together in a sinking submarine. And Jack dies at the end of the series finale, after being stabbed by the Man in Black (Titus Welliver). 

There are also a good number of deaths that are left up to our imaginations. Kate, Sawyer, Desmond, Claire, Rose (L. Scott Caldwell), Bernard (Sam Anderson), and Penny (Sonya Walger) all survive the finale and presumably die at some point in the years afterward. And as the new protectors of the island, Hurley (Jorge Garcia) and Ben likely outlive the other survivors by quite a wide margin, but at some point, they must eventually die as well. 

What is the Heart of the Island?

A good portion of the finale focuses on the question of who will fill Jacob's (Mark Pellegrino) role as the protector of the Heart of the Island, which turns out to be a magical, glowing pool at the island's center. This pool is supposedly the source of all life, death, and rebirth, and according to Jacob, it's the cork holding back a malevolent force that could destroy the world. In the finale, this is revealed to be a literal cork, which Desmond pulls to drain the pool, nearly getting everyone killed. 

The Heart of the Island also emits a strong electromagnetic field and can manipulate space and time, as evidenced by the relocation of the island and the time travel in earlier episodes. It's also implied to have a form of consciousness, or at least self-preservation, granting immortality to the humans who are willing to take on the responsibility of keeping it safe. 

While some of the earlier mysteries of "Lost" were revealed to have at least moderately plausible sci-fi explanations, the Heart of the Island requires viewers to accept some elements of the supernatural as well. No details are ever given about the origins of the Heart of the Island, but it's said that a piece of its light is inside every living thing, and if it goes out, so do we. 

How were the survivors of Oceanic 815 connected?

Throughout the series, we see that many of the characters on the show have some sort of connection before ever getting on the plane, implying that they were always predestined to board the same doomed flight and end up on the island together. However, in the final season of "Lost," we learn more about the way that Jacob has been pulling strings for years, traveling around the world in order to bring a group of potential "candidates" to the island, in the hopes of finding someone capable of taking over for him as the island's protector. He knew his brother, the Man in Black, was searching for a way to kill him and would eventually succeed. Jacob's intent was to find a successor before that happened. 

Jacob chose people who reminded him of himself — individuals who were alone and flawed and who'd come to depend on the island as much as it would rely on them to keep it safe. All of the survivors of Oceanic 815 fit this criteria, and as the series progressed and he was able to observe their interactions on the island, Jacob began slowly whittling down his list of candidates. None of the connections we saw between the characters in flashbacks were fated or accidental. All of them were engineered by Jacob.  

What was the deal with the smoke monster?

Throughout "Lost," one of the show's most enduring mysteries is the nature of the smoke monster , a seemingly sentient column of black smoke that occasionally attacks and even kills people on the island. And it turns out that the smoke monster is another form of the Man in Black, Jacob's immortal twin brother. So how did that come about? Well, after killing their mother, the Man in Black is transformed when Jacob throws him into the Heart of the Island.

For the next 2,000 years, Jacob and the Man in Black oppose one another, as the Man in Black searches for a way around the supernatural law that keeps him from killing Jacob. As the smoke monster, he can't be killed, but he also can't leave. Over the years, he assumes his smoke monster form in order to kill the candidates Jacob brings to the island, hoping that if Jacob dies and leaves no successor, the Man in Black can finally leave. Ultimately, though, the Man in Black's immortality is linked to the Heart of the Island, so when Desmond temporarily shuts it down in the finale, he's made mortal and killed by Kate and Jack, ending the smoke monster forever. 

What happened to Hurley at the end of Lost?

After Jack is appointed as Jacob's successor as protector of the island, he promptly gets into a knife fight with the Man in Black, where he's mortally wounded. Realizing he's dying, Jack volunteers to go replace the cork at the center of the island and tells Hurley that he needs to take over as protector. Hurley agrees, and he drinks from the water that's come from the Heart of the Island, making his new role official. 

After Jack leaves to restore the Heart, Ben also suggests to Hurley that he doesn't have to "protect" the island in the same way that Jacob did and that maybe Hurley will find a better way. Hurley considers this, then asks Ben if he'll consider staying on as his second-in-command, to which Ben responds that he'd be honored. While Jacob lived for 2,000 years, Hurley doesn't have the dark counterpart in the Man in Black that made it so hard for Jacob to find a replacement protector. So although Hurley likely lives for many years following the finale, it's very possible that retirement will prove much easier for him than it did for Jacob.

How did the DHARMA Initiative fit into everything?

The DHARMA (Department of Heuristics and Research on Material Applications) Initiative first came to the island in the 1970s, with the objective of studying the unique properties of the island and harnessing them in the name of scientific advancement. While DHARMA conducted research across all fields (including studies involving polar bears), attempting to uncover the island's secrets, they never fully understood what they were dealing with when it came to the supernatural Heart of the Island. However, that didn't stop them from trying, and they constructed stations all over the island in an attempt to make sense of the bizarre phenomena they were witnessing. 

DHARMA was eventually wiped out by a group of people living on the island who were devoted to Jacob, known to the "Lost" characters as the Others. By the time Oceanic 815 crashed, DHARMA was long gone, leading the plane survivors to wonder whether DHARMA might've been responsible for some of the strange happenings on the island. But the DHARMA Initiative didn't create any of the island's "powers." Those already existed long before DHARMA showed up and were, in fact, the reason why they came in the first place.

What's the deal with the church?

At the end of "The End," after regaining their memories of their time together on the island, the main characters make their way to a church, where they see the symbols of a number of different faiths. Christian Shephard then explains to Jack that the flash-sideways was constructed by and for the Oceanic 815 survivors to help them find one another, let go of the baggage of their lives, and move on together. And according to Christian, once they were all ready to do so, they each showed up at the church, one by one.

When Jack first arrives at the church, he sees his father's coffin and seems to think he's there for Christian's funeral. But the coffin is empty, and the funeral that he'd expected is replaced by a reunion with his loved ones and hope for a new future together. The church seems to symbolize that all of the "Lost" characters have said their goodbyes to their past lives, and they're finally ready to be at peace with one another. When Christian opens the doors at the end of the episode and light floods the church, it's safe to assume that signifies "moving on," whatever that means.

Why didn't Ben go into the church at the end of Lost?

Even though Ben's presence in the flash-sideways seems to indicate that the Oceanic survivors were indeed the most significant people in his life, he elects not to enter the church with them. Before Hurley returns to the church, he tells Ben that he was a "real good number two," and Ben replies that Hurley was a "great number one," which seems to indicate that Ben and Hurley worked together on the island for a long time after the end of the series, never turning against each other like Jacob and the Man in Black. That Ben was drawn to the church with the rest of them may be an indication that, cosmically at least, his service to the island was enough to redeem him for the horrible things he'd done in life and that he could move on with the others.

However, Ben opting not to enter the church could mean that he isn't ready to move on yet. Perhaps Ben still has more people to find in the afterlife before he can let go, or maybe, despite having been forgiven by some of the people he wronged, he still has to come to terms with what he did. Another possibility is that he just can't bring himself to move on and leave his adopted daughter, Alex (Tania Raymonde), behind. It's never clarified what happens to Ben after he decides to stay outside, but we can only hope that, eventually, he finds peace.

Why was Christian Shephard in the church?

While Christian Shephard explains to Jack that the church exists to help all of the Oceanic 815 survivors "move on" with the people who'd been most significant to them in their lives, that doesn't explain what Christian himself is doing there, along with infants Aaron and Ji Yeon. None of them lived on the island (or at least, not for long), so it couldn't possibly have been the most important time in any of their lives. Surely Christian's "most significant" period would've occurred well before his death while Aaron's and Ji Yeon's would've likely been once they were adults. 

The simplest explanation for their presence is that, like all of the other people in the flash-sideways who weren't survivors of the crash, those weren't the real Christian, Aaron, and Ji Yeon. They were merely manifestations of something the Oceanic survivors needed in order to move on. While the flash-sideways was created exclusively for the survivors of Oceanic 815, perhaps Christian, along with the adult versions of Aaron and Ji Yeon, are out there in their own versions of the afterlife, searching for their own most significant people before they can move on for themselves. And sure, their presence raises some interesting questions, but it doesn't take away from "Lost's" powerful ending.

What was the deal with the numbers on Lost?

" Lost" had no shortage of ongoing mysteries that arose throughout its run, perhaps none greater than the enigmatic numbers that seem to follow the characters around like a curse. 4, 8, 15, 16, 23, and 42 popped up in all sorts of places over the course of the series, from Hurley's winning lottery ticket and Kate's trial number to the sequence that Desmond spent two years punching into a computer every 108 minutes.

"Lost" never definitively addressed the nature of the numbers, but implied that, like so many other things on the show, the explanation behind the ascending string of figures was more mystical than scientific. Jacob assigned a number to each of the candidates he drew to the island, and the final six candidates each synced up perfectly with one of the numbers: Locke was 4, Hurley was 8, Sawyer was 15, Sayid was 16, Jack was 23, and 42 referred to either Sun or Jin Kwon. Before arriving on the island, Hurley noticed the pattern recurring in his life and associated it with bad luck, while the other candidates remained oblivious to the numbers until well after they were already on the island. It's worth noting that Hurley ultimately became the candidate chosen to become the new guardian of the island, suggesting that the numbers may have been tied into the idea of fate and inevitability — a prominent theme on "Lost."

What caused the crash of Oceanic 815?

Without the fateful crash of Oceanic Flight 815 in the pilot episode, there would've been no "Lost" at all. Like most of the other strange occurrences on the show, it turns out that the circumstances leading to the crash were more complex than it initially appeared. For a long time, it seemed likely that Oceanic 815 merely suffered some sort of tragic yet mundane technical malfunction. But as the series went on, it became clear that the plane crash was yet another circumstance that had been cosmically engineered by Jacob to serve his own millennia-long agenda.

