A Rambling Post on Lost

Hello, and welcome to Sunday.

So, the Lost ends today.

It'll be like a pet dying, I think. A pet that you've owned for six years, that has engaged you, enraged you and confounded you on multiple times, not because it's as smart as you like to think it is, but because you've overthought yourself, generally speaking. You've let this show drag you in, and now you're tripping over your own theories more than anything else.

Maybe it won't be like a pet dying. Unless you've had a pet that died in small increments every time a supporting piece became used up. I heard this stat the other day: 30 regular, speaking parts on Lost have died over the course of the show's 6 seasons. I'm not sure of the ratio, but that would be like, over the years, if Denise, Vanessa, Elvin, Sondra, Olivia, Russell Huxtable, Cockroach and Kenny (Bud) had all died over the course of the Cosby Show. Which would have changed the tone of that show, believe you me.

I generally don't pontificate too much on the show. I like the show, and along with Family Guy it's the only one I try to watch when it's on, anymore, if I'm home. And you don't see a lot of posts where I pontificate on Family Guy, do you (although the line from last week "Guys! Cut it out! You're ruining all my clothes!" became a minor catchphrase this week).

I will say that it's the only show that keeps me thinking about what's going to happen over the course of the week. There's not any other show that's done that, pretty much in my adult life. Heroes may have come close early on, but that one fell apart the minute it became a show of no consequences, when you learn Hiro will be able to travel time at will.

But I digress. Been watching the show for six years. It finishes tonight. Kinda sad, but I'm glad that there is a finish line, and the show itself won't be stretching on for a decade. Is the end what was originally envisioned for the show? Probably not, if even there was an ending planned. It's a business, and its first inclination to maximize profits over the longest feasible amount of time. If you don't think a finish line in and of itself isn't a minor victory, let my brother-in-law explain to you how ill he was when Supernatural didn't end when it was supposed to this year.

Still, it's been a mess. I grant you that. In fact, as we look at season six, I'll say that it's no small disappointment for me that the show wandered into the Mystical for all its answers. I didn't care for the bevy of new characters, even if I enjoyed thinking one of them was Mugsy having returned from the wreck of the Andrea Gail. Let me ask this, though: Have the words Dharma Initiative been uttered at all? Seems like there are loose ends gonna get all kinds of ignored there.

I didn't care for the whole Sayid coming back from the dead story, with all the hoopla being made over his being "tainted." I didn't like that he was a mindless soldier for Locke, which was somewhat interesting, but that was killed when he has a seven minute redemption story in the submarine. Maybe it's the Sayid fan in me, but that shit needed a whole episode. Does a character deserve a grander death? I'd say so, but then, I think Sayid should have broken Jack's neck in season one, and taken the Lord of the Flies fight to the Others.

Let me pause to admit that Sayid's still kicking in the mirror universe, and I have a feeling Sayid still has a part to play on the island, though how, I couldn't say.

I suck at segue. So, I'll say that I tapped out on Lost, once upon a time. I think I've written about it, but maybe not. There was a lot going on that particular year in my life, and it was in the third season. I'd immensely enjoyed the first two seasons, and had been counting days until the third season started. This was the season that was essentially split into two parts. When the second half of the season came on, I didn't mess with it. The first half was just so damned disappointing and convoluted. I didn't enjoy it, so I quit.

Which was something of a pity. I ended up catching the DVD's before the next season started. The second half of the third season was likely the show's high water mark, creatively speaking. I go so far as to say the second half of season 3 is some of the finest TeeVee ever put onto screen, with the finale of season 3 possibly being that show's finest moment.

I'd wanted to take this spring watching Lost over again, before we got to the final episode. I wanted to get a better feeling for the show as a whole Time being what it is, I made it through the sixth episode of the first season. That's just how the cookie crumbles.

Last thing I'll say in this meandering, go-nowhere post. There are haters. Which is cool, actually. I initially took a little offense, since the one thing I tend to hear universally is how much the fans of the show irritate them. I mean, if you're going to hate a show, hate it for the aforementioned trip into mysticism when part of what I liked was the balance between science and the unexplainable, or hate it for introducing new useless characters, or killing characters at random in the name of The Lost Cliffhanger (which is tiresome on my end, as well).

Or how about some decent computer graphics? What the fuck's been up with the smoke monster's animation the last couple of seasons? Any underwater scene looks like a construction paper cutout on a bluescreen. Seriously? We can't move into 2003 for computer graphics?

See? I love the show, and there are a thousand things to hate about it. In fact, given my personality and tendency toward such things, maybe that's why I like the show, because there are so many things to hate about it. It's a goddamn fool that looks for logic in the chambers of the human heart.

But anyway, my point with those last three bullshit paragraphs, I didn't dig on people hating the show because of the fans. But then, I hate the New York Yankees and St. Louis Cardinals in part because of their fans, and to a much larger degree, I stopped following University of Tennessee football because filling Neyland Stadium with 109,000 people who just want to be seen at the football game seemed like a tremendous waste of time and resources. So, I get that argument too.

I'll just say this: Don't hate me because I like Lost. Hate me because I tend to misplace the remote control twice a week, and because I forgot to buy milk for this morning, this despite Working In an Ever-Loving Grocery Store.

Last thing, and this is related to very little concerning Lost, except as an example. Been reading a couple articles on Violence and Sex in the media, and how our culture favors one and not the other. I happened to be reading one such article last week, and it popped straight to mind. Smoke Monster/Locke kills a character named Zoe, who'd only shown up this year. An annoying, new character, for my money, but she ultimately served a purpose. Even if that purpose was getting her throat slashed.

It was a violent scene, and one of the more violent on the show over its history.

But I didn't bat an eye.

However, had Locke instead just leaned over and honked Zoe's boobs like a clown nose? We'd STILL be talking about that on the news. It's like there wouldn't be anything else in the world going on, because we would be talking about the bald man groping Zoe on Lost. Instead, Zoe died on the floor, her throat cut.

(I was so pleased with my opinion, to the point that I was writing on it. Then, I heard Ron Bennington on Ron & Fez make exactly the same point I was going to. But again, I digress, this time, parenthetically).

Anyway, it's been a meandering post accomplishing nothing. It's a TV show. I'm going to miss it. You meatheads enjoy. Or don't.