John Locke

(About the actor: Terry O'Quinn)

Flashback Episodes: "Walkabout", "Deus Ex Machina", "Orientation", "Lockdown", "Further Instructions", "The Man From Tallahassee", "The Brig," "Cabin Fever"


Introduction: Johnathan 'John' Locke is one of the middle section survivors of Oceanic Flight 815. His paralysis was immediately healed upon crashing on the island, which has ultimately led him to believe that he has some sort of connection to the island. He is sometimes shown in antithesis to Benjamin Linus, sharing several traits including the ability to commune with Jacob and a mother named Emily. Seen as antithetical to Jack Shephard, he and Jack are philosophical opposites and share leadership among the survivors.

Hails from: Tustin, California

Status: Alive in Present Time. Confirmed Dead In Flash Forward (There's No Place Like Home - Part's 2 & 3)

Plane Section: Middle

Who he was before: Home inspector, Worked at a box company, paralyzed and in a wheelchair, anger management attendant, marijuana farm worker, sucker who got conned...twice

Who he is now: Survival expert and cool guy, great hunter, island mystic. He stays in a constant and quiet power struggle with Jack. Is responsible for the amount of high quality knives on the island. Believer in the spirit of the Island and destiny.The Others consider him to be "special."

Why he was in Australia: To go on a walkabout.

Daddy issues: He grew up in an orphanage; when his father resurfaced, it was only to con John into giving up a kidney. His father is also the reason his back was broken - when he confronted his father, Anthony Cooper (one of his many aliases), he threw him out of an 8 story window.

Locke's Mom: Locke's mother, Emily Annabeth, spent some time at the Santa Rosa Mental Health Institute (Hurley and Libby also spent some time there as well), around 1992 or 1995 (based on the papers Locke looks at in "Deus Ex Machina" ).

Romantic entanglements:
Pre-island: Met Helen in a therapy group, but she left him over his lies surrounding his father. Also had a thing with a phone-sex operator, "Helen", wink, wink.
On the island: Locke became close with Claire; however nothing developed and he is more of a father figure towards her.

Possible Namesake: John Locke was an important Enlightenment thinker that inspired Thomas Jefferson while writing the Declaration of Independence.

Island Adventures:
On the forty-four initial days (First season), Locke is the hunter and believer of the group of survivors. He leads the hunting group when they run low on food, and along with Michael and Kate they go hunting for boar. During the journey, he finds himself head to head with the Monster, and he later states to Jack "I've seen the eye of the Island, and what I saw, was beautiful". During Claire's search after her kidnapping by Ethan, he found, along with Boone, a hatch, which he ventured to open with the boy's help, believing he was meant to. Asking the island for instructions, he gets a dream of a Beech-craft and sees Boone injured, later to find it. He starts to lose his ability to walk -again-, and Boone must climb it, falling with it and dying. That day, he pounds at the hatch's door, and a light turns on -a signal that he should continue his quest-. John later admits that he attacked Sayid while he tried to triangulate Danielle's signal. On the season finale, along with Jack and the dynamite party they blow open the hatch, not after finding the monster and experiencing fear in his eyes. He tells Jack that each one of them was brought there for a reason, that the island gathered them - that it was destiny. He states that Boone was the sacrifice the island demanded.

The next twenty-three days (Second season), Locke spends most of his time pushing the mysterious button in the Swan hatch. Eko shows him the missing part of the Dharma tape, which further increases his faith in the island. Days after Henry Gale (soon to be known as Benjamin Linus) is captured, Locke's trapped in the hatch when the blast-doors fall, gravely injuring his leg, and getting a glimpse at a mysterious map drawn on the door, which depicts some of the hatches on the island. He isn't comfortable with Jack's lead over the group, and claims it's his hatch. When he's starting to lose faith in the island, after Benjamin tells him nothing happened when he didn't push the button, Eko partners with him after Ana Lucia's and Libby's deaths to find the ? point in the map, which it's revealed to be The Pearl station. Watching the video in which it's said that the Swan and the button is nothing more than an experiment, he's frustrated at the deception and stops pushing the button - not without Eko taking his role. With his leg coming back and leaving the crutches, he joins Desmond and tells him that they must stop Eko from pushing the button and figure out what happens if they don't do it. While locking Eko out, Desmond realizes he took down the plane the day he didn't press the button, but John destroys the computer, later to realize he was wrong.

During the start of the next season, Locke wakes up mute, and with Charlie's help builds a sweat lodge, in which Boone tells him that he was indeed the sacrifice the island demanded, and tells him he must save Jack, Sawyer and Kate, after cleaning up his own mess. He ventures in the jungle with Charlie to save Eko's life from the polar bears. He takes the role of the survivors' leader, and heads to the Pearl along with Sayid, Desmond, Paulo and Nikki to try to find Eko and a computer. After Eko's encounter with the Black Smoke, John tells him "What I saw was a beautiful light". Inside the hatch, they see a man with a patch (Mikhail) on one of the surveillance cameras in The Pearl, then are interrupted by the Smoke Monster killing Eko outside. He's told by the dying man "You're next." Locke tells Sayid the monster is what brought them to the island, and that Eko died for a reason - he had to find what it was. While burying Eko with his Jesus Stick, he reads the religious inscription "LIFT UP YOUR EYES AND LOOK NORTH JOHN" - he had finally received his further instructions.

Big secret:
Locke was paralyzed before crashing on the island. He father put him in his wheelchair by pushing him out an 8 story window.

