It has been nearly twelve years since "LOST" went off the air. After my recent re-watch of it, I realized that I had missed numerous plot points from the series' narratives. And to my embarrassment, I also discovered that like many of the series' other fans, I had made a big mistake regarding two characters - Dr. Juliet Burke and Dr. Jack Shephard. And this mistake had stemmed from the series' Season five finale, (5.16-5.17) "The Incident" and the Season Six premiere, (6.01-6.02) "LAX".
Season Five proved to be very chaotic. Several people from the mysterious island in the South Pacific had managed to escape, including five survivors of the Oceanic Airlines Flight 815 - Jack Shephard, Kate Austen, Sayid Jarrah, Sun Kwon and Hugo "Hurley" Reyes - and an infant born from another survivor - one Aaron Littleton. They were known as the Oceanic Six. Other Oceanic 815 survivors and other inhabitants remained on the island and forced to spend several days skipping through time due to some supernatural (or scientific) anomaly. When one of the survivors, John Locke, turned a special wheel and disappeared from the island, those remained behind ended up in 1974. One of them died, Dr. Charlotte Lewis, had died from the trauma of time travel. Within a day or two five of them - James "Sawyer" Ford, Jin Kwon, Juliet Burke, Miles Straume, and Dr. Daniel Faraday joined a scientific research organization on the island called the Dharma Initiative under false pretenses. Nearly three years later, five members of the Oceanic Six returned to the island. Aaron Littleton remained behind with his Australian grandmother, Carole Littleton. Four of those survivors - Shephard, Austen, Jarrah and Reyes - ended up in 1977. With the help of James and Juliet, they also joined the Dharma Initiative. Sometime during those three years, Daniel became a DHARMA scientist and ended up at the organization's headquarters in Ann Arbor, Michigan.
While in Ann Arbor, Daniel learned about DHARMA scientist Dr. Stuart Radzinsky's plan to drill the island in order to reach its unstable electromagnetic energy and create a station (the future Swan Station) around the drill site to "utilize it". Daniel regarded Radinzky's plans as dangerous. He also came up with a plan to stop Radzinsky's drilling project, prevent the construction of the Swan Station, and change the timeline and ensure that no one would have to push a button inside the station to save the world and prevent Oceanic 815's September 2004 crash on the island. That plan also involved finding the U.S. Army’s hydrogen bomb - "Jughead" found by the Others in the 1950s - and dropping it on Radzinsky's drilling site in order to destroy the island's electromagnetic energy.
Following his return to the island, Daniel presented his plan to his fellow time travelers to stop the impending disaster. Only two had agreed to help him - Jack and Kate Austen. Jack wanted to erase the three years he had known Kate following the end of their relationship. Kate reluctantly assisted them - out of a desire to convince Jack to stop this plan. The DHARMA security team eventually learned that James, Juliet, Miles and Jin had been lying to them for the past three years and regarded them as spies for the Others', the island's regular inhabitants. James and Juliet made a deal with Radzinsky and DHARMA leader Horace Goodspeed to leave the island via their submarine. The Others' leader - Eloise Hawking - erroneously viewed Daniel as a threat when he approached their camp with a gun and shot him dead.
However, Jack managed to convince Eloise to continue with Daniel's plan. Sayid Jarrah had also traveled to past, but was mistaken by DHARMA as one of the "Hostiles" (the Others). After his failed attempt to change the past by killing the 14-year-old Ben Linus, he joined Jack in continuing Daniel's plans. He also wanted to prevent his experiences of the past three years - the island, meeting Shannon Rutherford, her death, marrying his old love Nadia Abed Jaseem and being Ben Linus' hitman in the latter's war against Charles Widmore. A desperate Kate left them to seek James and Juliet's help in stopping their plan. Sayid got shot by a vengeful Roger Linus, while he and Jack tried to carry the bomb away from the main DHARMA compound. Hurley, Miles and Jin came to their rescue in a DHARMA van and drove them to the drilling site; where Juliet, James and Kate joined them. The Losties' efforts to drop the bomb did stop Radzinsky's drilling, but it also led to Juliet's death during the first few minutes of "LAX".