Many factors contributed to the crash of Oceanic 815, most of which had been manipulated by Jacob, from the DHARMA Initiative building the Swan station in the first place to the careful arranging of circumstances that led to DHARMA's eventual departure from the island. But likely the most significant single piece of the equation was the arrival of Desmond Hume and the subsequent three years he spent pushing — and becoming increasingly disillusioned about — a button.

Eventually, Desmond accidentally killed his companion in the Swan station and allowed the timer to run down to zero, resulting in a system failure. Desmond was able to fix it, but not before the system unleashed an immense electromagnetic charge, which in turn caused Oceanic 815 to break apart while passing over the island. So in a way, Desmond caused the crash of Flight 815, but considering that Jacob was the one who brought Desmond to the island, arranged the circumstances that required him to push the button, and carefully selected the passengers on the flight, the electromagnetic surge and the subsequent plane crash were all part of his plan.

What happened to Jack at the end of Lost?

"Lost" was the very definition of an ensemble show, with a large cast of characters who each received their own well-developed arc and fleshed-out backstory. However, even though the series had dozens of "main" characters throughout its run, most viewers would probably agree that if you had to pick a single main character from "Lost," it was Jack Shephard . The first episode began with a shot of Jack's eye opening, and the series ended on a similar shot of his eyes closing, bookending the series on Jack's point of view. And all throughout "Lost," Jack served as a leader and central figure for the survivors of Oceanic 815.

Ultimately, of course, all of the Oceanic 815 survivors wound up reconnecting in the afterlife in the final episode of "Lost," including Jack. However, the afterlife narrative wound up confusing many viewers due to the show presenting it as an alternate reality for the entire last season. So it's understandable to be uncertain about what really happened to Jack and "Lost's" other central characters by the end of the series.

Jack may have died in the final episode, bleeding to death of stab wounds inflicted by the Man in Black, but he made some hugely significant actions in his final hours. He briefly agreed to take over from Jacob as the protector of the Island, after which he immediately fought the Man in Black to the death. In his final moments, he said goodbye to Kate and Sawyer, appointed Hurley as the island's new protector, and replaced the cork in the Heart of the Island that temporarily turned the Man in Black mortal while also threatening to sink the island and destroy the world. After Jack saved the island and everyone he loved, he finally succumbed to his wounds and died.

What happened to Kate at the end of Lost?

As part of "Lost's" central love triangle — at least for the first few seasons — Kate was one of the few Oceanic survivors who made it all the way through the final episode more or less unscathed (at least physically). After helping Jack lead the survivors on the Island, Kate managed to escape the island along with Jack and the Oceanic Six in Season 4, along with Claire's infant son, Aaron. Since Claire was still on the island, Kate raised Aaron as her own. She was also tried for the crimes she committed before the crash and was sentenced to 10 years probation on the condition that she didn't leave California.

However, Kate ultimately realized that she couldn't abandon Aaron's biological mother on the island, and she left him with Claire's mother so she could return to the island with Jack and the rest of the Oceanic Six on an Ajira flight. After being transported by the island to 1977 and participating in the events that led to the infamous electromagnetic "Incident," Kate returned to 2007 with the rest of the survivors, where she finally found Claire. After helping Jack defeat the Man in Black once and for all, she convinced Claire to join her in escaping on the Ajira plane, which a small group used to escape the island. Before leaving, she told Claire she would help her raise Aaron, although we never learn what sort of co-parenting situation they eventually worked out or whether Kate suffered any legal consequences for breaking her parole.

What happened to Sawyer at the end of Lost?

After serving as "Lost's" resident ally-antagonist for the first season, the vengeance-driven James "Sawyer" Ford gradually shed most of his bad boy persona and eventually became an integral member of the group, forming deep friendships with a number of the other 815 survivors and even falling in love with Dr. Juliet Burke during the years they spent in the 1970s. Like many of the Oceanic 815 passengers, Sawyer had a dark past before boarding the fateful flight and was fleeing from the memory of murdering a man he'd been tricked into believing was responsible for his parents' deaths.

On the island, after pursuing Kate romantically for the first few seasons, Sawyer gave up his chance to escape the island in order to allow Kate and the rest of the Oceanic Six to leave. He subsequently was transported to 1974 with a group of other survivors, where they wound up joining the DHARMA Initiative, and he and Juliet fell in love. However, after Juliet was killed in their attempts to prevent the "Incident" and Sawyer was transported back to 2007, he became determined to leave the island by any means necessary. Sawyer was instrumental in uncovering the Man in Black's plan to destroy the island and in helping Jack figure out a way to defeat him. Realizing Jack was dying, Sawyer persuaded Kate to leave the island, and they escaped together on the Ajira plane. We never learn just how long Sawyer lived after escaping the island or if he was held legally responsible for the crimes he committed before the 815 crash, but we at least know that he left the island a much better person than he was when he arrived.

Was the flash-sideways created by the island?

While the nature of the flash-sideways is at least partially addressed by the end of the show, "Lost" still leaves us with more questions than answers about its origins. What we know is that Christian Shepherd (whose true identity is itself left pretty ambiguous) tells Jack that the flash-sideways is "the place you all made together so you could find one another." Exactly how this works is left open to interpretation, including whether this sort of in-between afterlife exists for everyone who dies or just the people who lived on the island at some point.

Considering that the island also has some sort of unspecified tie to all life and death on Earth, it wouldn't be outside the realm of possibilities that the island itself created the flash-sideways. But since the island's light is said to be in everyone all around the world, not just the people on the island, that doesn't necessarily mean that its version of the afterlife is limited to the island's inhabitants. Perhaps all humans get some version of a flash-sideways in order to reconnect with the significant people from their lives or perhaps they all even share the same flash-sideways, but different people shape different sections according to who they're drawn to. It's a complex question with no clear answers, but given how many other supernatural abilities the island seems to possess, it's not out of the question that it has its fingers in the afterlife too.

Were the minor characters in the flash-sideways real?

Although "Lost" gives us a pretty definitive explanation about what happens to the main characters from the show in the flash-sideways — or at least, as definitive as it gets whenever TV tries to tackle the afterlife — it's much less clear what happens to all of the minor and background characters who are there ... or whether they were even real at all. For example, take Jack and Juliet's son David, who of course didn't exist in real life. Was he just an illusion created by Jack or Juliet, or was he another real person tossed into a fictional afterlife scenario, who also needed to awaken to his real-world memories?

Then there are characters like Nadia (Andrea Gabriel), who had significant interactions with the main "Lost" characters during their lives but who only play a minor role in the flash-sideways and never enter the church. We know that some people who don't recall their real lives and don't enter the church, such as Daniel Faraday (Jeremy Davies), were definitely the "real" versions of those people. So is everyone real and just not "awake" yet, or are most people in the flash-sideways illusions, and the real versions are in their own flash-sideways somewhere else? The series never gives us a satisfying answer to this. The closest we get is Christian telling Jack that the people on the island created the flash-sideways together, rather than it just being a universal purgatory where they were cosmically drawn together. So while the true nature of the other characters in the flash-sideways is left mostly ambiguous, our guess is that most of them weren't actually real.

What happened to the people who didn't go into the church?

While most of the main cast members of "Lost" who reconnect in the flash-sideways get closure when they head into the light at the church, there are others who were most likely real but never woke up, such as Daniel Faraday, Charles Widmore (Alan Dale), Miles Straume (Ken Leung), and Charlotte Lewis (Rebecca Mader). In Daniel's case, his mother, Eloise Hawking (Fionnula Flanagan), specifically asked Desmond not to help him remember his life so that Daniel would stay with her in the flash-sideways instead of deciding to move on. Others, such as Eloise herself and Ben Linus, opted to remain in the flash-sideways rather than entering the church.

So what happens next for them? Like many of the more existential questions surrounding the ending of "Lost," the show isn't really clear. However, there are some subtle hints that the church will be there as long as there are still characters left in the flash-sideways who may someday decide to move on. When he opts not to enter the church, Ben says he'll stay "for a while," indicating that it's not a permanent decision. And when Eloise asks Desmond if he's going to take Daniel, Desmond answers, "Not with me, no," implying that Daniel may still leave on his own eventually. So although they missed the mass exodus of the main group, our best guess is that the others who remained in the flash-sideways will still have the opportunity to wake up and move on at some point in the future, whenever they're ready.

Why weren't Michael and Walt in the flash-sideways?

Although most of the significant characters on "Lost" appeared in the flash-sideways either as people who regained their memories and moved on or people who weren't yet ready to remember (or weren't ready to move on) and stayed behind, there are two notable exceptions. Michael Dawson (Harold Perrineau) and his son Walt (Malcolm David Kelley) were both main characters for "Lost's" first couple of seasons before escaping the island at the end of Season 2.

However, Michael returned to the island in Season 4, posing as a worker on Charles Widmore's freighter and ultimately sacrificing himself for his friends, making amends for his earlier betrayal. Later, his ghost appears to Hurley, who realizes Michael is now tied to the island and can't move on. Walt is later approached by Ben and Hurley (in the unaired epilogue included with the sixth season DVD box set) after they become the island's protectors, offering him a job and saying he can help his father if he agrees to return to the island. Yet neither appears in the flash-sideways. Perhaps Hurley gave Walt immortality, similar to Richard Alpert (Néstor Carbonell), in order to allow him to stay with his father, or perhaps they both ended up tethered to the island indefinitely. Sadly, their ultimate fates are never addressed by the end of the show, so we can only hope that wherever they wound up, they're at peace.

