Let's be honest: when drawing up a list of All-Time Great "Lost" episodes, few fans would put "Fire+Water" on their lists. Not every show can be consistently made of win, and by most accounts, "Fire+Water" is made of more maudlin stuff. But the "Light vs. Dark" series might just give this episode a little bit of redemption. After all, the series is all about looking back at older episodes of "Lost" and seeing if Jacob or The Man in Black might have had a hand in previously inscrutable moments in the show's history.So let's take a gander back at Charlie's dream in this less-than-stellar episode. Might have either of the show's Island Titans had a hand when the Driveshaft bass player dreamed a little dream?
The Episode: "Fire+Water"
The Sequence: Charlie has a series of dreams in which Aaron is perpetually in trouble. In the first, Aaron gets carried away to sea inside a piano. In the second, people in Charlie's life posed as a religious painting on the wall of his childhood home tell him that the child needs to be saved. Charlie interprets these dreams to mean that Aaron needs to be baptized. However, in his attempts to do so, he ostracizes himself from both Claire and the general camp by starting a fire in order to bring Aaron to the ocean undetected. However, by episode's end, Claire does get both herself and her child baptized by Mr. Eko.
The Case for Jacob: Jacob sees the eventual separation of Claire and Aaron by his nemesis. He pushes Charlie via these dreams because while their physical separation cannot be prevented, bonding them through the act of baptism might eventual undo The Man in Black's kidnapping plans. The specificity of religious ceremony doesn't negate Jacob's influence; indeed, the Island has historically born witness to a variety of religious acts and iconography. (See: statue, four-toed.)
The Case for The Man in Black: This is all about using Charlie's religious guilt in order to drive a wedge between him from Claire. Almost as much as for Aaron, Charlie acts a protective shield for Claire, ensuring that he and her child stay together to perform...well, whatever Richard Malkin may have seen in Australia before Claire boarded Oceanic 815. Driving her towards the arm of his hand-picked patsy (Locke) for protection only seals the deal the loophole-looking entity.
The Zap2it Opinion: While Claire did eventually get baptized, it's hard to imagine that as anything but a small dent in The Man in Black's overall plan. While Charlie did eventually reunite with Claire and ultimately sacrifice himself to save her, the time lost via their separation in the wake of Charlie's waking dreams gave The Man in Black a tactical advantage for a while over his adversary. Luckily, Jacob's all about strategy, so he went about seemingly innocuous things like ordering the construction of a runway in order to secure long-term victory. And given the events of "The Incident," it looks like Jacob had the right approach all along.
What do YOU think?
Who is responsible for Charlie's dreams?(polling)
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Photo credit: ABC
