Thoughts on Lost

I have a lot of spare time in my commute, and the hours make it not good “thinking” time, but more “stare like a slobbering idiot at a dumb TV show or movie” time (kinda like my weekends). Since February of this year I’ve been watching Lost for the first time, from Season 1 Episode 1 a couple of days into the Vancouver 2010 Olympics, to finishing the last 30 minutes of the last episode of Season 6 (the last season) over my lunch hour at work today.

Don’t read more unless you want some major spoilers from a few random thoughts about the series finale…

I have to say I’m pretty impressed with the series overall, other than a couple of major piss offs. A buddy of mine says that Lost is a Shaggy Dog Story, IE: a story where small details are made a big deal out of, but end up to be not that important at all. That’s another way of saying “a ton of the things you’re going to have questions about will be completely ignored”. IE: The origin of the numbers, the island, Walt, why certain people are “special”, have super powers, who were the others, and a hundred other tiny bits of minutia that fans have noticed and questioned over the last 6 seasons. A few theories on some of them are here and here.

My short answer about if the Lost finale can be summed up as such:

“They did a great job of wrapping up the characters stories’, but not a great job of wrapping up the questions from the series.”

The final few scenes were splendidly done I thought, and as Jack did the flashback thing I admit I got a little chocked up. The final reveal about what the “sideways” universe was was well done as well, assuming I processed it properly. Basically the line about “everyone dies, but some long after others” says to me that their final meeting is happening perhaps long in the future (real time) even though it seems to be happening “currently” for all of them. IE: Hurley lived out his life being the caretaker, etc. Doesn’t go to explaining how the whole sideways universe / backwards universe / forwards universe thing worked.

Still, well worth working through 6 seasons in 3 months, and now I can go back over the last 6 years of pop culture to get all the inside jokes I’ve been missing.