Monday, May 24, 2010

LOST: Season 6 Episode 17 & 18 - The End

Hello LOSTIES!!!!  You must excuse me, I am still wiping the tears away from an incredibly emotional 2.5 hour experience!  What an episode, what a conclusion!  The feelings for this episode will, no doubt, be all over the map.  The conclusion to the Sideways Timeline will be the cause for much debate about the whole point of the entire series.  From this blogger's perspective though, I can not think of a more fitting end to the show that captured our imagination for 6 years.  There is only one way to definitively END a story.  They need to show us the very "END"!  And folks, that's exactly what we got!  I will try to weigh in on my opinions throughout the recap of that very point.  But clearly, things are being interpreted in different ways.  And I am guessing this is by design!  The significance of the end will not escape me, but there is a significance in this blog posting at the same time.  This is my final LOST recap (do I detect some tears out there?  There are some right here!).   An era is about to end.  And while this blog is not going anywhere and I will be posting things in the future, there will not be a new hour of LOST to discuss.  So, this may be a bit emotional for all of us.  But we're going to get through it!   I will save my thanks and goodbyes for the end.  For now, I have to say that this final episode of LOST was one great THRILL of a ride!  I was on the edge of my seat, I was crying, I feel like I need to go buy something at Target (man how many commercials were there?  Can't believe I decided to watch LIVE!  The LOST-Inspired Target commercials were very funny though), and of course there was enough intrigue in the episode to leave us talking for days, weeks, months, years!   I cannot help but give this episode a major WOW WOW WOW WOW WOW!!!!!!!!!!!!   And my entire LOST experience one giant SUPER WOW!!!!  I dread this folks, but it's time to get to the next paragraph!


The End - "It only Ends Once, everything else is progress."  Everything that we have seen for 6 seasons and everything that was set up this season all culminates to one definitive ending point.  On the Island, Jack has been dubbed the "Protector of the Island" and he along with Kate, Sawyer and Hurley have been tasked with the need to kill Smokey before he destroys the Island.  Smokey has vowed to destroy the Island with the use of Desmond "the Fail safe".  He has seemingly recruited Ben to help him out in this task.   Richard was blown away by Smokey with his fate uncertain.  And Miles "RAN AWAY" from conflict to save his own tail.   Then in Sideways land, things to be shaping up where people are being "ENLIGHTENED" to where they are.  A Prison Break, a Concert and a Hospital play their parts in uniting everyone to where they need to be.  But there is one stubborn "last recruit" in Jack Shephard.  Considering how this one ended, I think we have to switch up our story lines.  Our Island story is coming first in our final recap!

Disclaimer: It is very surprising for me to see how many people are already coming up with different philosophies on how this show ended.  I definitely will keep to my normal style of recapping by posing various questions to ponder.  But there are some things that I accepted as FACT by the end of this show, and I cannot help but write the recap this way, especially when it comes to the Sideways resolution!  So, hopefully this may clear things up for some who are confused!   Here we go!

The Island

All the events that occur in the following storyline are REAL and happened while everyone was alive.  Don't let anybody fool you into thinking that they weren't! 

Assembling the Attack Plan


We rejoin Jack, Hurley, Kate and Sawyer after their encounter with Jacob.   Jack is standing in the waters where he was "REBORN" as the protector of the Island.  Kate and Sawyer watch from a distance, but then Sawyer moves in for a chat.


  • Sawyer is very confused on everything that has just transpired.  Jack is in the same boat.   He does mention how he doesn't feel any different than he did before.  
  • Gotta love Sawyer telling him to come down from his mountain and tell everyone what the burning bush had to say!  
  • Jack then fills the other 3 in on the big plan.  Go to the bamboo forest close to their old camp (where Jack's journey began).   There they will find the "heart of the Island."  
  • They resolve that the light must stay lit or "that'll be it for all of us."  This is probably something subject for interpretation, but it really seems like when putting all of these episodes together and seeing what was happening when that light DID go out, that if this Island's light went out, it may have had repercussions to the rest of the world.   If not pushing that button in season 2 caused an electromagnetic surge that could have destroyed the world, what's to say that distinguishing this power source and removing the metaphorical CORK wouldn't cause world destruction?   Yes, it is left very ambiguous in the end though and we can only guess.   That's going to drive many people bonkers!   And it probably drives people crazy when I say that I'm cool with it! 
  • Anyway, they realize that both sides need Desmond, or more alarmingly, Flocke needs Desmond to put out the light.  Jack mentions that Jacob never said anything about Desmond, then Sawyer implied that he really didn't say much about anything!    This all set up to 2 more fantastic Star Wars lines to have in this final episode and both come from Hurley. 1.) "That's kind of true dude, he's worse than Yoda!"  We'll wait on the 2nd line for a second.  
  • Because we have another great Sawyer line to get to.  "You all head to your heart of the Island and I'll go get the magic leprechaun out of that well."   I'm gonna miss this show! 
  • Sawyer and Kate have a joking commentary referring to Kate's urge to always follow along with people.  But she sticks with Jack this time. 
  • And then what better line to set up the final conflict than the one line that made it into all 6 Star Wars movies in one way or another?  "I've Got a Bad Feeling About this!"   Damon Lindelof promised at his recent Times Talk Live interview that the first 7 minutes of the episode would include some big Star Wars stuff.  He did NOT disappoint!  (Now, some may argue he DID disappoint in the FINAL 7 minutes of the episode, but alas...so the debate shall rage on for years to come).  
  • Jack, Kate and Hugo head towards the Heart of the Island.  Kate asks Jack why he took the job, and he responds that he was supposed to.  He didn't take it because Jacob wrote his name on the wall.  Ever since he became BROKEN after leaving the Island and ruining his relationship with Kate, he believes that the Island is all he has left.   It's the only thing in his life he hasn't ruined.  
  • Kate pretty much was picking up what he was putting down and let Jack know that he hasn't ruined anything.   She then says something that Sideways Jack tells Sideways Locke in the beginning of this season.  "Nothing is irreversible."   Awwwwwwwwww She still loves him!!  And the Jaters (including me) rejoice!
  • Leave it to Hurley to keep them on task, "This would be so sweet if we weren't all about to die!"  Too true, Hugo, too true!   And they continue on their trek. 

Meanwhile, At the Well
Flocke is pulling up the rope from the well, thinking that it might come in handy in a bit at one of his next stops.  Ben catches Sawyer spying from behind a tree and escorts him towards the well with his gun.



  • Sawyer and Flocke have a conversation about them both needing Desmond.  Sawyer assumes Flocke needs Desmond to destroy the Island. (Love that Sawyer called him Smokey too.  We all have called him Smokey, but I'm not sure he was ever called that on the show!)    Flocke implies that he will be leaving the Island.  We find out later that he has Desmond's sailboat lined up for this plan.  
  • Flocke agrees with Sawyer that he plans to destroy the Island and then gets into the fact that this will, in turn, kill all of Jacob's precious candidates in the process.  Sawyer updates Flocke on the situation that there are no candidates any more.  Then he gives Ben one more elbow to the face for good measure (I'm glad he got one more beating before the show was over!), he grabs the gun and then heads off.   Since there is no more Desmond to be keeping him there.    

  • With Flocke finding out that someone was the new Island protector, he had no interest in anything about Sawyer anymore.  
  • Then in a BIT of a stretch, we find out that Ben thought Flocke was talking FIGURATIVELY about destroying the Island because he had promised it to Ben when he was gone.  So, if Ben had any resolve to help Smokey out, I think he lost the desire after this, just as we had speculated in the last recap! 



  • Flocke apologizes that he left out the part where Ben could be in charge of the Island but that the Island would be on the bottom of the ocean.   Of course, this makes us think that the Sideways land was somehow a result of how things ended in this Island story.  But, it will turn out that the sunken Island has nothing to do with all of that.   He did invite Ben to come on his boat once he gets Desmond to do what he needs to do.  He'll sail away from the Island and watch it sink.  
  • Oh wait, what's this?  A little bit of John Locke's tracking skills are at work as he spots some DOG TRACKS!   Whoever called it that Rose, Bernard and Vincent would rescue Desmond last week, VERY GOOD CALL (Lost Addicts Blog Commenter Paolo called this FYI)! 


Casa Nadler
Welcome back Vincent to the show!  And of course welcome back Rose and Bernard!  We see that Rose and Bernard's life hasn't really changed much after time traveling back to 2007.  They still have their cabin that they built and they're still remaining non-confrontational.  But, they broke this "do not get involved" rule when they rescued Desmond.




  • Rose doesn't even know WHEN they are right now.  They knew they built the place in 75 and lived there for 2 years.  Then the sky lit up again (The Incident) and here they are.  They just don't care though.  They have been living their hippie lifestyle in peace.   She then asks Desmond to move on after he eats.  They do not want any conflict he has brought to interfere with their peace loving ways. 

  • TOO LATE!   Bernard returns with no food but a whole lot of conflict!  Flocke has arrived and he pulls out his knife ready for blood.  Oh man, was anyone else here super nervous?  After seeing him off Zoe so suddenly with that knife, it definitely provided the fear that he might strike the marginally important characters of Rose and Bernard! 
  • He gives Desmond the ultimatum to come with him or he'll kill Rose and Bernard.  While Rose and Bernard tell Desmond not to give in, he did the right thing!  How chilling was it when he told Rose "I'll make it hurt"?   Yikes this guy is creepy!  Kudos to Terry O'Quinn.  Give the man an Emmy for this season.  Seriously! 
  • Desmond asks for Flocke's word that he won't harm them if he goes with them.   Once again Smokey is forced to give his word and he does.  And so it would seem that Rose and Bernard go on to live a happy Island existence and possibly lived a happy and cancer free existence for many years to come!  How do I know this?  It's all in Christian's speech at the end folks!  
  • Desmond says he will do what Smokey wants.  And Smokey tells him chillingly "Yes, Desmond, you will!"  

Collision


Sawyer catches up with his crew and Hurley screams in fear of him coming out of nowhere.  "Easy Bigfoot, it's just me!"   Like I said, I'm gonna miss this show!  Sawyer won't be the only one joining this party.

  • Sawyer reports what he had found out in his "Recon" trip.  Flocke has every intention of destroying the Island.  And of course, Desmond is not in the well, so Sawyer thinks they need to get to him first. 
  • Jack sees the big picture and realizes that it doesn't matter WHO brings Desmond to the Light Cave.  They're all going to the same place.  Jack seems to have faith that he knows how to bring this conflict to an end.  
  • Cue the awesome Michael Giacchino music we hear in every finale when we get some journeying across the Island!  That, and the wide panning camera shots always give these finales such an epic feel! 

  • Meanwhile, Flocke, Desmond and Ben are journeying towards the cave of light as well.  Flocke asked Desmond if he knew where he was being taken.  Desmond said he assumed it was a place with a very bright light!  Flocke seemed alarmed that he knew this.  One could speculate on the reason that Desmond knew this, but I would suggest that he knew it because he had experienced it twice before now and survived it, and knew that is the reason he was here.  And he was hoping that by getting to this light again he could get back to his other plane of existence.  Of course, what he didn't seem to know is what exactly that plane of existence was that he saw.  We'll talk more on this later. 
  • And what do you know?  Jack and crew, and Flocke and crew are marching right towards each other!  Smokey sums it up, "Well this is going to be interesting!" 

