Uncharted Island

I’ve been thinking about it since the third season ended, and now that we’re less than a month away from the start of season four, I still don’t have any real notion.

Jack is completely obsessed with getting back to the island in the flash forward. Considering how badly he’s wanted to get off the island, so much that he went along with Ben’s wishes, it’s hard to understand why he wants so badly to go back.

My first thought was that he wants to go back for the people who got left behind when he got off the island. He was poring over maps enough to try and triangulate a position for a rescue mission. But his conversation with Kate negates that line of thinking. He was flying Oceanic flights every weekend, hoping to crash land again. He wasn’t trying to rescue anyone; he wanted to go back and stay there.

Even guilt about anything he’s done the island so far - or anything he will be doing in upcoming episodes before he leaves - doesn’t seem to be a good enough reason to want to go back to the island. He’s already punishing himself.

What would returning to the island do for him? Did he lose a part of himself when he left? Is the island like the Hotel California, where you can check out but never leave? Does Jack finally become a spiritual man, only when he discovered that his purpose was back on the island he left?

It should be interesting to follow Jack’s personal journey through the last three seasons.