Did the characters on Lost have free will?

After "Lost" revealed that the vast majority of its characters had been drawn to the island through Jacob meddling in their lives, it's reasonable to question how much autonomy those characters actually had to make their own decisions. It definitely seemed as though they were all free thinkers with their own agency, but if Jacob was pulling the strings behind the scenes the whole time, how can we know that their free will wasn't all an illusion? Could it be possible that all of the conflicts on the island — the struggles for power, the shifting loyalties, the surprising love stories — were actually engineered?

Well, most likely, yes and no. There's no denying that Jacob was a significant factor in everyone's lives, and his influence directly impacted many of the choices they made, often significantly. But if absolutely everything was fate, Jacob never would have had any need for "candidates" at all. He would simply have brought his successor to the island, along with the people who needed to influence that successor in order for them to choose to take over for him as Protector, and he wouldn't have needed to narrow down a list of possibilities at all. Jacob's lists of candidates — with many of their names crossed off as though they were once under consideration but weren't anymore — serve as hard evidence that while Jacob was indisputably powerful, he wasn't ultimately the one in control.

If the numbers were each assigned to a final candidate, what was the point of the other candidates?

Bear with us here, because this one may get a little confusing. Among the most perplexing elements of the "Lost" mythology are the ubiquitous numbers that recur throughout the series. Not only do the numbers make up the factors of the Valenzetti Equation, which was developed in order to predict the precise date that humans would eventually go extinct, but the numbers also appeared in many more places and contexts than that during the show's run, including being the numbers Jacob assigned to each of his six final candidates. Although he started with over a hundred candidates, by the time the show ended, all that remained were candidates 4, 8, 15, 16, 23, and 42.

This begs the question — did Jacob realize the significance of the numbers when he was assigning them to candidates, and if so, why did he consider any of those other people at all? Put plainly, if he already knew that these six people (Locke, Hurley, Sawyer, Sayid, Jack, and Sun or Jin) were going to be the finalists, why bother with the rest of the competition? While it is certainly possible that Jacob had no idea what the numbers were and there was a larger hand of fate at work of which he was completely unaware, it seems unlikely that Jacob wouldn't have come across the numbers during his millennia of life. The only explanation that makes sense is that although Jacob knew those six would be significant, he didn't necessarily know how , and he still needed to let events play out in order to narrow the field down to his final candidates.

What was the deal with the time travel?

What started as a seemingly straightforward show about groups of strangers surviving on an island together gradually evolved into something much weirder the longer the series went on. Eventually, "Lost" became a series about time travel , with characters being transported several decades back and forth in time. Ultimately, it was made clear through several storylines (such as discussions of "the Incident" in 1977, which wound up being largely caused by the Oceanic survivors trying to get back to the future) that there really was no original timeline or altered timeline. There was simply one timeline that had always existed, which certain people experienced in a nonlinear way.

But how did the time travel work, and how does it factor into the ending of "Lost?" We never get a clear answer about its mechanics, although it's implied that it has something to do with the island's powerful electromagnetic energy. As with so many other things, the island's ability to move through time and space appears to be partly a defense mechanism through which it keeps itself from being discovered on a large scale. But it also seems to have an element of fate to it, which may or may not be tied to the supernatural powers of the island. However it works, none of the characters would have wound up where they did by the end of the series without time travel — particularly Sawyer and Juliet, whose romantic reunion in the final episode would never have happened if they hadn't been thrown into the past together.

Did Desmond escape the island at the end of Lost?

Ever the enigma, Desmond Hume's earthly fate is left pretty open-ended by the end of the series. The last we see of Desmond, he's unconscious after being pulled out of the Heart of the Island cave by Hurley and Ben, after the Ajira plane has already carried off the other survivors. Ben suggests to Hurley that the first thing he could do as the island's new protector is get Desmond home, although Hurley laments that the task is impossible since no one can leave the island. "That's how Jacob ran things," Ben muses. "Maybe there's another way. A better way."

They leave it at that; we never see Desmond again while he's alive. Presumably, Hurley and Ben did figure out a way to get him back home, although how they would've done it remains a mystery. After all, without the plane, they don't have a lot of resources for intercontinental travel. Yet we do get confirmation in the show's DVD epilogue that Hurley and Ben do eventually make it off the island, so there's no reason to believe they wouldn't have been able to take Desmond with them, especially with Hurley making the rules. But whether Desmond made it home right away or whether it took a while for Hurley and Ben to figure out how travel on and off the island works, we'll never know.

What happened to the people who made it to the ending of Lost?

Although it's true that by the flash-sideways ending of "Lost," literally every character we've ever met is dead, there are a lucky few number of characters that at least make it to the end of the earth-bound narrative still alive. While many members of the show's original cast die by the time the Ajira plane makes its final flight away from the island, several remain behind, at least for a short time. In addition to Desmond, Rose and Bernard also end their "Lost" journey on the island, although unlike the time-traveling Scotsman, they actually choose to stay there. We don't know what happens to them after the Ajira plane takes off, but odds are that with Hurley in charge of the island, they're allowed to live out the remainder of their days in peace.

As for those on that Ajira plane — Frank (Jeff Fahey), Kate, Claire, Richard, Sawyer, and Miles — we don't really know much about what happens to them. It seems likely that they probably all lived for a long while after leaving the island, since otherwise their final escape would ring a little hollow, but the details of their post-island lives are mostly left up to the viewers' imaginations. Still, it seems safe to assume that Kate helped Claire reunite with Aaron, and that they went on to co-parent him together. The fact that both Claire and Kate regain their memories in the flash-sideways during Aaron's birth could subtly nod to the idea that they were both his mothers when they were alive.

Is Richard still immortal at the end of Lost?

Born in the mid-1800s, Richard Alpert was granted immortality by Jacob in exchange for acting as a liaison between Jacob and the outsiders who would come to the island. After that, Richard spent over a century doing Jacob's bidding. In the finale, he makes it off the island with the others in the Ajira plane, which is the last time we see him since he never appears in the flash-sideways. At a glance, this might seem to indicate that Richard continued to live long after everyone else died, but that's probably not the case. In the "Lost" finale, Miles observes that Richard has gotten his first gray hair, which is a subtle indication that he's started to age.

Since Jacob was the one who granted Richard his immortality, it seems likely that his long life was actually tied to Jacob's, and that when Jacob died, his magic left with him. The gray hair hints that once Richard leaves the island with the others, he will continue to age and eventually die like a normal person. But if that's the case, where did he go when he died since he's not in the flash-sideways? While we'll never know for sure, we'd like to think that Richard was finally reunited in the afterlife with his wife Isabella, who died shortly before Richard was arrested and sold into slavery, which is how he came to be on the island in the first place.

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'The Constant' turns 10: Revisiting the great Lost  time-twist episode a decade later

It was 2008 and you never know what kind of show Lost would be. The fourth season of ABC’s island mystery returned in January after an eight-month hiatus — unusual, exhausting, tantalizing, back before everything had an 18-month hiatus. Week-to-week, there might be flashbacks or flashforwards, new characters introduced, old characters reintroduced, old characters brutally disposed of. The scope felt bigger. Typical episode logline, “Ben wakes up in the Sahara, flies to Iraq, then flies to London.” And yet it would be the shortest season, a mere 14 episodes, including a three-part finale, back before every season had 10 episodes.

An embarrassment of riches, is what I’m saying, and then there’s “The Constant.” Ten years ago, on Feb. 28, 2008, Lost aired the fifth episode of the fourth season. It’s about a man unstuck in time, trapped in confusing calculus, searching for true romance.

Revisiting “The Constant” on its own can be strange. By season 4, tracking the greater serialized story of Lost was a microsecond-rewarding viewing experience, especially as mediated by my former colleague/guru Jeff Jensen . (I assume half the stuff I noticed on a rewatch, he already wrote about a decade ago; consider all this supplementary material.) There are revelations in “The Constant” weeks or years in the making: the first appearance of the long-promised Freighter, the final confirmation that time travel is possible no flux capacitor required. If you were locked into the Great Game of Lost , then maybe your mindblowing memory from “The Constant” was a painting of a terrible old ship.

But context collapse helps with “The Constant.” After all, the story of the episode is context collapse. Desmond (Henry Ian Cusick) is on a helicopter, looking at a picture of his beloved Penny (Sonya Walger). The helicopter flies through a lightning storm, and now suddenly Desmond’s in the past. No more Jesus beard, no more Jesus hair: He’s a military man, waking up in a Full Metal Jacket nightmare, with a vague memory of flying a helicopter through a lightning storm.

And then Desmond’s back in the present, the helicopter landing on a ship in the ocean. But see now the Desmond of the present has been memory-wiped back to his past self, before the Island, before the Numbers. Charming: Here in the show’s most riotously complicated episode, the main character is the one person who has no clue about anything that has ever happened on Lost .

Is this why “The Constant” lives more in memory than so many other Lost episodes? It helps, I guess, that Desmond always seemed to be in his own very specific kind of TV show. His episodes were complicated, time-tossed and chrono-triggered, but his arc was the most straightforward: A Quest Toward Lost Love, a story so archaic that it’s literally archaic. (Penny is, of course, named after the patient wife from The Odyssey .) Desmond’s stories always ran up against the borderlands of mythology, nefarious lingering Big Bads and mad science. But those borderlands were distant from anyone you’d call a Main Character On Lost . Typical for a Desmond episode, “The Constant” reduces initial/eventual hero Jack (Matthew Fox) to the role of Exposition Demander, the confused audience member asking brilliant scientist Daniel Faraday (Jeremy Davies) to explain what the hell is going on.