  • Before Flocke can even finish his sentence, Kate has grabbed Sawyer's rifle and opens fire!  She is a woman on a mission to kill this man-thing for what he has done!   Naturally, the bullets are doing nothing but flying right through him, around him or whatever!  I love that Ben and Desmond hit the deck! 


  • Sawyer stops Kate from shooting and Flocke just says "You may want to save your bullets." and walks right past towards Jack.  Well, Smokey, little did you know but that just gave Kate her Action Movie "One Liner" for a big event yet to come!  One that almost had me jumping out of my seat and cheering like when Hurley ran over the others with the Dharma Van on the beach! 
  • You have to love Smokey's speech here to Jack.  "So, it's you.  Jacob, being who he is, I expected to be a little more surprised!  You're sort of the obvious choice. Don't you think?"   It was almost like Smokey took the place of Hurley for a second as the Audience's representation on the show!  I have always loved how they address what they think the fan's reaction will be within the show itself! 
  • Jack was quick to clarify that Jacob didn't choose him, he chose to do it himself.   Then Jack, with his confidence at an all-time high, suggests that he cannot stop Flocke from reaching his destination.  Instead, he volunteers to go with him.  And then Jack tells him that Flocke THINKS he's going to destroy the Island, but this is not what is going to happen.   What will happen instead?  "I'm gonna kill you."   NIIIIICE!!!  Even if Jack was wrong, at least he was going down swinging! 
  • Flocke looked a little nervous and just asked Jack how he plans to do that.   "That's a surprise."  Man, Jack got some quality lines in this one!  So, they agree to move onward to the cave together and see which one of them will be right.  




Operation: Blow Up Plane - Take 2
Don't worry, there was plenty to do for our Non-Season 1 and 2 LOSTIES as well!  Of course, we may have only thought that Miles was alive from this crew, but we were happily mistaken!  Miles returns to the barracks to rejoin with his crew.  

  • He radios Ben on the walkie talkie which Ben has to turn down very quickly because he doesn't want Flocke to know he has it.  If there was any question whose side Ben was on, that little move cleared it up for us!  
  • Well guess what guys? Surprise #1, Richard is still alive and Miles found him! 
  • Miles updates Richard on what happened to him and how he got launched into the jungle.  He then offers to get him some help.  I agree with Richard.  Help from WHERE?   Anyway, since they have no idea what was going on with Flocke and Jack's respective missions, his resolve is still to blow up the plane.  Of course, with us being in the know, this really confuses us!  But it quickly makes more sense.   And yes, I remembered that Claire was hanging out on Hydra Island too so that would get her back into the story! 
  • Later on, we see Miles and Richard at the dock getting read to take Flocke's outrigger over to Hydra Island.  Miles notices something different about Richard and then welcomes him to the "club".   Richard has a grey hair!  He is no longer immortal!   I guess maybe this ended with Jacob's death?  Maybe Jack taking over?  If anything, it signified that his obligations to the Island were complete.  But, to Richard, it meant more.  It signified that he still wanted to live!  

  • They head on over towards Hydra Island but here some screaming on the way.  I think immediately we know who is screaming!  Surprise #2!  FRANK is still alive.  The producers did state that the oversight of him not being mentioned in the sub sinking would be corrected.  They sure were right!  Of course, he's been laying out in the Ocean for a couple days now but seems pretty fine a couple scenes later!  But, you know, Jin blew up in a freighter and was out at sea for a few days during some intense time travel.   This is child's play compared to that! 



  • Frank quickly addresses the fact that if they leave on the plane, Smokey won't have a plane to leave the island with.  And, in a nod to the fact that he's been wearing that crazy shirt for 2 seasons now, he tells Richard "In case you haven't noticed, I'm a pilot!"  GOOD TIMES!   So this story does have a "leave the island" plot after all!  It totally seemed like Frank had been brought back in season 5 and 6 for no reason whatsoever when we thought he was killed off a few episodes back. So this corrects all of that!




The Cave of Light
On their approach to the Cave, Sawyer wants to catch up with Jack's plan, since he thinks it's absolutely nuts that they're all going together.

  • Jack tells Sawyer that is surprise to kill Flocke is Desmond.  He isn't exactly sure how it's going to happen but he said there has to be a reason that Jacob brought Desmond back to the Island.  Funny that Jacob implied that he didn't know how to kill Smokey but he knew enough to bring Desmond back?  Maybe he did know and just wanted Jack to figure it out for himself.  Jack refers to Desmond as a weapon.  Loved Sawyer's "That's a hell of a long con, Doc!"  

  • The crew arrives at the outskirts of the bamboo forest.  Flocke thinks that only he, Jack and Desmond should continue on.  Jack agrees with this sentiment.   I love that Hurley runs after Jack and tells him that he believes in him.  Remember in season 4 when Hurley chooses to go with Locke instead of Jack?  So great to see these guys back on great terms.  Jack smiles and heads in to begin the fulfillment of his destiny.  

  • One issue that I will mention about the finale is that they make various references to the weather on the Island, the coming storm.  And yes, it's all metaphoric.  I get that.  But Team Darlton had suggested that we were going to get more information about the Day turning to Night kind of weather that has always been on the Island.  Why we saw Jacob and the Man in Black sitting on a sunny beach, watching the Black Rock arrive and then a huge storm was summoned and sent the ship crashing into the statue in sliding into the jungle.  The Enhanced version of the Pilot episode that aired Saturday spoke of how the rain was used to symbolize that something BAD was about to happen.  That doesn't answer any questions about the elements and how they played a factor on the Island.  My only issue with this is that they said it would be in the show, and it wasn't.  If they never said that I would have been fine with it!   I guess this could be part of the 20 minutes of additional storyline that will be attached to the DVD and Blu-Ray release of Season 6 on August 24th.  I'll be first in line to buy it and blog about it! 
  • Anyway, the reason I brought that up now is because we hear a roar of thunder and then we see Smokey, as John Locke (who always predicted the weather patterns on the Island), saying that it's going to be a bad one.  And it sure was! 
  • They arrive at the cave of light and they spend little time taking the scene in.  They get right to work! Flocke ties the rope to a tree and they begin to lower Desmond down into the hatch...errr cave.  
  • Then we find out what has been motivating Island Desmond ever since his zap of electromagnetic energy.   He begins to tell Jack that none of this matters.  Flocke destroying the Island, Jack destroying Flocke.   He tells Jack that when he goes into that light he is going to go somewhere else where they can all be with the ones they love and never have to think of the Island ever again.    He tells Jack of what he saw in sideways and how they say next to each other on Oceanic 815.   He said how Jack seemed happy and how the plane didn't crash.  He said he'd find a way to bring Jack there too.  And then we get it straight from Jack's mouth.   "I tried that once.  There are no do overs, no short cuts.  What happened happened."  Jack is of course referring to THE INCIDENT.  I guess some will look at this conversation and believe that what Desmond is saying is the truth.  But one thing that Damon and Carlton said in a recent interview (Times Talk Live) was that the Answer is in what they SHOW us, not what people say.  And what they show us by the end of this episode is that what Jack says here is right.   So we did get a big answer tonight folks.  Whatever happened, happened!  Jughead didn't reset anything.  Everything they did when they were in 1977 including setting off that nuke, was all part of what made the incident THE INCIDENT.   And upon re-watching the show, this will make the most sense.  When you watch that DHARMA orientation video and Marvin Candle (Pierre Chang) talks about the Incident, you will picture everything that they went through in that season 5 finale and know that this is what happened!  PERFECT.  Obviously, we need to still talk about Sideways land to get into this more.  But I am 100% sure that this is what we were meant to think.   Island Desmond was speaking the truth of what he saw, but what he didn't realize is what that vision actually WAS.  It was not a "do over."  It was something else entirely.   Everything they are doing, MATTERS. 
  • They head into the cave.  And I am so glad they did.  I'd be the first to admit how hokey the entrance to that cave looked the first time we saw it.  But I didn't realize how big it was and how far the waterfall went down into the cave.  Very cool. 


  • Jack asks Desmond if he knows what to do when he gets to the bottom.  Desmond says that he goes where the light is brightest.  They begin to lower him down.  Flocke starts to talk to Jack about how familiar this all seems.  And they talk about how they lowered rope into the Swan Hatch all of those years ago and Desmond was waiting down there for them.   He said if there was a button down there the 2 of them could fight about whether to push it or not.  Just like old times.  Jack isn't buying into it.  Jack tells Smokey "You're not John Locke.  You disrespect his memory by wearing his face, but you're nothing like him.  It turns out he was right about mostly everything.  I just wish I could have told him that while he was still alive."   YEAH JACK!!  Don't worry, you can tell him anyway!    Flocke continues to refer to Locke as a "sucker" and he wasn't right about anything.  And when the Island drops into the ocean along with Jack, he'll realize that.  While they resolve to see which one of them is right, we do get a shot of them looking into the cave exactly like they looked into the hatch in the final shot of season 1.   AWESOME symmetry! 

  • Desmond gets to the bottom of the cave.  He sees a few skeletons in this cave.  Looks like the Man in Black was NOT the first person to venture in here.  But unlike Man in Black, these bodies didn't seem to be kicked out of the cave either like his body was.  I'm sure I could speculate on this for hours but I need to keep moving for now!  I do not, however, think one of these bodies is EVE (Mother) because her body was found in the other cave next to Man in Black's body.  
  • And then Desmond sees it, the water mixed with the light and the proverbial cork ends up being an ACTUAL CORK plugging in some kind of hole.   I could speculate again about what this all signifies, and I'm sure many people out there will comment and give their theories on it.  I will save it for the discussion.  For recapping purposes, all we need to know is that EVE and Jacob both warned that the light must never be put out or it goes out EVERYWHERE.  This seems like unplugging this hole, while ending up being essential, also could have world wide stakes.  Desmond, without hesitation, moves towards the light with a big smile on his face.   A nice touch that I didn't notice the first time, Desmond's nose began to bleed as he screams and approaches the plug/cork.  That is something we saw various times during all of the time traveling of last season.  He reaches the center, not without some difficulty, and begins to pull at this plug.   We should note that a lot of the sounds that all of this activity was making sounded very similar to things we heard when they were all time traveling as well.  I am sure this, along with Rose talking about the bright white light again, is significant to remind us that all of the time travel that happened on the Island and the movement of the Island were all part of this core SOURCE of energy mixed with the water.  
  • Once successful in pulling the plug, the light diminishes until it is gone.  And the water stops running. Instead, something else replaces this light.  And one might compare the look and sound to something quite VOLCANIC!   This is what I choose to believe since we always new there was a volcano somewhere on the Island.  (why not underneath?)    Smoke and Fire begin to rise out of the uncorked hole.  Symbolic of EVIL being unleashed?   Sure, why not?   But the immediate threat is that it seems the Island is about to start falling apart!  We hear Desmond scream in defeat "NO!!!!"  




  • Meanwhile Flocke temporarily claims victory over Jack telling him that he was wrong.  He then says goodbye to him and leaves the cave. 

