LOST Conversations. part 3

Hi Losties!

Here is another segment of shared thoughts from fellow LOST friends.

A few friends shared their honest thoughts and honest perceptions with me about the show, the story and its writers, the LOST community, recappers, bloggers, podcasters, theorists and fans. It is enlightening to see how the journey was for the them over past six years. I thought it an interesting idea to collaborate and post  some of their thoughts here.  I will post a series of these shared thoughts so be sure to check back.  Also I encourage you share your LOST journey with us, so leave your thoughts in the comment section below.

Shared Thoughts from Kim Muller. Educator and Book Bawk:
This story gave me a whole new concept of looking at life, death, and beyond. Sure, stories like Lord of the Rings and even The Dark Tower series touch on this a bit, but Lost showed us what we can and need to do in order to be happy, and, in my humble opinion, it meant reaching out to others (no pun intended.) Every character who reached "the end" in the Church had to extend his/her life in a way that ended a piece of selfishness in him/herself and brought him/her closer to others, and in turn, closer to the goodness that we each are capable of finding in ourselves. Of all of the characters, the two who I enjoyed seeing this change in the most were Sawyer and Juliet. Sawyer is the obvious one for these changes, but Juliet made such a huge sacrifice to keep a near stranger company, and her reward in that decision was love, which seems to sum up what they all gained in their own ways.
I have turned at least twenty high school students into "Losties" by showing them the pilot episode as a stretched parallel to Lord of the Flies and to another class to show a parallel to Alas, Babylon. However, I think I was wrong with The Lord of the Flies parallel. William Golding's novel was an allegory showing each reader how man will naturally choose savagery over order, peace, and goodness every time. In my opinion, Lost showed the complete opposite, and I think Jacob somewhat noted that to the final four candidates when he mentioned how lonely and sad their lives were before coming to the island. Each of them, especially Sawyer, chose a path of loneliness, inner violence, and isolation. Only by allowing others in can we find goodness and peace, which they each did.
On a personal note, I was reading The Shack at the time of the series finale, and I think the two media merged and reacquainted me with the afterlife. I also enjoyed the fact that Lost is one of the few shows where a brain is required. I noticed that EVERY one of my students who really enjoys reading watched Lost, even if it was to make fun of the plot.


Shared Thoughts From Amy from LostBlog:
WHAT LOST DID TO ME: THE SIX YEAR JOURNEY TO WTF?! (AND WHY I LOVED EVERY MINUTE!)

“Instead of dumbed down TV, LOST is dumbed up TV; it’s designed to make us all feel stupid.” – quote from Amy’s favorite LOST watching pal.

I openly admit it. The only reason I watched the very first episode of LOST was to scope out Matthew Fox. That man is totally hot and very sexy. As I watched that first hour, happily feeding my imaginary lust for, quite possibly, the grumpiest man on TV, I remember being impressed with nearly everything else I was seeing on the show. The set up was cool. The characters were interesting. That first hour was beautifully shot, written, produced – even the music was cool. I was impressed. THEN:

All of a sudden, out of nowhere, a loud, unknown, unseen, scary-as-all-get-out Thing snatches the pilot of Oceanic Flight 815 right out the fuselage. Pfft. Blood spatters on the window behind a freaked out Kate.
I never missed another episode.

WHAT LOST DID TO TV
When people ask me why they should watch LOST, my answer is always the same: One day you'll be sorry you didn't. When the sum total of human intelligence crystallizes into a vortex of unyielding creativity, it is indeed a beautiful thing, but when it happens on network television, son, you’d better thank your fucking lucky stars and pay attention. It won’t happen again in your lifetime.

In case you missed it, LOST just redefined TV for the 21st Century.

At a time when the most lucrative mass media products are reality TV and internet porn, Team LOST managed to put together and pull off a show that defies definition, breaks every rule and remains, to date, the most ambitious creative undertaking in television history.

Think about it. From its inception, LOST tossed out the Lowest Common Denominator theory of television viewers (that’s like you denying your own DNA, btw).

More importantly: it forced a major studio (ABC/Disney) to create an entirely new marketing strategy specifically around this ONE show. That means ABC/Disney had to reconsider and redefine “the viewer.” [That almost never happens, like EVER.] And it did all this while, at least for the first few years, losing a fortune for the network in production costs.

