Yes, I plan to do at least two Lost posts a day until Monday

So after the somewhat dissatisfying amount of answers in last week's episode, I found we made serious progress this time.

Let's have a look at LA first:
Desmond does a great job getting everyone together.
First he beats the shit out of Ben, who connects and tells Locke to let go. What a nice looking lady Rousseau can be if she isn't living all worn out in a jungle. So Locke decides to get the operation after all. "Maybe you are supposed to fix me. I think I am ready to get out of this chair."
Desmond then turns himself in and rides with the convicts Sayid and Kate, makes Hurley pay Ana Lucia (!) to let them out. So, did Hurley recognize Ana Lucia there? He fully connected since he kissed Libby, eh?
They all have a concert to attend on Sunday. A concert where Jack's son will be playing, where Miles is, because his dad hosts it or whatever. Hell, he even considered bringing Sawyer who doesn't want to because Charlotte could be there, hehe.
Jack's ex-wive will be there too, of course. It has to be Juliet, no? Claire certainly will go with her brother.
What's gonna happen at this concert? What is Desmond hoping for?

On the island things are going really bad and really promising at the same time.

Ben says he was told he could summon Smokey, before he realized it summoned him. Who told him that in the first place?
So it was Widmore who wired the plane with C4, he claims Jacob visited him after the freighter incident to talk a few things through.
Smokey body slams Richard. Was that his death? That would be a bit anti-climatic for him. I mean Smokey could have killed him hundreds of years ago when he came back to tell him that he works for Jacob now.
Smokey tells Ben that when he's done with the island he could have it all for himself. Which makes Ben switch sides again (right?), lead him to Widmore and Zoe. While she gets her throat cut, Widmore explains a few things: he wanted Desmond for his unique resistance to electromagnetism, as a measure of last resort in case Smokey manages to kill all candidates. One final way to make sure he never leave this place.
Ben shoots Widmore, so "he doesn't get to save his daughter."
Smokey is now after Desmond again, who was freed from the well by someone (Miles?). Smokey wants to make him do what he could never do himself: destroy the island. Does that free him? Or does he know that there is a new candidate at that point already and he is trapped again now?
At least we know why Smokey likes to walk around as a person most of the time: having the feet on the ground reminds him he was human.
After Smokey's promise on the porch to give Ben the island, shouldn't Dr. Linus be a bit disappointed to hear that it's gonna get destroyed now. Ben can't possibly stay on Smokey's side! Come on!

Young Jacob snatched his ashes from Hurley and puts them in a fire, so adult Jacob can appear one last time to talk to the candidates. And they ask the right questions.
Jacob wrote the names on the wall. He scratched Kate when she became a mother. Jacob knows he made Smokey this way, he admits his mistake and is sorry for the losses on the way.
He brought the people to the island because he knew it was only a matter of time until Smokey would figure out how to kill him and and then someone had to replace Jacob.
He claims that he didn't pluck anyone out of a happy existence. He choose the candidates because they were like him, all alone, looking for something they couldn't find out there.
The candidate's job is to protect the light from Smokey.
Jack doesn't hesitate to take it, drinks from a cup near the heart of the island and is now like Jacob. He has this job for as long as he can do it, as Jacob puts it.

I am pretty happy with how much we learned this week. Jacob seems to hope there is a way to kill Smokey after all. I always assumed the best he hoped for was to trap him again.

We're gonna have a pretty exciting finale, I am sure.
Can't it be Sunday already? Or better Monday for me