Now that we have seen the secret closet and that Ben can and has traveled all over - it seems more likely they the Others did go and retrieve Locke's dad - and that was really him.

Yeah, well they might well go grab whomever with all those passports making travel so easy...for Ben anyways (who we had thought virtually never left the island. Damn liar. :)

:) Isn't it great when things actually make sense on this show?

What would be the point of all of this "box" talk, if they just drove out and captured Cooper?

"The box is a metaphor, John."

~Benjamin Linus

There's nothing to say that Ben used any of those passports. I doubt that he would have personally gone out to fetch Anthony Cooper either way.

There's nothing to say that Ben used any of those passports. I doubt that he would have personally gone out to fetch Anthony Cooper either way.

Well, he definitely left the island at some point since Miles had picture of him from the outside world as an adult.

my head is all foggy about the order of events, when did john blow up the sub? before/after lockes father was there, before/after jack did his surgery? but if ben could get off the island, up to just recently, why could he not go to a "real" doctor to perform his surgery, instead of putting his faith in jack....that didn't go 100% as planned..........or is it all just one big head game by ben?? and he already knew what the outcome would be all along......

guess we won't really know for a few years now. love it anyways!!

my head is all foggy about the order of events, when did john blow up the sub? before/after lockes father was there, before/after jack did his surgery? but if ben could get off the island, up to just recently, why could he not go to a "real" doctor to perform his surgery, instead of putting his faith in jack....that didn't go 100% as planned..........or is it all just one big head game by ben?? and he already knew what the outcome would be all along......

guess we won't really know for a few years now. love it anyways!!

Well, he'd found out about the tumor just prior to the plane crash. Once he found out there was spinal surgeon on board he probably felt that the island had delivered him this opportunity and he should capatilize on it.

but if ben could get off the island, up to just recently, why could he not go to a "real" doctor to perform his surgery, instead of putting his faith in jack....that didn't go 100% as planned..........or is it all just one big head game by ben??

My guess is that Ben has a real easy -- almost magical -- way of getting *off* the island, but the hard part is getting back on. For instance, we know the Dharma Initiative had some sort of facility for making polar bears show up in the desert.... but, since there were polar bears left in the desert, they didn't seem quite so good at bringing them back.

Ben leaving the island to get surgery, therefore, would've meant turning off all his electromagnetic jamming equipment for some time so he could get home, also making the island visible to the people who were looking for it.

Just total, wild speculation. But it seems to me like something the show would do: Have the Losties spend seasons trying to get off the island, only to discover that it's basically as simple as flipping a light switch, except now that they're off, the one thing in the world the desperately want is to get back on.

my head is all foggy about the order of events, when did john blow up the sub? before/after lockes father was there, before/after jack did his surgery? but if ben could get off the island, up to just recently, why could he not go to a "real" doctor to perform his surgery, instead of putting his faith in jack....that didn't go 100% as planned..........or is it all just one big head game by ben?? and he already knew what the outcome would be all along......

guess we won't really know for a few years now. love it anyways!!

Well, he'd found out about the tumor just prior to the plane crash. Once he found out there was spinal surgeon on board he probably felt that the island had delivered him this opportunity and he should capatilize on it.

Also, there has been a lot of turmoil between Ben and the rest of the Others because Ben had cancer and Jacob was supposed to heal him... so Ben may have told them that Jack falling from the sky was Jacob's way of healing him. Maybe he had to let Jack do the surgery so his followers wouldn't lose all faith in him.

Also, there has been a lot of turmoil between Ben and the rest of the Others because Ben had cancer and Jacob was supposed to heal him... so Ben may have told them that Jack falling from the sky was Jacob's way of healing him. Maybe he had to let Jack do the surgery so his followers wouldn't lose all faith in him.

Weren't there some hints dropped about why Ben wasn't automatically healed or how/why he got the tumor in the first place? I can't remember what episode, but I remember that someone (Locke maybe?) was trying to say that Ben relied on technology too much and was losing his connection to the island because of that. I assumed this is how he was not healed and developed the tumor.

Did anyone get a screencap of the name and nationalities on those passports?

There are a bunch of threads about the one that Sayid opened. Name was Dean Moriarty and it was a Swiss passport. You can do a search in this forum for Dean Moriarty and you should come up with a bunch of threads already in the running.

I thought it was pretty obvious that it was Anthony Cooper cause he said he was driving , got in an accident, and then when he was being put into an ambulence someone smiled at him, mysteriously.

When Ben found out there was someone on the island who had been paralyzed before the crash, he must have been like, "Well we are going to need to get this guy." and thats why in season two Ben said he was coming for Locke when he was trapped by Danielle. So they gather information on John Locke and find out about his biological father and decide that bringing him to the island would be the best way to get Locke curious enough to join them.