S6: What They Died For

In the penultimate episode, Jacob finally has a sit down with the remaining candidates:  Jack, Hurley and Sawyer.  Kate is there too and it's revealed that her name was crossed off by Jacob when she became a mother, but the job of becoming the protector of the island was hers if she wanted it.  Jack stepped up and became the new leader.  As Jacob's remaining ashes are burned in a fire, he will disappear for good.  ?Before the fire burns out for good, Jacob has told Jack what he needs to protect the Source for as long as he can.  If he could kill the Smoke Monster too that would be great.  Jacob really messed up and he's hoping his successor can fix the mistakes he made.

Locke/MIB/Smoke Monster is tying up loose ends.  He kills Zoe and Ben kills Widmore.  The MIB recruits Ben as he needs him to kill some more people for him.  Miles takes off into the jungle and the MIB in the form of the Smoke Monster rails right into Richard, sending him flying into the jungle.  No idea where Claire is currently.  Desmond is not in the well where the MIB last put him, but the MIB is not worried.  He's going to use Desmond to destroy the island.

In the flash sideways, things are getting exciting.  Locke goes to Jack and decides to have the surgery so he can let go.  Desmond turns himself in for running down Locke and in doing so gets transferred to a different prison with Sayid and Kate.  He works something out with Anna Lucia and Hurley, and they are set free.  Desmond puts his plan into place as Sayid goes with Hurley and Kate goes with Desmond.  Hurley's eyes appear to be open, but not anyone else's yet.

I enjoyed this episode as I forgot what happened to Widmore.  I liked that he sacrificed himself to save the island in the end, but he said he was three steps ahead of Ben.  It was a shame that he didn't survive.

I liked that Ben appears to be bad again, but I think he's just playing the MIB and buying his time until he figures out what to do.  He can't blow up the plane if he's dead, but at the same time, he likes the idea of being in charge of the island, which is what the MIB is promising him.  So I guess they are using each other.  I'm sure it's only a matter of time that if Ben does kill the people the MIB wants dead that the MIB will just kill Ben.

"The End" is 104 minutes so I haven't decided if I'm going to watch the whole episode next time I work out or split it up into two work outs.  I believe the episode aired in its entirety on the same day, but if I remember correctly I think there was a clear point where it can be split into two episodes.  I guess we'll see how I feel.  I'm sad that it's almost over.