Was the build-up pointless? I don't think so. All of it--the Others, Dharma, Jacob/MiB, their lives on the island--it was important. In the eyes of our castaways, the most meaningful part of their lives were the relationships they had with each other on the island. In the audience's eyes, we can presume that they succeeded in keeping evil/MiB from escaping and protecting the light/electromagnetic source and thus saving the world (side note: it was confirmed in the preview show the MiB and Smokey were one). The Others, Dharma, Vikings, whomever--these were the groups that FakeMom and MiB said always came, fought, corrupted, etc. They wanted to figure out and perhaps harness that light/water source for their own purposes, always wanting more. Our Losties rose above that, so Jacob was right about them after all. It wasn't all for nothing, but there were aspects of it they never answered, and I understand it's left some people unsatisfied.
Minor characters. Frank is alive, and flies most of the survivors out of there. Richard begins to age, and now wants to live. Would've been nice to say something about Isabella, but I guess he had his closure with her already. Ben got to be special as Hurley's #2, as he wanted to be Jacob's #2 originally. And he was redeemed in the end. Eloise doesn't want to move on and lose Daniel, who's not leaving yet. Ben now doesn't want to move on either. Perhaps Daniel and Alex haven't died yet in the real universe and they're waiting? Frank never showed up in the alt-reality. I think he was never that tied to anyone or anything.
Fight scene. Jack's flying punch. lol, but good one. I imagined more Smokey in the fight scene, but I guess they wouldn't have been able to overcome him. More teamwork, too, rather than a shot to the back. A few more punches for our friend Ben over here! Hurley is the new Jackob.
Some answers. It wasn't the bomb that "worked," but Juliet was just crossing into the alternate reality as she was dying (thus why she said the dutch and coffee lines before she died as well). The cave is actually a structure built by some ancient people. Desmond's purpose. Who stayed and who left or tried to leave. No replacement for MiB.
Now for some of disappointments. 1) Michael and Walt. If Ben who murdered way more people in cold blood could be invited to move on, why not Michael? Poor Michael, stuck on the island whispering for eternity, and yet he had shown remorse/regret/a turned heart twice already. No indication of Walt being special or a moment from him. I think they gave his role to Desmond, but there could have been something more as Walt was the one with active powers.
2) Miles. I'm glad he just kept running away and was presumably safe, but would've been nice if he could've revealed more in the end. Like how was it possible for Sayid (and maybe even Claire--I still think she died in the explosion) to come back to life? Didn't need to be explained in the finale, but comic relief was not enough reason to keep his character.
3) Hurley can make new rules. So, I guess people can get off the island. Why have any? I guess he made it so he could die, too?
4...10) I don't mind that they didn't answer everything, but I think they should have given us a couple more explanations, even if deadpan or straightforward, earlier on in the season. There were only two answers I wanted. The first was the interest in the children and particularly Walt (ok, foreshadowing the candidates list and Desmond's role, but...sigh), the second was why women couldn't have kids (yeah, okay, the radiation from the incident or Jacob's doing, your pick--but then why Tawaret, goddess of fertility, and bringing Juliet in, etc?). I get that it doesn't matter in the big picture for the castaways, but if you're going to answer some, you might as well answer the questions you spent so much time building up. I accept they won't go way back to the Egyptians or whoever built the statue, temples, and structures, but they easily could have addressed that more back with the Dogen stuff. Even more science with Zoe. I know they're saying it wasn't about the mythology or scientific explanations, but a lot of it was.
Still, it was a solid ending for me. I'll probably never be so invested in a TV show again. Oh, and 24's series finale is here. :(
What did you all everybody think?
19 comments:
I had similar thoughts about The End. I enjoyed the finale. It was well paced and better than I expected.
Ultimately, their afterlife was very flawed and thinking about it too much just shows how flawed it is. If I take it at face value though, I can get past it. I also thought Michael got pretty jacked. He killed Ana Lucia and Libby in cold blood, but Ben who killed way more gets the option to figure things out before moving on? Not sure if Keamy and Anthony Cooper were the real people or part of the castaways "working things out". Like I said, it falls apart if you think about it too much. I did like the reunion aspect of it though.
