Debunked theories

The following are a list of relatively popular but clearly debunked theories, listed along with the sources of the debunking.

Lost has generated a huge number of interesting and diverse theories to explain the mysteries of the show. Some are more plausible than others, but some are clearly (and at times, repeatedly) refuted or discredited by Lost's writers and producers.

The head writers and executive producers have also said repeatedly that they already have an "end game" and larger story arc in mind for how to wrap up the entire series. From the Comic Con transcript: "We have at least, four, probably five awesome seasons planned out… and from that point, obviously after that, we’d have to start tap-dancing. Which is something that we just don’t want to do."

Aliens

• Theory: The Others or DHARMA or other characters of the story are actually aliens, or the Island itself is a giant spaceship.
• The statue may be the remains of an Alien civilization.
• Debunked by:
  • Damon Lindelof
• Source:
  • SciFiWire Interview - 'As the show progresses, [Damon Lindelof] added, it won't venture too far into science fiction as its mysteries unfold. "We're still trying to be... firmly ensconced in the world of science fact," he said in an interview. "I don't think we've shown anything on the show yet that has no rational explanation in the real world that we all function within. We certainly hint at psychic phenomena, happenstance and... things being in a place where they probably shouldn't be. But nothing is flat-out impossible. There are no spaceships. There isn't any time travel."'
• In-show parody:
  • Sawyer on the Others: "My theory, they're aliens. That's why they use the fake beards -- their heads are made of plastetic". Hurley: "Prosthetic, dude". ("Live Together, Die Alone, Part 1")
  • Sawyer asking Juliet about his and Kate's forced labor in "The Glass Ballerina": "So, when you pulled us out of thise polar bear cages and put us on the chain gang, what the hell did you have us breaking all those rocks for anyway?" Juliet: "We were building a runway." Sawyer:" Runway? For what?" Juliet: "The Aliens. (smiles) I don't know what for, do you think they told me everything?" ("Through the Looking Glass, Part 1")
• How the Producers contradicted themselves:

• In "Flashes Before Your Eyes" and "The Constant", Desmond has a lucid flashback and Desmond's consciousness did, in fact, time travel (as confirmed by the producers), respectively. In There's No Place Like Home we learn specifically that a) DHARMA was using the Orchid to conduct experiments dealing with manipulating space-time and b) that coming into contact with the "negatively charged exotic matter" when Ben moves the Island via the Orchid wheel causes him to time jump in his entirety to the Tunisian desert 10 months later in "The Shape of Things to Come", reminding us of the DHARMA polar bear skeleton Charlotte finds in "Confirmed Dead".
• Knowing that time travel has become (and possibly always was) an integral part of the show's mythology, Damon's indication that there was neither spaceships nor time travel in any interview casts major doubt and calls into suspect that there will be no spaceships in Lost. Since those statements were made during Season 1, it can be argued that there had been no spaceships or time travel to our knowledge yet, or that such information would not be revealed until later seasons. Also, it should be noted that nowhere in the SciFi Wire article is there mention of aliens one way or another; the only thing mentioned in the text relating to this section is a single reference to "spaceships." Add to this more recent statement by Lindelof that "Somewhere just outside the Crab Nebula is where it will all end, geographically," evidence of spaceships being involved in Lost actually seems to mounting... ABC News: 'Lost' Fans Will Find Answers

Clones

A clone is a new, identical organism grown from a cell; to suggest that a character in Lost is instantly cloned into a duplicate full-grown individual is a contradiction. The rabbits numbered "15" in the Orchid video are not examples of cloning, but of time travel gone awry.

Dinosaurs

• Theory: The Monster is a dinosaur.
• Debunked by:
  • Damon Lindelof
• Source:
  • Lost-TV Forums Exclusive Interview - Damon says: "JJ and I have always known what it was and we're VERY discriminating about who we tell, because that's one of the biggest secrets of the show. We know from the beginning it wasn't a dinosaur. If the network ever said anything about it to us it was more on the order of, 'Please tell us it's not a dinosaur.' And we're like, 'Ok, it's NOT a dinosaur!'"
• In-show parody:
  • Hurley questions Jack about what they just saw, after a Monster encounter: "Was it a dinosaur?" Jack: "It wasn't a dinosaur." Hurley: "You say you didn't see it." Jack: "I didn't." Hurley: "So how do you know it wasn't a dinosaur?" Jack: "Because dinosaurs are extinct." ("Tabula Rasa")
  • Paulo: "It could've been a dinosaur." Nikki: "It's not Jurassic Park, Paulo." ("Exposé")
  • Hurley theorizes that the survivors time-jumped to the time of the dinosaurs, and that some of them became Adam and Eve. ("Lighthouse")
  • In the alternate timeline, Hugo is presented with an award in the form of a plastic Tyrannosaurus Rex. ("Everybody Loves Hugo")