Rewatching “The Constant” this week, it struck me how quiet the episode is. Everyone’s whispering. Amnesiac Desmond and Sayid (Naveen Andrews) are on a ship full of people they can’t trust. Daniel is revealing the secrets of the time continuum in his trademark low-gravel voice. In other episodes, flashbacks are announced with a whoosh sound. But as Desmond’s mind literally flashes back and forward, there’s no announcement sound, just timelines slipping through in a moment. (Charming: For the first time on Lost , a character onscreen knows the flashbacks are happening, the non-diegetic trope gone hyper-diegetic, like if one day Jack Bauer reached across the 24 splitscreens to grab the latest terrorist-affiliated evil corporate white guy, or if Darth Vader started humming “The Imperial March.”)

If you’re any of kind of TV watcher, you’ve seen the time-tripping episode done elsewhere by now, maybe better. Two years before “The Constant,” Doctor Who aired “The Girl in the Fireplace,” a lifespanning romance toggling between a far-future spaceship and Versailles before the Revolution. Today, Rick & Morty would circle the plot concept for “The Constant” four times before the opening credits end, and the most decaf CW superhero has met two alternate past versions of their own mother.

What’s still sets “The Constant” apart? It helps, I think, that writer-showrunners Carlton Cuse and Damon Lindelof frontload the sci-fi complexity, then teeter suddenly into radically sincere emotion. Past-Desmond flees to Oxford, where Past-Daniel explains how time-travel sickness works. The problem, see, is that Present-Desmond is in a strange place with nothing around him he recognizes. He needs to find something on that Freighter to connect his past to his present — or someone .

There’s this big idea of Desmond that sets him apart from so many other Lost characters. Everyone else is running away from something, seeking curious tropical redemption from a sad past, the drugs, the murder, the father you betrayed or betrayed you. For Desmond, the past is the goal. He doesn’t carry a picture of her, he carries a picture of them , his own past self taunting him with a smile. Odysseus is the clear comparison here, but there’s something Full Gatsby in Desmond’s outline. He knows his dream is already behind him, somewhere back in that vast obscurity, etc. For him, the way forward is the way backward — and so he’s also an Ebenezer Scrooge, another yuletide time traveler borne back ceaselessly into the past.

Desmond’s story isn’t as tragic as Gatsby’s. (Or maybe it secretly is: His scattered appearances in seasons 5 and 6 dead-end into an eerily ineffective pointless act of non-heroism, and one of the last things he says on the show is, “It didn’t work.”) But there’s something a bit tougher in the meaning of “The Constant,” an idea that goes beyond heroics: Not that you can change yourself, but that you have to connect yourself to who you once were. The bearded wanderer of 2004 must reconnect with the young man he once was, must create continuity in his own life.

That continuity is Penny. So she is a person but also a token, a remembrance of lost time. This made Penny an icon in a few minutes of screen time, but it would weirdly reduce her as the show reached its endgame, and she started to feel more like a contrivance, a “love interest” in the most old-fashioned and grandest sense. There’s a trickier version of what Lost became where we see Penny’s journey as clearly as Desmond’s. Actually, that could just literally be Lindelof’s follow-up series The Leftovers , which tracked Kevin’s shamanistic hero’s journey before concluding that the Book of Nora offered harsher, deeper, tricker truths.

So is Desmond’s journey romantic, or narcissistic? Is he seeking Penny — or the man he was with Penny? No right answer, and the secret ambiguity lingers because the execution is so damned perfect. In the past, Desmond goes to Penny’s house, begs her to A) give him her new phone number, and B) receive a phone call from him on Christmas Eve in 2004. That this scene works at all is largely due to Walger; you watch her performance once to see her lingering feelings for Desmond, and then watch it again to see a sensible woman trying to get her weird ex out of her house. Past-Desmond walks away from her door, looks up at the window, sees Penny close the curtain. Present-Desmond makes a hail-mary phone call from a satellite phone; what young-ish adult person kept the same phone number from 1996-2004?

But Penny answers! And there’s a Christmas tree! The episode’s director, eternal Lost pro Jack Bender, ups the quick cuts, a close-up on Desmond, on Penny, on Past-Desmond getting a glimmer of hope. The closing door, the answered phone, the lonely young man, that young man older and lonely no more. Penny tells him she’s been looking for him for years — so actually, she’s Odysseus the globetrotting searcher, and he’s the patient one waiting on the island kingdom. “I love you!” they say. Space and time collapse, and they’re together in London and the Pacific, 1996 is 2004 is 2008 is 2018. Love is the answer, and that’s just science, brotha.

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Exploring the Mysteries and Legacy of “Lost”: An In-Depth Analysis

“Lost” is a critically acclaimed TV series that premiered in 2004 and ran for six seasons. The show was created by J.J. Abrams, Damon Lindelof, and Jeffrey Lieber and was known for its intricate storytelling, complex characters, and mythology. “Lost” follows the survivors of Oceanic Flight 815, who crash land on a mysterious island in the Pacific Ocean. The show was a massive hit and had a dedicated fan base that eagerly followed the characters’ journey and tried to unravel the show’s many mysteries.

Over the years, “Lost” has become an iconic show, and its influence can still be seen in today’s TV landscape. The series paved the way for other serialized dramas that explored complex themes and characters, and it continues to be a beloved and debated show among fans. In this article, we will explore the show’s plot, characters, themes, and its controversial ending. We’ll also discuss the impact that “Lost” had on TV and pop culture and why the show is still relevant today.

Plot Summary – What about series Lost

Lost ending explained, unanswered questions, character analysis, the importance of themes, legacy of “lost”.

“Lost” follows the survivors of Oceanic Flight 815, which crashes on a mysterious island in the Pacific Ocean. The group of strangers must band together to survive in this strange and dangerous new environment. As the series progresses, the show’s mythology becomes increasingly complex, and the characters’ backstories and relationships are revealed through flashbacks, flash-forwards, and time travel.

Here are some of the key elements of the show’s mythology:

• The Island: The island is the central location of the show and is where the plane crash survivors find themselves stranded. The island is shrouded in mystery and is home to many secrets, including the mysterious black smoke monster and the ancient statue of Taweret.
• The Dharma Initiative: The Dharma Initiative is a research group that was stationed on the island in the 1970s. The group conducted various experiments and built several facilities on the island, including the Swan Station, which plays a significant role in the show’s mythology.
• The Others: The Others are a group of people who have been living on the island for a long time. They are initially portrayed as the show’s antagonists but are later revealed to have more complex motivations.
• The Numbers: The Numbers (4, 8, 15, 16, 23, and 42) are a recurring motif in the show and are believed to be cursed. They are introduced in the first season and have significant implications throughout the series.

The series finale of “Lost” aired on May 23, 2010, and was met with mixed reactions from fans and critics alike. The finale, titled “The End,” attempted to bring closure to the many plot threads and character arcs that the show had developed over six seasons.

In the finale, the survivors are reunited after their many trials and tribulations on the island. The final episode features a flash-sideways timeline that reveals that the characters are actually in a sort of purgatory or limbo, created by themselves to reunite with each other before moving on to the afterlife. Many fans were disappointed with the final episode, feeling that it left too many questions unanswered and didn’t live up to the show’s earlier promises of solving all of the show’s mysteries.

Despite the backlash, the ending has also been praised for its emotional resonance and for the way it brought closure to the many character arcs that the show had developed over its six seasons. The final shot of the show, which features Jack dying on the island while Vincent the dog lays next to him, is widely regarded as one of the most poignant moments in TV history.

Despite the show’s complex mythology, there are still several unanswered questions that fans continue to debate about. Here are some of the most prominent:

• What is the nature of the island? The show hints at various explanations, including that the island is a sort of purgatory or that it has a unique electromagnetic energy that affects time and space.
• What is the significance of the Numbers? While the show explains that the Numbers are cursed and appear throughout the show, their precise meaning is never fully explained.
• Who or what is the Smoke Monster? The Smoke Monster is a mysterious entity that terrorizes the characters on the island. While the show reveals that the Smoke Monster was once a man named Jacob’s brother, many fans still debate about the entity’s true nature and motivations.
• What is the purpose of the Dharma Initiative? The Dharma Initiative is a research group that was stationed on the island, but their exact purpose is never fully explained. The group’s experiments and research are hinted at throughout the show, but many details remain unclear.
• What happened to Walt? Walt is one of the youngest characters on the show and is revealed to have special abilities. However, the character disappears from the show after the first few seasons, and his fate is never fully explained.

“Lost” is known for its large ensemble cast and complex character arcs. Here are some of the most memorable characters and their character arcs:

• Jack Shephard: The show’s protagonist, Jack is a spinal surgeon who becomes a leader among the survivors on the island. Throughout the series, Jack struggles with his own identity and his relationship with his father. His character arc is largely focused on learning to let go and accept his own limitations.
• Kate Austen: Kate is a fugitive who is on the run from the law when she crashes on the island. Her character arc is largely focused on her relationships with the other survivors, particularly Jack and Sawyer. Over the course of the series, Kate learns to confront her past and take responsibility for her actions.
• John Locke: Locke is a mysterious figure who has a deep connection to the island. His character arc is largely focused on his search for purpose and meaning. Throughout the series, Locke struggles with his faith and his belief in destiny, culminating in his tragic death in the fifth season.
• James “Sawyer” Ford: Sawyer is a con artist who initially keeps to himself on the island. Over the course of the series, Sawyer learns to let go of his anger and grief and becomes a valuable member of the survivors’ community. His relationships with Kate and Juliet are particularly memorable.
• Benjamin Linus: Ben is a manipulative and cunning figure who is initially presented as an antagonist. As the series progresses, however, it becomes clear that Ben’s motivations are more complex than they initially appeared. His character arc is largely focused on his relationships with the other characters, particularly his daughter Alex and his adversary John Locke.