[If that’s not the very definition of “most ambitious,” then I’m the frickin’ Queen of England.]

However, most importantly for us, it did all these things while satisfying the primal need that binds all human intelligence together: It told a great fucking story.

That’s what finally reeled me in for good. The level of collaboration required and the sheer magnitude of detailed visual and auditory story telling used on LOST sets a new benchmark for the medium known as film/television [Media is plural form of Medium. It’s a Latin thing. Try not to let it bother you].

I couldn’t believe it then, and I can barely believe it now. This show broke boundaries all over creation, and it was still BRILLIANT. It still WORKED. It still made MONEY. It still told the STORY.
Problem: the story doesn’t make any sense.

WHAT LOST DID TO YOU
That’s right. I’m just gonna say it. On its surface, LOST makes NO SENSE whatsoever. Okay, boys and girls of TV watching land, what does that tell you? That’s right! You MUST look beyond the surface for it to make sense. It is not optional. This means you can not take ANYTHING on LOST at face value.

That means the show has put the responsibility for how much you do or don't enjoying watching it directly on your shoulders. As soon as you stop looking beyond the surface, your enjoyment of the show fades. That is, if LOST makes no sense whatsoever to you and you hate it, then (according to LOST philosophy) it’s your fault because you wouldn’t look past the surface.

Basically, you're eating soup with a fork. You'll never get more than a taste, and you’ll always be hungry. [Bummer for you. It's really good soup.]

LOST’s primary message is fairly simple: Don’t judge a book by it’s cover (HA!). That is, don’t let the traditional blank-minded, spoon-fed, spongy, traditional gimme-it mode of TV watching lead you astray.

In essence, LOST respectfully requests that you Mcwatch TV someplace else.

WHAT LOST DID TO ME
So that’s it in a nutshell, folks. Between breaking new ground, breaking the rules, redefining the viewer and demanding a minimum level of critical thinking and investigation from each and every viewer, LOST pushed me into the best of all possible worlds: The glorious land of academic investigation affectionately known as “WTF?!” [Ahhhhh-yes. The English major’s dream world].

LOST forced me to question my assumptions. It challenged me to find, consider and balance all the evidence. It made me think, rethink and then think again. It did all these things because I accepted LOST for what it is from the beginning: A puzzle, a riddle, and a great fucking story.

When credits rolled on “The End,” I was just as excited as I was when I watched the pilot. The show isn’t “finished” anymore than a puzzle is finished once you sort out all the edge pieces. Now that we finally have all the pieces, it’s time to begin. I’m totally jazzed to go all the way back to the beginning and start over for the last time.

Which, ironically enough, means watching Matthew Fox footage over and over for hours on end.
[Could this show be any more awesome? I don’t think so!]

LOST Conversations part 2

Hi Losties!

Here is another segment of shared thoughts from two fellow LOST friends.

A few friends shared their honest thoughts and honest perceptions with me about the show, the story and its writers, the LOST community, recappers, bloggers, podcasters, theorists and fans. It is enlightening to see how the journey was for the them over past six years. I thought it an interesting idea to collaborate and post  some of their thoughts here.  I will post a series of these shared thoughts so be sure to check back.  Also I encourage you share your LOST journey with us, so leave your thoughts in the comment section below.

Shared Thoughts from Anna of Jacob's Cabin:
Here are some of my thoughts on the finale...since Damon and Carlton have been stressing for a long time that this show is about the characters, I was not surprised to see what they did with the finale. The characters were all that mattered, to the degree that I now believe that we the audience almost became characters too, in two ways.

First, we only know what the characters know. We don't get to see special behind-the-scenes workings of the island; we only see what Desmond or Jack sees, and we understand it as they understand it, which unfortunately means we don't understand the mechanics of much. This takes it back to faith, which we need just as much as the characters do to accept the solutions to their problems, both personal problems and island-plotline problems.

