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Rubicon
Game. Set. Match. Thanks for proving my point even further dude. Always count on you coming through in a pinch.
Lost Finale: Explained
- Thread starter Calleja
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So, Mav isn't allowed to post? He's already tried to say, "hey, this is my opinion on it, and it's just different than yours" and you're the one who keeps bringing him up.
It kind of makes you look like a douche.
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Reboneer
Game. Set. Match. Thanks for proving my point even further dude. Always count on you coming through in a pinch.[/QUOTE]
How does that prove your point?
So, Mav isn't allowed to post? He's already tried to say, "hey, this is my opinion on it, and it's just different than yours" and you're the one who keeps bringing him up.
It kind of makes you look like a douche.[/QUOTE]
I guess I'll have to admit that Mav brings out the inner douche in me.... I still tried to avoid this, though.
I don't have anything against Mav, He asked why there are thousands that agree with him, and people who disagree try to answer.
For the episodes of Lost that I did watch, it was always a well done show. Then some one comes out saying that it was the worst show ever, and everyone on the net agrees. That is basically just stirring the pot.
For the episodes of Lost that I did watch, it was always a well done show. Then some one comes out saying that it was the worst show ever, and everyone on the net agrees. That is basically just stirring the pot.
Exactly. I get that Mav is a little excitable, and Mex is a bit confrontational, but Mav did come out swinging in the last thread pretty much immediately with profanity and "everyone agrees with me". The whole purpose of that kind of argument is to imply that the ones who don't agree with you are stupid. While he started out better in this thread, it pretty much turned into the same thing. Is it any wonder that people jumped all over him?
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Joe Johnson
For me, it was quite apparent that they probably wouldn't be answering all the questions once the sixth season started. I certainly knew, by the time the finale was going to air, that there was no WAY they'd be able to in a two and a half hour show.
So, in other words, I wasn't disappointed by the finale from that stand point. To me, it seemed like Lost was about both the characters AND the mysteries in the first 3, maybe 4 seasons. After that, they really shifted focus to just the characters. That's OK, I guess. But, I have to admit, for the people who got hooked into the show by the mysteries as WELL as the characters, it sucks to have had the weird, mystery vibe of the show completely pulled away, and have it move to more of a purely character based show.
There's nothing wrong with a story being both about the characters AND the mysteries. Stories do it all the time, and are able to tie things up. Look at the "Sixth Sense". Now, yes, it's probably a lot harder to pull that off in a six season show. But, starting with season 4 they knew it was going to end after the 6th. Why not start wrapping things up then?
I don't know, like I said in the other thread, I"m pretty "meh" about the finale, and thought the sixth season was pretty lacking. But, again, none of that can take away from the fact that the first few seasons were frickin' awesome TV.
So, in other words, I wasn't disappointed by the finale from that stand point. To me, it seemed like Lost was about both the characters AND the mysteries in the first 3, maybe 4 seasons. After that, they really shifted focus to just the characters. That's OK, I guess. But, I have to admit, for the people who got hooked into the show by the mysteries as WELL as the characters, it sucks to have had the weird, mystery vibe of the show completely pulled away, and have it move to more of a purely character based show.
There's nothing wrong with a story being both about the characters AND the mysteries. Stories do it all the time, and are able to tie things up. Look at the "Sixth Sense". Now, yes, it's probably a lot harder to pull that off in a six season show. But, starting with season 4 they knew it was going to end after the 6th. Why not start wrapping things up then?
I don't know, like I said in the other thread, I"m pretty "meh" about the finale, and thought the sixth season was pretty lacking. But, again, none of that can take away from the fact that the first few seasons were frickin' awesome TV.
I seem to recall Lost being all about the questions of the Island when the show was starting. I also recall the creators putting stuff like the Dharma logo on the shark just to fuck with people.
Claiming the show was never about nor marketed to be about the mystery of the island is like claiming M*A*S*H was about the Korean War.
Claiming the show was never about nor marketed to be about the mystery of the island is like claiming M*A*S*H was about the Korean War.
The show was ALWAYS about the characters. You can see that by WATCHING THE SHOW. What was the show's main narrative strategy? flash backs/forwards/sideways. Were these flashes about the mysteries of the island? NOOOO they were about the CHARACTERS.. their back stories, their interactions, their meeting of each other.. their family, their job, their friends.