  • Outside, the entire Island is shaking and rocks are crumbling everywhere.   Jack runs out and jumps after Flocke and slams him to the ground. Then he takes a swing at Flocke's face!  And then we see the man who cannot be injured in any way, has a cut on the face!!  We immediately think of when Rocky Balboa made Ivan Drago bleed in Rocky IV!   YOU CUT HIM!  He's a MAN!  He's not a machine!!  Another classic Jack line followed:  "Looks like you were wrong too!"  
  • So yes, for whatever reason, unplugging that hole made smokey a mortal human being, capable of dying.  WHY?  We don't have to know why.  Why not?  Because we're not going to find out why!  There could be some subtext to it all and people will find it.  But, for me, it showed that Jack knew what had to be done and he made it happen!  
  • Jack began to choke Flocke, but he wasn't quite done yet.  He grabbed a rock and slammed it into Jack's head.  OUCH!  Flocke runs off, but only so that we could be treated to a scenic and epic final fight on the cliffs.  How AWESOME WAS THAT?!?!  We'll get there in a second.



Catch-up on Escape Plan
Let's take a break to catch up with the other LOSTIES.  Miles radios Ben on the Walkie talkie again.

  • Miles updates them on their plan to fly the plane off of the Island.  He instructs them to get over to that Island as quickly as possible. 
  • While the radio is still on, Miles, Frank and Richard run into the other current resident of Hydra Island.  It's crazy Claire!   Claire thinks they are there to do Flocke's bidding and kill her.  We got treated to a little bit of the season 3 finale when Ben told Tom Friendly to kill Jin, Bernard and Sayid and we heard 3 gunshots.   We see Kate on the Walkie hearing gunshots while Claire shoots at everyone's feet.  Good times!  
  • Richard stresses that they are not with Locke.  She tries to tell Claire that they have a chance to leave this island.  They can be free of everything Smokey ever did to them.  Richard then asks Claire to come with them.  Even though she no longer is posing a threat to them, she still refuses to leave with them.   Looks like she's going to need some convincing from Kate!  



Storm and Island Destruction
After the uncorking of the Island's heart, we catch see Hurley, Ben, Kate and Sawyer struggling to maintain their footing.  A tree collapses on Ben.  Who would have thought that we'd see these 3 other people fighting to save Ben Linus?   But sure enough, they do manage to get him free! 

  • We get one more Sawyer jab at Jack as he states that "Locke was right.  This island is going down."   
  • Miles checks back in with the crew.  We see Richard and Lapidus patching up the plane and prepping it for takeoff.   Finally, they took care of that broken windshield!

  • Kate picks up the walkie and asks Miles about Claire.  She finds out that Claire does not want to join them on the plane to leave the Island.  
  • Lapidus tells them that he needs like 5 or 6 hours to get the plane ready to go.   Richard tells him that he pretty much has one hour.  (seems like a very Kirk and Mr. Scott conversation from Star Trek!)  
  • So now Kate and crew are on the main island and need to get to Hydra island in an hour?   It used to take them DAYS to travel back and forth.  Good thing there's a sailboat nearby!  And Ben had this information since he was "working" with Flocke.  It was/is Flocke's getaway plan.   


Jack vs. Flocke
Meanwhile, Jack wakes up and is a little shaky, he runs into the cave and screams for Desmond.  No response.  He knows he has no choice but to head out after Flocke.    We see Flocke on the cliff looking outward towards the sailboat in the stormy waters.   This is the cliff near the cave that he brought Sawyer back in the beginning of the season.  It provides the setting for one fantastic fight (and one ill-timed commercial break!).

  • We hear Jack scream "LOCKE!!!!!!!"  They face each other from a distance.   And then both of them come running towards each other with one goal in mind.  KILL THE OTHER MAN! 
(pause for commercial)

  • The clash into each other and begin to roll around the cliff.  They get up, they do some more fighting.  The scene was just awesomely shot and choreographed. No explanation from me could do it justice.  
  • In the end, it became a battle for control over the knife.  But as they were laying having each other in a chokehold, what an amazing shot of part of the cliff just collapsing off of the Island!  


  • Flocke grabs the knife and delivers a blow to Jack's side.  Oh no!!  He then gets the upper hand on Jack and throws him to the ground.  He puts the knife up to Jack's neck and we immediately can draw comparisons to the cut Sideways Jack keeps seeing in the mirror.  
  • Flocke then tells Jack that he died for nothing.  This can't be how it ends can it?   I know as I was watching, I took a break from my finger nail biting to utter these words in hopes that rescue was coming.  "LIVE TOGETHER DIE ALONE!!"  
  • Then, we hear a gunshot and we see it go straight into Flocke's back!   It's KATE!!!   And the crowd goes wild!  (except everyone that hates Kate)  

  • And then in true Die Hard or any Arnold movei fashion, Kate gets to deliver her big catchphrase that Flocke helped set up.  "I saved you a bullet!"  NIIIIIIICE!  
  • The Island continues to crumble and Flocke tells them that they're too late.   Jack has had quite enough of him and decides to just kick him off of the cliff!  And he doesn't just fall into the stormy waters.  No, he falls onto a very hard surface many feel below from where they are.  I would say that dude is SMOKE!  I mean...er TOAST!  


  • RIP Smokey, Flocke, Man in Black - Whatever you want to be called. You were a truly worthy adversary.  And I still like you for taking out Keamy's crew at the barracks and ripping off Montand's arm!     




Goodbyes

  • To expedite the leaving the Island process, Lapidus has to delegate some duties.  Because Miles worked as a maintenance man at some off-island apartment complex, he gets some duct tape and is sent to go adjust some electrical wiring issues!  Good times.  (by the way, I got feedback on Twitter that I use this expression too much.  In my opinion, this just means I never used it enough!)  
  • By the way, we do see Miles working on this later and the only part I want to quote is this "I don't believe in a lot of things, but I DO believe in duct tape!"  GOOD TIMES! 
  • Ben checks in on their status via Walkie Talkie and you gotta love Frank saying "Don't Bother me" and throwing the walkie aside!   Ben's response was quality too.  "Sounds like they're making progress."  
  • Just to remind us that the Island is still falling apart, we get a greatly timed quake.  
  • Sawyer insists they need to get moving.  Kate doesn't understand why it's still happening after Smokey has been destroyed.   Jack suggests that whatever Desmond turned off needs to be turned back on again.  The only man to do this?  Jack Shephard.   He tells them if it doesn't work, they still need to make their way to the plane.  
  • They all seemed to catch on to what was being said.  Just as many had speculated.  In the end, Jack would need to sacrifice himself for everyone else.  It was the only way for this Island drama to come to a satisfying conclusion.  At least, I know I have said that several times.  
  • Kate pleads for Jack to reconsider and that he should come with them.  It doesn't have to be him.  She tells him to let the Island sink.  He says that he cannot.  We are left to wonder why he can't.  But, since he has sworn to protect the Island, I would say that we are meant to believe that the stakes for the rest of the world are real.  Other people would probably argue that it's all pointless.  But I choose to believe there was a point to these 6 years worth of stories!  Of course, even if it was uniting these characters and giving them purpose and a new life, maybe that is enough in the end?  Naaaa, we need WORLD STAKES! 
  • Then the goodbyes begin.  And it was a very emotional time. (have I mentioned I was a crying mess this entire episode??)  
  • Jack and Sawyer have their handshake and reconcile their differences.   Jack wishes him luck, and he thanks him.  FOR EVERYTHING. awwwwww

  • Then Ben tosses the walkie to Sawyer.  I got a little emotional when Ben opts to stay behind.  He says if the Island is going down, then he's going down with it.  Perfect.  
  • I thought this might end with everyone deciding to stay with Jack in one more Live Together Die Alone moment.  But it was enough that Hugo decided to stay.  Of all of the people who would choose to stay in the face of danger!  This really got me!   Of course, he uses the ladder as an excuse!  Good stuff.  "I'm with you dude"
  • He then approaches Kate and tells her that she has to go and get Claire on the plane.   Kate asks Jack to tell her that she will see him again.  He doesn't really respond.  But we know when the next time they see each other will be.  And it isn't in this world!  So, instead we get the moment that every Jater was waiting for.  One big final emotional kiss.  I would say in this moment and a moment we see later in Sideways, it shows that Kate made her choice.  Sure, maybe she and Sawyer end up together off Island.  We'll never know.  But her true love was Jack Shephard.  
  
  • Whew, letting it sink in.  This was rough stuff!  And then they tell each other that they love each other and that is it.  Kate is a mess.  Jack moves on to fulfill his final mission.  





Saving the Island
Ben and Hurley help Jack back to the cave of Light (well darkness right now).   Hurley wants to know how they're all going to get down there.  But Jack informed them that he is going down there alone.

  • Right now they think Desmond didn't make it, and Hurley wonders how Jack will survive.  Jack knows that he is not going to make it.  He tells Hurley that he is already dead.  That stab wound was going to get him in the end.   It's not suicide, it's what is supposed to happen.  What he's supposed to do.  

  • And then he tells Hugo that HE has to become the Island protector.   Major kudos to anyone that called this after Hurley said "I'm glad it's not me" and when Jacob told Jack to hold the position "As long as you can".   Great stuff.  
  • And of course, Hurley didn't want the role at all and he fought it.  But in the end he accepts only in the condition that Jack takes it back when he comes out alive.  So just like Jacob, Hurley is given the role reluctantly, but sorta by inevitable choice.   Very fitting that the passing of the torch is done via an Oceanic Water bottle too.  I guess the latin incantation over the water or wine wasn't important?  Maybe they showed us it being done differently each time to signify that it was up to the protector on how to pass the torch?  I'm fine with that I guess.   Anyway, Jack does tell Hurley
  • And of course, Hurley didn't want the role at all and he fought it.  But in the end he accepts only in the condition that Jack takes it back when he comes out alive.  So just like Jacob, Hurley is "Now You're Like Me" and then he moves towards the cave.
  • Jack is lowered into the cave and he ends up finding Desmond down there who is still alive!   Desmond is very aware that the light did not do what he thought it was going to do to him.  He said that he put it out!   He thought he would leave and end up in sideways.  Jack ends up sending Desmond back up and tells him to go be with his wife and kid.  I just knew they'd end up back together!!  Desmond did try to resist knowing he was the only one that could withstand the electromagnetism.  But Jack had already made up his mind.  

  • By the way, this scene right here where Desmond is telling Jack he was right is the clearest indication you'll get that the ISLAND is not purgatory (I'm responding to 100s of comments on the discussion thread I posted on the blog here).   I cannot even fathom how this episode clarified that for people when the producers have said since Day 2 or 3 (obviously not 1 since we all guessed it in the beginning) that this story is not Purgatory.   Now, when we're discussing the Sideways story, let's raise the issue back up for debate. 
  • You gotta love that Jack tells Desmond "I'll see you in another life brotha" before he goes to plug in that hole.  Great stuff. 
  • Jack goes back, and with all his remaining strength, plugs in the hole!  He then collapses and waits for the inevitable. 
  • After enough time passes, the light begins to shine again and the water begins to run down the waterfall and into the cave's light.  All becomes right with the Island!  But Jack is still sitting in the light.  He is all smiles with what is about to happen to him.  