“Lost” was more than just a thrilling adventure story – it also explored a number of complex themes and messages. Some of the most prominent themes and messages include:

• Fate vs. free will: The show frequently explored the idea of whether our lives are predetermined or whether we have the ability to shape our own destiny. Characters like John Locke and Desmond Hume were particularly interested in this question, and the show often used flashbacks and flash-forwards to explore how our choices and actions can shape our futures.
• Science vs. faith: Another major theme of “Lost” was the tension between science and faith. Characters like Jack and Juliet often placed their trust in science and reason, while characters like John Locke and Mr. Eko were more interested in the island’s mystical and spiritual properties. The show often suggested that both science and faith have their limitations, and that a combination of the two may be necessary to fully understand the world around us.
• The human condition: Finally, “Lost” was deeply interested in exploring what it means to be human. The show frequently delved into questions of morality, mortality, and the nature of existence. The characters on the island were often forced to confront their own flaws and weaknesses, and the show suggested that it is through our struggles and hardships that we grow and develop as people.

“Lost” was a groundbreaking show in many ways, and its impact on TV and pop culture cannot be overstated. Here are some of the most significant ways in which the show has influenced the media landscape:

• Pioneered serialized storytelling: “Lost” was one of the first shows to fully embrace serialized storytelling, with each episode building on the last to create a complex and interconnected narrative. This approach paved the way for other serialized dramas like “Breaking Bad,” “Game of Thrones,” and “Stranger Things,” which have since become some of the most popular shows on TV.
• Created a rabid fanbase: “Lost” inspired a passionate and dedicated fanbase that dissected every detail of the show and developed elaborate theories about its mysteries. This fan culture helped to create a sense of community around the show and made it a cultural phenomenon.
• Raised the bar for TV production values: “Lost” was one of the most expensive shows of its time, with elaborate sets, stunning visual effects, and a large ensemble cast. The show’s success demonstrated that TV could be just as visually impressive and ambitious as movies, and paved the way for other high-budget shows like “Game of Thrones.”
• Influenced storytelling across media: The impact of “Lost” was not limited to TV. The show’s serialized format and use of flashbacks and flash-forwards have influenced storytelling in other media, including video games, comics, and novels.

Overall, “Lost” was a groundbreaking show that pushed the boundaries of what TV could do. Its legacy can be seen in the many complex, serialized dramas that have followed in its wake, and its impact on pop culture will be felt for many years to come.

“Lost” was a highly ambitious and complex show that captivated audiences with its mysteries, characters, and themes. From its groundbreaking use of serialized storytelling to its exploration of weighty philosophical and existential questions, the show set a new standard for what TV could achieve. Despite its divisive ending and unanswered questions, “Lost” remains a beloved and influential show that continues to inspire and fascinate viewers to this day.

Whether you’re a diehard fan or a curious newcomer, delving into the world of “Lost” is a journey well worth taking. By analyzing the show’s mysteries and themes, exploring its memorable characters, and understanding its legacy, you can gain a deeper appreciation for this groundbreaking and unforgettable show. So, whether you’re watching for the first time or revisiting the Island, get ready to be lost in the world of “Lost” once again.

Hi, I’m William Jones, the administrator of the exciting website explainedthis.com, which offers movie, music, and book reviews. With a deep passion for entertainment, I created this platform to provide a trusted source of information for fellow enthusiasts who want to stay up-to-date on the latest releases and trends.

I take great pride in my team of reviewers to provide high quality content that is informative and entertaining. Each review is thoroughly researched and written to ensure readers have a complete understanding of the subject matter.

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Lost: why desmond had time travel powers.

In ABC's Lost show, Henry Ian Cusick's Desmond Hume possessed unique time travel abilities. Here's where they came from (and why only he had them).

In ABC’s Lost show, Desmond Hume (Henry Ian Cusick) possessed unique time travel abilities. Despite not being one of the Flight 815 passengers, Desmond turned out to be one of the show’s most important characters. Much of his significance to Lost’s story can be attributed to his ability to travel to different time periods.

Originally, time travel was one genre that had no role to play in Lost . However, that began to change when Desmond became a main character. In a season 3 episode, Lost moved in a brand-new direction by implying that Desmond remembered being on the island during his 1996 flashback story. Of course, that seemed impossible since he hadn’t arrived on the island at that point. Then in season 4, Lost took things to the next level by putting Desmond’s consciousness in the body of his 1996 self in the critically-acclaimed episode, “The Constant”. Desmond’s discovery of time travel paved the way for the main characters’ own experience with the concept in Lost season 5 when the island became displaced in time.

Related: Lost: Why Walt Was So Important (& Why The Show Dropped Him)

Desmond being such a special case among the show’s cast of characters can be attributed to the events of the season 2 finale. When Locke and Desmond stopped Charlie and Mr. Eko from pressing the button in the Dharma facility , it triggered a massive release of electromagnetic energy. Preventing its release turned out to be the purpose of the Hatch and the numbers that had to be entered into the computer. To reverse their mistake, Desmond activated a failsafe to undo the process, and seemingly sacrificed himself to save everyone else. Having been so close to the explosion that destroyed the Hatch, Desmond was exposed to a tremendous amount of electromagnetic energy. Though he didn’t know it at the time, this event set in motion his biggest Lost stories.

This moment was responsible for his premonitions of the future. Presumably, the visions in Lost season 3 were a result of Desmond’s mind being briefly sent forward in time, allowing a peek at events that had yet to happen. But most importantly, the electromagnetic radiation his body took in was the primary cause for the temporal displacement that Desmond occasionally suffered from in the series. His body never left his place in the timestream, but his consciousness was able to move to different points in his own timeline. In order to survive (and end) this phenomenon, he had to find a “ constant ” in his life that existed at both times in his life – Penny.

Characters such as Daniel Faraday and Charles Widmore understood how truly special Desmond was. Because of everything that happened to him, he had developed an astounding resistance to electromagnetic radiation, which was why he was used by the villains to find the Source. These unique properties possessed by Desmond effectively made him the key to Jack reaching the Source, the character getting to the afterlife, and in turn,  Lost’s ending  in general.

More: Lost: Why Ian Somerhalder's Boone Was The First Major Character To Die

Lost's Time Travel Theories Start To Become Clear

But the biggest revelation may be that we finally learned why the time-travel flashes are occurring more often and with more vigor. It turns out Faraday was dead-on with his skipping-record analogy. Somehow, that donkey wheel controls what we believe is a pocket of exotic matter that's stored behind/underneath/inside the Orchid Station. Somehow, the wheel was knocked off its axis (maybe when Ben turned it?) and is now skipping--like a scratched record that can't get back in its groove. And every time it skips, it releases just enough of this powerful stuff to disrupt the space-time continuum.

But before you start playing Geronimo Jackson records backward to look for the hidden messages that reveal the secrets of Lost , let us break a few things down for you.

Moving the Island vs. Moving Through Time

We know that when Ben first cranked that donkey wheel, the island moved. There are a few different opinions on how time travel can occur. PM has spoken to two physicists who have different ideas about what might have happened. The first is that when the island disappeared, it moved through a wormhole to another place in space and time. We know this because Halliwax/Candle/Chang told us that the exotic matter's strange energy properties can create a Casimir effect, which in principal could open and stabilize a wormhole between two points in space and time. Therefore, the island just traveled through it, and moved to a different point in space-time.

The second theory is that the island is connected to the South Pacific by a wormhole-like warp in space-time. To move the island, all someone would have to do is move the wormhole connection, not the island itself. Under this theory, the island didn't disappear; it didn't even move. When we spoke to University of CaliforniaÐBerkeley physicist and rabid Lost fan Richard Muller last season , he put it this way: "Imagine that you are visiting a small town that you used to visit when you were young. You drive for miles, and never come to it. But it turns out the town has not moved. Rather, the highway now goes around it. That's what Ben did--he changed the highway." Either way, this would explain what we were seeing in the previews for next week's episode with Mrs. Hawking's map-and-pendulum rig.

So Ben turned the donkey wheel, the island is "moved," but the flashes are still happening--and not everyone on the island is affected, only our castaways and their crew. That's because it's now just those guys moving through time--not the island itself. Both Faraday ("Either we're moving, or the island is") and Alpert ("I'm not going anywhere, John, you are") have hinted at as much. Instead of connecting two different points in space and time, we believe that the wormhole is now only connecting points in time. According to our experts, however, the equations that indicate time travel is theoretically possible don't make a distinction between space and time. In other words, if the castaways are moving through only time, it's simply because the writers want them to, not because the equations support it. But producers Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse have never promised an entirely scientific explanation for the happenings on the island.

Who's Your Daddy?

We learned last night that Charlotte was born on the island, and that she has a memory of a "crazy old man" telling her she can never return to the island or she'll die. She's sure that "crazy old man" was Faraday--and we're pretty sure that when she blurted out "Don't bring her back here! This place is death!" she wasn't talking to Jin, but rather experiencing that memory.

There are a couple of schools of thought on what effects time travel would have on the universe. Some theories suggest that as you travel back in time and change the past, that alternate past exists in another universe. In this case, if you can meet yourself in the past, you'll never remember it. Time then can fork like this continuously.

But what we see on Lost is different--people are able to travel back in time and influence the future. This opens up the grandfather paradox: A time traveler who goes back into the past and kills his grandfather before his mother is conceived, which negates his own birth. This--bear with us here--would cause him not to not travel back in time in the first place. So his grandfather wouldn't be killed at his hand and the time traveler would be born--and could potentially travel back in time and kill his grandfather. Therein lies the paradox.