As far as the unanswered questions, there are no answers. They were never written and I guess I just have to accept it. Sometimes it's probably better left alone. The Star Wars prequels come to mind, haha. I would have liked to know how they built that drain plug and what's with all the dead bodies around it. Maybe you can't live long down there and the people who were building it were constantly dying. What's the significance of Dogen and the ashes? Why did the pyschic tell Claire she had to raise the baby? The reason no Walt is because he's too old for it to make any sense, haha.
Oh yeah, and I'm glad Lapidus didn't go out like a punk. And I guess planes can go in reverse. I really didn't see how they were going to turn that plane around until they did.
BTW, the alternate endings are just gags. They are funny though, but not as good as Connect Four Million!
I've only done a first watch so everything is pretty fresh and still processing. I appreciate that the writers wanted to tie up some lose ends but seriously why the build up the last two years? It's obvious they *really* didn't know the ending and needed to clean up quickly.
That said, I side with the alternate universe most likely because we didn't see their development in full detail. I thought the same about the emotional intensity of the finale, very Asian drama!
Hey Kev--I know one of the producers wasn't a fan of the SW prequels, so it makes sense. But perhaps it was their own doing that led to people caring about the mysteries. Wouldn't have hurt to give MiB a name and wouldn't have hurt to have Ilana explain a little more on the Egyptian or fertility stuff before she blew up. Zoe was a scientist--it does seem like they had some ideas there with introducing Ilana and Zoe, and then just had to scrap it. I don't really like the "just chalk on a cave" and "just a Latin phrase"--I understand some fans feeling disrespected who gave a lot of time to figure these things out.
Hey Mare--When the actors were first hired, they were all told to read The Stand by Stephen King, and Jack knew what the closing scene would be. I think they had the beginning and the end, but the stuff in between was just to add to the journey. Nevertheless, they did have the time to tie up more. Bad pacing at the start, I think. They ran out of time with Zoe and Ilana and just killed them off.
Yeah, the story is flawed, but done well enough for me to be ok with it. I'm not really a fan of when writer's say it's up to the reader/viewer to determine what really happened. I think any real writer that cared about his/her material would not want multiple interpretations of their writing. If they had something to tell that they cared about, the details wouldn't be left dangling. I call it the Writer's Conspiracy. Any writer that goes for that "reader decides the details" nonsense means they didn't care enough about their own story or they weren't good enough to write it properly.
Hey, guys... I liked the emotional reunion deal, but yeah, the whole afterlife and all the symbols of all the religions was kind of bothersome... I was bawling during the charlie/claire reunion, and i never really cared for them as a match before! ;) so something was going on there (good story-telling). in the end (no pun intended), i guess they capped it off as best they could.
i liked that hurley got to be the protector for a while. he got his chance. i liked what they did with ben, too. he needed a break from all the evil to just try to be good for a while. ;)
it was kinda too bad for me that kate shot locke. i guess it was just because i wanted claire to do it.
i also liked that richard started to age. ;) that was nice.
you have NO idea how loud i was whooping, "I KNEW IT!" when lapidus was there, bobbing in the waves. :)
i'm glad they didn't bring michael back. he was hard to stomach. and yeah, i guess he already got his resolution and his turnaround.
i gave up on walt when he appeared to locke over the pit. he looked to old, like kevin said. that's hilarious. it would have no longer made sense!
i think i'm going to go ahead and get the boxed set when it comes out in august. it's going to be a classic. :) and i'm still holding out that eric will watch it someday. maybe if we OWN it and don't have to return it to the video store, he can watch bit by bit, maybe one episode per night for a while. :)
The actor that played Walt did film some scenes for the finale, so maybe they'll be on the DVD. I agree he appeared old, but there would have been some way to explain that. They even added that 3 years to the off-island timeline to help explain his growth when he met up with Locke as Bentham. And he's not that much older than when he appeared there.
