"Brought here?" Jack answers, shaking his head. Knowing that he would not believe John's answer, he asks, "And who brought us here, John?"
"The island."
Jack Shepard vs. John Locke
Dr. Jack Shepard is our protagonist, our hero, the main character of Lost . Jack is the person that we, the audience, are meant to identify with. He is the first person we saw during the first seconds of the first episode in the first season. We lived the devastating aftermath of the Oceanic Flight 815 crash through him. At first we, like Jack, were disoriented. Then we began to hear noises-fire, water, screaming. Jack walks around the bend and we see the mayhem caused by the plane crash.
We identify with Jack right away. But, do we side with Jack? Do we agree with Jack, the skeptic, or John Locke, the believer in fate? John is mysterious. He is older, wise, and, like Jack, knows how to take care of himself and others. John believes that everyone was brought to the island for a reason. Incredulous at the thought, Jack believes it just sort of happened. There was a crash, some people survived, and there is no reason as to whom or why they survived.
Previous Connections
At first we are inclined to think like Jack. How and why would the survivors have been brought to this remote island which supplies mystery after mystery? But leading into season two, we see that John has to be right. There has to be a reason for each and every survivor to be there. The survivors, while they didn't know it, had intertwined lives before Flight 815 even left the ground. And it's beginning to look like each survivor has some connection directly to Jack and possibly to everyone else on the island.
We know that Jack and Ana Lucia had a connection before the flight, when they met in the bar. Sawyer had met Jack's father. The guy in the hatch had previously met Jack running in a stadium.
The fact that Jack and Ana Lucia had met is not that big of a deal. They met in the bar of the airport before boarding the same plane. That's not too big of coincidence. Sawyer meeting Jack's father is a bigger coincidence, but still something that could reasonably happen by chance. However, the guy in the hatch is just too much of a coincidence, especially added to the other two coincidences.
The Answers
While Jack is the hero and the one with whom we are meant to identity, and we do, John is the one with more answers. And where John doesn't have the answers, he has the tools to seek out the answers. John raises the questions, whereas Jack believes it is all happenstance.
I agree with John Locke, the island has brought each survivor to her for a specific reason.
Guide Note:This article was written based on first season information. The quotes at the beginning are from season one's season finale, Episode 1x24, Exodus Part 2. Beginning with season two, it became apparent that the characters of Lost are interconnected in many ways. For a list of of how they are connected, see Interconnected Clues.