Dreamworld/All Inside Someone's Head

• Theory: All the events on the Island are not "real", and merely the dream/imagination/hallucination of one of the characters (most commonly named as Walt or Hurley). According to this, that character will wake up by the end of the show, and the audience will realize that none of the events actually happened.
• Debunked by:
  • Damon Lindelof
  • Carlton Cuse
• Source:
  • SciFiWire Interview
  • Lost-TV Forum Interview
  • UGO Interview
  • Mysteries, Conspiracies and Theories (Season 2 DVD featurette) - Carlton says: "What we have said and will continue to say is that we will not end the show with a cheat. It will not all have taken place in a snowglobe, it will not all have been a dream."
• Special Note:
  • Though the writers have said that the entire story is not all in the mind of one character, they have not denied that dreams and hallucinations are of significance, simply that not all the events will be fabricated in someone's mind (a la ending for St. Elsewhere, the snowglobe reference that Carlton makes above).
  • This is once again emphasized in the March 10, 2008 podcast, when Damon Lindelof (in a response to a question about possible interpretations of the ending of Via Domus) says: "We're not interested in 'All a dream' storytelling," instantly followed by a reaffirmation that individual scenes could always turn out to be dreams, but there would never be an ending when a character wakes up and everything had just happened inside a "snowglobe".
  • In an interview with UGO in the middle of Season 4's production, Damon finished the interview by stating "The one thing that Carlton and I are steadfast on saying over and over again, and that we're not lying about is that the show is not all a dream. It's happening in the real world, there are real stakes, you're not going to get to the end and cut to black and suddenly realize that this was all sort of a fantasy. That's the only thing that we sort of need to get out there in the world, because it does diffuse a lot of wacky theories."
• In-show parody:
  • Dave to Hurley: "It's hard, I know, but I mean -- all this? You, me, this island, that peanut butter -- none of it's real, man. None of it's happening. It's all in your head, my friend. The second you closed that window your brain popped a gasket. You went back into your little coma thing. That's where you are right this very second. In your own private Idaho, inside Santa Rosa". ("Dave")

Mapinguari

The Mapinguari as an explanation for the Monster first appeared on the ABC website oceanic-air.com, but is not valid or canonical since the site was created by ABC's marketing department rather than Lost's creative authorities.

Nanobots

• In-TLE parody:

• Callers to DJ Dan's show (known "conspiracy nuts") mentioned black clouds made of nanobots as a nod to the popular refuted theory, but by the end of The Lost Experience, DJ Dan himself says that "I sure as hell don’t think you’re going to be seeing it on your television screens anytime around September of this year."

Purgatory

• In-show/TLE parody:

• Gary Troup is an anagram of purgatory, and Bad Twin also mentions the concept.

Reality TV

• Theory: The castaways are actually unwitting participants in a reality television show run by DHARMA, and He is monitoring them all through the video surveillance system.
• Debunked by:
  • Carlton Cuse
• Source:
  • Sydney Morning Herald Article

Zombies

• Theory: Dead characters can come back to life, explaining why Christian Shephard and Yemi reappear on the Island.
• Debunked by:
  • Damon Lindelof
  • Carlton Cuse
• Source:
  • Numerous Official Lost Podcasts:
    • In the 7/31/06 podcast, Damon specifically states, "When a character dies on the show, they’re dead. The only time you’ll see them again is in someone else’s flashback. So, um, we do that because we want the stakes on the Island to be real—there are characters who have died who have appeared in other people’s memories." An almost identical quote about life-and-death stakes being 'real' is said in the 11/08/05 podcast.
    • Of course, Christian appeared to Locke in real time...
    • ...and in Jacob's cabin, and to Michael on the freighter, and to Jack on the mainland; Ana Lucia and Charlie have both spoken to Hurley, and he also mentions having been visited by Eko...I don't think there are any zombies or literal, physical resurrection going on, but "the only time you'll see them is in someone else's flashback" simply isn't true.
    • I think it's implied that he meant you won't see the REAL person anywhere except for a flashback. With the expanded knowledge we have about MiB, it's a safe bet that when we saw these people, we weren't seeing them.
• Behind-the-scenes parody:
  • Joke script pages, where zombies are also written as a joke
  • "Zombie Season 7" is a running gag on the podcast. Podcast episodes which reference zombies include the following:
    • March 20, 2006
    • May 15, 2006
    • July 31, 2006
    • October 9, 2006
    • October 17, 2006
    • November 6, 2006
    • December 6, 2006
    • February 12, 2007
    • April 16, 2007
    • May 11, 2007
    • May 21, 2007
    • September 21, 2007
    • February 28, 2008
    • April 25, 2008
• In-show parody:
  • Sayid to Hurley: "I am not a zombie". ("What Kate Does")