  • Hurley and Ben realize that he did it and begin to pull on the rope!   But they realize that it is Desmond who is brought up and not Jack.  Hurley screams after Jack.  But there is no response.  
  • Desmond appears to be okay.  Hurley is still trying to cope with the loss of Jack.  (We'll get back to Jack's story at the end)  Ben tries to console Hugo telling him that Jack did his job.   Hurley realizes this is his job now.  And he has no idea what he's supposed to do.  Ben gave him some advice.  Hurley should do what he does best and take care of people.  Awwww  He says he can start by helping Desmond find a way off of the Island.   Hurley wonders how because people can't leave the Island.  Ben shrugs this off saying that this is how Jacob ran things.  Hmmm, are they telling us that the inability to find the island and leave the Island was all Jacob's doing?   If so, maybe we just found out how Jacob and "some" of the others were able to leave the Island whenever they needed to.  Of course, I still wonder how they got Anthony Cooper there so suddenly (Richard did that too...why didn't he just use THAT way off of the Island instead of fixing a plane and flying it?  Oh well, I'm not going to nitpick.  That's my only one for now!)  
  • The point is, Hurley is going to get to make his own rules when he protects the Island.   He can find a better way to do things.  And then in an awesomely unexpected moment, Hurley asks for Ben's help.  He offers the role of his #2 to Ben.   He needs someone with experience.  And Ben humbly takes the role saying it would be his honor.   And there went the waterworks again!!! 


And so the torch has passed to Hugo Reyes to protect the Island for as long as he possibly can.  How long was this?  We never find out.  We only find out how it all ends.  And we'll get there. 





Escape 
Meanwhile, while the Island is still crumbling (pre-Jack "fixing") Kate and Sawyer end up taking a big dive off of the cliff to get to the sailboat, knowing they don't have much time.  Frank and crew are leaving while there is still ground to get off on.   Yikes that was a big jump!


  • Fast forward to Hydra Island, they arrive on shore and the Ajira flight is ready to go.  They see it prepping to leave in the background and also see the Main Island crumbling.   But there is one more thing that must be resolved.  Kate needs to recruit Claire!  
  • Kate pleads to Claire to come with them.  Claire knows that she is a mess and not fit to be a mother.  She doesn't even remember how to be one.  Kate tells her that nobody knows how until they are.   And Kate offers to help Claire.  In the end, Claire does decide to get on that plane.  And no, there will be no fulfillment of Desmond's vision seeing Claire and Baby get on a helicopter and leave the Island.  But we do see Claire get on a plane to GET to her baby! 

  • Meanwhile Frank is getting ready to take off, but then sees Sawyer, Kate and Claire run right in front of them! 
  • They all get on board and then head down the runway built in season 3 on Jacob's orders.  Built by Sawyer, Kate along with Juliet and various OTHERS.  And Richard, Frank, Kate, Sawyer, Claire and Miles all leave the Island safely to live their lives.  Claire will return to her baby and her mother.  There are SOME happy endings along with the uber Sad bittersweet ending.  






Flash Sideways
Are you still with me?  We're about halfway there!  In the sideways land, we continue the enlightenment of our LOSTIES in finding out why things don't seem quite right in Sideways Land.  And why they remember their Island lives.   I have to say just about every scene in Sideways Land had me in tears.  It was so well done, and when I rewatched the final 15 minutes of the show to justify that they had put together a fantastic ending, I cried again!  But let's dive in from the beginning.  

The Coffin / Church
The episode began with a musical montage of where our Sideways Losties are and Island Losties are.  In the Sideways land we also see Christian Shephard's Coffin arrive on an Oceanic Plane.   We see it reach the final destination of the infamous CHURCH where the Lamp Post station was in the Island timeline.  We see Desmond has already arrived there in the Camaro with Kate after their prison break-out last episode.


  • He impersonates someone being employed by the church to sign for the coffin.   He instructs the man to take the coffin around back. 
  • Kate asks Desmond when he returns to the car who died.  Desmond said that it was a man by the name of Christian Shephard.  Kate jokes at the irony of the name.  Really?  I man named "Christian" "Shephard"?   Especially with the heavy spiritual themes this final season brought about, the name is very ironic.  
  • Long story short, this is a setup for a scene later to come.  A scene that I had been waiting for since season 1 and really hoped that it would be in the finale.  But we'll get to that in a bit.  
  • Kate is still not sure what is going on and asks Desmond for some answers.  She wants to know why she was broken out of prison, she is wearing the dress and going to the concert.  She wants to know why she is here.  Desmond tells her that no one can tell her WHY she is here.  And he wasn't referring to the church.  He's referring to this sideways existence.  And it all makes sense by the end, even if it's not what people were hoping!  Desmond assures Kate that he is a friend and what he wants.  He wants to LEAVE.   This is probably meant to mirror the Man in Black's wishes to leave the Island.  But now people want to leave Sideways?  Huh?  Again, no sense in really questioning it, because it all makes sense in the end.   Desmond says that he will show Kate.  And we continue onward to the concert! 




Sayid and Hurley
So the enlightened Hurley is taking Sayid on a few errands to run.  The first is to grab Charlie for the big concert.  It turns out that the concert that Eloise Hawking was preparing for in "Happily Ever After" IS the same benefit that is in this finale.  I just assumed it was over by now.  But then again, it would seem that time doesn't really play a factor here.  Whoops, getting ahead of myself!

  • Hurley brings Sayid to the motel where Sayid's "safe house" was in the beginning of season 5.  If you recall, Sayid broke Hurley out of the mental institution and brought him here.  There were people waiting for them with tranquilizer darts and everything.  And Sayid got shot.   Hurley thought by showing Sayid this tranq gun, it might trigger some memories.  No such luck.  
  • Hurley tells Sayid to stay in the car.  If he doesn't, it's his choice but Hurley assures Sayid he will be happy he stuck around.  
  • Hurley knocks on the door to Charlie's motel room.  He answers.  And...well, the look on Hurley's face says it all.  He is so happy to see his friend.  But Charlie isn't FULLY enlightened yet.  He just saw glimpses of his other life.  




  • Charlie still is not interested in playing the concert.  Hurley suggested that this concert is the most important thing that he would ever do.  Charlie still isn't buying it.  Which led to an awesome scene of Hurley shooting Charlie with the tranquilizer gun!  Nice! 

  • Sayid is shocked at what he just saw.  "That was Charlie, " is all Hurley says and then he drives on.  
  • Note: we do see Hurley drop off Charlie at the concert.   This sets Miles in motion as he sees Sayid in the van!  He calls up Sawyer and sends him to the hospital to check on Sun who survived her gunshot wound.  She could be a target.  Nice! 

  • Next we see them staked outside of a bar where Sayid asks why they're there. Hurley said that he's not allowed to tell.  Similar to what Desmond said as no one can tell them why they are here.   Hurley brings up THE RULES!  Of course, these are different rules than the ones that governed the Island.
  • Hurley tells Sayid that he trusts Sayid as he should trust him.  He thinks that Sayid is a good guy and that he needs to not let other people influence him.   Maybe he heard he WASN'T good so many times that he started to believe in it.  He told Sayid he has to decide for himself who he is.   
  • While Sayid is in denial still a fight breaks out outside of the bar.  We see a blonde woman come out of the bar yelling "Leave my brother alone!"  Hmmmmm  The woman gets thrown to the ground.  The ladies' man and hero in Sayid comes out and he runs to save a damsel in distress! 

  • Who the attacker was makes no difference, but who the woman was?  Well, I think we caught on by now.  It's SHANNON!!  The both look at each other and the memories come crashing back!  Their Island relationship, their love for each other.  They instantly remember everything!  (by the way, I stand corrected on whom Sayid was referring to when he said to the Man in Black he wanted the woman back who died in his arms.  It would appear that Shannon may have been his true love.   Kudos to commenter Holly for calling me on this way back in episode 6 of this season "Sundown")

  • And yes, it would appear that Boone was in on it too!  Poor Boone never had a love interest besides his step sister, but somehow he got enlightened.  We just didn't get to see it.  (Similar to Rose and Bernard who already seemed to be "in the know")   Boone said he went through a lot of trouble to get Shannon back from Australia to be here.   For all we know that could have been a nod to the producers going through a lot of trouble to get Maggie Grace back on the show for this finale!  (she was tied up with conflicting shoots earlier in the season).  
  • The first of many tear-jerking Sideways reunions! 

The Hospital
  • The minute we read the subtitle from Jin telling Sun that a doctor was going to come look at their baby, I think we knew who it was going to be.  I saw this scene unfolding before my eyes.  I could see how they were going to wake up!   The Season 3 Sonogram where Sun finds out the baby is Jin's!  (Episode: D.O.A.) 
  • Before we get the doctor reveal Jin says if everything is alright "We can leave soon."  The word "leave" was used by the writers intentionally to fit in with the Sideways theme.  Jin and Sun just didn't know what they meant by it yet.  They feel like they're going to keep running from Mr. Paik (Sun's father) 
  • So the doctor walks in an sure enough, it's JULIET!  Her last name is Carson here as it would seem she never married that Burke fellow.  (Of course, she did marry someone else, but we'll get to that) 
  • Juliet realizes that neither of them speak english so she gets right down to business and begins the sonogram.  And we just know that it's coming!   She uses some of the same words she used in season 3's episode.  "It's a little cold" as she is applying that gel-like substance to read the ultrasound.  And then it hits Sun first.  She remembers!!  Then Jin looks at the ultrasound and he begins to remember.  The difference this time?  We see them remembering everything all the way up to their death.  So this is the first time where we can state that this definitely happened "AFTER" the Island timeline.  
  • Both Jin and Sun are enlightened and Juliet just keeps talking about the baby's heartbeat.  Except now they understand every word!   She asks if it's a boy or a girl and Sun just speaks in English.  "It's a girl!"  Jin says "Her name is Ji Yeon"  and Juliet, still unaware of what is going on, tells them that their English is just fine!  NICE!  Btw, I was bawling like a baby again here! 

  • Meanwhile Jack is prepping Locke for surgery.   Ironic conversation in more ways than one when Locke asks Jack if he is sure it's going to work.  Jack says yes, but of course there is always the chance that he could kill him.   We hadn't seen it yet, but Jack does finish off the Man in Black who was assuming Locke's image.   And of course the other meaning comes into play at the reveal towards the end of the episode!  Jack then tells Locke that he'll "see him on the other side."  All significant word choices by the writers I would say! 
  • Locke asks Jack if he had ever gotten word on his father's body.  Jack said that he DID get a call and was going to claim him later.  Jack is convinced that if he can fix Locke he will be at peace.  Not being able to bury his father. 
  • And the the next sideways scene is the big reveal of who David Shephard's mother is.  Drumroll......it's Juliet!  Good call everyone who said this from the beginning.  By the time we got to this episode I was torn between Juliet and Sarah, but Juliet definitely made sense for the way this was all going.  Of course, later on we will find out that the very existence of David Shephard is questionable.  Not questionable actually, his whole meaning for existence in this sideways land is to get Jack to deal with this father issues.  But, we'll get to that all! 