Second, I think that the scene between Christian and Jack in the church was aimed directly at the fans. All the things Christian said could be interpreted as things that the producers would say to each Lost fan if they could talk to them all face to face. That said, it was a little disappointing on a few levels. Of course we would have loved to see more mysteries answered instead of getting a final "thank you for watching and building a community around our show" nod from the producers. It was weird as a Christian to see that these characters created their own heaven-like limbo where they have everything they (think) they want, because that doesn't jive with my beliefs about heaven and life after death. But as I've said before, I don't get my beliefs from this show nor do I want to read them into the show too much. It was disappointing as a fan who wanted the sideways to be vital to the plot, and it raises so many questions that unfortunately I don't have the curiosity to actually want answered--could they sin in this in-between place? Once they awakened, was it okay to break all moral and ethical codes to wake others up (Desmond running over Locke, for example)? Doesn't knowing the end make the sideways moot to re-watch? One great feature about Lost has always been its re-watchability, but with a third of season 6 invested in the now-irrelevant sideways, will we want to re-watch it as much? What is the point of watching dead people who don't even know they're dead running around in a timeline that doesn't even match up (was the concert the day 815 landed as in Desmond and Charlie's case, or days or weeks later as in the case of Sawyer and Miles and the rest, who had many days pass first?) only to leave the timeline as soon as they realize where they are? If they've created a place to be together, why leave so soon? The only decent explanation I can see is that it's all a message to the fans about how we've creating an amazing community, made friends, and now we have to let go of the show and move on. We don't have all the answers, but we have all the things we've learned and gained along the way. This message seemed so clear to me in the finale that it was almost didactic, which was rather surprising.

As for the on-island ending, I was perfectly satisfied with the resolution of the characters. The yellow light and all that may have been a little hokey, but explaining any piece of "magic" too much is dangerous, and I guess I have to look at it as Jack's proving ground more than what it actually is in terms of the island, the mythology, and the pseudo-science behind it. I'm a little worried about how the rest of the mythology will look upon re-watch. Some of it we can still form valid theories about while other pieces are dead ends. The lists came up as early as season 2, but the candidate issue was really only a season 6 convention, and this worries me because the first 5 seasons of the show point in a very different direction than season 6. There are seeming inconsistencies such as, if Jacob hand-picked these people and brought them there, why did he let all his prime candidates leave at one point (Oceanic 6)? I will admit that the ending made me doubt that they've had anything more than Jack's eye closing planned all along.

To cap off the whole series, the finale was a nice retrospective as we saw the flashes along with the characters in the sideways. The producers did a good job evoking those memories and bringing back a flood of emotions--this episode was not lacking in those areas whatsoever. I did wonder if that was more for the fans or more for them; were they looking back at how far they'd come and got so sentimental about the earlier seasons that they basically turned a portion of the finale into a tribute to their own creation? At the Times Talk in theaters last week, Jorge Garcia said about the finale, "I think I...got it." That makes me think that their intent was indeed to give us that message about how great the ride has been and how the show has been about breaking boundaries, making friends, and sparking conversation more than about individual answers. It is weird to have been so desirous of receiving answers just a few weeks ago, and now to feel as though the answers don't matter, but it was almost as though the finale flipped a switch in me. I want to look back on Lost and think of all the good moments on the show and with friends, podcasts, Twitter, etc., and speculate for years on what the answers could be, but I lost my intense need to know. I think I "got" the point of Lost...and I think I'll carry it with me for the rest of my life.


Shared Thoughts from Levi Muller of Book Bawk:
I consider LOST my favorite show of all time and I cannot imagine another show replacing it. Something about these people and this island captivated me and kept me watching every week. I always wanted to know why they were there and what would happen to them next.

I have mixed feelings about "The End" of LOST. Kim and I started our trips to the island in season 2. First, we watched season 1's episodes back to back, then, we were hooked and watched every week. We really got involved with our friends and made many new ones while analyzing and discussing theories (mostly through MySpace blogs). It was a lot of fun, but I soon started finding myself putting more energy into theories and the show in general than I felt was necessary. After all, it was just a TV show. At that point I was still craving answers, but wanted them only from the show itself. So, while I hated for it to end, I wanted to know what was really going on.

I'm not sure that I can put my finger on a single reason for why I enjoyed the show so much, but part of it revolved around connection to characters. I can't say that I could always relate to one specific character for the duration of the show, but there were many times that I could relate to at least one of them. There seemed to be a personality on the island that anyone could relate to or wanted to be more like. At the same time, there always seemed to be someone to despise

Another aspect that I loved about the show was the element of suspense. Someone or something was always in peril. New discoveries were made often. Strange and incredible aspects were constantly introduced. Viewers were always intrigued. Also, there were many times that I couldn't figure out whose side of the current battle I was rooting for. This became especially difficult once people who were once on the same side were pitted against each other.