The mysteries were the hook, of course, it's called a PLOT. But the main premise, what the show was "all about" was always the characters.
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Joe Johnson
I still think that's a bit of a cop-out. You can say that about ANY show/story/etc, really.
They really DID promote the first few seasons pretty heavily about the "mysteries".
They really DID promote the first few seasons pretty heavily about the "mysteries".
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Soliloquy
In the medieval ages, brave warriors headed to the battlefield to fight for the honor of their Lord.
In the modern ages, brave posters headed to the internet to fight for the honor of their favorite TV shows.
Progress is an... interesting thing.
In the modern ages, brave posters headed to the internet to fight for the honor of their favorite TV shows.
Progress is an... interesting thing.
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Joe Johnson
What, you don't think they argued about the bullshit acts that the jesters, mummers, and troubadours were putting on?
And, I never said I was brave.
And, I never said I was brave.
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Soliloquy
Huh. Good point.
Heck, I heard an anecdote about how regular attendees of Shakespeare's Globe Theatre would occasionally attack attendees of the Marlowe's Rose Theatre when they left after a play, and vis-versa. So at very least it happened during the Renaissance.
And you are brave, Joe. You are the bravest of us all.
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Reboneer
And to be fair, most of those mysteries were solved.
Well sure, but only the ones that actually mattered.
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Reboneer
That was the foot of the Taweret statue, which presumably had four toes because hippos have four toes (or at least that's what everyone assumed when we found out the statues identity - seems reasonable to me).
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Joe Johnson
Well, some things matter to some, others don't. I guess it's the same as your answer about leaving some things unanswered, since many wouldn't be satisfied anyway.
For instance, I didn't really care whether or not Sayid got back together with Shannon because >gasp< it didn't matter. In fact, I'd rather he got back together with the woman he'd been pining for the last 6 seasons.
Anyway, like I mentioned before, this season was pretty meh for me, I don't feel strongly either way (ie - I'm not about to start a website to "finish the mysteries like they should have been").
To me it's not the fact that they didn't answer some of the questions. Just the fact that they put some of this stuff in the show let me use my imagination to think about what the history of the island was, etc. I realized that the reason I felt meh about the last season is that the show shifted focus. What I enjoyed about the show was the weird stuff. Remember how frickin' cool the first few seasons were? The numbers? what the heck was this monster? Who were these hillbilly like Others? Who the heck is this Ethan character who seems almost inhuman? etc, etc.
The turning point for me was once they introduced Jacob in that shack. They seemed to change the dynamic of the show from one of oddball, cool mysterious stuff that you only ever get to see in comics or books, to a fairly straightforward "battle between good and evil".
I guess what I'm saying is, I don't have a huge stake in the discussion as far as "Ohmygod theendingwasfuckingawesome!", or "Whatfuckers,theydidn'tanswermahquestionsfuckthemIwasted6years!!!!"
I fall in the middle.
I suppose to stay on topic I'll just say this. The finale was pretty emotional, and really did a good job of wrapping up all the storylines the way they had progressed the last few years. Did it answer "all the questions"? No, but it DID answer some, and it was in-line with the theme of the show during the last half of its run.
For instance, I didn't really care whether or not Sayid got back together with Shannon because >gasp< it didn't matter. In fact, I'd rather he got back together with the woman he'd been pining for the last 6 seasons.
Anyway, like I mentioned before, this season was pretty meh for me, I don't feel strongly either way (ie - I'm not about to start a website to "finish the mysteries like they should have been").
To me it's not the fact that they didn't answer some of the questions. Just the fact that they put some of this stuff in the show let me use my imagination to think about what the history of the island was, etc. I realized that the reason I felt meh about the last season is that the show shifted focus. What I enjoyed about the show was the weird stuff. Remember how frickin' cool the first few seasons were? The numbers? what the heck was this monster? Who were these hillbilly like Others? Who the heck is this Ethan character who seems almost inhuman? etc, etc.
The turning point for me was once they introduced Jacob in that shack. They seemed to change the dynamic of the show from one of oddball, cool mysterious stuff that you only ever get to see in comics or books, to a fairly straightforward "battle between good and evil".
I guess what I'm saying is, I don't have a huge stake in the discussion as far as "Ohmygod theendingwasfuckingawesome!", or "Whatfuckers,theydidn'tanswermahquestionsfuckthemIwasted6years!!!!"
