Flashbacks

In literature, film, television and other media, a flashback (also called analepsis) is an interjected scene that takes the narrative back in time from the current point the story has reached. Flashbacks are often used to recount events that happened prior to the story’s primary sequence of events or to fill in crucial backstory. In the opposite direction, a flashforward (or prolepsis) reveals events that will occur in the future. The technique is used to create suspense in a story, or develop a character. In literature, internal analepsis is a flashback to an earlier point in the narrative; external analepsis is a flashback to before the narrative started.

Flashbacks are a major part of how Lost tells its story and one of the major components that makes it such a unique and distinctive television programme compared to other TV shows. Each main character has been featured in multiple flashbacks that portray what happened in their life before being stranded on the Island.

The Main Format

In general, each episode's flashbacks follow these norms:

• The flashback begins with a "whoosh" noise while the character appears in thought.
• The flashback usually takes place prior to the plane crash.
• Each episode usually features only one character's flashbacks. Exceptions include "Pilot, Part 2", "Special", "Exodus, Part 1" and "Exodus, Part 2", "...And Found", "S.O.S.", "Dave", "The Glass Ballerina", "Exposé" and "Greatest Hits".
• The flashbacks have some thematic or narrative parallels with the events on the Island.
• Through all of season one and almost all of season two, only Flight 815 survivors were subjects of flashbacks. The first non-survivor flashbacks we saw were Desmond's, in "Live Together, Die Alone, Part 1". Season Three began with a flashback initially focused on Juliet but revealed information about the Others as a group, while episodes "Not in Portland" and "One of Us" centered solely on Juliet's past. Ben also had a flashback episode dedicated to his childhood as part of the DHARMA Initiative in "The Man Behind the Curtain".

General Exceptions

• The episode "The Other 48 Days" was the first episode to take place entirely in flashback - it follows the tailies from the crash until they reach Sayid and Shannon, and had screen titles indicating "Day X".
• The flashbacks in "Maternity Leave" are signaled differently. Instead of a close-up of the character and the "whoosh" sound, Claire's flashbacks begin with sudden flashes of mental images as her memory is jogged. Additionally, her flashbacks are from her time on the Island, specifically during her kidnapping.
• The "flashbacks" in "Three Minutes", while narratively similar, are not true flashbacks. They do not contain the "whoosh" sound, they are labeled with captions (like "Thirteen days earlier"), and they occur on the Island.
• Libby and Walt are the only main characters who are no longer on the Island, not to not get their own flashback episodes, although both had minor point-of-view (POV) flashbacks and have appeared in other people's flashbacks.
• Rose and Bernard were the first guest stars to get a flashback episode ("S.O.S.").
• Desmond's flashbacks in "Live Together, Die Alone, Part 1" were the first from a character who was not on board Flight 815.
• In "Flashes Before Your Eyes" Desmond relives events of his past, aware that the events have already happened. Even though one could say he is aware it is a flashback, that's not precisely the case: he is aware it is his past, but even those events were part of a larger flashback segment which included the scene in the Hatch when Desmond switches the failsafe key and the scene when he is alone in the jungle, which take place before and after his "conscious flashback", respectively. The only actual difference between this flashback and the main format flashbacks is that this one is continuous, instead of intercut with on-island scenes as usual.
• Nikki and Paulo's flashbacks in "Exposé" had both off island and on island segments, and had "X days ago" titles.
• Juliet's final flashback in "One of Us" did not feature the usual "whoosing" noise since it occurred a long time after the crash of Flight 815.
• Jack's flashback in "Through the Looking Glass, Part 1", was a flash-forward instead of a flashback.

Multiple Characters

Most flashbacks are from the POV of one character. For instance, while the "Hearts and Minds" flashbacks feature Shannon, they are clearly Boone's flashbacks, from his POV. There have been some exceptions to this rule:

• "Pilot, Part 1" and "Pilot, Part 2" feature flashbacks of Jack, Charlie, and Kate on the plane.
• In "Special", two of the flashbacks are from Walt's POV, not Michael's.
• "Exodus, Part 1" and "Exodus, Part 2" contains flashbacks for most characters. Sayid's airport story is told, but he does not receive an actual flashback. Neither does Claire, but both characters have deleted flashbacks scenes on the season 1 DVDs.
• "...And Found" and "The Glass Ballerina" alternate flashbacks between Sun's and Jin's POV.
• "S.O.S." contains shared flashbacks of Rose and Bernard's life together. Some of the flashbacks are from Rose's POV.
• "Dave" ends with a very quick flashback from Libby's perspective, her only true flashback.
• "A Tale of Two Cities" opens with a flashback from Juliet's POV.
• "Exposé" contains flashbacks from both Nikki and Paulo's viewpoints.
• Near the middle of "Greatest Hits", there is a flashback from The Others' POV, more specifically Alex Rousseau and Karl's. It includes a screen title of "6 Hours Ago".

Temporal Exceptions

For the first two seasons, most flashbacks took place before the plane crash. However, there are some exceptions:

• Two brief flashbacks to the crash aftermath appear in "Walkabout".
• "The Other 48 Days" shows the events of the first 48 days of the Tailies on the Island.
• "Maternity Leave" occurs on day 57 on the Island. The flashbacks occur around Day 16-17.
• In "Three Minutes", the pseudo-flashbacks cover what Michael was doing in the last half of Season 2.
• In "Flashes Before Your Eyes" a single prolonged "Déjà vu" was used in place of the usual discontinuous flashbacks; the idea of non-linear time was introduced to the series.
• Nikki and Paulo's flashbacks in "Exposé" had both off island and on island segments.
• Some of Juliet's flashbacks in "One of Us" occurred during or after the plane crash.
• Locke's flashbacks in "The Brig" show what Locke was doing with the Others the week before he returned to find Sawyer.
• "Through the Looking Glass, Part 1" appears to contain flash-forwards rather than flashbacks, showing what Jack's life is like after he's rescued.

Note

• The producers dismissed the theory that the flashbacks are fake or implanted.
  • However, the producers also dismissed the idea of time travel, only to have Desmond time travel.
    • Desmond didn't time travel he 'relived' previous events. Time-travel has been dismissed, therefore he did not time-travel.
• There is some danger associated with having a flashback episode: Shannon, Ana Lucia, Eko, Nikki and Paulo were all killed off at the end of their centric episodes, and Charlie and Boone in the episode after theirs.

See also

• Flashback Tally
• Portal:Flashback Characters
• Flashbacks/Theories
• Flashback Sequences