  • Jack and Juliet seemed to have ended on pretty good terms because they are all smiles when they talk to each other.  Juliet even jokes about meeting this Claire that Jack has managed to keep secret during their marriage.  Of course, we know Jack had no idea about his sister's existence.  David ends up bringing Claire as his "date" to the big show. 
  • Of course, on Juliet's way out she runs into Sawyer but they don't recognize each other this time around!
  • Later on we revisit Jack after surgery and it appears that he has accomplished what he set out to do with Mr. Locke!  A nurse points out that Jack's neck is bleeding again.   This time though, it immediately follows us seeing the scene where Jack's neck gets stabbed by Flocke in the Island timeline.  The clues were all there, we just needed to hear it for ourselves at the end! 
  • Then John Locke begins to wake up even though he shouldn't have so quickly.  Locke, then tells Jack what Juliet told Sawyer in the Island timeline right before she died.  "It worked"  Of course, Locke is referring to his legs but he is about to realize a whole lot more!  Jack tells Locke he needs to be patient as the recovery will take awhile.  But Locke is convinced that it worked.  He can feel his legs.  We then see John wiggle his toe!  And this sends a rush of memories back to John Locke starting with the plane crash when he realized he had regained sensation to his legs again!   LOCKE IS BACK!!!   Locke asks if Jack saw any of it.  Jack did not see anything.  Locke asks if Jack remembers and he starts seeing some things including the shot of looking down the hatch for the first time.   But Jack, in denial of what is going on, runs away.   Locke is ready to GO now.  Jack is trying to calm him down, but Locke is determined to leave to wherever he's supposed to go.  





  • Jack says that they're not going anywhere and he needs to go see his son.   Locke then tells Jack that he doesn't have a son.   Locke tells Jack that he hopes someone opens his eyes as Jack just did for him.   Jack runs off to the concert.
  • Meanwhile, Sawyer checks in on an enlightened Sun and Jin that just couldn't help but smile at "detective" Ford.   They tell Sawyer that they don't have to go on a hunt for Sayid.  They are safe and they'll see Sawyer there.   Where?  We're getting there! 
  • Sawyer heads down the hallway and bumps into Jack.  They don't recognize each other.  Sawyer just wants some grub.  Jack sends him to the vending machine where he proceeds to pick out an Apollo bar and it gets stuck!  Juliet came back from the concert because she was called there for something.  She happens to run in on Sawyer!  She tells him to unplug the vending machine and that usually lets the candy bar out.  Lots of great flirtation between the 2 but then when the lights go out and she gets the candy bar.  It's fireworks for those 2.  THEY REMEMBER!!   (note that she said "it worked" again!).   Juliet says "We should get coffee sometime" and Sawyer says the machine ate his dollar.  She says the line we've been waiting for.  "We'll go dutch!"  And they hug and remember some more and they remember Juliet dying and man, if people hate the mushy part of LOST, this episode was not for them!   Whew, I'm trying to get this recap done, but I'm all in tears just watching it again and snagging pictures!   And as they're crying and remembering and then Juliet asks Sawyer to kiss him and just like his last kiss to her before she died he says "You got it Blondie!"   

  • Whew rough stuff.  You still with me?  This is going to take years to read I know! 

The Concert
We finally arrive at the concert and everyone who wasn't anywhere else (Hospital, Bar) are here!  Lots of things going on here and of course David, Claire, Desmond and Kate all end up getting seated at table 23! (nice, one of the numbers made an appearance in the finale!)   Meanwhile Charlie is passed out on the couch.

  • It ends up being Charlotte that wakes Charlie up.  Why?  Because he has a note on him that says "Bass Player, Wake me up for show."  Good times!  
  • And then Charlotte and Daniel Faraday (Widmore) have their one scene where they see each other and somewhat recognize each other.  Actually, Daniel already has realized that something is off with this Sideways land.   Daniel is kind of showing off that he's playing in the band with Driveshaft.  But, as we learn later, it is not time for them to be enlightened.   Desmond tells Eloise Hawking that he is not going to take Daniel from her.  Well actually he said he wasn't going to take her son "with him".  So whatever that means, I guess when it was Daniel's time to leave he would leave!  But for now only certain people are to be enlightened and "leave".  


  • When we get to table 23, Kate and Claire immediately recognize each other from earlier in the season.   And then Pierre Chang starts the band off and lots of stuff starts happening.  Charlie recognizes Claire, Claire sorta recognizes Charlie.   Claire goes into labor!  And then she runs off behind stage.  Kate follows!  I think we all saw where this was going too and started to discuss the possibility last week! 





  • Sure enough, we get a scene where Kate delivers Claire's baby just like she did in the Island timeline.  And we get it at this point.  It wakes them both up!   It was highly emotional, but nothing compared to when Charlie arrives with blankets and Kate tells him to go up to Claire.  And then they remember everything.  EVEN THE PEANUT BUTTER PEOPLE!!!!  Ohh it was glorious!   Seriously, never have so many tears fallen in a single episode of TV!  



  • Desmond then asks Kate if she understands.  And she certainly does, but there is one more task left for her! 
  • Later on Jack finally arrives to the concert and we finally have the meeting of Jack and Kate in Sideways land.  Well, the OFFICIAL meeting, since the first time was just a bump on the plane that Kate quickly reminded Jack of.  Kate says this is NOT how Jack knows her though.  She goes up to him and puts her hand on his face.  
  • He starts to see the Island again and all of his experiences with Kate.   She tells him how much she has missed him.  At this point in the episode, we know that they had said goodbye on the Island, so it's important to note that this is the first time they are really seeing each other since then.  And we don't know how long it has been for Kate.  We're getting there! 

  • Jack doesn't understand what is happening to him, but Kate is going to bring him to a place where it all will be revealed.  



The Church
We return to the church where Christian's coffin was taken.  And John Locke is getting out of a cab.  Who is there to great him but an enlightened Benjamin Linus, with his hair and attire back to normal Island Ben stylings!

  • We have some amazing closure with Ben's character when he apologizes to John Locke for killing him.  He was jealous because Locke was special.  
  • John does forgive him for what Ben did.  And Ben says that means a lot to him.  But for some reason Ben decides not to join everyone in the church.  One might suggest that he needs to repent for some of the things he did in his Island life, so he feels he needs to stay there longer.  Maybe he wants to have a love life with Danielle Rousseau for a little bit before leaving.  I'm going to guess the former though, especially when we find out what is going on.
  • Ben then tells John that he doesn't need to be in that chair anymore.  And sure enough, John stands up and heads on into the church! 
  • When Locke goes in, Hurley comes out to talk to Ben.  He tries to tell Ben to come inside.  Ben says he is not coming.  At this point Hurley says that Ben was a great #2.  And Ben called Hurley a great #1.  If there was any doubt of WHEN this Sideways was taking place, that resolves it again right there.  This happened AFTER Ben and Hurley had served their time protecting the Island.  Of course, TIME doesn't really play a role here.  I'll say more in a few lines! 

  • Jack and Kate arrive to the church.  And Jack recognizes this as the place where he was supposed to have his father's funeral.  Kate says that he still is going to do that.   She instructs Jack to go in around back and that everyone will be waiting for him when he's ready (to leave).  



Revelation

Back on the Island

Jack wakes up in the same place that Jacob found the Man in Black's lifeless body.  Jack is still alive though for the time being.  He is a little shaky just like when he was knocked unconscious by Flocke.   He is still bleeding to death from the stab wound that Flocke gave him.


In Sideways at the Church

Jack heads inside and he sees his father's coffin.   Mirroring both the season 1 scene where Jack opens his father's coffin to find it empty as well as when he opened Locke's coffin at the end of season 4, Jack approaches this coffin.  He touches coffin and begins to remember.

  • We see scenes from seasons 1-6 of LOST.  Touching moments between him and all of the castaways, most notably Kate.  But I did see the scene where Sawyer told Jack about meeting his father in Sydney.  (always loved that scene!) 
  • Jack realizes what is going on and when he lifts open the coffin it is empty once again!  But before we have time to dwell on it we hear a familiar voice call out to Jack and we know that the scene we've been waiting for forever finally is happening.  

  • It's CHRISTIAN!  Jack cannot believe his eyes.  How can Christian be here, he died!  A fact that Christian indeed confirms.  So how is he here?  Christian challenges Jack to ask how is JACK here. 

  • And there it is folks, right before our eyes.  Some of us may have even theorized on it briefly at times.  But Jack is there because he died!  They all died....EVENTUALLY.  The Flash Sideways is revealed to be a place where all of the LOSTIES could meet before moving on.   Yes, some will call it a Purgatory, and with Ben staying behind to do some serious penance, maybe that's right.  But this should no way be confused with the ISLAND events that happened from seasons 1-6.  THAT WAS REAL!  Christian said so himself.  Everything they experienced is real.  And this Sideways is REAL as well.  They all had to find each other and resolve some of their issues and then they were able to move on to whatever is next.  What is next?  Well, as I have stated for many seasons, I never thought that this show would prove or disprove the existence of Heaven or Hell.  And it stayed true to that.  It left it ambiguous for all faiths to be applied.  But they did prove the existence of some kind of afterlife.  But, honestly, they had done that right from the start too.  We have been seeing ghosts on this show from day 1.  And I even started to speculate (but then got scared of being laughed at and backed away from it) what if the Sideways Land was the home of where all of these Ghosts that have visited Hurley and other people come from?  They seem to be all knowing.  Charlie made comments to Hurley like "I am dead, but I'm also here."  Christian visited Jack off of the Island where Smokey couldn't get to.  Christian visited Michael and told him he could go now (of course that may have been the Island or Smokey but I'm not too worried about it).    Ana Lucia told Hurley that "Libby says hey"
  • Another important distinction that Christian brings up is that TIME is of no importance here.  Everyone lived their lives.  Some died earlier, some died later.  But all of this awakening is happening now.   So Hurley may have lived for thousands of years as the Island's protector.   Kate may have went on to live a long life.  But they all ended up in this sideways land together because the Island time of their life was the most important thing that they all went through and they went through it together.   And now they'll move on together.   So maybe Desmond had a near death experience and that's how he saw the Sideways land?  Maybe when he turned that hatch key his life really DID "FLASH before his eyes".   It all really seems to tie together. 
  • I know people do not like this ending, but I think they have had it in mind for quite some time.  And, even if people think that they don't want to rewatch the show now, I most certainly do.  I definitely want to rewatch season 6 to try and pick up on some clues IMMEDIATELY!  
  • But how fitting is it that we get to see the definitive END of all of these characters?   Sure, there's lots of time in between that could be filled in if they really wanted to.  But it has been stated that the time they spent together was the most important.   And they Lived Together and most certainly will not go through DEATH, alone (thanks commenter Penner for that brilliant tidbit!) 
  • And the icing on the cake of this scene is the reconciliation between Father and Son right before Christian "shepherds" the LOSTIES into their next plane of existence.  And what an emotional scene it was watching all of these former LOSTIES in one room, get reacquainted?   We see everyone paired up with their true loves as well.  Sayid/Shannon, Desmond/Penny, Charlie/Claire, Hurley/Libby, Jin/Sun, Rose/Bernard.  Then we have Locke there with everyone.  We have Boone there.  Aaron is there.  And of course Kate and Jack!  

  • Everyone takes a seat to prepare to move on.  Christian opens the doors and a bright white light enters the room.   And the rest is up to speculation on where they went next! 



