Why Didn’t They Just Cut the Wire?
Okay, this question has come up repeatedly. Why didn’t they cut the cable leading to the looking glass instead of diving down there? There are several good reasons for that:
a) How do we know that the cable is the primary power supply? It could just be a communications cable and nothing more. There is no information that would indicate cutting the cable would achieve the desired result.
b) Desmond foresaw that flicking the switch resulted in a copter coming. Yes, he also saw that Charlie getting an arrow through the neck reunited him with Penny, but this might be a little more precise.
Voila! At least two good reasons why "Just cutting the cable" isn’t a viable solution. Besides, you need to have the Obi-Wan Kenobi disabling the tractor beam in order to stick with you Star Wars motifs… come on!
Are you people stupid! Did you not see Sayid’s blueprints, it isnt a cable! Its an anchor to the mainland. It clearly says “Anchor”. It aint a cable!!
Comment by Stephen Byrne — May 19, 2007 @ 11:12 am
And there you go… yet another answer.
Comment by DocArzt — May 19, 2007 @ 11:14 am
The thing they always teach you in writing school is: if there’s a potential plothole, shine a light on it. It answers the question for the audience before they even think of it themselves. (A good example from LOST: Mikhail’s explanation of the “non-lethal” fence setting.)
It’s an obvious question, and it would have taken five seconds for Sayid to say, “We can’t just cut it. The schematic says it’s not a power cable.”
Comment by Joe V — May 19, 2007 @ 11:18 am
If these Dharma scientists put in the time to construct this massive underwater facility, would they really use the equivalent of giant extension cord as it’s power supply? My logic says, no. The facility is big enough to have it’s own power or at least a back-up generator.
Additionally, since Ben and the Others are using the Looking Glass for their own purposes we can assume that he’s not going to leave something so simple and obvious to chance. Can you see that conversation:
Tom: Ben,… uh… you remember that cable that powers the Looking Glass and allows the island to remain hidden from incoming frequencies?
Ben: Yes, Tom…. I do.
Tom: Well, Jarrah found it and cut it.
Ben: Doh! I knew that was going to come back and bite us in the ass. I told Ethan to fix that! If I told that idiot once, I told him a thousand times, “Forget the plumbing Ethan! Fix that damn cable!”
Comment by sandleford — May 19, 2007 @ 12:02 pm
It blatantly was the anchor to the island
Comment by ady — May 19, 2007 @ 12:04 pm
Anchor? I hope nobody is thinking a literal anchor here, guys. Can anyone seriously be suggesting that the Looking Glass is just FLOATING?! Is the Statue of Liberty kept in place thanks to a couple of lengths of twine from Wal-Mart?
Comment by Marcus — May 19, 2007 @ 1:00 pm
Sayid, Hurley, and Desmond have all known of that cord prior to anyone even knowing of a “Looking Glass.” All three men have followed the cord through the forest. If not Hurley or Desmond wondered, wouldn’t Sayid have been the one to be the most curious as to what the other side of the cord lead to when he first found out? I mean, knowing Sayid, wouldn’t he have thought, “Hmm..why the fuck is this cord going through the water and where is it coming from?”
I’m not looking for answers because God knows there’s apparently no such thing when it comes to Lost, but can anyone help me out with some possibilities to help my mind from stop burning with that question?
Comment by frankie — May 19, 2007 @ 1:16 pm
The writers obviously made the cable exposed on the beach for a purpose. To make a way for different stories to branch out. First Sayid found Rousseau by means of the cable, then it became a marker for those on the beach to find Rousseau again. And now they find the underwater station, how else would they find the station if not for the cable. The writers made a simple yet profound way of keeping the story options open.
Comment by sharpside — May 19, 2007 @ 1:25 pm
I guess the only real answer, Frankie, is that Sayid has been rather busy and probably his mind distracted from the cable by other demands - filling his plastic water bottle, collecting and chopping wood, keeping the fires going, strengthening the shelters, starting to dig trenches in the sand with makeshift tools, looking at old photos, having flashbacks, trimming his beard, taking mobile phones apart, learning his lines, rehearsing fight sequences, answering fan mail, talking to his agent… and all manner of day-to-day tasks of a similar ilk.
Comment by Marcus — May 19, 2007 @ 1:29 pm
so you dont know either.
Comment by frankie — May 19, 2007 @ 1:38 pm
Until they had the outrigger canoe, the Losties never had the means or time to explore the cable. Usually when they have a boat it’s being used to go to the Others or menace them. Only now did they have the means to explore the cable.