Yes, Michael's character was hard to stomach, and so was Charlie for me, which is why I felt Michael deserved the treatment that others got in the end, but have to leave that be. I always wish better for black characters, I guess. Rose was just part of Bernard and Rose.
Yeah, people figured Lapidus was alive because there was no mention by the characters or producers about his death, but I almost hoped that scene would have included when Juliet shot someone on the outrigger (when they were flashing through time). Would've been cool is all. But I'm glad he got to fly people off the island. He had no major connection to them, and did his own thing as always, and I think that's why he didn't show up in the alt-u at all.
The show was never a Christian show (what is these days?), so while it bothered me, I didn't expect any different. But I might talk about it in a future post if I have time.
I also thought about that outrigger chase scene when they were traveling through time, too. I know it occurred after the Ajira flight crashed because they found that water bottle on the beach from the airplane. I'm going to assume it was Widmore's people so sometime between when the sub arrived and they all got killed. I was still hoping for it to happen though. Wouldn't it have been hilarious if they ended up shooting at themselves? 10 seconds of screen time, how hard can that be? It was good story telling, but they sure skipped out on a lot of details.
Also lostpedia says that planes can't reverse. I thought so!
lol at the reverse. That's really what they meant by "Nothing's irreversible!" I did go reverse in a plane once in S.Korea, if I remember correctly, but I think we were pushed backward by some vehicle or something.
Yes, just 10 seconds for the outrigger! I went back and watched it, and someone definitely got shot there. Another red herring. Boo.
"you all everybody" ha ha, I love it! I was hoping to hear that song one more time!
We went to a dress up Lost party and enjoyed watching it with other Lost fanatics, I mean fans. Initially, after the show I hated it. I had a few minutes where I thought, "ew, this feels gross." The longer I've thought about it, the more I'm okay with the ending. I would have preferred to not have gone to the sideways world, but instead stayed on the Island. I obviously don't agree with the purgatory theme, so that might be coloring my vision of it.
It was an entertaining show with an end that had me fully engaged throughout.
It was a fun ride.
Randi! I feel like we're gathering here for the last time before moving on as well! I have the opposite case--the more time passes, the less I like it, if only because Manny and I were looking forward to rewatching and looking for clues, and now there's not much reason to. Manny has a theory that people had figured out the island early on, perhaps as purgatory/limbo, and that they all really died in the crash, and the writers then had to find a different direction to keep people interested/guessing. I think so, too. Maybe it was not wanting to go the way of Twin Peaks. It felt like they went out of their way to not have people figure it out, and in the end the answers weren't there or were lackluster. But I agree, it was a good ride, especially when accompanied by friends like you. :)
ps, I do plan on still posting about LOST every week, just short stuff mostly --like I just found out MiB's real name in the script (yes, he did have one). dun dun dun
I'm still confused. Dan and I hope to watch "Episode 19" soon, which will hopefully give some explanations. So, the island was purgatory all along? I am still confused. I guess I'm a box of rocks.
Amy, since you mentioned wishing Michael got a second chance b/c you root for the black guy, I'm surprised no one mentioned Mr. Echo's absence. Maybe the actor was too difficult to find or something. Ana Lucia even pops up in a scene, even if she isn't "ready." So, the African gets shafted entirely. What's up with dat?! :)
I'm still confused. I'll have to think more about the conclusion and maybe now I can surf the web for some explanations for dummies! Thanks for your insights throughout the journey, Amy and friends!
Sorry, my reply was riddled with grammar issues--let's try again.
Hi Angie, Christian Shepard's dialogue with Jack explained it. The island was real, and everything happened as we saw it. Everything except the alternate reality was real. The alternate reality was not really a flashsideways, but more of a flashforward to a purgatory/limbo-like world that the Losties had created so they could find each other to move on together into the afterlife. Everything before they died was real as we saw it, and everyone died at different times. Thus Kate says she missed Jack so much, and Hurley and Ben look back on their time on the island. I think perhaps the producers originally wanted the island to be a purgatory, but changed it as the show took off or as people figured it out.