On the Island
We see Jack walking through the bamboo forest, where his journey began.  He falls to the ground in what we should assume is where he originally woke up.  Just like in the beginning, Vincent comes running out of the jungle but this time he takes a seat next to Jack.   Jack sees the Ajira plane flying overhead and he realizes his friends made it safely off the Island to live for another day and possibly many more years.  His job is done.  He did what he was supposed to do.  He saved his friends, he saved the world.  And now he can die in peace and meet up with his friends someday in the afterlife.  Just like we opened up on Jack's eye in the beginning, we now watch it close as he passes on to whatever is next.


BOOM LOST!!!!

WOW!!!! Just WOW!  Just watching it all again as I wrote this epic finale recap, it all just hit me again how truly great it was.  And how truly "SPECIAL" this show was from day 1 to this very day and quite possibly for years to come.  A perfect show?  Not by a long shot.  But you couldn't ask me to give it a more perfect send off.  It was truly beautiful.   Everyone is free to draw your own conclusions!  But I have no regrets in writing about this show for the past 5 years.  I wish I could do it for 5 more!  Yes, there are mysteries that still need answering.  But in the large scheme of things, I say they are not as important as what they accomplished.   That doesn't mean I won't begin to nitpick them after time passes and I'm ready to start doing so! 

So, let that be my first statement in saying that while the recapping is done, our work at this blog is far from finished!  There will be more posts everyone!  Not as frequent, no.  And I may need a little break after 18 straight weeks of writing them.  But I fully intend to write more!  There are 20 minutes of extra storylines that were filmed this year and will be included on the Season 6 Blu-Ray and DVD!  All with the intent on answering big fan questions!  You can be sure I'll take a stab at them in a blog.  The LOST Encyclopedia comes out the same date as the DVDs.  8/24.  I'll be there to discuss that as well.    We have formed a great community here and there is no sense in letting it slip away!  I will pursue other blogging efforts in the future so I urge you all to keep in touch to see what I might do next.   Definitely follow me on Twitter too!   I will keep people posted there on my next ventures.  

One final note of thanks to everyone who helped make this blog successful.  To all of my friends, family and co-workers who worked so diligently to make people aware of this blog.  THANK YOU SO MUCH!   I am forever in your debt.  To everyone that found this blog out of my shameless self-promotion, thanks for sticking around and spreading the word as well!   To my incredibly patient wife, thank you so much for putting up with me over the past 5 years as I decided to channel my LOST obsession into this blog that only progressively got more complex and busy over the years.  I promise to take you on that honeymoon now! (Just kidding, that's not why we didn't go yet! but it was still funny!)   And thanks for still marrying me last year even though you knew that this February to May period of your life was going to be truly hell!  :-)   Thank you everyone for all of your kind words over the years and for your many insightful comments.  This blog wouldn't have been half as fun without being able to go on the journey with each and every one of you.  And thank you last but not least, for your patience with me getting up this final recap.  It has been a very emotional experience for me but I am finally ready to say goodbye to LOST recapping.  (I think)

As I mentioned, please keep in touch as there will be more to come.  If you are done for good, I do not blame you.  I hope you enjoyed my ramblings as always and I'll see you in another life bruthas!!!   NAMASTE! 


Ending Credits
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Thanks to Apple, my iMac and TiVo Transfer for the ability to capture the wonderful Screen Captures. And by default thanks to ABC too for allowing me to post pictures on the blog! 















717 comments:

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Glenn R. said...

Carlton was cornered into a short interview a few days ago:

http://www.craveonline.com/entertainment/tv/article/lost-carlton-cuse-leaves-the-island-106067

Glenn R. said...

btw, great link, AUStarwars. My thoughts exactly! Well, many of them anyways. ;-)

Mike V. said...

I meant to comment on this awhile ago but that link AUStarWars posted is OLD! lol I think we discussed it like 400 comments ago! Surely you guys could have looked it up! LOL (kidding obviously!) Yeah, they bring up some good points....but I still think they answered a lot. And I'm hoping for a few more things on the DVD. But I've made my peace with the show.

@Florin - Yeah I remember our discussions...I also remember Darlton saying that we would get more on the elements in the final episodes. I guess they were talking about the crazy rain storm that hit and MIB referring to the weather "Gonna be a bad one" before it hit (in the finale).....yeah maybe it was related to MIB... So yeah...maybe he was involved in raging waters that brought the Black Rock to the Island. I think we'll have an audio commentary on Ab Aeterno on the DVD...maybe Darlton will discuss stuff there. Doubtful...and I'm sure Nestor will be on the commentary as well. lol

@Glenn - Thanks for posting that link...good stuff. I actually saw a video of the same interview yesterday and forgot to post it. Adam Horowitz was standing right next to Carlton during the interview and he interjected a few things as well. But he was mostly talking about Tron Legacy....I had no idea that Eddie and Adam wrote the script for that. I might have to check it out! Of course...I've never seen the original lol

Mike V. said...

WOW, so LOST got some serious EMMY Love today scoring 13 Nominations! Here's just a few of them:

Best Drama: LOST
Best Lead Actor: Matthew Fox!!!
Best Supporting Actor: Terry O'Quinn, Michael Emerson
Best Guest Actress: Elizabeth Mitchell in The End
Best Score: Michael Giacchino - for The End
Best Art Direction (or something like that): Ab Aeterno
Best Script: The End, Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse

So excited for Matthew Fox getting a nomination. So well deserved. I was starting to doubt that LOST would even get nominated for Best Drama after all of the mixed responses that this season received. But, I was pleasantly surprised to see Emmy honor the groundbreaking show for its 6 year amazing run.

Sure, it has some tough competition with Dexter, Mad Men, Good Wife (haven't watched), True Blood (watch it, love it but really????), and Breaking Bad (still need to watch this!) But just to get so many nominations is fantastic. For it to win against such strong seasons of these other shows...it would be awesome!

On a conference call and typing this so if I think of anything else I'll write more but just wanted to share my thoughts and excitement! lol

Mike V. said...

Hey guys, for anyone still reading and who were curious on my run through BSG, just wanted to let you know that I finally finished! I watched the extended cut of Daybreak (parts 1-3) and it was fantastic!

Of course, with the final couple of minutes I was left with a bit of a "HUH???" but I think I have let it sink in a bit now and am content with the spiritual nature of the ending.....very much like LOST! lol I'm sure if I watched the show week to week like most people, I would have let these themes and ideas sink in a bit more like I did with LOST.

So crazy how we always lean towards wanting a scientific explanation to everything on these types of shows, and the producers decide to go in a different direction lol Maybe sometimes it's the only way to answer stuff, or maybe they're all just very spiritual people! But there is no doubt that the GODS/one True God played a large part throughout the BSG series, so they can't really be faulted in going that direction.

Definitely didn't get as emotional as I did in the LOST finale, but the Return of the King ending to BSG definitely had its almost tear jerking moments. I don't know if any readers here have yet to watch BSG so I don't want to say too much. And yes, I refer to Return of the King because we all know that that crazy movie seemed like it was going to end many times and it just kept going. Maybe part of it was because I was watching the extended cut. I enjoyed all of it though. the more time I could spend with the characters, the better!

Anyway, just wanted to let you all know that I finished....I wish there were more episodes! (Yes, I know about the Plan lol) I'm not quite ready to watch it all again like I always am with LOST ...so I guess I'll have to move on to something else. I believe Breaking Bad or The Wire is up next. Have to see what the wife wants to watch since she let me fly solo with BSG lol

Mike V. said...

Didn't realize Darlton got together for an interview on nomination day! Nothing new revealed plot-wise but they do discuss their excitement over nominations. Thanks Glenn for the link!

E! Interview with Darlton

Floreen said...

ngel@Mike V - Yeah we're reading.

Floreen said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Floreen said...

@Mike V - it is interesting that J.J. Abrams hired Michael Giacchino to write the musical scores for Alias before Lost where our Grunberg, Terry O'Quinn were featured as well.

There are references to such numbers like 47 and even 108 that were in place. Agent Sydney Bristow had 108 minutes to complete a mission and a crucial server was numbered 47.

It is a world of differences in between the musical styles, but it shows that J.J. knew what Giacchino can do with a musical score.

Mike V. said...

Yep, very true Florin. Giacchino is used for all J.J. Abrams TV shows and Movies. Of course Giacchino has branched out to do other things as well, hence winning the Oscar for UP.

I did always want to get into Alias, but that bridge may have passed. If I ever get around to it, maybe I'll go back and watch!

I have moved on to Breaking Bad now and it's top notch entertainment! BTW...there is a new post up on this blog in case you wanted to check it out. Nothing too exciting, just a new area for new comments while we await the season 6 DVD/Blu-Ray and LOST Encyclopedia!

Floreen said...

Sorry Mike, but with the discovery of dvd, that bridge is never too late to cross, especially with a lot of stuff blowing up ;-) Time to watch all those shows will be an issue I can agree with.

Mike V. said...

Yeah florin that's what I meant! Just time to watch it. There are so many other shows I'm trying to watch that alias is on the back burner! Lol

Floreen said...

@Mike V - I do forget that I am single and that affords me more spare time than you have.

Mike V. said...

Oh yeah..if I was single I would have watched alias ages ago! every tv show is a joint discussion now! Lol (not that I'm complaining! :-))

Floreen said...

@ Mike V - I have finally remembered somethings.
First, Mr Paik and Pierre Chang appeared in Alias, so Grunberg is not the only one who have been brought to Lost by J.J. Abrams.
Second, J.J.'s signature can be seen in Lost not only by the numbers he uses, but also by the fact that he does answer the clues and mysteries at hand just like he did in Alias.
I think that a fall out must've occured in between and the rest of producers, fall out which has plagued the show in my opinion. I think that the finale and the course taken has been a reverse to J.J.'s approach. The two producers must've realized that they have to answer the questions and give a solution to the mysteries in Lost. J.J. did won the day I guess.
Michael Emerson appeared in a Law and Order just like Sayid did.

Mike V. said...

Florin,

I don't think there was any question that Damon and Carlton knew they had to answer questions. But, I think what they considered questions vs. what the rabid fanbase obsessed over were 2 different things. That doesn't mean to say I don't think Darlton copped out on a few things, because I think some of the answers they have provided on and/or off the show were kind of insufficient. But, I think in the end, I didn't watch for the mysteries primarily...I watched for good TV and they delivered big time!

As I recall, many people weren't thrilled with how JJ ended Alias either, so it's not like he has a perfect track record or anything!

Good call on all of the people that were on Alias. BTW...if you ever are watching a show and think "where do I know this guy from?" and you look them up on IMDB? 9 times out of 10 they have been on at least one episode of one of the Law and Orders lol It's like a 6 degrees of Kevin Bacon thing for TV!

One week until the season 6 and complete series release! (BTW anyone still just reading this post...I do have another post up while we've been waiting for the DVD/Blu-Ray sets)

Floreen said...

@ Mike V - Well, I don't know about others, but I am still around and reading.

As with J.J. you're right he's not perfect. He's got his share of cancellations. I think that his problem is more in line that he tries to do more than one project at the time, delegates a lot to other producers, directors, etc., and that's where there's more than one general in charge and too many hands in the cookie jar.

I did see reformulated pilot things throughout and when the recreation of the SD-6 in the final season occured, that told me ahead of time that the show is coming to an end. It did had a satisfying end though. Questions were answered and nothing was left out. The outrageous fans who didn't like it, were more in line with the abrupt end. Alias just run out of creative ideas and J.J. made the judgement call to end it while still in good glory. After all, that allowed Lost to come in as a replacement.