Comment by kkty — May 19, 2007 @ 2:14 pm
Until they had the outrigger canoe, the Losties never had the means or time to explore the cable. Usually when they have a boat it’s being used to go to the Others or menace them. Only now did they have the means to explore the cable.
Comment by kkty — May 19, 2007 @ 2:15 pm
It seems highly unlikely that one cable was a power supply, or that cutting it would therefore deactivate the jammer. And if they took the chance and cut it, they’d have no way of finding the station again if didn’t work. Seems pretty obvious to me.
- Giovanni
Comment by CyHunter — May 19, 2007 @ 2:30 pm
I’d also like to say… what exactly would they cut it with?
If it was a power cable then couldn’t exactly chop it with anything metal anyway. Shoot it? Waste bullets?
Comment by Pip — May 19, 2007 @ 2:30 pm
I keep wondering why was Sayid digging a hole in The man behind the curtain. I think it has something to do with these schematics and maps he’s been collecting.
As for this “anchor” I’m thinking that maybe part of the looking glass detaches from the main structure and would need an anchor to keep it from floating away. It’s called a HATCH, so I beleive this is just an opening to something below the sea floor. I can’t wait to find out!
Comment by havoc1922 — May 19, 2007 @ 2:33 pm
The question is what is anchoring what? Is the island anchoring the looking glass or the looking glass anchoring the island?
Comment by TabulaRasa — May 19, 2007 @ 2:37 pm
Actually, scrap my last thought…stupid thought. They could hang on to the cut part. Still:
The thing they always teach you in writing school is: if there’s a potential plothole, shine a light on it. It answers the question for the audience before they even think of it themselves. (A good example from LOST: Mikhail’s explanation of the “non-lethal” fence setting.)
It’s an obvious question, and it would have taken five seconds for Sayid to say, “We can’t just cut it. The schematic says it’s not a power cable.”
That’s what the “anchor” line was. Now, we know from the schematics as they are clearly visible (and Charlie’s scene, if I recall correctly), not to mention common sense, that the Looking Glass is not floating in the water but is built into the seabed on supports. “Anchor” in this sense probably just means the cable was for use precisely as it was used: As an emergency connection between the station and the mainland in case it couldn’t easily be reached for whatever reason. DHARMA wasn’t expecting Hostiles or whomever to be in intimate proximity with it for extended amounts of time like the castaways have been for 90 days, so they weren’t too concerned with just keeping it in the sand where it could be found if someone in need was looking for it.
- Giovanni
Comment by CyHunter — May 19, 2007 @ 2:40 pm
(Note: HTML tags were lost for some reason - those second and third paragraphs were supposed to be italicized “quotes” from Joe V
Comment by CyHunter — May 19, 2007 @ 2:42 pm
In the words of Hurley - “Duuuuuuuude.”
I think you just totally blew my mind. It’d be extremely interesting to find out that the island was anchored to the Looking Glass, and not the other way around, as most of us have assumed - remember, you can NEVER assume with this show.
Comment by KrissyLove — May 19, 2007 @ 2:46 pm
precisely, frankie
Comment by Marcus — May 19, 2007 @ 3:04 pm
maybe they just didn’t have any wire cutters!
Comment by nickk — May 19, 2007 @ 4:20 pm
IF The Looking Glass is anchored to the island by the cable (and not the other way around) AND IF The Looking Glass is otherwise free-floating, cutting the cable would result in one of two things:
Either: The Looking Glass would be washed out to sea and the jamming signal would loose its influence over the transmission from the radio tower…
Or: (if the tide were coming in) The Looking Glass would be washed ashore and they could walk into it and turn off the switch.
Comment by gusteaux — May 20, 2007 @ 9:00 am
Do we know where the other end of the cable leads to (the jungle side)?
Comment by kelpipper — May 20, 2007 @ 4:01 pm
If you look at the promotional photo’s the blue prints of the Looking Glass clearly show the cable and call it an anchor. The diagram clearly shows it has no other function. Check it out. But I did think about cutting the cable too.
Comment by Larry — May 21, 2007 @ 5:00 pm
If you look at the promotional photo’s the blue prints of the Looking Glass clearly show the cable and call it an anchor. The diagram clearly shows it has no other function. Check it out. But I did think about cutting the cable too.
Comment by Larry — May 21, 2007 @ 5:00 pm
maybe because they plan to use it to communicate
durrr
ty
Comment by roger — May 22, 2007 @ 1:06 pm
Gusteaux-
Why would the anchor cable prevent the Looking Glass from drifting TOWARDS the island? This all technically makes no sense because the cable was obviously quite slack. If the cable was truly meant to anchor the Looking Glass,
a) It would be taut.
b) If it were not taut, that would mean that there were other cables anchoring the Looking Glass, and thus cutting one would make little difference.