If there was anything I didn't like about "The End," it would be the amount of unanswered questions that were prompted by the writers of the show. I loved being intrigued by the elements of the show, but why weren't these elements explained by the time the show was concluded? Now I feel that I have to make up my own answers, which will be highly influenced by other people's theories and the data they have to support them. However, I'll never trust my own or the theories of the "Others" because these theories can't be confirmed now that the show is over.

As far as the questions that were answered by the time the show concluded, I feel fine. I know a lot of people may be upset that their theories didn't come true. Maybe the show could have been better if these theories were the direction the writers took the show, but I cannot say. Since I stopped putting a lot of effort and analysis into the show, I actually enjoyed it more. I didn't have a theory to be tested, so however the writers decided to answer a question was fine with me. I graciously accepted what they gave me and remain thankful for the entertainment.

I may go back and watch old episodes of LOST, now that I know the answers. However, much like the characters of the show, I think that it's time to move on and let go. There are many new things that are more than willing to accept my attention and many new adventures that are yet to be taken.

LOST Conversations

Hi Lostie's,

A few days have past since the LOST series finale aired and I'm still in denial that we will not have our beloved show grace us with a new episode...not next week...not next season...not...
Well, you get the idea.

I waited a couple of days to peek around the Internet at fan reactions to the finale.   I wanted to be sure that I wrote up my  thoughts on The End the same way I wrote up all my other notes, without being spoiled and without influence before or after an episode aired.
A few friends shared their honest thoughts and honest perceptions with me about the show, the story and its writers, the LOST community, recappers, bloggers, podcasters, theorists and fans. It is enlightening to see how the journey was for the them over past six years. I thought it an interesting idea to collaborate and post  some of their thoughts here.  I will post a series of these shared thoughts so be sure to check back.  Also I encourage you share your LOST journey with us, so leave your thoughts in the comment section below.

Here is Joshua M. Patton. thoughts:
A few seconds after I watched the final moments of LOST, my cell phone rang bearing a call from a fanatic friend in Florida. I imagined that upon answering the phone, I would hear his sobbing voice seriously asking if he should perhaps gouge out his own eyes so that the image of Jack closing his eye would be the last thing he would ever see. I couldn’t have been more wrong. Rage peppered with expletives met my ears, “Those bastards! How could they? I mean dead the whole time?”

“What?” I said, incredulous and wondering if he’d seen the same television show I had just watched. Had he closed his eyes with Jack, he would have been spared a modicum of this anger because of, what I believe to be, ABC’s decision to show the crash site over the credits. Since this space is normally occupied by promos, and with no more LOST to promote I’d decided to opt out of the promo for “Rookies” or “Other Modern Family/Parenthood Show,” that those whose living depends on “the next thing,” would hope may replace LOST in the zeitgeist. Although they think “zeitgeist” is a German word for money-fountain. ABC, on the other hand, took a much higher road than I thought they would.

When I looked at those images, I clearly saw the remains of the survivors’ camp, piles of sorted clothes, and the burned fuselage. I read this as one part homage to the beginning of the show and the second part, perhaps, was a suggestion that since the Island lives on this crash site, and the remnants of those who lived and died here, is now as much a part of this island as the four-toed foot, the Dharma barracks, and the Black Rock before it was blown to smithereens. The show ended when Jack’s eye shut and Christian definitively said that everything that happened to him was real and it did matter. It was not the Ajira plane, although it is perfectly within fans’ rights to believe that plane never landed safely, but I’ll get to that in a moment.

The other reason for my friend’s dissatisfaction, I think, is how central a theme love was to the end of the show. His personal life is fraught with stress as an impending divorce has separated him from his wife and, even worse, his children. I think that once he realizes that in his own sideways world, this woman that left him would not have caused his “flash,” and once he realizes that, perhaps his perception will change. Love and the overall spiritual element of the ending also left some fans dissatisfied. Another of my friends is a rabid agnostic. A man of science, his faith was in that everything would be explainable by science. Thanks to articles in Popular Mechanics and Wired, he believed that everything on LOST had a scientific explanation and left no room in even his imagination for magic.

