I agree with that theory, that they were going to come, it was just a matter of when.

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I am starting to think that Ben is evil (I hate saying Benry). I think that he is the leader or at least He is the one who started this uptopian state on this island. I think that he led these people to this island because of what Dharma had started. He either worked for dharma or whatever. IN any case I think that these people are an offshoot of the original Dharmanians.

Ben is the 'cult' leader. He strictly controls everyone. How he does this is remaining to be seen.

And I think there are good people who are a part of his uptopia, people who don't want to be controlled by him anymore. A type of insurrection if you will... certain people that are secretly conspiring to free themselves of him. And I think that the abduction of claire had something to do with it. I am leaning towards the idea that ethan was one of these people., but that he was mentally unstable, and willing to murder whoever to escape Ben's control. Which does not make him that good... and I think that someone like Juliet would not do such things... I don't know.. it's a very underdeveloped theory... I am hoping very much to see the storie go in this direction. I am going to watch the Claire flashbacking to ethan having her in bunker... I want to see if I can catch something. Because of what I think and what has been revealed you can look at that episode in a very different way now. (I hope)

I definetly agree about Ben's cult status amongst the ranks of DHARMA, or the others, or whatever we are calling them now, I liked Dharmanians. The way he values life, as in the life of his employees, and the life of all others is concerning. The only life he seems to value is his own.

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Good point! I should mention what I read in another post, that there were NO CHILDREN visible in that opening scene. Could that be some form of control? Makes you wonder what they did with Walt and the other kids they took from the Tail section?

I too agree with the odd lack of children being something that requires attention. But you do have to take into account that they had taken neither the tail section children nor Walt at that particular moment. If there ARE other kids on the island, then i have no idea where they were. If the only kids that were there were the tail section kids and walt...they had yet to be taken. Just something to think about.


On a side note with this whole Ben/Dharma/etc... thing: has anyone ever seen the movie The Village? I'm not saying its the same story type (although it could be), but its the first thing i thought when i saw their utopian society. They created the society they thought would be perfect. And what we are seeing is them living in that society. Just a thought as well...

Lots of good points coming out on this tread. The lack of children in the town would make the abdution of the two tailie kids, Walt and the attempt at taking Aaron make more sense.
As for expectiong the plane crash... We know that there had already been a small plane crash, a sail boat, a slave ship, a group of scientist and a hot air ballon. If they didn't have some kind of plan for new arrivals I would be surprised.
I don't think they knew it was coming but, I do think they knew it was possible and had plans in place. The reaction they had when the Swan hatch blew was as if they had been through it before. Just like when the earthquake hit. They delt with the situation fairly calmly and then went to work.

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Hope is a very dangerous thing to lose. - Sayid

I do what my Rice Krispies tell me to. - Anonymous

I'm not sure if the Others were ever part of Dharma before, but I certainly don't think they are part of Dharma now...remember that Kelvin called them the "Hostiles" which implies the Others are working against Dharma. For what purpose, who knows...since the Lost Experience revealed that Dharma was working to change the factors of the Valenzetti equation in order to postpone the date that humanity will destroy itself, maybe the Others are working to stop Dharma, which implies they want to hasten the date of humanity's end...just a thought...

You answered that question in your own sentence - we know that Ben knew about the hot air balloon because he chose Henry Gale's identity.

They were the ones who very likely killed him. So absolutely they have a plan for new arrivals, but as far as the Losties go it doesn't necessarily involve killing on arrival like they did to Henry Gale.

If you go read my spoiler post about the aftermath of the Lost Experience, there's a new clue that might tell you something interesting about that very subject.

I don't think they are hastening humanity's end, according to the Lost Experience they were working to make a virus that would kill 1/3 of the world in order to change the Valenzetti equation. We haven't seen any virus-related deaths so far, and in fact very few Losties have died since they were stranded.

I think if they were out to end the world they would not be having book clubs and fixing plumbing, baking muffins, living in a small city with houses and parks, having divorces and grooving to "Downtown". They are, however, waiting out the event to come, so that they can give birth to a new civilization.

No no no- just rewatched the beginning. They ran outside and SEARCHED the sky above. They knew to look up and keep looking- it took them quite a few to see the plane. They KNEW to look up due to the "earthquake" . Not that they knew it was coming - but that the "earthquake" maybe was a malfunction in button pushing and could potentially cause the crash. Watch again- pushing that button "protected" them in a way. Remember Henry Gale talking about just going into someone else's home and taking over when he was captured. Like the button was part of them.

I just rewatched the beginning yesterday night, and they were absolutely for sure looking for that plane for almost a full minute before it appeared. You don't run around staring at the sky when it is the ground that was shaking. They may not have known it was going to crash that time or that day, but they knew there was a plane coming after that earthquake. They didn't know enough to know from what direction the plane was coming from though....

Oh, and Ben also knew there would be survivors in the fuselage part of the plane, but was not sure there would be survivors in the tail section. I don't know if that has any relevence to anything