Also, that last scene with the crash debris was stuck in there by ABC and threw people off, too.
The actor that played Mr. Eko was invited back, but he wanted 5 times what they were offering for his appearance, so they couldn't reach a deal in time and didn't bring him back. I did actually mention Mr. Eko in my original post, then edited it out once I found out about this.
Amy, thanks for the explanation. After I left that comment (since your blog is the first place I'd visit after any episode of LOST), I surfed the web a bit and got some cool answers. I also read that about Mr. Eko. Too bad for him. What else could he possibly have going on to refuse another chance to appear on the biggest show to ever hit television?! Oh well...
I'm appreciating the ending more and more the more I read and understand what happened. It was satisfying and happy, especially considering that I had asked myself, "How could this possibly have a happy ending when so many of the people we love are dead?"
On a side note, I think it's ironic that in the "flash-sideways" (which are actually forward) Jack and Kate end up together and Kate misses Jack so much. But, think about it, she and Sawyer get on that plane and make it safely back to the real world to live the rest of their lives out. Wouldn't it be natural that if they loved each other at one point, that they'd fall in love again? (And, if not with one another, then with someone else, for sure). But they end up with their old flame in the afterlife nonetheless. It reminds me of the story in the gospels where the Saduccees tried to stump Jesus about the brothers who all married the same woman and they wanted to know whose wife she'd be in the age to come. :)
Yeah, if you really want to analyze the afterlife of this show, it all falls apart. For example...
1.What happens if you get killed in the afterlife (Keamy and his henchmen)? Do you just start over?
2.Was everyone in the afterlife the real people or just people made up to facilitate the real people in letting go.
3.Who is the administrator of all this afterlife hooey? How can you decide your own purgatory? How can you create a place for yourself and some friends to meet before moving on and then not even remember your life in that place until the end?
4.How can you commit more sin in this purgatory? Aren't you supposed to work these off not add more?
5.Why can't everyone just decide to meet in the afterlife?
6.What happened to Locke's fiance? He moved on and just left her behind? What happens if you're a vegetable in this purgatory? See question 2.
7.What's the deal with Christian Shephard being in this purgatory? He was dead and didn't know most of these people in the first place, but he's going to be in this purgatory too? Why am I here? Oh yeah, I need to explain everything to Jack once they find my body in the lost luggage.
It seemed more like the Matrix than a purgatory. It makes sense at face value, but if you even try to rationalize it a little bit, you'll go nuts!
That's some interesting insight, Angie (about the Saduccees). I wonder about that sometimes myself. I didn't like the pairing off at first in the purgatory (like Rousseau and Ben, too?!), but you see Locke and Boone by themselves, so it's not really that *everyone* there had to be with their soulmates. I'll probably post about LOST again next Tuesday just for old-times' sake. Hope to still see you around! By the way, I thought you wouldn't like the finale, because it didn't have much in the way of answers, but looks like you and I sort of switched places!
Hey Kev, yeah, Manny had some of the same questions, so once I got to thinking about it, it made me more annoyed with the last season altogether. :/ Manny also asked why Sun and Jin would want her to get shot in the stomach and risk their baby in their afterlife? Or is it that they don't have full control over it?
Is Christian Shephard there to lead the way, since he's the one that opens the door? But then that means he should have had Desmond's role in the afterlife? Oh well. Lots of holes, but I get that they were going for dramatic effect (to cover up the lack of answers? Hopefully not).
And Wallace--I've never seen Pulp Fiction all the way through, but looking around the internet, I see that Marsellus Wallace's soul might have been the light in the briefcase that was "so beautiful." QT said he didn't have an answer for what was in the briefcase. So is Wallace on the island a reference to that? The beautiful light of unknown origins? Unknown even to the writers/producers?
At least the light in Pulp Fiction was only one unanswered question.
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