One Russian scientist, Igor Novikov, believes that you can only influence the past if it doesn't create a paradox. His self-consistency principle states that the probability of an event happening that could change the future is zero; therefore, the universe will keep a time traveler from altering the past to change the future. But even though Faraday knows that according to this rule, he can't change the past to save Charlotte, it doesn't mean he won't try.

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J.J. Abrams was everywhere in the early 2000s, but the project that put him on the cinematic map was Lost . As co-creator with Carlton Cuse and Damon Lindelof, they created one of the most memorable serialized TV shows of all time, depending on who you ask. Lost frequently finds itself at the top of both lists of the best and worst TV shows of all time, dividing the fan base evenly. The most divisive part of the entire series was its finale that aired in 2010, because despite answering a great many questions, it failed to answer burning ones fans had since the first season.

The series finale of Lost was a testament to network television, proving that it's possible to give a show about time travel and weird science with a large ensemble cast a proper conclusion. It might not have answered every question fans wanted, but it tied up nearly every character's story nicely and managed to bring back characters from prior seasons as a means to bring it all full circle. Lost is very much the epitome of not being about where people end up but about the friends they make along the way.

RELATED: Why No Other TV Show Can Be Like Lost

There were a lot of curve balls thrown at the audience throughout Lost's tenure. Season five dealt with a lot of time travel that ultimately saw friends turn against each other once everyone returned to the present time period. Sawyer, the smooth-talking confidence man, lost the love of his life Julia after she detonated a hydrogen bomb on the island, sending the small group that was left behind back to the future. The final season simply became a battle between good and evil .

Evil Locke, who the audiences eventually learn is "The Man in Black," one of the original inhabitants of the island, worked his way through different factions of people, manipulating them until he can find his way off the island. This evil Locke was supposed to represent ultimate evil. Desmond Hume, who had been through a lot throughout the series that eventually made him immune to electromagnetic energy, found the heart of the island where a glowing pool with a stone "cork" of sorts rested in the middle. Desmond pulled the cork from the pool, rendering evil Locke mortal.

With him mortal, Jack and Kate were able to fight him and kill him, essentially saving the world. Unfortunately, evil Locke stabbed Jack during the skirmish, but the good doctor had enough energy to convince Kate to get to the plane where other survivors were waiting so he could return the "cork" back to its rightful spot in the heart of the island. He manages to do so while also convincing Hurley to become the new guardian of the island with Ben Linus as his second-in-command. Jack wandered out from the cave to a forest of bamboo trees , which turned out to be the very spot he first woke up when he arrived on the island. He found a good spot to lay down with Vincent, the dog at his side, and die.

Meanwhile, the survivors gathered together at a church in the "Sideways" world. Jack's father, Christian Shepherd, meets them and explains that they collectively created this world as a place to meet when they died but before they traveled on to their final resting place. They created the "Sideways" world because the most important time of their life was the period of time they shared together.

The most widespread theory on Lost , next to dinosaurs roaming the island , was that all of the characters were dead the whole time, living in some sort of purgatory. The official finale didn't help matters as it led to those who didn't watch the show believing that that theory was proven right when it couldn't have been further from the truth. Did all the characters exist within purgatory on the show? At one point, yes. However, everything that happened in the series also actually happened to the characters. They didn't die in the plane crash.

There was some confusion in the finale besides everyone meeting in the afterlife. When the finale aired, the final credits rolled over silent footage of the Oceanic 815 wreckage, leading many to believe that the writers and Showrunners were telling them that the characters they fell in love with were dead the whole time. It was a simple misunderstanding because the footage was intended to be a tribute to the crew and the experience in making Lost . It was nothing more than that.

Each season featured a unique storytelling device. The first three seasons used flashbacks to delve further into each character's backstory. This allowed the audience to get to know the characters and understand their motivations. It also showed the events that lead to them each getting on Oceanic Flight 815 in Australia. At the end of season three and until season six, the series transitioned to flashforwards, which revealed what some of the characters were up to after they left the island. Some characters were still trapped on the island, thus they didn't receive any flashforward scenes.

The final season did something new. They kept the storytelling device, but instead of seeing the past or the future, the audience got to see every character experience a new life. This was jarring and discombobulating at first, especially because it presented a life where Oceanic 815 never crashed. Sawyer and Miles became cops, Locke and Linus were teachers, and Jack was a father in the Sideways world. This was a place each of the survivors' collective conscience created to go when they died. It was where they went to meet up before they ventured into the afterlife. They only accomplished this because everything that happened prior to the finale episode happened. They were never in purgatory for the whole series .

Lost was about a great many things. On the surface it was about a group of airline passengers who survived a crash on an island. They learned to work together despite different belief systems, upbringings, language barriers, and professions in order to survive the many challenges the island threw at them, including another group of people already living on the island and a giant smoke monster that killed seemingly indiscriminately.

Underneath all of that, Lost was a story about love, relationships, religion, philosophy, found family , diversity, good and evil, and ultimately coming together for the greater good. The series had a large, diverse cast that allowed the writers to show their audience a wide array of stories, but at the very core it was about relationships. Jin and Sun showed the audience what undying love looked like, probably showing the truest form of love. Sawyer, while incredibly unlikable at first, turned his whole life around on the island and forged a strong friendship with many of the characters, especially Jack, which nobody thought would happen.

Sawyer redeemed himself further when he became the de facto leader of those who stayed on the island and traveled to the '70s, where they became members of the Dharma Initiative . During his time there, he formed a relationship with Julia that rivaled the love Jin and Sun shared with each other. When Julia died, the audience felt Sawyer's pain.

MORE: High Concept And Low Concept Science Fiction, Explained

Time travel: Is it possible?

Science says time travel is possible, but probably not in the way you're thinking.

Albert Einstein's theory

• General relativity and GPS
• Wormhole travel
• Alternate theories

Science fiction

Is time travel possible? Short answer: Yes, and you're doing it right now — hurtling into the future at the impressive rate of one second per second. 

You're pretty much always moving through time at the same speed, whether you're watching paint dry or wishing you had more hours to visit with a friend from out of town. 

But this isn't the kind of time travel that's captivated countless science fiction writers, or spurred a genre so extensive that Wikipedia lists over 400 titles in the category "Movies about Time Travel." In franchises like " Doctor Who ," " Star Trek ," and "Back to the Future" characters climb into some wild vehicle to blast into the past or spin into the future. Once the characters have traveled through time, they grapple with what happens if you change the past or present based on information from the future (which is where time travel stories intersect with the idea of parallel universes or alternate timelines). 

Related: The best sci-fi time machines ever

Although many people are fascinated by the idea of changing the past or seeing the future before it's due, no person has ever demonstrated the kind of back-and-forth time travel seen in science fiction or proposed a method of sending a person through significant periods of time that wouldn't destroy them on the way. And, as physicist Stephen Hawking pointed out in his book " Black Holes and Baby Universes" (Bantam, 1994), "The best evidence we have that time travel is not possible, and never will be, is that we have not been invaded by hordes of tourists from the future."

Science does support some amount of time-bending, though. For example, physicist Albert Einstein 's theory of special relativity proposes that time is an illusion that moves relative to an observer. An observer traveling near the speed of light will experience time, with all its aftereffects (boredom, aging, etc.) much more slowly than an observer at rest. That's why astronaut Scott Kelly aged ever so slightly less over the course of a year in orbit than his twin brother who stayed here on Earth. 

Related: Controversially, physicist argues that time is real

There are other scientific theories about time travel, including some weird physics that arise around wormholes , black holes and string theory . For the most part, though, time travel remains the domain of an ever-growing array of science fiction books, movies, television shows, comics, video games and more. 

Einstein developed his theory of special relativity in 1905. Along with his later expansion, the theory of general relativity , it has become one of the foundational tenets of modern physics. Special relativity describes the relationship between space and time for objects moving at constant speeds in a straight line. 

The short version of the theory is deceptively simple. First, all things are measured in relation to something else — that is to say, there is no "absolute" frame of reference. Second, the speed of light is constant. It stays the same no matter what, and no matter where it's measured from. And third, nothing can go faster than the speed of light.

From those simple tenets unfolds actual, real-life time travel. An observer traveling at high velocity will experience time at a slower rate than an observer who isn't speeding through space. 

While we don't accelerate humans to near-light-speed, we do send them swinging around the planet at 17,500 mph (28,160 km/h) aboard the International Space Station . Astronaut Scott Kelly was born after his twin brother, and fellow astronaut, Mark Kelly . Scott Kelly spent 520 days in orbit, while Mark logged 54 days in space. The difference in the speed at which they experienced time over the course of their lifetimes has actually widened the age gap between the two men.

"So, where[as] I used to be just 6 minutes older, now I am 6 minutes and 5 milliseconds older," Mark Kelly said in a panel discussion on July 12, 2020, Space.com previously reported . "Now I've got that over his head."

General relativity and GPS time travel

The difference that low earth orbit makes in an astronaut's life span may be negligible — better suited for jokes among siblings than actual life extension or visiting the distant future — but the dilation in time between people on Earth and GPS satellites flying through space does make a difference. 

Read more: Can we stop time?

The Global Positioning System , or GPS, helps us know exactly where we are by communicating with a network of a few dozen satellites positioned in a high Earth orbit. The satellites circle the planet from 12,500 miles (20,100 kilometers) away, moving at 8,700 mph (14,000 km/h). 

According to special relativity, the faster an object moves relative to another object, the slower that first object experiences time. For GPS satellites with atomic clocks, this effect cuts 7 microseconds, or 7 millionths of a second, off each day, according to the American Physical Society publication Physics Central .  

Read more: Could Star Trek's faster-than-light warp drive actually work?

