Lost: What Secrets “The New Man in Charge” Epilogue Reveals

The sixth season of Lost has been released on DVD and Blu-ray. As promised, the sets include a 12-minute epilogue that takes place after Hurley (Jorge Garcia) has taken over as the new caretaker of the island. As promised, “The New Man in Charge” gives us a few more answers to various island questions.

The two-chapter Lost epilogue opens up on a warehouse in Guam that’s producing Dharma-branded food and supplies. Employees Glenn (Ray Porter) and Hector (Ted Rooney) are in a hurry because they need to get stuff ready for another airplane drop.

Ben Linus (Michael Emerson) enters and tells them that he’s from the “home office” and that their services are no longer needed. The place is being closed down and he gives them envelopes with lots of cash as severance packages (probably from Hurley’s lottery winnings).

Confused, they start asking him questions and Ben agrees to answer one question apiece. He also shows them the first Dharma initiative DVD (transferred from a Betamax tape), starring Pierre Chang (Francois Chau), that gives some further insight. He asks them to turn out the lights and quickly leaves, on his way to shut down other such stations.

In the second scene, we see the Santa Rosa Mental Health Institute, where Hurley once stayed. Ben comes to visit patient, Walt (Malcolm David Kelley). He’s now a despondent young adult. Walt is concerned that Ben’s going to kidnap him again (ala season two).

Ben apologizes and says that he’s there to help him. He tells Walt that he has work to do, including helping his father. Walt reminds him that his father is dead. Ben replies, “That doesn’t mean you can’t help him.” Walt agrees to go with him and they walk outside and get into a familiar blue and white van. Ben gets into the driver’s seat and Walt’s happy to see Hurley waiting in the backseat.

Walt says, “I kept hoping that someday someone would come back for me. I thought I was crazy.” Hurley assures him that he’s not and says he just needs to get back to the island, where he’s always belonged. Why? Hurley says, “I need to talk to you about a job.” He asks Ben to start driving, saying “It’s time for all of us to go home.”

And that’s it. It’s short, likely shorter than most would have liked, but it does give us some small answers to outstanding questions. So what did we learn?

Though the Dharma initiative’s been inactive for 20 years, the supplies kept coming to the island because there was an automatic system set up to give coordinates on where to drop the shipments. How this was continually funded is left to our imagination. (If Charles Whidmore had known about these coordinates and drops, he could have found the island much quicker!)

In the video, Dr. Chang asks viewers not disclose his real name for security purposes, otherwise he might have to start using an alias. This explains why he introduced himself in later recordings as Dr. Marvin Candle.

The purpose of the Hydra station was to conduct behavioral and physical tests on animals and marine subjects. This explains the bunnies, polar bears, and glimpses of sharks with Dharma Initiative tattoos.

As part of their studies, they genetically altered birds (“hybirds”) and then released them into the wild to be studied. One is heard in the recording and it sounds a lot like the bird that Hurley heard say his name in season two. (Who would have thought we’d ever get an answer to this one!)

Polar bears are on the island to be tested because of their keen sense of memory and adaptability. They’re ideal for helping to test the island’s magnetic properties in some way but it’s cautioned that they’re very dangerous and cunning. We see the island cages and a helper who’s missing an arm. A leather collar is used to track and transport the bears. It’s the same sort of collar that was found on the polar bear skeleton in the Tunisian desert.

The island’s magnetism has an extremely harmful effect on females in the first trimester of pregnancy so the polar bears (and others) must not become pregnant.

The island’s other residents (“hostiles”) are used for experimentation as well. They are captured, sedated, and brought to the station. They are supposedly interrogated to better understand their way of life, how they came to be on the island, and the island deity named Jacob that they worship.

Because the hostiles are unwilling participants, they are placed in room 23, the brainwashing room where we once saw Alex’s boyfriend, Karl. The combination of drugs, loud noises, and rapid pictures are intended to essentially erase their memory of the interrogations.

Walt is registered at the mental health facility as Keith Johnson, a similar name to the one that his father, Michael, used to get on the freighter — Kevin Johnson.

Based on what Hurley and Ben say, and perhaps even the title of the epilogue, it would seem that Walt will become Hurley’s successor. He has special abilities though we still aren’t sure exactly what they are.

Walt will be able to help his father. We last saw Michael as a spirit who was “unable to move on” because of the bad things he had done on the island. It would seem that, like the rest of the original “Losties,” Michael will get some sort of happy ending.

What do you think? Are you happy to have a few more island answers or does it just make you all the more frustrated?