Comment by Joel — May 22, 2007 @ 2:05 pm
In response to Frankie,
There is an episode in which the show alludes to the idea that the cable is just a power cable–I believe the episode in which Danielle and Sayid discover each other.
Comment by Joel — May 22, 2007 @ 2:11 pm
might be a bit late… hehe, dunno if anyone would still read this.
Being not a US-resident, I just saw the 3rd season of Lost, on the internet. And I also asked myself, why didn’t they just cut the damn cable, and googled if others might have wondered, too.
But as it appears to me, the anti- cable cut party here, to say it in Sawyers words ;), fail to see the big picture.
Some comments on things that have been said (some comments I make were partially made, but I’d also like to summarize):
- Blueprints: “anchor” does not have to be meant literally, or even could be an intentionally misleading name tag
- I actually DO remember one episode of the first season where I saw the jungle-end of the cable going just loosely into the ground of the forest. That was when Hurley, Charly, Sayid and Jack went to search Rousseau. Saw the end of cable, then looked further, and approached the ramshackle rope bridge…
A cable just going into the sand is really not the way rope anchoring to stabilize the position of an object is done. This alone would be totally mechanically unreliable, aplified by the fact there was only one cable (no other “anchors” in the water were seen during the dive to looking glass). So the station could still wildly float around, which would make something as simple as entering the station from below by divers, as it’s apparently supposed to be done, a very hazardous endeavour. Considering how sophisticated the rest of all the DHARMA stuff is… I really don’t think so.
While I admit that a power/communication cable layed out that sloppily is also not very professional, it’d still be less of a problem than if this would actually have to withstand mechanical load, like, if it was an anchor.
- reported visible metal in some place, where the insulation was broken, does not prove it’s a mere metal wire, like for an anchor. Power supply cables that are used “buried” always have a metal shielding (typically aluminium I think) to prevent diffusion of water molecules through the rubber insulation (which is not *totally* water-proof under those conditions), and to give the cable stability. This is especially true for undersea cables.
- The cable was seen as being very loose in every episode it showed. Even when they dived down to looking glass, you saw it loosely hanging around, while the looking glass station not moving the slightest, seeming pretty stable on its own.
- If it was an anchor, the cable should be properly mounted on a big concrete fundament, with some big steel thingies on-top properly holding it all together.
It probably should not lead ashore at all, leave alone reach miles into the jungle. How does that make sense?
- “Cutting the cable would let the station drift away, if it really is an anchor, or at least won’t reveal the path to the station anymore”
–> Not necessarily.
How about clamping the cable to some dug-in wooden pillars on the beach, while cutting it somewhere near the jungle-end ?
- “how should the cable be cut?”
–> dynamite might also work, especially if big rocks were positioned around the part of the cable to be destroyed, to direct the force of detonation more on the cable.
–> the cable didn’t look *very* thick. If the inner coating was aluminium, maybe even some strikes with the axe would have done. I mean, not cleanly cut, but who gives a damn if your goal is damage. Given it be done on a dry day, with dry wooden axe handle, and doing it in the forest on dry ground, not on beach sand (conducting well), it should at least be a lot less risky than sending someone down to the station to drown, or get shot or something
–> letting sharp-edged heavy rocks fall from a certain height onto the cable several times might work. Locke built “scaffolding” to do this with the hatches destruction-proof glass, so why not here.
Conclusion:
I think the risk of losing the cable as a guide to the under water station, when cut, was very low to nonexistant.
But the dangers of visiting the station, without proper diving equipment and weapons, were very real.
The chance of ending the radio jamming by cutting the cable was pretty realistic, so if *I* had been there, I definitely would have tried to cut the cable and see whether the jamming would stop - what could bemore obvious and easy than that? - before sending my friends down there!
If it hadn’t done anything, well, then so what. Proceed with plan-B.
I guess this was really just to let Charly die in a heroic way. The actor was bored with the role as I have read and he wanted to quit. And they thought Charly deserves a heroic end, not just by stumbling in some trap of Rousseau’s or something
Charly saw Desmond fail in predicting who the parachute lady will be, so he shouldn’t have been so keen on fulfilling his “flashes”.
Comment by steve — November 11, 2007 @ 4:58 pm
Yes, cut the cable would be the only logical thing to do. Even if you don’t know for sure that it would work, it would be the first thing to try!
What is worse though, how could a underwater station be sending a jamming signal, and how can they communicate with walkies from the underwater stations to the island.
Water stops radiowaves very effectively!
Comment by sadfsdf — May 12, 2008 @ 5:25 am