Nikki and Paulo replaced Rose and Bernard in an alternate timeline

• The gist of this theory: In "Flashes Before Your Eyes", we learned that Desmond went back in time. The theory claims that his actions in the past somehow created an alternate timeline where Rose and Bernard were never on the plane, and had instead been replaced by Nikki and Paulo. This is why Rose and Bernard haven't been seen again after the end of season 2, despite having gotten their own flashback episode ("S.O.S."), whereas Nikki and Paulo suddenly appeared out of the blue. ("Further Instructions")
• Several promotional stills for "Exposé" show Nikki and Paulo in a recreation of the scene from the end of "Live Together, Die Alone, Part 1" with the Hatch door that came falling out of the sky, with Bernard not being seen anywhere near Claire despite having been with her in that very scene in "Live Together, Die Alone, Part 1". That scene was missing from the actual episode that aired on TV, however.
• This theory is further fueled by Sawyer's repeated comments towards Nikki and Paulo ("Who the hell are you?", "Who the hell is Nikki?"). ("Enter 77") ("Exposé")
  • The theory suggests that Sawyer was at the Pala Ferry docks when Desmond turned the fail-safe key ("Live Together, Die Alone, Part 1"), and thus wasn't affected by the timeline change and couldn't remember Nikki and Paulo as they were not part of the original timeline.
    • A counter-argument to this would be that Hurley was with Sawyer when "the sky turned purple", and thus would have to be equally unaffected by whatever Sawyer would have been exempt from. Yet Hurley seems to have a very clear memory of Nikki and Paulo. ("Exposé").
    • Another counter-argument to the overall theory would be the fact that Rose and Bernard have made various contributions to the progress of the story that would require some major "universe course correction" in order to undo the consequences of them not being around in a parallel timeline. Bernard being stuck in a tree and calling for help ultimately resulted in Ana Lucia realizing that Goodwin hadn't been wet when he came running out of the jungle in "The Other 48 Days"; and Bernard also was the one picking up Boone's transmission from the Beechcraft, thereby unknowingly causing Boone's fall in "Deus Ex Machina", which led to his death one episode later. Rose, meanwhile, helped Charlie overcome his feeling of guilt following Claire's kidnapping in "All the Best Cowboys Have Daddy Issues"; and she also prevented Hurley from blowing up the Swan's pantry in "Everybody Hates Hugo", thereby allowing Eko to use the remaining dynamite in "Live Together, Die Alone, Part 1".
    • In the March 30, 2007 podcast, Carlton Cuse, Edward Kitsis and Adam Horowitz address the whereabouts of Rose and Bernard, explaining that they would only use them if they have "something to do"; after all, Sam Anderson and L. Scott Caldwell most certainly have other assignments and can't be expected to make a trip to Hawaii just for one day of shooting of a scene where they're standing around in the background.
  • The scene depicting the immediate aftermath of the crash of Oceanic Flight 815 in "Exposé", partially recycling shots from "Pilot, Part 1", shows a brief glimpse of Boone giving Rose CPR, and later shows him asking Nikki for a pen, which he did in "Pilot, Part 1" after Jack took over Rose's reanimation attempts and sent him off to go looking for a pen to perform a tracheotomy.
    • Supporters of the theory have alternatively suggested the inclusion of the shots depicting Rose may have been "production errors", or that Rose's reanimation may have not been successful in this timeline.
  • In "Catch-22", Sawyer gives Kate a Phil Collins tape which he claims belongs to Bernard, thereby confirming Bernard being alive and well on the Island.
  • Script coordinator Gregg Nations officially debunked this theory once and for all.
  • The final nail in the coffin of this theory was the return of both Rose and Bernard, alive and well on the Island, in "Greatest Hits".
  • And as a postscript note, the scene featuring the Swan door falling down originally intended for "Exposé" is included as a Deleted Scene on the Lost: The Complete Third Season DVD box set, and Bernard is seen in footage recycled from "Live Together, Die Alone, Part 1". (It's possible that Sam Anderson was simply not available for shooting new footage for "Exposé", and since the official promo stills usually don't include recycled footage, he was not seen in them.)

Last Humans

Theory: States that the Island is not on the planet earth. The survivors of Oceanic 815 were the last humans on earth and then placed on the Island. Since there was never a plane crash, the flashbacks we see are implanted memories.

Debunked by: Season 4 and Season 5 show an outside world in existence, off the Island.

See also

• Persistent rumors
• Theories