On the island:
After the crash, Locke miraculously recovers the use of
his legs. On the Island, Locke demonstrates his skills as
a hunter, tracker, as well as sort of spiritual leader.
He is the oldest of the principal characters. He appears
to have a connection to the Island itself, to which he ascribes
mystical powers, claiming "I've looked into the eye
of this island, and what I saw was beautiful." For
a number of episodes, he keeps secret his findings and revelations
from nearly all, except for his apparent acolyte Boone Carlyle,
with whom he often explores the Island's jungles. During
one such exploration, the two come across a metal hatch
with a glass window, which they unsuccessfully try to force
open or break. Later, a seeming vision leads the two to
a crashed Beechcraft airplane stuck in trees. When Boone
climbs into the cockpit, the plane falls to the ground,
crushing Boone and eventually leading to his death. Because
Locke initially lies about how Boone's injuries were received,
the death drives a wedge between some of the survivors and
Locke — and both Jack Shephard and Boone's step-sister,
Shannon hold him responsible for Boone's death.
In The Greater Good, after showing Sayid the location of the Beechcraft, Locke
confesses that he was the one who sabotaged the jury-rigged
communication equipment that Sayid used to search for the
Island's radio transmitter. Later, in retaliation for her
brother's death, Shannon tries to shoot Locke, but due to
the intervention of Sayid, the bullet only grazes his temple.
Later, in "Exodus: Parts 2 and 3," with the help
of Jack and Kate, Locke is successful in blowing open the
hatchway with dynamite.
Shortly afterwards, Locke and Kate attempt to descend down
the hatch by rope. When Kate is captured by Desmond, Locke
enters alone, and is confronted by Desmond. At first Desmond
believes Locke might be his replacement, but after asking
him a riddle which Locke fails to answer, Desmond holds
him at gunpoint and makes him enter "The Numbers"
sequence into the computer. After Desmond runs off, Locke
creates a duty roster to man the computer console.
In Born to Run, Locke requests that Sayid bring Jack to
the hatch with an open mind. When Jack asks why he kept
it a secret for three weeks, Locke replies, "Since
when does everyone have to report to you, Jack?"
Locke first meets Mr. Eko in "Collision" and
runs The Dharma Initiative orientation film for Eko and
Michael in "What Kate Did". Eko shows Locke the
cored-out Bible found in the Station discovered by the tail-end
survivors. Inside is a missing section of film, which Locke
splices into the orientation film.
In One of Them Locke is persuaded by Sayid to change the
combination on the armory in order that Henry Gale be detained
there whilst being interrogated by Sayid. However, Jack
blackmails Locke into opening the door when he realises
that Sayid is torturing Gale. Jack achieves this when the
alarm for the button which needs to be pressed becomes critical,
and he refuses to let Locke enter the code unless he opens
the door first.
Locke spends much time watching over the prisoner Henry
Gale, until he hears voices and noise coming over the hatches
loudspeaker system. Suddenly, the blast doors shut, locking
him into the living area. Locke releases Gale to try and
lift the doors, but instead gets his legs pinned under it.
While Henry is scrambling to enter the code and reset the
timer, Locke catches a very brief glimpse of a map,
visible only under UV blacklight, scribed on the back of
the blast doors.
Later, John and Un-Henry have a conversation in which Un-Henry
tells John that he was coming for him - that John is "one
of the good ones".
After Mr. Eko has a dream in which his brother advises
him to help John, the two go on a trip into the jungle to
look for the escaped Un-Henry Gale. They stumble upon the
plane where Boone died, and discover a new hatch which appears
to be a monitoring station that gives John the impression
that none of the other work being done on the island is
significant. John also discoveres a pneumatic tube, which
he deposits his roughly drawn recreation of the UV map into.
It is whisked away.
John continues to be convinced from this point that the
button means nothing, so much that he locks out Eko from
the hatch with the help of the returned Desmond and they
wait until the timer counts down. When he and Desmond converse
more, Desmond begins to change his mind, and believes that
his mishap may have caused the plane crash. He activates
a destruct EMP, and the hatch appears to be destroyed.
Before the crash:
Prior to the flight, John Locke led a lonely existence
as a middle manager at a box company in Tustin, California,
where he was constantly belittled by a snide (and younger)
higher-up for his interests in wargaming and survivalism.
Most critically, Locke was a paraplegic— apparently
for the preceding four years — the reasons for which
are unexplained. He comes to Australia hoping to fulfill
his dream of taking part in a walkabout, but when it is
discovered that he is disabled, Locke is forced off the
tour and sent back to the United States on the doomed flight.
Locke relates to Sawyer that as a child, he and his sister
were raised by a foster mother. When his sister died at
age six, his foster mother blamed herself, and sunk into
depression. A few months later, a dog came into their house
and his foster mother began to feel better. The dog even
slept in his sister's bed, leading Locke's foster mother
to believe that the dog was the sister reincarnated. When
asked whether he felt the same, he replies, "That's
just silly." He later reveals that he also had a brother;
however, it is as yet unclear whether his siblings were
biologically related.
Flashbacks in Deus Ex Machina reveal a younger Locke, with
a full head of hair and use of his legs, working at a large
retail store. His real mother, Emily Annabeth Locke (Swoosie
Kurtz), makes a sudden appearance at his workplace, claiming
that his birth was part of a greater plan, that he had no
father and was "immaculately conceived". This
leads to Locke hiring a private investigator to track down
his biological father, who turns out to be a wealthy hunter
named Anthony Cooper (played by Kevin Tighe). Cooper seems
to take his newfound son under his wing, teaching him to
be a sportsman. However, he is actually laying the groundwork
to con Locke into donating his kidney, which Cooper desperately
needs. Once the operation is completed, Cooper leaves the
hospital and orders his security guard not to admit Locke
back into his estate. Locke is crushed when he discovers
that he has been emotionally manipulated.
Following the deception by his father, Locke becomes an
angry and bitter person, even attending an anger management
group. He also loiters outside of his father's house early
in the morning in his car every day, hoping to simply ask
his father how he could con his own son. When Locke's father
finally meets with him again, he shatters Locke by simply
telling him to get over being conned, and that no one wants
him around. Despite being told that, Locke still continued
to loiter outside the house. Locke eventually begins a relationship
with a woman named Helen, another member of the support
group he attends. She successfully convinces him to stop
loitering, and to "take a leap of faith" into
the unknown. This is later paralleled in Locke's convincing
Jack to "take a leap of faith" by pushing the
button.
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