On Wings of (Green) Eagles

As the theorizing gets underway, I was thinking of something Damon and Carlton said in a recent podcast. They indicated that the green eagle that swooped past Hurley, Jack, Sawyer, Kate and Michael in "Live Together, Die Alone" was something they looked to put in the finales. Here is a screencap of that most obvious appearance of the bird (which prompted Hurley to ask if the bird called his name, and Michael to discover the gun Jack gave him had no bullets).


But I had no recollection of any prior appearances of the green "Hurleybird" until I recently rewatched Season 1 on DVD (if you have not taken another look at the first season since it aired, I strongly suggest you should - it was much more packed with clues than I, for one, initially realized). Anyway, in the first season finale, "Exodus, Part II," the green eagle in fact did make an appearance. Here are a couple of freeze frames, courtesy of lost-media.com.


Here, the eagle took flight away from Jack, Hurley, Locke, and Kate shortly after Dr. Arzt blew up, seconds before Smokey appeared and tried to drag Locke off into its subterranean lair.

Still, Damon and Carlton mentioned the bird, and its tendency to appear in finales, at a time recent enough for them to know what would happen in "Through the Looking Glass." And yet, there was no green bird...

Or was there? The bird's first appearance was a harbinger of Smokey. Its second was just before the whispers could be heard as Jack's team was ambushed by the Others. In the third finale, John Locke heard the whispers, and then (impossibly, it would seem), saw a significantly aged Walt, who seemed to have prescient knowledge of John's role on the island.

So I'm wondering - as related as the many strange island manifestations seem to be, is this evidence that, at the very least, spirit Walt and the Green Eagle are one and the same? Some food for thought, in any case.