Hurley Bird/Theories

From Lostpedia

"Real" Bird

• Might not be a joke. The closed captioning for the episode says something like: Bird Squawks "Hurley", though that too could be done as a joke. More likely the bird is an omen. Or maybe it's Libby warning Hurley in much the same way as Eko dreamed of Ana Lucia.

Closed captioning is notoriously inaccurate, particularly when trying to interpret unfamiliar words or unusual pronunciations. CC is generally done by independent contractors who generally use the broadcast version rather than an actual script. This could be an example of the closed captioner making the same mistake that fans have made.

Counter theory: Usually closed-captioning is done by a separate operation from the producers of a television program, and therefore is generally considered unofficial and non-canon. It is unknown if this is true with Lost.

However, if done independently, it should support Hurley's claim that the bird said his name. The closed-captioner heard (or read it in the script), too.

However, the second squawk is an admitted joke refering to the first appearance.

However, on the Season 2 DVD of Lost, the official subtitling for the hearing impaired, done by ABC who produces the DVDs, the subtitles says some to the effect of "Bird Squawks: Hurley"

Two Birds

• May be two different birds, the one in "Exodus, Part 2" was black, not green.

Male and Female birds of the same species are often different colors.

The bird in "Exodus, Part 2" appears to be green and not black. Even though proof is needed, I believe people merely presumed the bird was black when it was first seen in "Exodus, Part 2".

Smoke Monster

• The bird in "Exodus, Part 2" appeared just before an attack from the black smoke. And a similar bird call was heard moments before the black smoke attacked Boone and Shannon a few episodes earlier in "Hearts and Minds". If this is indeed the same bird as the Hurley Bird, then this bird may actually be the Black Smoke or serve as a scout for the Black Smoke.
• Could be the incarnation of the Monster that a podcast said viewers saw without knowing it.
  • If so, the Monster's intentions could have been to entice Michael into shooting at it. The Monster wanted Michael to know that his gun was not loaded, and that his plot had been foiled.

The Green Lantern

• The Green Lantern, one of the heroes in Walt's comic book, often creates green animals with his ring. Since many pieces of the comic book have somehow turned up on the Island, this could support theories about Walt "creating" things on the Island.

DHARMA Project

• The bird could be another animal species part of a zoology DHARMA facility on the Island, along with polar bears and sharks.
• Hurley trained the bird to call out his name when he was in the 70's. However the bird would have to have an awfully long lifespan to still be alive in 2004, but it could as healthy as Joop.
  • Possible, some birds live longer than their owners (50 years +), especially large tropical birds like parrots.
• The bird maybe some sort of extremely intelligent DHARMA Experiment into birds and Pierre Chang tells Hurley in Some Like It Hoth that if anyone found out about the body then Hurley would be sent to the hydra island to clean up "polar bear poop" and so maybe the information about Alvarez being dead somehow gets leaked, not necessarily from Hurley but from someone else. Pierre Chang may find out about this and blame Hurley, sending him to the Hydra Island this is where the aviary is found and Hurley, as he does makes friends with the bird and teaches it to say his name and it learns his name and at the same time the polar bears escape so do the birds and the reason that Hurley doesn't know about the bird in 2004 when he sees it is because in his timeline he has not yet met the bird yet.
• I partially stick to this theory. That the bird was originally from the Hydra Island and used to be involved with DHARMA experiments and zoology projects. I think that the reason why the bird can say "Hurley" happened around 1977. At some point in their journey through the past Hurley & others had a conversation or had to hide near the bird cages when the bird was still inside it's cage as a youngling and that Hurley was one of the first words it picked up.
  • Or Hurley was just the one who feed the bird a lil' something extra during on of his food-deliveries to Hydra Island.

Faith Harrinton

• This bird could be the one Faith Harrington is running after in the book Endangered Species.
  • according to wikepedia "The Paradise Parrot (Psephotus pulcherrimus) was an unusually colourful medium-sized parrot..." emphasis added

It's Just a Parrot

• It's green and seems to talk. Maybe it's a giant parrot.
  • Seems to be more to it than that, it specifically say's "Hurley"
    • It heard Hurley's name in 1977 and and has a long lifespan, thus it saying "Hurley" in 2004.
• looks exactly like the austrailian dream god could it be that Dave was right that Hurely is really making it all up

Genetically Altered

• The bird is genetically altered like the polar bears to live in the climate

A lot of green birds are native to island, jungle, forest like enviroments.

Other Possible Sightings

• May be heard in the very beginning of the Pilot Part 1 when Jack is laying on the jungle floor.

Time Traveling

• Someone experiencing the effects of time traveling could of yelled Hurley's name while the bird was flying by.
• Or maybe Hurley taught the bird to say his name.

Jacob

• Since a bird like this one was known as the creator of earth, it might make sense that it's Jacob. Also, since the monster is theorized to be jacob's enemy, then it would also make sense that the bird was seen minutes before the monster---maybe the bird was running from the monster...