Time Tripping Clarifications from Damon Lindelof
That lucky man Jeff Jensen over at EW.com got the chance to talk to Damon Lindelof about last week’s episode of Lost, "The Constant." Jensen asked Lindelof to clarify certain elements of the time tripping story, and as always it’s possible that these clarifications may change a couple of your theories. Here are a couple of the more interesting tidbits, and check the bottom of the article for info on how you can have your revised theories posted on The Tail Section:
WHAT REALLY HAPPENED TO DESMOND?
In ”The Constant,” Desmond became ”unstuck in time” after flying through a thundercloud crackling with strange electricity. He experienced something like time travel, though not bodily time travel; instead, his consciousness shuttled between two different time periods, Island present 2004 and Desmond’s past 1996. But here’s the tricky twist: Desmond’s Island-present mind wasn’t the one doing the time traveling. When Desmond got hit with Island magic, his consciousness got knocked off-line and was replaced by his 1996 self. It was this older Desmond consciousness that toggled between present and past throughout the episode. Once Desmond ‘96 completed the errand of getting Penny’s phone number so he could call her on Christmas Eve 2004, Desmond’s present-day mind came back online, but rebooted with the new memories created by his time-travel adventure. I know: tricky stuff. But I had the chance to run all this by Damon Lindelof — and he says this interpretation is correct.
PARADOX R/X, or ”HOW COURSE CORRECTION WORKS”
To be clear, Desmond’s past was different before ”The Constant.” Before his time-travel adventure, Desmond never met Faraday at Oxford, never got Penelope’s digits. As a consequence of changing the past, Desmond’s personal history has been ”course corrected” by The Powers That Be, beginning from the moment he walked away from Penny’s apartment. Lindelof says this interpretation is also correct. But here’s a Big Question: since scoring Penelope’s phone number, has Course-Corrected Desmond lived his life knowing that on Christmas Eve 2004, he MUST be on a freighter in the South Pacific in order to make a call to Penelope if he wants any chance of having a future with her? Lindelof says this is indeed a matter we should be mulling. Perhaps in the future, Lost will give us an episode that replays Desmond’s backstory (getting the boat from Libby; killing Kelvin; meeting the castaways) from the point of view of this knowingness.
Also in the article, Lindelof confirms a big difference between Desmond and Minkowski. You can read the entire article here.
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So is this becoming a link site?
Comment by JustinSA — March 6, 2008 @ 10:37 am
So the island state of mind is different than the present state of mind on the freighter? My headache just got bigger! LOVE this show!
Comment by Jennifer — March 6, 2008 @ 11:15 am
LOST SUCKS!!!
Comment by Ben — March 6, 2008 @ 11:19 am
so this is how Desmond was able to see Charlie’s death and all the other premonitions based around Charlie. So I wonder is it possible Des gave the picture of he and Penny to Faraday and he gave it to Naomi to identify Desmond when she found him. Maybe there is more in the flash between old Des and current Des where he tells Faraday of an island and the 815′ers and that is why Faraday cries when he sees the footage on TV. He knows then that he will be on the island somehow.
Still a little conviluted but an interesting thought.
Comment by Blash — March 6, 2008 @ 1:06 pm
What if Desmond’s ability to see Charlie’s future is tied to some sort of time “disturbance”…that somehow Desmond’s actions, and his attempts to save Charlie are all tied to something he did previously that imbalanced his future trajectory through time, and the storm incident provided the opportunity to “correct” the problem and set the trajectory right again. If so, it begs the question of whether we saw that experience on the show, or if we have yet to be introduced to the incident that caused the time disruption.
Comment by Brownjam612 — March 6, 2008 @ 1:55 pm
omg JustinSA, a link site? Every other article in the past month nearly has had no links, and very other lost fan site has also brought this news up with a link, if one of the crators of the show sit down for a chat about Lost it’s officially big news, but if thi site didn’t conduct the interview then they have to link it, just like Darkufo and DocArzt have also had to link it
Comment by morty — March 6, 2008 @ 4:03 pm
Blash- very interesting, I like it.
Comment by Tracie Wurster — March 6, 2008 @ 4:17 pm
I love the cartoon today!
Comment by Greg — March 6, 2008 @ 4:58 pm
Interesting that in last weeks episode, Faraday said to Desmond (in the lab), “you can’t change the future”. As the post explain, you CAN change the past…
So, back to season 3 finale when Jack says to Kate, “We have to go back”. Does he then mean they have to go back (to the past?) How far back? Far enough to never leave the island? Far enough to not get on flight 815? Far enough to bring everyone else back with them?
Remember how there are 2 cockpits (Season 1 and Season 4) is it really the “same” 815? One where the past was course corrected? Which one is the “correct” one? The one that lands on the island and sends everyone time tripping or the one that crashes into the ocean?
Finally, does the time tripping occur on the island or only coming and going? Remember all the early episodes of the show when it started with the close-up of a characters eyeball? Was that them “arriving” back to their body at the island? All along, we just thought it was a cool way to start an epidose, but maybe we’re just seeing the island end of their time travel.
Comment by tawnry — March 6, 2008 @ 10:54 pm
Ben, for a guy that believes that Lost sucks, you sure spend a lot of your time around here, don’t you think?
Comment by Amy — March 7, 2008 @ 7:38 am
I’ve been lurking around for a while trying to find answers to my questions from your posts, or at least get some idea. I just don’t get it. What do you mean you can’t change the future? Didn’t Desmond by doing what he did after the instructions of Faraday, actually prevented his death? Wouldn’t he die if he hadn’t got Penny’s number? If that’s not changing the future, I don’t know what is… And what’s the difference between changing the future and “course correction”? Arrggh!
Comment by Amy — March 7, 2008 @ 7:43 am
The Constant reminds me of the movie Back To the Future…where Michael J. Fox goes to the past & meets with the crazy scientist, Doc. Doc views a video clip on Michael’s video camera where he sees some Asians shooting bullets at him (Doc) because he stole some chemical (?). At the end of the movie, Michael rushes to save the Doc, but he’s too late because the bullets have hit him, but the Doc wakes up because he wore a BULLET PROOF VEST (like Charlotte). The Doc was able to save his own life because of Michael, his vizitation from the future..hehe.
Comment by Eunice — March 7, 2008 @ 2:38 pm
I have mixed feelings with any medium whether it’s film, book, or in Lost’s case, television when it involves travel. It almost always gets bogged down with heavy explanation or damaged by inadequate information. I hope that the writers of my favorite show know what they’re doing. They haven’t failed yet but time is a tricky subject to tackle.
Comment by Mike — March 7, 2008 @ 8:08 pm
I do enjoy the show…I enjoy the plot twists…I really like all the characters (I hope Charlie is not gone) but I have one major concern. Will the writers and creators of this wonderfully complex show be able to pull it together and explain to us what the heck is going on? This is before they get cancelled by some ABC corporate bean counter. And if cancelled prematurely will they attempt to tie it all up with some pieced together movie? Will we ultimately be X-FILED?
Comment by Billy — March 10, 2008 @ 1:42 pm