For some reason many "LOST" fans believed that Jack Shephard was solely responsible for Juliet's death. I am sorry to say that I had been among those fans who shared that opinion. I believe many of us believed that Jack's decision to carry out Daniel's plan to set off Jughead had led to her death. And in a way, it did. James Ford aka Sawyer, who was Juliet's lover, had blamed him in "LAX" when the time traveling castaways ended up in 2007, instead of aboard Oceanic Flight 815 on September 22, 2004. In the Season Six episode, (6.03) "What Kate Did", Sawyer eventually confessed to Kate Austen that he blamed himself for Juliet's death, since he was the one who had convinced her to remain on the island in the Season Five episode, (5.08) "LaFleur". And yet . . . Jack's failure to convince Sawyer not to stop the Man in Black's bomb inside Charles Widmore's submarine in ( 6.14) "The Candidate" made me realize that on another level, Sawyer had continued to blame him for Juliet's death. Throughout most of Season Six, Jack took responsibility for what happened. But was Jack really responsible for Juliet's death? After my recent re-watch of the entire series - especially late Season Five and Season Six - I finally realized that he was not.
There is someone I blame for Juliet's death. To explain, I have to go back to the Season Five premiere, (5.01) "Because You Left". In that episode's opening scene, featured DHARMA scientist Dr. Pierre Chang preparing to film an orientation film for the island's Arrow Station in the late 1970s. Someone informed him of an incident at the Orchid Station where workers had stumbled across an "unlimited" energy source that the organization had been searching for. Chang, along with other DHARMA scientists had hoped this energy source, namely the island's electromagnetic source, would help the organization to manipulate time. Unfortunately, the energy source had killed a worker. This led Dr. Chang to view this energy as very unstable and dangerous. So did the time traveling Daniel Faraday, who had been present at the time.
In a step-by-step analysis, this is what happened:
1. Daniel informed Dr. Chang that he was a time traveler from 30 years in the future. He also warned Chang that drilling the island for the electromagnetic energy would produce a lethal event in the near future and that the DHARMA personnel should be evacuated. Dr. Chang refused to believe him. However, Daniel also informed his fellow time traveling castaways of the same danger. Both Jack and Kate Austen had agreed to help him contact the Others and inform them of this danger.
2. During the journey to the Others' camp, Daniel informed Jack and Kate that his research at Ann Arbor led him to realize that he could use the U.S. Army hydrogen bomb ("Jughead") acquired by the Others in the 1950s and use it to stop Radzinsky's drilling at the Swan Station and destroy the island's electromagnetic energy. Daniel believed this would stop the Swan Station's construction and prevent Oceanic Flight 815 from crashing in September 2004. Unfortunately, the Others' leader Eloise Hawking shot and killed Daniel, when he wandered into the Others' camp, foolishly waving his gun.
3. Charles Widmore and some of the Others captured Jack and Kate. Jack informed Eloise that they, along with Daniel, came from the future. They also revealed DHARMA's dangerous drilling at the Swan Station and Daniel's plans to change the future. When Jack managed to prove to Eloise that Daniel was an adult version of her son, she agreed to help them acquire Jughead. Unfortunately, Kate found the idea of using Jughead crazy and decided to leave. She managed to do so, thanks to Sayid's sudden appearance.
4. While Jack and Sayid, along with Eloise and the ageless Richard Alpert, set out to get "Jughead"; Miles managed to convince Dr. Chang that he was an adult version of his son and that he, along with Hurley Reyes and Jin Kwon, were time travelers. They warned Chang of the dangers involving Radzinsky's drilling. Although Dr. Chang managed to convince DHARMA' leader Horace Goodspeed to evacuate the organization's personnel and inhabitants from the island, an increasingly paranoid and aggressive Stuart Radzinsky assumed control of the DHARMA organization and ordered the former to continue drilling for the island's energy source at the Swan Station.
5. Thanks to a DHARMA security guard named Phil, the organization discovered Sawyer and Juliet's three-year deception. Sawyer made a deal with DHARMA to allow him and Juliet to leave the island permanently aboard a submarine. Before they could leave, Kate managed to worm her way aboard the sub and convinced them to help her stop Jack and Sayid from detonating the "Jughead" bomb. Sawyer was reluctant to do so, but Juliet convinced him to change his mind. Upon reaching the beach, the trio reunited with fellow Oceanic 815 survivors Rose and Bernard Nadler, who had formed their own settlement away from the DHARMA compound for three years. A comment from Rose led Kate to exchange a smile with Sawyer. Juliet noticed.