So while that may be a more legitimate grip than a misunderstanding about the images run over the credits, Still, I don’t even think that sending our characters off into a bright light is the real reason for my friend’s and everyone else’s dissatisfaction with the way the show ended. The reason is that for the past six years, LOST has been simultaneously two shows. There is the show the writers and producers and actors have presented to us and then there is the show as we’ve written it in our minds. The finale itself was an expertly done elegy for the series. These characters and their tragic paths to redemption and then ultimately salvation was always what the show was about. Just like the stories of Narnia was about the children who visited the world and Hogwarts was only seen through the eyes of the three main characters, so was the island a magical and deeply mythological place that only served as the setting for a story about the survivors of a plane crash.

LOST is a show that demands much of its viewers. Unlike procedural dramas and other such formulaic shows, LOST provided us with a myriad of stories that crossed many genres. The much reviled Exposé was a murder-mystery show (with a twist), He’s Our You was a spy-thriller, and many other episodes of the show defied genre classification. This is not what I am getting at. At its height, the first season, the promises of the show’s mysteries were much more appealing than once the answers started coming. A brilliant story through-and-through, many viewers found that the answers they were being given were less intriguing than the ones that they had imagined in the hours, days, or weeks after a given episode.

To be fair, the writers of the show have more or less given us paths to the answers. Rather than give us specific facts on a platter, the writers give us suggestions, sometimes from dubious sources, and confirmations that need to be married up with information given in other episodes. When answers are given to us straight and with no ambiguity, e.g. the whispers, many viewers are left feeling unsatisfied. As someone said on the lovely and talented Maggie Furlong’s web show Instant Dharma, the most satisfying thing the writers could give us is closure on a topic, rather than didactic answers. When the answer to a question is hidden we have mystery, once we have the “answer” that exhilarating mystery just becomes another bit of information. This once fascinating question is as robbed of its magic as the digital effects of Avatar would be reduced to its ones and zeros.

Yet, just because there are certain answers given to certain questions, such as the polar bears, it doesn’t mean that your theory about how the polar bears are the ones that built the Dharma Barracks is any less valid or any less a part of the show. When Karen and I first corresponded, one of the first things I told her was that I thought most of her theories were completely and utterly ridiculous. The wonderful thing about Karen, and others like her such as her podcast partners the ODI and Vozzek69, is that usually when the answer proves to be nothing like the particular nutty theory postulated weeks before, her enjoyment of the show does not seem to diminish. It was a wonderful gag that when the LOST community of website-runners would grade each episode, they mostly used a typical “A” through “F” grading scale, Karen used an “A+” through “A++++++++” scale. Just because the show went to a different place than she thought it was going to, she was merely happy to have had her passport stamped in that far corner of her imagination.

In fact, all that wild speculation and willingness to explore even the most absurd ideas paid off for them in that after “The Candidate,” they were perfectly primed for what the finale ultimately showed us. I downloaded and listened to the last ODI podcast, but in bits and pieces because they always give you at least two hours of LOST ramblings. On a long drive back to Pittsburgh from a more rural part of Pennsylvania, I was listening to the last half hour or so of the podcast the day after the finale and, while I don’t have quotes, they essentially nailed the scenario – all along really – that the Lostaways had to atone for their baggage and join the community to move on, spiritually speaking. While this was sandwiched between theories that the island is a shoehorn and that Christian Shepard is Santa Claus and the President the point isn’t that one theory was correct and others are off-the-mark, confused, or batshit crazy, but that these folks had opened their minds to the possibility of anything. This is not to say that they are apologists nor that they will swallow anything like gullible pelicans, in fact of all the theorizing stayed very true to the characters as we knew them. They were anchored to the show by these characters and through them, anything was possible.