Then, according to general relativity, clocks closer to the center of a large gravitational mass like Earth tick more slowly than those farther away. So, because the GPS satellites are much farther from the center of Earth compared to clocks on the surface, Physics Central added, that adds another 45 microseconds onto the GPS satellite clocks each day. Combined with the negative 7 microseconds from the special relativity calculation, the net result is an added 38 microseconds. 

This means that in order to maintain the accuracy needed to pinpoint your car or phone — or, since the system is run by the U.S. Department of Defense, a military drone — engineers must account for an extra 38 microseconds in each satellite's day. The atomic clocks onboard don’t tick over to the next day until they have run 38 microseconds longer than comparable clocks on Earth.

Given those numbers, it would take more than seven years for the atomic clock in a GPS satellite to un-sync itself from an Earth clock by more than a blink of an eye. (We did the math: If you estimate a blink to last at least 100,000 microseconds, as the Harvard Database of Useful Biological Numbers does, it would take thousands of days for those 38 microsecond shifts to add up.) 

This kind of time travel may seem as negligible as the Kelly brothers' age gap, but given the hyper-accuracy of modern GPS technology, it actually does matter. If it can communicate with the satellites whizzing overhead, your phone can nail down your location in space and time with incredible accuracy. 

Can wormholes take us back in time?

General relativity might also provide scenarios that could allow travelers to go back in time, according to NASA . But the physical reality of those time-travel methods is no piece of cake. 

Wormholes are theoretical "tunnels" through the fabric of space-time that could connect different moments or locations in reality to others. Also known as Einstein-Rosen bridges or white holes, as opposed to black holes, speculation about wormholes abounds. But despite taking up a lot of space (or space-time) in science fiction, no wormholes of any kind have been identified in real life. 

Related: Best time travel movies

"The whole thing is very hypothetical at this point," Stephen Hsu, a professor of theoretical physics at the University of Oregon, told Space.com sister site Live Science . "No one thinks we're going to find a wormhole anytime soon."

Primordial wormholes are predicted to be just 10^-34 inches (10^-33 centimeters) at the tunnel's "mouth". Previously, they were expected to be too unstable for anything to be able to travel through them. However, a study claims that this is not the case, Live Science reported . 

The theory, which suggests that wormholes could work as viable space-time shortcuts, was described by physicist Pascal Koiran. As part of the study, Koiran used the Eddington-Finkelstein metric, as opposed to the Schwarzschild metric which has been used in the majority of previous analyses.

In the past, the path of a particle could not be traced through a hypothetical wormhole. However, using the Eddington-Finkelstein metric, the physicist was able to achieve just that.

Koiran's paper was described in October 2021, in the preprint database arXiv , before being published in the Journal of Modern Physics D.

Alternate time travel theories

While Einstein's theories appear to make time travel difficult, some researchers have proposed other solutions that could allow jumps back and forth in time. These alternate theories share one major flaw: As far as scientists can tell, there's no way a person could survive the kind of gravitational pulling and pushing that each solution requires.

Infinite cylinder theory

Astronomer Frank Tipler proposed a mechanism (sometimes known as a Tipler Cylinder ) where one could take matter that is 10 times the sun's mass, then roll it into a very long, but very dense cylinder. The Anderson Institute , a time travel research organization, described the cylinder as "a black hole that has passed through a spaghetti factory."

After spinning this black hole spaghetti a few billion revolutions per minute, a spaceship nearby — following a very precise spiral around the cylinder — could travel backward in time on a "closed, time-like curve," according to the Anderson Institute. 

The major problem is that in order for the Tipler Cylinder to become reality, the cylinder would need to be infinitely long or be made of some unknown kind of matter. At least for the foreseeable future, endless interstellar pasta is beyond our reach.

Time donuts

Theoretical physicist Amos Ori at the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology in Haifa, Israel, proposed a model for a time machine made out of curved space-time — a donut-shaped vacuum surrounded by a sphere of normal matter.

"The machine is space-time itself," Ori told Live Science . "If we were to create an area with a warp like this in space that would enable time lines to close on themselves, it might enable future generations to return to visit our time."

Amos Ori is a theoretical physicist at the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology in Haifa, Israel. His research interests and publications span the fields of general relativity, black holes, gravitational waves and closed time lines.

There are a few caveats to Ori's time machine. First, visitors to the past wouldn't be able to travel to times earlier than the invention and construction of the time donut. Second, and more importantly, the invention and construction of this machine would depend on our ability to manipulate gravitational fields at will — a feat that may be theoretically possible but is certainly beyond our immediate reach.

Time travel has long occupied a significant place in fiction. Since as early as the "Mahabharata," an ancient Sanskrit epic poem compiled around 400 B.C., humans have dreamed of warping time, Lisa Yaszek, a professor of science fiction studies at the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta, told Live Science .  

Every work of time-travel fiction creates its own version of space-time, glossing over one or more scientific hurdles and paradoxes to achieve its plot requirements. 

Some make a nod to research and physics, like " Interstellar ," a 2014 film directed by Christopher Nolan. In the movie, a character played by Matthew McConaughey spends a few hours on a planet orbiting a supermassive black hole, but because of time dilation, observers on Earth experience those hours as a matter of decades. 

Others take a more whimsical approach, like the "Doctor Who" television series. The series features the Doctor, an extraterrestrial "Time Lord" who travels in a spaceship resembling a blue British police box. "People assume," the Doctor explained in the show, "that time is a strict progression from cause to effect, but actually from a non-linear, non-subjective viewpoint, it's more like a big ball of wibbly-wobbly, timey-wimey stuff." 

Long-standing franchises like the "Star Trek" movies and television series, as well as comic universes like DC and Marvel Comics, revisit the idea of time travel over and over. 

Related: Marvel movies in order: chronological & release order

Here is an incomplete (and deeply subjective) list of some influential or notable works of time travel fiction:

Books about time travel:

• Rip Van Winkle (Cornelius S. Van Winkle, 1819) by Washington Irving
• A Christmas Carol (Chapman & Hall, 1843) by Charles Dickens
• The Time Machine (William Heinemann, 1895) by H. G. Wells
• A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court (Charles L. Webster and Co., 1889) by Mark Twain
• The Restaurant at the End of the Universe (Pan Books, 1980) by Douglas Adams
• A Tale of Time City (Methuen, 1987) by Diana Wynn Jones
• The Outlander series (Delacorte Press, 1991-present) by Diana Gabaldon
• Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (Bloomsbury/Scholastic, 1999) by J. K. Rowling
• Thief of Time (Doubleday, 2001) by Terry Pratchett
• The Time Traveler's Wife (MacAdam/Cage, 2003) by Audrey Niffenegger
• All You Need is Kill (Shueisha, 2004) by Hiroshi Sakurazaka

Movies about time travel:

• Planet of the Apes (1968)
• Superman (1978)
• Time Bandits (1981)
• The Terminator (1984)
• Back to the Future series (1985, 1989, 1990)
• Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home (1986)
• Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure (1989)
• Groundhog Day (1993)
• Galaxy Quest (1999)
• The Butterfly Effect (2004)
• 13 Going on 30 (2004)
• The Lake House (2006)
• Meet the Robinsons (2007)
• Hot Tub Time Machine (2010)
• Midnight in Paris (2011)
• Looper (2012)
• X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014)
• Edge of Tomorrow (2014)
• Interstellar (2014)
• Doctor Strange (2016)
• A Wrinkle in Time (2018)
• The Last Sharknado: It's About Time (2018)
• Avengers: Endgame (2019)
• Tenet (2020)
• Palm Springs (2020)
• Zach Snyder's Justice League (2021)
• The Tomorrow War (2021)

Television about time travel:

• Doctor Who (1963-present)
• The Twilight Zone (1959-1964) (multiple episodes)
• Star Trek (multiple series, multiple episodes)
• Samurai Jack (2001-2004)
• Lost (2004-2010)
• Phil of the Future (2004-2006)
• Steins;Gate (2011)
• Outlander (2014-2023)
• Loki (2021-present)

Games about time travel:

• Chrono Trigger (1995)
• TimeSplitters (2000-2005)
• Kingdom Hearts (2002-2019)
• Prince of Persia: Sands of Time (2003)
• God of War II (2007)
• Ratchet and Clank Future: A Crack In Time (2009)
• Sly Cooper: Thieves in Time (2013)
• Dishonored 2 (2016)
• Titanfall 2 (2016)
• Outer Wilds (2019)

Additional resources

Explore physicist Peter Millington's thoughts about Stephen Hawking's time travel theories at The Conversation . Check out a kid-friendly explanation of real-world time travel from NASA's Space Place . For an overview of time travel in fiction and the collective consciousness, read " Time Travel: A History " (Pantheon, 2016) by James Gleik. 

Join our Space Forums to keep talking space on the latest missions, night sky and more! And if you have a news tip, correction or comment, let us know at: [email protected].

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Ailsa is a staff writer for How It Works magazine, where she writes science, technology, space, history and environment features. Based in the U.K., she graduated from the University of Stirling with a BA (Hons) journalism degree. Previously, Ailsa has written for Cardiff Times magazine, Psychology Now and numerous science bookazines. 

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Is Time Travel Possible?

We all travel in time! We travel one year in time between birthdays, for example. And we are all traveling in time at approximately the same speed: 1 second per second.

We typically experience time at one second per second. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

NASA's space telescopes also give us a way to look back in time. Telescopes help us see stars and galaxies that are very far away . It takes a long time for the light from faraway galaxies to reach us. So, when we look into the sky with a telescope, we are seeing what those stars and galaxies looked like a very long time ago.

However, when we think of the phrase "time travel," we are usually thinking of traveling faster than 1 second per second. That kind of time travel sounds like something you'd only see in movies or science fiction books. Could it be real? Science says yes!

