Lost finale recap! A great finish!

So why did it take an hour and 40 minutes for someone to ask if Jack's plan to detonate the hydrogen bomb is the very event that sets everything in motion?

But I'm getting ahead of myself.

Season five of Lost has finally come to an end. Here's a not-so brief recap, separated by the time zones:

1977: Sawyer, Juliet and Kate are on the sub, leaving the island, and Kate tells them about Jack's plan to detonate the bomb to destroy the island, and ultimately prevent Oceanic flight 815 from ever crashing. Sawyer is fine with the idea, but Juliet launches an escape attempt, agreeing that Jack needs to be stopped.
After the trio make it back to the island they run into Rose and Bernard, the happiest married couple on earth, who say they have deliberately been avoiding any attempts to find them because they are enjoying their retirement and solitude. They want no part of the 'nonsense' involving any of the Oceanic survivors (it was a great slap of reality, really.) The trio grab their guns and go to find Jack. Meanwhile, Jack and Sayid remove the core from the hydrogen bomb and make their way to the Swan station. They try to sneak through Dharmaville, but are forced to shoot their way out after being spotted. Sayid is shot, but the two are rescued by Hurley, Miles and Jin in a Dharma van. On the road to the Swan station they are stopped by Sawyer, Kate and Juliet. To Be Continued ...

2007: Locke, Ben, Sun and The Others are on their trek to find Jacob. Locke learns that Ben has been ordered (by his dead adopted daughter Alex) to follow Locke's every order, which makes Locke happy since he was going to order Ben to kill Jacob. We also learn that Ben has never seen Jacob and the whole 'talking-to-the-empty-rocking-chair-in-the-moving-cabin' thing was just a ruse. As the group continues walking, we catch up with the other passengers of Ajira 316 (that brought Jack, Hurley, dead-Locke and the others to the island again.) It appears they have taken Lapidus hostage, but insist they are the good guys and are only trying to take their mysterious crate to the statue. Lapidus is freaked out by what he sees inside. They finally make it to the foot of the four-toed statue (literally) shortly after Richard shows Locke and Ben the entrance into Jacob's lair. To Be Continued ...

Random: The episode starts by showing a man in ancient clothing on the island in the distant past, when the statue is still intact. He's watching the arrival of a tall ship on the horizon (the Black Rock?.) He is Jacob, who spends his days making tapestries and catching fish. He has a brief conversation with another island resident who talks about his desire to kill Jacob, and how he realizes he has to find some kind of loophole to make it happen. (There’s a lot of talk about the other man being Esau … get it? Jacob and Esau? From the Bible? You’ll have to Google it, this is getting too long!) We then see an ageless Jacob appearing at key moments in our hero’s lives; he's there when a young Kate tries to shoplift for the first time; he gives Sawyer the pen that he uses to write his vengeance letter after his parents' murder-suicide; he revives Locke after he is thrown out of that 8-story window by his father; he meets Hurley outside prison after his release, gives him the guitar case and tells him about the Ajira flight; he talks with Jack after his first surgery,where his father undermined his authority; he's there to congratulate Jin and Sun on their marriage; and he distracts Sayid just moments before his beloved Nadia is killed by a hit-and-run driver. Who IS this guy?

Now for the big wrap ups:

2007: We discover that Locke's body is inside the big crate, and it appears the Locke that has been leading the others is actually the man who has been trying to find a loophole to kill Jacob (possessed by Esau?)
The loophole apparently involves Ben, who is offended that Jacob never spoke to him directly, and knifes him in the heart. The pseudo-Locke then pushes Jacob into the fire.

1977: Sawyer tries to reason with Jack about why he shouldn't detonate the bomb, but when diplomacy fails, fists fly, and we finally get the big fight between the two leading men that we have been expecting since day one. Juliet stops the fight, telling Sawyer she has changed her mind, and she wants Jack to be able to change things back so she never has to face the day when Sawyer realizes that he actually loves Kate more. A dying Sayid rigs the bomb core to explode on impact, and Jack sneaks his way to the Swan construction site, where they are still drilling despite Dr. Chang's objections. There is another major gunbattle between the Dharma loyalists and Jack and friends. The drill finally punches through the magnetic core of the island. The force begins dragging every piece of metal in the area down into the center of the island. Jack tosses in the bomb core, but nothing happens. Juliet get tangled up in a chain that is being drawn into the hole and, despite Sawyer and Kate's rescue efforts, she falls to the bottom. Severely injured, but alive, Juliet grabs a rock at the bottom of the hole and smashes the bomb core until ...

WHITE FLASH, BLACK 'LOST' LOGO. Wow!

So I go back to my first question. Why did it take an hour and 40 minutes before someone (Miles) pointed out that Jack's plan to detonate the hydrogen bomb is the very event that sets everything in motion? I don't consider myself to be incredibly astute, but I’ve been wondering the same thing for a week.

It's hard to believe that we have to wait 8 more months until the final season starts. So let the speculation begin! Will the explosion reset everything? Will Oceanic 815 really land in Los Angeles as if nothing has happened? Who is Jacob's nemesis, and what, exactly, is the loophole he used to kill Jacob. What will be the impact of Jacob's death ... if he's really dead? Lemme know!

We have a lot to think about until 2010!