Karen and Vozzek69, as far as I know, were not professional writers who saw in LOST an opportunity to find a dedicated audience, but two rabid fans who were compelled by this fictional story that they loved and the only way to make sense of it all was to work it out on the (web)page. I began my writing career in a similar fashion; at a very young age there were things I loved and things I couldn’t make sense of, so I thought I would organize those thoughts on paper. As if summoned by a supernatural force, they too began to peck away at the keys and have done what all good writers do: organize thoughts and ideas for those who cannot. A mish-mash of literary analysis and rabid imagination, they and others wrote the second storyline of the show and it is one that will never end. It’s the stories told by the fans, the podcasters, and the other LOST writers: Karen, Vozzek69, and others. And thank Hurley for them, because there is still quite a bit to talk about.

You can check out Joshua's blog at: www.thelastrube.blogspot.com

Shared Thoughts From JO of Get LOST with JOpinionated
None of us knew what we were in for when LOST debuted on September 22, 2004, but without a doubt I had no idea that this television series would have such a profound effect on and change my life. The level of creativity from start to finish was astounding and inspiring; to be able to weave and intermingle so many elements and characters for six seasons was an admirable and tremendous accomplishment, and one we will probably not witness again for 5-10 years.

To be honest, I did not care how LOST ended. I trusted the writers and producers based on the stellar quality of the overarching story and seasons leading up to the last episode, and enjoyed every second of the journey they provided for all of us. I was pleasantly surprised and touched by the emotional resonance of the Flash Sideways reveal, and truly loved the final ten minutes of The End. After watching the series finale four times, the same two words come to mind: beautiful and perfect.

Shared Thoughts From Andy of DarkUFO:
Being part of the whole LOST "experience" running the site has helped me enjoy the show so much more as I could see all the reactions of the fans each week on the site along with all the great insight our recappers and theorists made.
The show itself hooked me from the very first minutes and that feeling of not being able to wait for the next episode has never dwindled, even after the Finale. I still feel I want more LOST.
Hopefully all Lost fans will meet up at the "church" at some point in the future.
Namaste.

Shared Thoughts from Chris of  Super Duper Stream:
"Lost, for me at least, began as a story about a dozen or so normal, broken human beings who find themselves coping with the real issue of being trapped on an Island, and unreal issue of supernatural events. These people were not your usual TV cliches - the two de facto leaders were a Doctor who harboured cryptic tattoos and an unassuming woman hiding the fact she is a 'dangerous' fugitive.

Although this is where Lost began, and the writers did a fantastic job of returning us to our core characters and their attempts to overcome the various real and supernatural events thrown at them, along the way something altogether more magical happened. These writers weren't just entertaining us, they were teaching us, guiding us. Like a veritable mash-up of every theme, story, myth and idea ever conceived, Lost took us, the viewer, through every genre imaginable in weaving their tale - romance, science fiction, action, adventure, mystery, crime, comedy. All of them had their moment to shine.

What Lost has done for me is to provide a gateway to all these fantastic stories and themes. It has taught me more about philosophy, books, science, history, etc than School ever did. Through via various aspects of the fandom that have taken each piece and investigated it further, I have learned so much. There are websites out there solely devoted to the various books mentioned in Lost and how they tie into the overall motif, websites out there dedicated to the etymology of the character's names, others too that deal with the repetition of phrases and how they make up a rich tapestry over time. Each of these people, these fans, these websites, make up a chain that wraps and envelopes the Lost story to make it something altogether stronger and larger. I also feel like I have been a link in this chain - my own forte is in analyzing all of these ideas and theories and condensing them into something that is easier to understand without all the intricate details.

As you can see, it is hard to tie Lost down into one core aspect - it is the storyline, the characters, the themes, the fans, the community. All of it, combined, makes Lost what it is, was and always will be. Magical. One of a kind. Easy to love. A perfect marriage of quantity and quality. There were some little aspects that I didn't like with Lost, some minor details I disagreed with, even felt they were 'wrong'. But for everything I didn't enjoy, there were hundreds more things I did enjoy, and I guarantee there were thousands of fans who LOVED the very thing I didn't. And I think that is where Lost's successes lay - it could never be everything to everyone, but I think there was enough of everything there that everyone could at least love some part of it.

Now that we've reached The End, I still feel like the journey has only just begun. To fully appreciate all the little details, we need to go back to the start, to re-watch the show, to continue to share our opinions and takes on the past six seasons, and to continue to read and share with each other all the things we loved and noticed - and maybe together we will eventually understand everything that has happened. And until then, I will relish every moment of the journey."