Danielle Rousseau is a fictional character on the ABC drama television series Lost, which chronicles the lives of over forty people after their plane crashes on a remote island somewhere in the South Pacific.

[1] Croatian actress Mira Furlan plays the scientist who shipwrecks on the island sixteen years prior to the crash of Oceanic Flight 815.

Sixteen years prior to the plane crash, Rousseau was a member of a French research vessel, whose ship ran aground on the island.

Rousseau's primary objective is to reunite with her daughter; 16 years 253 days 21 hours 42 min 59 seconds later, which is achieved in the season three finale "Through the Looking Glass".

Damon Lindelof later revealed that the short-lived reunion was unexplored due to the 2007–2008 Writers Guild of America strike, which also scrapped an episode dedicated to the character.

Sixteen years before Oceanic 815 crashes on the island, Rousseau was a heavily pregnant member of a six-person crew aboard a French research vessel three days out of Tahiti.

[6] Rousseau later tells the survivors of Oceanic 815 that two months after their arrival, that the island natives, which she called the Others, carried a disease that the rest of her crew had contracted.

Rousseau also attempts to kill Jin, having witnessed him vanish moments after her team entered the Smoke Monster's lair, believing he has the disease.

[7] Rousseau makes her first appearance in the season one episode "Solitary", where she captures Sayid (Naveen Andrews), one of the plane crash survivors.

[10] Rousseau makes her next appearance in "Numbers", where she shoots at Charlie (Dominic Monaghan) and Hurley (Jorge Garcia), suspecting them of being Others.

[9] Season four begins with the survivors dividing into two groups, with those who believe the people from the freighter to be dangerous, including Rousseau and Alex, joining Locke (Terry O'Quinn).

[16] After learning of the freighter crew's intentions to kill everyone on the island, Ben directs Rousseau, along with Alex and her boyfriend Karl (Blake Bashoff), to head to the Temple where the rest of the Others are located.

[17] The buried bodies of both are discovered by Miles (Ken Leung), Sawyer (Josh Holloway), and Claire after they leave Locke and travel back to the beach.

[23] Co-show runners and executive producers Damon Lindelof and Cuse originally intended for Rousseau to get her own flashback episode in season four,[24] however as a result of the Writer's Strike, this did not come to pass.

In her memoir, Furlan disclosed the producers retaliated against her during re-negotiation for a new deal to guest star on the show (as she was not under contract as a series regular).

She remarked how asking for better accommodations—after dealing with a hostile work environment for years—suddenly led "the discourse to change"; they abruptly announced a plan to kill her character off, leaving "the mother and the daughter storyline unfinished".

In a review of the first-season episode "Solitary", Chris Carabott of IGN commented that Rousseau appeared to be more emotionally fragile than in later seasons, and was like a "loose cannon".

[28] Carabott found that as the series progressed and the mystery around the character was lessened, Rousseau was unable to deliver the same impact she made in her first appearance.

"[29] Lost co-creator J. J. Abrams commended Furlan for giving the character "heart and soul", and managed to make her "identifiable and complex".

[30] BuddyTV's Don Williams believed that Rousseau would survive, mainly because he had been waiting to see her flashback for four seasons, and thought her death would ensure it would not happen.