IMDB is a valuable source and yes certain shows did included many appeareances of many of our faves, which I find it a good thing.

Miles Balzard said...

Well, after three long weeks I've finally seen the series finale of the most creative TV show I've ever seen and I'm ready to say….WOW! I finished the show last night, and then just sat back for a few minutes and contemplated the closure the finale had given me. It's hard to summarize my feelings, but I believe Lost put together a very solid, wildly entertaining and satisfying finale.

Eventually, wanting to experience "The End" like a typical fan, I started wading through the early blog comments…and then the recap blog…and all its comments…and all that took quite a while.

Having read the recap and a lot of the comments, Mike, I don't have any choice but to say that I agree with 99 percent of everything you wrote about the finale. I don't know if it's because I binge-watched the show and have a fresher understanding of its essence, or if it's because we're like-minded souls, but there was scarcely a single detail in your recap that I disagreed with. Perhaps I agree with you so much because I've been reading your blog all along the way, but honestly I think I would've felt this way if I hadn't ever read your blog until the finale recap.

Yes, everything that happened on the Island was real. And that meant if the light at the heart of the Island went out, the entire planet might be doomed to destruction. So after Desmond uncorked the heart of the Island and turned off the light (which triggered the MiB's mortality and Jack's ability to kill him), Jack needed to turn the light back on to save the Island. And he did, but he died from the effort. But at least Hurley and Ben stayed behind and served as the Island's dynamic duo of protection for many years.

The sideways timeline was a "waiting place" for all the characters to meet each other after they died, but it had no fixed time in the real world and, in fact, was literally timeless. As you wrote in a comment, Mike, it was a "collective waiting room" where all the characters "went back to where they were when they were together" after each one died in the future. None of the characters had to wait for anyone to die in the future because the waiting room was not anchored to any time frame in the living world.

So the passengers on the Ajira plane that left the Island in 2007 survived in the real world for many happy years before they finally croaked and were reunited with Jack in the timeless waiting place. Kate telling Jack, "I missed you so much!" as if she hadn't seen him in years was one of many obvious signs of this fact. Hurley and Ben's exchange outside the church was another. Even though some had grown very old before they died, in the waiting room they were all the same age as when they were all together, which was the most important time of their lives.

When Jack died in 2007 (or possibly as soon as he turned the light back on), he joined the sideways timeline where he'd already been having a great life for quite a while, including having a son with Juliet. My Rebirth Theory and Rewrite Theory were both wrong in some ways, but one thing I think they were right about: Jack didn't have to relive any of his early life in the sideways timeline; those events had already happened and Jack came back to the point in sideways life when Flight 815 would've landed in L.A. in 2004. All that was left for Jack to do was find a path (or follow the path that was created for him) that enabled him to wake up and let go.

With Kate's touch and his father's coffin, Jack was finally ready to become enlightened and join his friends in the church. Everyone has a beautiful reunion before Christian flips open the doors to the bright white light that has symbolized every great shift in time or place on the Island. But this was the final shift, allowing everyone to let go of their mortal life and move on. Jack closes his eye on the Island. Cue credits.

Miles Balzard said...

As I suspected, I'll need another post to conclude my thoughts about Lost. Would you expect anything less? HAHA.

Well, so much for my recap of the series! I really loved the finale and thank goodness I was always into the characters on the show first and foremost, so I didn't feel the need to bitch about the unanswered questions about the Island mythology!

The last ten minutes: Like many others, I thought the last ten minutes invoked a little too much formal religion, even though faith had been a consistent theme throughout the series. I get that they meant to include all the world's religions during the final scenes in the church, but it still struck me as a bit too conventional considering the show's consistent embrace of Paganism and a reality filled with crazy science, supernatural apparitions, and time travel.

I don't necessarily believe in Heaven, at least as it's defined in Judeo-Christian religion. But I do believe in the continuum of life and that the entire history of man is like one very, very long chain of existence. We each provide a single link in that chain, and that link is influenced by the links that came before it and influences the links that come after it. Looking at it from that perspective, I really don't fear my own death as I do believe in some sort of continuity between life and death, whether it's called an afterlife or whatever.

Bottom line, Lost fulfilled my hopes that it would end on an optimistic note, despite the realization that our last scene with our favorite characters took place after they were all dead. For them, like for me, death is really only a new beginning.

Sideways Timeline: I was disappointed that the sideways world couldn't somehow be a real-life existence, but it sure was a very nice waiting place. As Christian noted, the characters had created a place (led by who? Desmond? Christian? Hurley?) where they could reunite with each other after death and collectively let go and move on. It's actually a lovely idea and I like how the show resolved this mysterious timeline.

Jack and Kate / Sawyer and Juliet So Jack and Kate did wind up being the ultimate destiny love couple, making all the Jaters happy when they ended up arm in arm. But Sawyer's reunion with Juliet was the most touching reunion of the finale, finishing just ahead of Charlie's reunion with Claire. I was gasping with tears in my eyes as Sawyer and Juliet remembered their time on the Island. I actually had to move Sawyer and Juliet ahead of Desmond and Penny in my favorite love stories list! Sorry!

Other characters: Ben didn't really do anything heroic like I thought he would! But he's still awesome! The reunion of Sayid and Shannon was more powerful than I might've expected it to be, but I still think his years of lost love for Nadia outweigh the few weeks he spent with Shannon. I was thrilled the way Jin and Sun become enlightened and suddenly understood that everything would end in the best possible way! It was wonderful to see how happy Richard was that he was finally aging! He finally wanted to live!

Jack The Hero Ultimately, this was Jack's story. And I sympathize with some people who were disappointed with that, but how could the ending not be from Jack's perspective? The transformations in Jack's identity from beginning to end was the essence of Lost. His growth was mirrored in virtually all of the other characters as well, but Jack, as the hero and the Island's savior, had to be the focal point.

The last scene of Jack dying: Wow, I thought that was the perfect way to end it. Good call, Mike! It was pretty awesome that Jack's last vision was the Ajira plane flying overhead, letting him know that Kate, Sawyer, Richard, Miles, Claire and Frank had escaped the Island. It was a beautiful final scene, no matter what anyone thought of the scenes in the church.

Miles Balzard said...

One last initial thought: It was nice to watch all six seasons without a single commercial interruption! My Netflix experience was probably like rewatching the show on DVD or Blu-Ray for other people. It was like watching one 100-hour long movie and no doubt it's the best way to enjoy the show.

Mike V. said...

Miles, I couldn't have summed up the finale any better than you just did! Obviously, I did sum it up but in 10,000 words! lol (probably longer than the actual episode was)

I guess we are pretty like-minded in how we viewed the show. It was definitely fun to watch you experience it for the first time! As for the heavy handed religious tones...yeah I guess I can see that. Like you said, they did embrace ALL religions. I had maintained that this show would not try to prove the existence of God or gods or whatever. And they did that. There was some kind of afterlife....and there were god-like beings on the island. But, they never said WHAT exactly those people were.

As for the white light...I like that you observed that light similar to me. It wasn't "moving on into the bright white light of heaven"...but I thought it was the "light" from the island... The source of life, death and rebirth. To me that was stating they were becoming ONE with the source so to speak.

I'll wait until you see the epilogue to comment on theories on who created the sideways world. I mean..I just assumed they created it through their actions and life...not like they physically got out hammers and nails and built it! lol (metaphor obviously!) But...there were interesting things going on on that island..and Hurley could speak to the dead, so who knows what they were able to figure out.

One thing that I pointed out in this recap and always pointed out...the ghosts that visited Hurley and other people....Like Charlie. He seemed to be fully knowing of what happened and what was going on. That made me think that "THAT" instance of Charlie was "AFTER" he moved on in that final scene. Like he came back to Hurley in his point of need to tell him something about his journey. And we know that Michael was stuck ON the island because of what he did...so he was unable to move on. (at least at the point that the finale ended)

So there were still lots of discussion to be had with how it ended and I didn't feel it was a cop out at all. It was a character journey and they rewarded viewers with closure for those character arcs. And there were many more answers than people gave the show /writers credit for.

There's definitely plenty more to say, but that's all I have at this moment. Definitely read the rest of the posts and come over to the TV Addicts blog and join the discussions there! (There are also those posts where we all discussed our rewatch of LOST if you're so inclined)

Thanks for posting your journey Miles! It's been fun to follow along!

Miles Balzard said...

Mike, I like your take on the white light not being literally the white light of heaven, but more like the light from the Island; the source of life, death and rebirth. Indeed, it felt like everyone was becoming "one" with the source and could finally rejoice in being together in the right place instead of fearing for their mortal lives on the Island. It really was a blissful way to let go.

I agree that ghosts like Charlie seemed to be fully aware of what had happened and that the waiting room was already in place, waiting (yet not counting time) for Hurley and everyone else to arrive so they could begin their final journey together. As timeless as the waiting room was, Charlie had already taken the next step of moving on and wanted Hurley to know he just needed to finish up the business at hand before joining Charlie in the waiting room, which would always be open and would wait for Hurley to arrive as long as necessary.

Anyway, I posted this reply on Lost Addicts Blog for the sake of potential future visitors and new Lost fans like me. Like you, I encourage anyone who enjoyed this blog to visit your new TV Addicts Blog and join in the fun over there!

Mike V. said...

That's for the advertisement Miles! I'll see you over there. And always happy to continue discussing LOST if you ever think of something new. And that can be on this site OR TV Addicts.

aly said...

OK Mike, sad day since I’ve now finished the series. And yeah, wow.

So first off despite not being 100% satisfied with some stuff that was going on and all, I have to say I’ve just let that all go because it doesn’t really matter. I thought the ending was pretty much perfect, the best way to wrap up everything. Having sidesways world literally be THE END, not just the end of the show, the end of the story in getting off the island… but the actual end, where they all met after the end of life… very satisfying.

Loved the Jack had a son to work out his father issues, loved that Ben & Eloise weren’t ready to move on yet and still had to resolve things concerning the fact they were both responsible for the deaths of their children (and therefore needing to spend more time in sidewaysland with their children & Ben with taking care of his dad), loved that Hurley & Ben were #1 & 2 and talked about the lives they lived a little… great, great, great all around. Loved the explanation of sideways world. Loved seeing Vincent & Rose & Bernard again. Loved that it explains the Japanese dude & his piano boy showing up in sideways land. Loved that Widmore was working it out with his family. And most of all (you probably knew this), LOVED that Shannon was indeed Sayid’s one true love! YES!!! That was the most satisfying thing for me! Nadia was just the idea for Sayid, this women that he thought was “too good” for him, she was his “good” side and his path to redemption and working out all the troubles he had and his battle with his personal light/dark sides. But SHANNON was his One True Love and the one he was meant to be with… god, I love that! I still hate that he married Nadia & pursued her after he got off the island but I don’t care, I can let that go since his One True Love Shannon had died and he & just trying to move on. I loved his story in sideways land.

I really enjoyed the episode with the folklore of Jacob/Smokey, I thought it answered all the questions I wanted. I loved the quip in the finale where MIB says “Come on, Jack, obvious choice?” haha. And I loved that Jack protected the island “for as long as he could” which wasn’t very long. The Jacob/MIB centric episode was perfect.