I fall in the middle.
I suppose to stay on topic I'll just say this. The finale was pretty emotional, and really did a good job of wrapping up all the storylines the way they had progressed the last few years. Did it answer "all the questions"? No, but it DID answer some, and it was in-line with the theme of the show during the last half of its run.
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Soliloquy
Just found this.
Well that's exactly the problem, it would have been better if they didn't add mysteries that they couldn't explain in a satisfactory way in the first place.
Well that's exactly the problem, it would have been better if they didn't add mysteries that they couldn't explain in a satisfactory way in the first place.[/QUOTE]
Winner!
Well that's exactly the problem, it would have been better if they didn't add mysteries that they couldn't explain in a satisfactory way in the first place.[/QUOTE]
I know that's why I get pissed at science textbooks all the time.
Seriously, though, while there is some truth to this, it's also true that we don't actually want our mysteries resolved. Just look at magic acts. We want to be entertained. We don't want the tricks to be explained, we just want the payoff from the setup to be amazing. So I guess what it comes down to is whether you, individually, were sufficiently entertained enough by the payoff that the setup was worth it, and the Lost writers' ability to judge what kind of payoff the audience wanted is the real measure of success for the show, whatever other flaws it had.
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Chazwozel
I love how you're terrified of me enough to confine yourself to the media section of the forum and anticipate for me to chop through your bones at any moment in a thread. Seriously, I just came at the thought of you cowering in the corner of your room wishing for me to just stop being such a meanie head. That's why you tend to lump me into all of your little retorts isn't it? Even when I barely make an appearance in a thread? You're scared of the big, mean internet person? Grow up.
That aside, you can find THOUSANDS of complaining and being overly analytical over EVERYTHING ever created on TV or cinema whilst surfing the internet.
Again, never watched Lost. I just think you have your storytelling backwards, i.e. character development is for the purpose of caring about them at the ending (as opposed to developing characters to care about and then finding a good end for them) and mysteries shouldn't be answered if they have poor explanations (as opposed to having an answer and then shrouding it in mystery or giving clues).
That's a terrible example, because there is an explanation. He has powers given to him by being an alien under our yellow sun. Does it hold up scientifically? Obviously not. But it's an explanation. His flight is not a mystery. To put it in Lost perspective, it'd be like the people on the island suddenly see a man flying through the sky. There's no explanation to who he is, why he did it. He was just there, and they experienced seeing it.
And it's also irrelevant to what I said; you have your storytelling backwards. Like coming up with a scene of a character dying, and then thinking "I'd better tell people about this character's life so they'll care about his death." When a good storyteller should be writing an interesting character, and that character will have an ending. Same with a mystery. For Lost, it's as "Add this in because it's interesting, and we'll figure out an explanation for it later" (which they didn't, but that would be a sensible mentality) when a good storyteller will come up with a phenomenon, or a cause to a crime if it's that kind of mystery, and then think of what clues to leave.
In fact, what it looks like is Lost did with its mysteries what it should've done with its characters, and did with its characters what it should've done with its mysteries (if what you say about them knowing the ending from the start of the show is true). Which I suppose is novel all by itself, though I can't blame anyone for pointing out flimsiness. They'll have to do so though--I've not watched the show. I just keep seeing big, gaping holes in the logic of both Mav's and your arguments against each other. Maybe mushing the arguments together would create something seamless.
I'm afraid you'll need to make love to Mav for this to ever work, and perhaps prevent his website from needing to exist. I'm sorry. Weeping would not looked down upon.
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Element 117
I see your point Tekeo, I'm just afraid alot of shows/stories take the mystery as icing red herring as an easy cop out to developing characters through plots that actually have some idea of cause, effect, and consequence. If the mystery is "how does the warp drive work?," then you're right, we don't need to know. But if the mystery impacts the existence/fabric of the characters, then it had better be a damned good character study to not make sense.
I stopped watching after the season 3 finale. I was usually at work when it was on and I just didn't feel like trying to catch up. For me, it was always about the characters. I guess I missed some of the mysteries on the island, but basically I liked seeing how the characters interacted. Sawyer, for instance, was generally a dick, and intentionally so, but he had enough good qualities to balance it out, and the other characters acknowledged it.
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