Lost Finale Breakdown...AK Style...

Here you go. I will follow up with my own comments later. A lot to digest and I have 9 months to do so.

From AK:
What an awesome show. My first reactions are that I can't believe we have to wait 9 more months, followed soon thereafter by I cannot believe there is only one more season left.

I love being wrong about what is going on. I have to give credit to Annie though for at the very beginning of the two hours saying that "dead Locke" was in the box.

New thoughts on what is going on:

The guy at the beginning of the episode (who was awesome in Deadwood) on the beach with Jacob. Is it Esau? Going in a different direction from the Egyptian mythology angle... And going biblical; Jews in Egypt, maybe? For the simplicity of referring to him, I will just call him Esau.

Who is the biblical Esau:

Firstborn son of Isaac and Rebekah, and ancestor of the Edomites (Gen chap. 36). Popular etymologies (see Gen 25:25, 30) relate the name Esau to se'ar (hairy) "he was like a hairy garment all over; so they called his name Esau" (cf Seir, another name for the land of Edom) and to admoni (ruddy) and adom (red) "the first came forth red" (cf Edom).

Before Esau's birth, it was prophesied that Rebekah's elder son would serve the younger (Gen 25:23). In addition, Esau was born with his twin brother holding his heel, which was interpreted as a sign that Jacob would supplant him. This he did on two occasions: Jacob sold a bowl of lentils to Esau in exchange for the latter's birthright (Gen 25:29-34); and later, with Rebekah's help, he tricked Isaac into giving him the blessing intended for Esau, the firstborn son. Instead of receiving a blessing, Esau's fate was to dwell in the wilderness, live by the sword, and for a time serve his brother Jacob. Some have suggested that this destiny was realized when the Edomites "became David's servants" (II Sam 8:14) in the 10th century, but rebelled successfully against Judean rule (II Kgs 8:20) in the 9th.

In contrast to Jacob the shepherd, Esau was a "skilful hunter, a man of the field" (Gen 25:27), whose venison his father Isaac loved to eat. Esau vowed to kill Jacob (Gen 27:41ff), but when the two met some 20 years later, Esau, at the head of a 400-man army, forgave his brother.

This seems to fit the mold that Jacob on lost is in charge, but that Esau resents his role as leader.

The last sentence of the description above seems to resonate for not only Esau killing Jacob, but also potentially referencing the war of the coming season. Except, of course, in this case Esau (or Ben anyway) kills Jacob.

Esau presumably has the ability to take on the appearance of dead islanders... And I think we can assume that Esau has also been previously appearing as Christian Shepherd. I think it is safe to say that Christian Shepherd is still dead.

Ilyana made the comment, I cannot remember precisely, but more or less that someone else was pretending to be Jacob - right before they burned the cabin down. This seems to be a role reversal. Jacob steals Esau's birthright, and now Esau is taking it back under false pretenses.

Based on the dialog at the beginning, there was sort of an implied love, or at least comradarie between Esau and Jacob prior to Esau saying he wanted to kill Jacob if there were a loophole. Did God forbid one from killing the other?

Ben's line about Locke walking right in "like Moses" jumped out at me, and steered hard into the biblical interpretation of events.

I also am wondering if the boat that Jacob and Esau saw at the beginning of the episode was the Black Rock. Was Richard on it? Esau said that Jacob called for it. Does Jacob need Richard to be the caretaker for the island while he is gone?

Things I still wonder about:

Where is Claire?

Where has Jacob been? Has he been off the island for many years? I get the impression that Richard perhaps hadn't even seen him in years, and that he was stalling Locke because he didn't know if he would be there or not. Is it his absence that has allowed Esau the opportunity to pose as him.

Was the Rose and Bernard thing a simple farewell homage to them? Or was there something more going on there? It seemed like something was going on. Was Juliet holding her stomach as she walked away? Is she pregnant? Is she really dead?

Richard had told Sun that he watched all of her friends die "before his eyes" 30 years ago. I thought we were going to see Richard watching on at the gunfight. They didn't show that to us. He may have been there. If he wasn't, was the flash that ended the episode not realy the bomb going off? If the bomb did go off, I move up my prediction for the series finale to the series premiere next season... If the bomb did go off, we are going to see the remaining survivors boarding flight 815 to start the season. And then presumably the plane will crash again to get the season going? I don't know. I love not knowing.

And last but perhaps definitely most importantly - what was Richard's response to Ilyana's "What lies in the shadow of the statue?" What did he say? And perhaps more importantly, what language was it in?

The response to "What lies in the shadow of the statue?"
It was Latin and Richard answered "Our leader who will save us all!".........translated from "Ille qui nos omnes servabit"

The weaving that Jacob was working on:
Greek reading "may the gods grant thee all that thy heart desires"