The Lost season finale was one of the best of primetime this year. In trademark LOST fashion, it answered some questions while posing many more. It had excitement, romance, humor, creepiness and intrigue. It gave us plenty of clues to decipher, freeze-frames to examine and plot elements to analyze and debate. And really, aren't those the things we really love about LOST?
At the season's outset, fans complained about the long delay before the premiere. Once shows began airing, there were complaints that Lost had "lost it", that episodes weren't answering questions and weren't impactful or exciting enough. True, viewership was down from Lost's hey-day, but now, as we look at the 06/07 season as a whole, we see that this exodus of viewers is happening across ALL shows - even the hits. (There's just too many choices out there and so many hours in a TV fans' day - even a rabid one like me.)
]]>I never gave up on LOST, and I'm very glad I didn't. Sure, there were some episodes that were slow, or that were building toward something that wouldn't happen for a few weeks. That happens on ALL shows. Besides, the Powers-That-Be at LOST know they have to be careful.. to peel the onion layers away little by little and to try to hit that fine balance between giving too much away and not giving away anything at all. Knowing, as we all do now, that there is a set end-point for LOST, 48 episodes(and 3 years)from now, will help them to pace the "onion-peeling", resulting in a plot-line with a logical progession that doesn't spin out into total weirdness, as Twin Peaks did. I'm looking forward to watching this story play out to its conclusion.
The big "game-changer" we were all promised for the finale, Jack's flash-forward, shows us that at least Jack and Kate do get off the island and back to a life on "the mainland" somewhere. Neither of them looks very happy, and they sure aren't "together". In fact, Jack's life looks like a train wreck.. and WHOSE funeral did Jack just barely miss? (and why would Kate care? Was it one of the fellow LOST-ies?)
This makes us wonder.. Does everyone get rescued? Are Naomi's and her boat benevolent and promises of rescue true? Or is she setting a trap for the LOST-ies as Ben told Jack? We know from Charlie's heroic death that Naomi's boat is NOT tied to Desmond's Penny. So who? and why?
The showdown between our LOST-ies and the "Others" finally happened, and HOW GREAT WAS IT that Hurley saved the day for Jin, Bernard, and Sayid with his magic VW van, that Sawyer shot Tom outright "for taking the kid", and Jack beat the crap out of Ben.
This finale had more deaths than a typical Sopranos episode but not as many as the average Clint Eastwood spaghetti western. RIP to Charlie, Tom, Mikhail (we assume - but he's already died and returned again TWICE.), and several other Others, not to mention the guy in the box in the Flash Forward. Fans are already having fun with that piece of the puzzle. I've learned the name of the Funeral Home Jack visits, Hoffs-Drawlar, is an anagram for Flash-Forward. One vigilant fan even has decoded a portion of the newspaper clipping in Jack's hand by freezing that frame. The screenie can be found on http://losteastereggs.blogspot.com/, and the transcript he came up with is as follows:
"The body of John Lantham of New York was found shortly after 4 am in
the 4300 block of Grand Avenue.
Ted Worden, a doorman at the Tower Lofts complex, heard loud noises
coming from the victim's loft. Concerned for tenants' safety, he entered the loft and found the body hanging from a beam in the living room.
According to Jaime Ortiz, a police spokesman, the incident was deemed a suicide after medical tests. Latham is survived by one teenaged
son.
Memorial services will be held at the Hoffs-Drawlar Funeral Home
tomorrow evening."
Locke, on the other hand, was presumed dead. But after a talk with "Walt", he somehow sprang back to life, got out of the mass grave, made it to camp, killed Naomi and threatened to kill Jack if he called Naomi's boat. Jack made the call anyway. Their response was, Sit tight! We'll be right there!" Celebrations ensue.. but given what Jack's life looks like in the future, maybe they better think twice!
Come February, we'll start to get the answers to our new questions while, I'm sure, puzzling over a whole crop of new ones. In the meantime, keep diggin' around the web, blogging and posting and sharing info with others. Buy the DVD set when it comes out and watch again. Freeze-frame and slo-mo for clues. Interact with the show the way good fans do and the way advertisers and networks LOVE. And, we'll chat LOST again in 2008.
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