6. Upon retrieving the "Jughead" bomb, Richard knocked out Eloise in an effort to protect her and informed Jack and Sayid that they were on their own. The pair left the tunnel underneath the DHARMA compound and found the personnel in the middle of an evacuation. Roger Linus spotted them and shot Sayid in the gut in retaliation for the latter's attempt to murder his son, a younger Ben. Hurley, Miles and Jin appeared in a DHARMA van and came to their rescue.
7. Kate, Sawyer and Juliet reunited with Jack and the other Losties near the Swan Station construction site. Sawyer tried to convince Jack to change his mind - first with logic and later with violence. Juliet stopped him. A dying Sayid struggled to set up the bomb to detonate upon impact.
8. Jack and the other time traveling Losties arrived at the construction site, and a massive gunfight followed. Although Jack managed to finally drop the bomb into the site's chasm, it failed to detonate, due to Sayid’s failure to insure it would happen. Matters got worse when Radzinsky’s drilling finally reached the island’s power source. Dr. Chang tried to stop the drilling, but the electromagnetic energy prevented him from shutting off the drill. Worse, the drill breaches the island's power source. This attracted metal objects in the area, forced the drill equipment to crush Dr. Chang's arm, forced a toolbox to knock Jack unconscious, forced a rebar to fatally stab Phil and forced a meal chain to drag Juliet into the site's chasm.
9. Radzinsky, Chang and the surviving DHARMA personnel quickly made their escape. And deep inside the chasm a seriously injured Juliet finally detonated Jughead, which stopped Radzinsky's drilling and sent the Losties back to the future in 2007.
As I had earlier stated, many "LOST" fans had blamed Jack for Juliet's death. No one had blamed Daniel for coming up with the idea to detonate Jughead in the first. No one had blamed Sayid for immediately agreeing to help Jack detonate the bomb. No one had blamed Eloise for agreeing to help both men find the Jughead bomb. No one had blamed DHARMA for sanctioning Stuart Radzinsky's plan to drill at the Swan Station construction site. And no one had blamed Radzinsky for getting obsessed with his drilling in the first place. Many had forgotten that Radzinsky's drilling had led Juliet to be dragged into that hole. And no one had blamed Juliet for making the final decision to help Jack detonate the bomb, because her insecurity over Sawyer and Kate go the best of her. Instead, many fans discovered that the bomb had failed to send the Losties back to 2004 in "LAX". And they took Sawyer's grief-stricken reaction to heart by supporting his blame of Jack for Juliet's death.
I found myself wondering what would have happened if Daniel had never come up with the Jughead plan in the first place. Chances are they would have all died on that day in 1977, along with the rest of the world. Remember . . . the electromagnetic energy that flowed beneath the island, also flowed to other pockets throughout the world. Eloise Hawking had revealed this in (5.06) "316". If Radzinsky's drill had continued to breach the island's energy source, disaster would have spread from the island to the rest of the world. Sawyer and Juliet had originally thought they were escaping disaster when they first boarded the submarine leaving the island. Chances are they would not have survived long anyway if Juliet had not been inside that pit to detonate the bomb. Chang had attempted to stop Radzinsky's drilling, but the obsessive scientist refused to do so. If anyone was truly responsible for Juliet's death, I believe it was him.
However, Radzinsky was not the only one responsible. If Roger Linus had not shot Sayid, the latter could have successfully arranged for the bomb to detonate upon impact inside the pit. The detonated bomb would have stopped Radzinsky's drilling before it breached the island's energy source and sent the Losties - including a very healthy Juliet to 2007. Unfortunately, Sayid had been shot in retaliation for his attempt to murder the 14-year-old Ben Linus by the latter's father. Which is why he had failed to properly set the bomb. Sayid’s failure to set the bomb properly and Radzinsky’s insistence on drilling to the island’s power source eventually killed Juliet.
In the end, detonating the Jughead underneath the Swan Station construction site was the right thing to do, even if Daniel, Jack, Sayid and Juliet had wanted to detonate it for the wrong reason. Detonation of the Jughead bomb had stopped Radzinsky’s drilling of the island's electromagnetic energy. If the drilling had continued, the island and eventually the world would have ended in 1977. My recent rewatch of (5.16-5.17) "The Incident" and (6.01-6.02) "LAX" made me question why so many "LOST" fans continue, to this day, to mainly blame Jack Shephard for Juliet Burke's death.
