SIS: Your thoughts on LOST finale (SPOILERS likely)

can someone explain it

I’m still trying to reconcile the other stuff. I liked it, but there are parts that bothered me. I may need to rewatch before I develop a final opinion.

she didnt, but the finale was pretty good anyway. i think they did a good job of toeing that line between not explaining enough and explaining too much (which is too say they didnt explain very much at all). but that was what the whole show was all about, so im cool with that.

a few things:

the aforementioned stuff about the secondary characters, especially Sayid. so much of the show was spent dwelling on his relationship with Nadia, and it turns out the “most important” person in his life was that whiny slut Shannon? they had all of, what, 3 episodes 4 years ago to establish that relationship and all the sudden it’s the best he ever had? that felt forced.

they didnt even try to explain away Walt. they could have said something, right? i know the actor grew up too fast and they had to write around him, but they could have said something, anything, to explain why he was special. i guess it’s best they left it unsaid, as anything probably would have felt weird. i dont know.

it was really great to see real Charlie again, if even for just a few moments. im still kinda hurt that he had to die so soon.

i HATE that Kate got the final shot at the Man in Black. i was reeeaaaally hoping that she would be the one thrown off the cliff. and then spit upon.

was it all a dream?

i hope it was all a dream

Looking back, there are things I wish they’d addressed better (the whole Walt loose end is the biggest problem for me) or things that don’t quite add up (if the alternate storyline was a sort of Purgatory, why all the different details like Jack’s son and Sawyer’s job, and why the need to have their “awakening” moments?)

But I literally found myself saying about an hour and a half in, “At this point, they’ve honored the series’ past so well, given me so many little happy endings, I don’t even care if everyone ends up dead in the end.” I’ve always been someone who watches primarily for the characters, so this was exactly the kind of closure I wanted. And I loved the symmetry of the final imagery. Good story, very good.

Also, has anyone read the novel Life of Pi? One of my favorites, but it also has a very controversial ending. I have a feeling the people who were upset by that book’s ending would be upset by the end of Lost, too. Just a theory.

Sun and Jin finally have an ending where they weren’t seperated

where were the shipments of Dharma food coming from?

who was shooting at Sawyer & Kate from the other boat during the time skips?

There was an implied unhappy ending for Sawyer, Claire and Kate, I thought….the Island was still the most important times of their lives. I think this means they either died a relatively short time after leaving, or they led relatively unfulfilling lives once they got home.

I don’t mind this interpretation, but I don’t think it’s the only one. For each of those three, the mere fact that Oceanic 815 didn’t land in LA irrevocably changed their future. Without the island hiatus, Kate would have gone to prison, Sawyer would have surely ended up back in prison, and Claire would have given Aaron up for adoption. So even if they went on to have amazing lives after they finally left the island, their time with the Losties was foundational.

Those were so beautifully done, I though. It was like the eight most emotional moments in the history of the show, one after another. I kept thinking I couldn’t wait for the next one.

But I figured about 4 or 5 shows into this season that we were headed for something like we got and really stopped thinking and wondering about the show. I still enjoyed watching it, but I mostly forgot about it the moment after a show ended.

The fact that the two episodes that dealt with the island’s history were slow-paced and insular indicated to me that they weren’t really interested in really exploring the island anymore.

Last night’s conclusion was suitable and well-done, but I think that Darlton and the creators overestimate how interesting their characters actually are. Most of them are rather two dimensional, especially when they’re trying to emote. The acting has always been oases of great performances (usually from Michael Emerson and Terry O’Quinn) among long stretches of Jack/Kate/Claire desert. In any case, the most interesting character is always the Island itself. The longer the show is away from the island the more it drags.

I thought that this season, and this finale in particular, marginalized my interest and love for the island itself. It basically turned into a set from The New Adventure of Hercules in Season 6, some of that has to do with unfortunate production budget cuts, but I think that it also comes from a change in vision from the creators. What we’re told last night, very clearly imo, was that the island was like a giant vending machine that needed to be unplugged and replugged to get the desired empty calories of character resolution.

There some major narrative flaws for this ending, but because relying on vague and mush-mouthed religious and spiritual ideas can essentially argue away all the criticisms, I don’t think it’s worth going into. BTW, I hate and will always hate the notion that such’n’such is great" because it’s open to your own interpretation." If that’s true, then it’s not art.

In any case, it speaks to the talent of the creators that this ending — which is essentially an incredible cop out given the possibilities that existed in Season 3 and Season 4 — stil seemed plausibly conclusive.

i think maybe 50 percent still think that everyone died in the plane crash. this blows me away

I would attempt to make the case that Red Reporter is our Island.