Rose is the only one who ever appears to have noticed and mentioned anything about Locke in his wheelchair before the crash since she saw him in the airport. Locke did reveal this secret to Boone, but Boone took that secret to his grave.

Saw the Monster (Tells Jack that he saw the eye of the Island, and it was beautiful; told Sayid it was what brought them there; and told Eko he saw a beautiful light).

In "The Man from Tallahassee"we learn that John's father pushed him out of an 8 story building, when John confronted him about a murdered boy who had suspected him of being a Conman. John goes with Kate and Sayid to rescue Jack, after Kate tells them what Karl had told her. On the way there he kills Mikhail by pushing him into the sonic fence, when he didn't need to, though not before Mikhail explains how he got to the island- which is by submarine. It later turns out that Mikhail survived. Locke also steals C4 out of the flame, and puts it in Sayid's backpack.
When they get there, he leaves the backpack with Sayid and as Kate goes to Jack, he breaks into Ben's house with a handgun. When Alex comes to check on her 'father' Locke grabs her, and then hides with her in the closet when another Other comes to tell Ben that they have captured Kate and Sayid. Ben tells the guy "bring me the man from Tallahassee." The man leaves and John asks if that is code for something. Ben says "No, we don't have a code for 'there's a man in the closet with a gun to my daughter's head' although we obviously should."
Locke has Alex go retrieve Sayid's bag, supposedly under her father's orders. After a talk with Ben, he finds out that Ben can't understand why Locke is healed, and he is now in the wheelchair. Locke tells Ben that he is 'cheating' (he has the good luck to be on the island but is using electricity and other things) and supposes that is why they have switched places. As Locke goes to leave Ben says, "Imagine a big box, and anything you wish for can appear in it. What would you say to that?" Locke replies, "I hope it's big enough for you to wish a submarine into it."
Locke appears to blow up the sub. It looks like what Ben said during their talk is right, Locke doesn't want to leave the island because he is afraid he will be paralyzed again. Ben also asks Locke if he wants to stay on the island so he can be away from his father. John doesn't answer, but we have to wonder because... After the sub gets blown up and Locke is taken into captivity, Ben goes to Locke. John asks if he is going to start talking about the 'box' again. Ben says "No, I'm going to show you what came out of it." When John opens up a random door that Ben has brought him to, he gets a panicked look on his face once he sees what's inside... his Father.

Ben instructs Locke that he must kill his father in order to prove his devotion to the island and also learn its secrets. Locke attempts to sacrifice his father on the stone pillar at the Other's camp but realizes he cant do it, much to his Father's and seemingly Ben's delight. After he has Sawyer kill his father (since, as it turns out, this is the man who conned Sawyer's mother, leading to his being an orphan) and gives Sawyer Juliet's tape, he demands Ben take him to the mysterious Jacob. Ben reluctantly agrees.
On their journey, Locke notices gray powder on the ground, but Ben refuses to comment on it. Once at Jacob's house Ben says "Once I open this door there's no going back". Locke makes him open it and sees nothing but an empty chair. He thinks Ben is crazy when he speaks to the empty chair. Ben is constantly asking if he can see him, then when Locke turns away he hears "HELP ME" from the room, turning on the flashlight we see the house begins to act strangely with the door closing, windows breaking, the Lantern spilling and cracking, and as the camera changes, a figure in the chair. Locke runs out and Ben comes out incredulous of Locke saying what did you hear?
Later after walking Ben reveals that he was not part of the others initially and show the ditch with their bodies. He says, "I'm smart enough not to be down in that ditch, unlike you."
He shoots Locke who falls in the hole and the last we see of Locke in the episode is his supposedly last breath.
In the finale he sees Walt who tells him to get up because he has work to do. The next time we see him, he throws a knife into Naomi's back and is trying to stop Jack from calling for rescue.

Locke (through Jacob) has become the Island. He now has more clout than Ben. Locke is in charge and will let those who want to leave, leave; and those who want to stay, stay. But he loves the island and knows that it is his salvation.

At the end of season 3 we find Jack visiting a funeral home and we saw that Jack was upset when he saw the coffin. After waiting a while to find out who was in the coffin, we finally found out that it was John Locke. John Locke was told by Richard Alpert that he would have to kill himself to get the Oceanic Six to come back to the island. John tries to convince the Oceanic Six, and he failed to get anybody to listen to him. John realizes that the only way to get them to listen was to kill him. Benjamin Linus walked in the room just as Locke was about to hang himself, but Ben convinces him not to. Ben is trying to encourage Locke, until Locke tells mentions Eloise Hawking. Ben then strangles Locke to death, and sets up the scene to make it look like Locke committed suicide. All Ben wanted was the name. That is how Locke ended up in the coffin. After he ends up there, he is moved onto Ajira Flight 316 to be in proxy of Christian Sheppard.

After the Ajira plane crash lands on the island we see Locke is alive, and even tells the new survivors that he was killed. Despite all of the mysterious things that happen on the island several of the island's long time inhabitant are freaked out about the fact that Locke is alive again. Locke moves back to his people (The Others). Locke commands all of the others to get ready to go see Jacob. Locke tells Ben that he is planning on getting Ben to kill Jacob, not just meet him. Locke and the rest of the others get to where Jacob lives, and Ben and locke go in to see Jacob. But then something very creepy happens. The Ajira people have made a very important discovery. They move into the group of others toting a large steel box. They open the box and dump it out. The camera zooms around the box and there lays a dead John Locke. Meanwhile Ben is killing Jacob with sombody who we're not even sure who he is. So is Locke dead or alive?