This image from the Hubble Space Telescope shows galaxies that are very far away as they existed a very long time ago. Credit: NASA, ESA and R. Thompson (Univ. Arizona)

How do we know that time travel is possible?

More than 100 years ago, a famous scientist named Albert Einstein came up with an idea about how time works. He called it relativity. This theory says that time and space are linked together. Einstein also said our universe has a speed limit: nothing can travel faster than the speed of light (186,000 miles per second).

Einstein's theory of relativity says that space and time are linked together. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

What does this mean for time travel? Well, according to this theory, the faster you travel, the slower you experience time. Scientists have done some experiments to show that this is true.

For example, there was an experiment that used two clocks set to the exact same time. One clock stayed on Earth, while the other flew in an airplane (going in the same direction Earth rotates).

After the airplane flew around the world, scientists compared the two clocks. The clock on the fast-moving airplane was slightly behind the clock on the ground. So, the clock on the airplane was traveling slightly slower in time than 1 second per second.

Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

Can we use time travel in everyday life?

We can't use a time machine to travel hundreds of years into the past or future. That kind of time travel only happens in books and movies. But the math of time travel does affect the things we use every day.

For example, we use GPS satellites to help us figure out how to get to new places. (Check out our video about how GPS satellites work .) NASA scientists also use a high-accuracy version of GPS to keep track of where satellites are in space. But did you know that GPS relies on time-travel calculations to help you get around town?

GPS satellites orbit around Earth very quickly at about 8,700 miles (14,000 kilometers) per hour. This slows down GPS satellite clocks by a small fraction of a second (similar to the airplane example above).

GPS satellites orbit around Earth at about 8,700 miles (14,000 kilometers) per hour. Credit: GPS.gov

However, the satellites are also orbiting Earth about 12,550 miles (20,200 km) above the surface. This actually speeds up GPS satellite clocks by a slighter larger fraction of a second.

Here's how: Einstein's theory also says that gravity curves space and time, causing the passage of time to slow down. High up where the satellites orbit, Earth's gravity is much weaker. This causes the clocks on GPS satellites to run faster than clocks on the ground.

The combined result is that the clocks on GPS satellites experience time at a rate slightly faster than 1 second per second. Luckily, scientists can use math to correct these differences in time.

If scientists didn't correct the GPS clocks, there would be big problems. GPS satellites wouldn't be able to correctly calculate their position or yours. The errors would add up to a few miles each day, which is a big deal. GPS maps might think your home is nowhere near where it actually is!

In Summary:

Yes, time travel is indeed a real thing. But it's not quite what you've probably seen in the movies. Under certain conditions, it is possible to experience time passing at a different rate than 1 second per second. And there are important reasons why we need to understand this real-world form of time travel.

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Biden-Harris Administration Announces Final Rule Requiring Automatic Refunds of Airline Tickets and Ancillary Service Fees

Rule makes it easy to get money back for cancelled or significantly changed flights, significantly delayed checked bags, and additional services not provided  

WASHINGTON – The Biden-Harris Administration today announced that the U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) has issued a final rule that requires airlines to promptly provide passengers with automatic cash refunds when owed. The new rule makes it easy for passengers to obtain refunds when airlines cancel or significantly change their flights, significantly delay their checked bags, or fail to provide the extra services they purchased.

“Passengers deserve to get their money back when an airline owes them - without headaches or haggling,” said U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg . “Our new rule sets a new standard to require airlines to promptly provide cash refunds to their passengers.”  

The final rule creates certainty for consumers by defining the specific circumstances in which airlines must provide refunds. Prior to this rule, airlines were permitted to set their own standards for what kind of flight changes warranted a refund. As a result, refund policies differed from airline to airline, which made it difficult for passengers to know or assert their refund rights. DOT also received complaints of some airlines revising and applying less consumer-friendly refund policies during spikes in flight cancellations and changes. 

Under the rule, passengers are entitled to a refund for:

• Canceled or significantly changed flights: Passengers will be entitled to a refund if their flight is canceled or significantly changed, and they do not accept alternative transportation or travel credits offered. For the first time, the rule defines “significant change.” Significant changes to a flight include departure or arrival times that are more than 3 hours domestically and 6 hours internationally; departures or arrivals from a different airport; increases in the number of connections; instances where passengers are downgraded to a lower class of service; or connections at different airports or flights on different planes that are less accessible or accommodating to a person with a disability.  
• Significantly delayed baggage return: Passengers who file a mishandled baggage report will be entitled to a refund of their checked bag fee if it is not delivered within 12 hours of their domestic flight arriving at the gate, or 15-30 hours of their international flight arriving at the gate, depending on the length of the flight.  
• Extra services not provided: Passengers will be entitled to a refund for the fee they paid for an extra service — such as Wi-Fi, seat selection, or inflight entertainment — if an airline fails to provide this service.

DOT’s final rule also makes it simple and straightforward for passengers to receive the money they are owed. Without this rule, consumers have to navigate a patchwork of cumbersome processes to request and receive a refund — searching through airline websites to figure out how make the request, filling out extra “digital paperwork,” or at times waiting for hours on the phone. In addition, passengers would receive a travel credit or voucher by default from some airlines instead of getting their money back, so they could not use their refund to rebook on another airline when their flight was changed or cancelled without navigating a cumbersome request process.  

The final rule improves the passenger experience by requiring refunds to be:

• Automatic: Airlines must automatically issue refunds without passengers having to explicitly request them or jump through hoops.   
• Prompt: Airlines and ticket agents must issue refunds within seven business days of refunds becoming due for credit card purchases and 20 calendar days for other payment methods.  
• Cash or original form of payment: Airlines and ticket agents must provide refunds in cash or whatever original payment method the individual used to make the purchase, such as credit card or airline miles. Airlines may not substitute vouchers, travel credits, or other forms of compensation unless the passenger affirmatively chooses to accept alternative compensation.    
• Full amount: Airlines and ticket agents must provide full refunds of the ticket purchase price, minus the value of any portion of transportation already used. The refunds must include all government-imposed taxes and fees and airline-imposed fees, regardless of whether the taxes or fees are refundable to airlines.

The final rule also requires airlines to provide prompt notifications to consumers affected by a cancelled or significantly changed flight of their right to a refund of the ticket and extra service fees, as well as any related policies.

In addition, in instances where consumers are restricted by a government or advised by a medical professional not to travel to, from, or within the United States due to a serious communicable disease, the final rule requires that airlines must provide travel credits or vouchers. Consumers may be required to provide documentary evidence to support their request. Travel vouchers or credits provided by airlines must be transferrable and valid for at least five years from the date of issuance.

The Department received a significant number of complaints against airlines and ticket agents for refusing to provide a refund or for delaying processing of refunds during and after the COVID-19 pandemic. At the height of the pandemic in 2020, refund complaints peaked at 87 percent of all air travel service complaints received by DOT. Refund problems continue to make up a substantial share of the complaints that DOT receives.

DOT’s Historic Record of Consumer Protection Under the Biden-Harris Administration

Under the Biden-Harris Administration and Secretary Buttigieg, DOT has advanced the largest expansion of airline passenger rights, issued the biggest fines against airlines for failing consumers, and returned more money to passengers in refunds and reimbursements than ever before in the Department’s history.

• Thanks to pressure from Secretary Buttigieg and DOT’s flightrights.gov dashboard, all 10 major U.S. airlines guarantee free rebooking and meals, and nine guarantee hotel accommodations when an airline issue causes a significant delay or cancellation. These are new commitments the airlines added to their customer service plans that DOT can legally ensure they adhere to and are displayed on flightrights.gov .  
• Since President Biden took office, DOT has helped return more than $3 billion in refunds and reimbursements owed to airline passengers – including over $600 million to passengers affected by the Southwest Airlines holiday meltdown in 2022.   
• Under Secretary Buttigieg, DOT has issued over $164 million in penalties against airlines for consumer protection violations. Between 1996 and 2020, DOT collectively issued less than $71 million in penalties against airlines for consumer protection violations.  
• DOT recently launched a new partnership with a bipartisan group of state attorneys general to fast-track the review of consumer complaints, hold airlines accountable, and protect the rights of the traveling public.  
• In 2023, the flight cancellation rate in the U.S. was a record low at under 1.2% — the lowest rate of flight cancellations in over 10 years despite a record amount of air travel.  
• DOT is undertaking its first ever industry-wide review of airline privacy practices and its first review of airline loyalty programs.

In addition to finalizing the rules to require automatic refunds and protect against surprise fees, DOT is also pursuing rulemakings that would:

• Propose to ban family seating junk fees and guarantee that parents can sit with their children for no extra charge when they fly. Before President Biden and Secretary Buttigieg pressed airlines last year, no airline committed to guaranteeing fee-free family seating. Now, four airlines guarantee fee-free family seating, and the Department is working on its family seating junk fee ban proposal.  
• Propose to make passenger compensation and amenities mandatory so that travelers are taken care of when airlines cause flight delays or cancellations.   
• Expand the rights for passengers who use wheelchairs and ensure that they can travel safely and with dignity . The comment period on this proposed rule closes on May 13, 2024.

The final rule on refunds can be found at https://www.transportation.gov/airconsumer/latest-news and at regulations.gov , docket number DOT-OST-2022-0089. There are different implementation periods in this final rule ranging from six months for airlines to provide automatic refunds when owed to 12 months for airlines to provide transferable travel vouchers or credits when consumers are unable to travel for reasons related to a serious communicable disease. 

Information about airline passenger rights, as well as DOT’s rules, guidance and orders, can be found at   https://www.transportation.gov/airconsumer .