(cont...)

aly said...

OK, so here are a few weird quips I have, that I’ll let go of, but I still think it’s fun to talk about:
1. What the hell is RICHARD going to do once he lives OFF the island? Hahaha, the dude is hundreds of years old and starting to grey and the world is so different! I think it’s funny he wanted off so badly at the end. I loved that he survived though.
2. Bit of a Star Wars moment at the end. You know, the one I’m talking about where Darth Vader/Anakin Skywalker appears as a ghost next to Yoda & Obiwan to Luke. He appeared as a much younger version of himself and not what he looked like when he died. Same with sidewaysland characters. If some of them lived a full life, to be 80 years old presumably, then how come they all ended up back in their 20s/30s in sideways world? I had to laugh at that. Not really a complaint though, just something I found funny.

I wasn’t really emotionally moved or touched by the memories of the island flashbacks as much as I think I should have been, when they were happening, but I still thought it was a good way to show everything that happened all across the seasons. I only cried when Sun & Jin remembered because OH MY GOD I STILL have not recovered from the episode where they died!!! HOLY CRAP that was such a good, intense episode and I cried so hard. I am tearing up again right now just thinking about it.

All in all, I thought it wrapped up nicely. I thought the mysteries of the show were answered sufficiently, especially the big ones. I mean, to be honest, I don’t really love the idea of the island or the light or any of that lore, but it is what it is and I’m happy to leave it at that. The journey was fun enough. The answers aren’t as satisfying as the questions and the journey, which was great. So yes, the end was beautifully wrapped up and made me not even care about the answers that I wasn’t satisfied with anyway.

I am still kind of sad Jack died in the end but the way it closed was perfect. Good call, Mike. :)

Anyway thanks for replying & accompanying me on my journey through LOST, even though you’ve already done so a million times! How great it must’ve been having this blog during that time. Now, it’s on to the next show! I think I’ve decided on Suits or House of Cards, but we’ll see. I have that comment you saved to Miles on suggestions & I will slowly work my way through all.

Still looking forward to reading the comments about the finale & the discussion afterwards. You mentioned an answers DVD? I look forward to reading about that too.

Well, I don’t know what everyone was on about being disappointed about the show when it was over. I found the end immensely satisfying, albeit very very cheesy (I had to roll my eyes at times lol but I can’t hate on that because I loved the feel-goodness of it all)! Clever clever that it ended up being en epilogue after all, just not in the way we expected.

Mike V. said...

Aly - Welcome to the other side!! Congrats for finishing LOST, though I feel for you. Life hasn't been quite the same since I've seen everything the show had to offer. It's a little upsetting! But, the show gets better on rewatches, so there's that. lol I think I remember you commenting about Shannon a couple seasons back, so yeah at that time, I knew what was in store there and didn't spoil it for you! And FWIW, Sayid didn't necessarily "pursue" Nadia when he got off the island, she just happened to be there when he got off the plane. But they definitely left it openly vague all of season 6 who Sayid was talking a bout...both women died in his arms. And there were casting issues with getting Shannon back on the show. (hence why she wasn't on the plane at the beginning of season 6). But it was cool they could work Shannon back into it.

Glad you loved how they handled the finale and the "Across the Sea" episode which had a very divided crowd when it aired. Yeah Jack being the obvious choice was a pretty funny line. A lot of people did predict that Hurley would be the eventual protector because he said "I'm glad it wasn't me" the episode before the finale. Anyway, looking forward to reading your gripes...maybe I can address a few. But we all definitely had our own gripes about what wasn't covered or how things were covered. I do respect them for giving us their vision though.....and I let go a lot of my gripes because I understand that writing for television is a tricky complicated business that I don't know the half of. And what they put on screen for 6 seasons was nothing short of amazing! OKAY...but putting that aside...GRIPES/QUIPS TIME!

1.) Well Richard HAS been off the island before. He was one of Ben's recruiters off island. He got Juliet to come to the island. He also kept tabs on Locke through the years. So, he's up with technology and how the world works. He probably also has access to the funds of the others...and if not..he can borrow a diamond from Miles to get started. :-)

2.) Okay, you might be showing your age with when you first saw Star Wars!! lol Anakin originally appeared as the age he died in the original Return of the Jedi. Even the Special Edition. It wasn't until the DVD release (after Episode III was in the works) that they replaced him with young Anakin. But yes...the concept is similar, I guess. :-) lol But as for sideways...they returned to the place in their lives that was most meaningful to them...so I guess in theory they'd be the age they were at that time too. I'd compare it more to the Titanic ending than the Return of the Jedi ending. Rose died while sailing over the titanic remains at an old age and then we see her reunited with Jack at the same age as she was. (sorry for the spoiler if you hadn't seen Titanic, but who hasn't seen either of those movies?? lol)

Oh man...i was a bawling mess (clearly obvious from my recap) at each of the flashbacks in that finale. The whole thing brought our 6 year epic to a close and remembering those moments and how powerful they were with the amazing Giacchino score (fellow Holy Cross High School alum!! Go Lancers!!)...ooh it still gives me goosebumps thinking about it and I still cry when I watch! But..you have to remember how invested in this show I was over 6 years. I drove my wife crazy how much i ate breathed and slept thinking of it and blogging about it. And the number of times I rewatched it. So...when I was watching this culmination, it was an emotional experience for me!

Exactly...the journey was always going to be more exciting than any answers they could come up with. The fun was in the speculation of what it all meant not what it ACTUALLY all meant. Not everyone agrees with that, but I certainly do. Everyone had their own expectations and they couldn't satisfy them all. Their idea was pretty satisfying I thought.

Mike V. said...

Yeah...definitely sad about Jack, but I thought it was very fitting for his journey. Plus...they were all reunited at the same time as it was happening so it was a bittersweet moment.

You're totally welcome for replying. Love joining new viewers on their journey thought LOST. The real time experience of this blog was pretty intense! Definitely a fun time...but taxing when it got so popular. I felt the need to respond to everyone's comment...and that got a little overwhelming! But I enjoyed every minute of it! Did my wife enjoy that? Well you'd have to ask her. lol

Enjoy the new shows...I've never watched Suits and only have seen 5 minutes of House of Cards so far. Definitely come check us out on my new blog. We're talking about TV weekly and there might be a show we're discussing that you watch.

I think there's many reasons why people did not like the ending. Many didn't get it. During the end credits they ran plane wreckage footage instead of showing promos for another show or something. People took that to mean they were dead the WHOLE TIME through all 6 seasons. And then they started to say they predicted that in season 1 that the show was about purgatory. Where as only that Flash Sideways was "Similar but not really" purgatory. So then they started calling the writers liars for dismissing that the show was about purgatory....never read anything after that and just decided the show was awful. There were many people that wanted ALL of their questions answered and went into that final season with a checklist. I tried to set people's expectations (yours too) as much as I could to try and counter that but there were many people annoyed that answer after answer wasn't just flat out given to them. Many answers WERE provided, but you just have to do your research and read between the lines.

Many people hated that the show ended with them all going into the big white light. They didn't really consider all of the information around that all encompasing light....the source of life, death and rebirth (with electro-magnetic properties)....they became one with the source at the end. That in itself was an answer to all of the ghostly visions we were seeing in the later seasons. People just thought it was lazy writing and that the show was NOT always about the characters. There were mysteries that the writers couldn't figure out answers to so they made it about the characters. This is not my stance in the least...but you see that written by people a lot.

Hey, I respect people's opinions. I vehemently disagree with them...but as long as they don't say that they were dead the whole time, I respect their opinion.

There was an epilogue on the final season DVD that had some answers they couldn't get to in the show. In my recap there is now a youtube clip that I added. Don't expect much but it's an entertaining 12 minutes!

Thanks for sharing your journey on here and look forward to seeing you on the other blog!

Krista said...

Mike!! I'm still here! :)

I watched the finale a couple of nights ago and just watched it for the second time tonight (after watching the pilot again). Holy cow. I loved it. So so so much.

I agree with you that it was the perfect way for this show to go out. Anyone who thinks that they were all dead the whole time clearly has problems with reading comprehension. I cannot even believe people thought that.

As for not all of the mysteries and questions being answered - who cares? I'm totally satisfied with what they answered and what they left ambiguous. There's no way that a show like Lost could tie everything up into a neat bow (and I really didn't want them to!).

I thought that the whole sideways universe was brilliant. It really makes more sense on a second watch, once you understand what's going on. When all of the characters remember their lives, well, I was bawling. This show has always been about the characters for me - so I absolutely ate those scenes up.

I think it's really fitting that Jack was the last one to remember, even though he had small memories with Locke and then with Kate after the concert. This is perfectly in keeping with his character. He's stubborn. He's still a man of science even though he's taken a leap of faith. Of course he'd be the last to fully embrace it. And I love that it was Kate who took him to where he needed to be.

The island stuff was awesome. Man I was cheering while they were hiking across the island to meet Locke, and the camera sweeps upwards and Giacchino's score is swooping over everything. AMAZING. Oh and Jack and Locke's epic battle on the rocks? Come on! This finale truly had it all.

Anyway, I know I stopped commenting back in season 4, but that doesn't mean I stopped reading your posts. I just couldn't keep up with posting after each episode (but you should know that I was really satisfied with how the Oceanic 6 got off of the island).

I can't believe I watched the whole series in a month. Yikes. I'm sad it's over, but I had so much fun watching. Thanks again for this awesome blog!

Mike V. said...

Hi Krista! Good to hear that you finished the series! I will write more when I get a chance but I'm glad you enjoyed the ending. Welcome to the right side of the debate! lol j/k

Don't forget to check out the new man in charge epilogue. I have a recap and a link to YouTube on the homepage. I also wrote a 1 year anniversary of the end post where I revisited some questions we wanted to explore further. And of course we still have a fraction of our community over at www.tvaddictsblog.com that you're more than welcome to check out. We talk about all kinda of tv as well as currently recaps for game of thrones and walking dead. (I did fringe for the final 3 seasons)

Anyway thanks again for reading the blog and taking the time to comment. I'm glad you found it useful!

I'm on my phone so whenever I get to a computer I'll respond more directly to the details in your comment. :)

Mike V. said...

Okay, I'm back with a more detailed response! Once again, so glad you enjoyed the show, the blog and the finale! The crazy thing about people thinking they were dead the whole time is that people STILL think it to this day. Half the people you talk to that disliked the finale will start by saying they predicted it was purgatory from the beginning and stuff like that. They didn't get it!

Totally agree on the mysteries...at one point I thought I wanted everything answered and I'm sure Damon/Carlton and all the writers wanted to answer everything. But, it just didn't work for the show to do that. Plus, I'm pretty confident that most questions people throw at me I have a pretty good answer for them or at least an excuse why they didn't answer it! lol

Yeah...I was a fan of Sideways. Maybe it was overkill for the WHOLE season to be about that, but I thought it worked as a device to bring things full circle with the 1st season and eventually the entire series. And yes every time they remembered, I was drowning in a puddle of tears! (I'm man enough to say so!)

Yeah, it was great with Jack being the last to remember. It was a combination of Locke, Kate and his father's empty coffin that did it. It was good stuff! One of the things I wanted most out of the final season was some kind of resolution between Jack and his father. Little did I know it would be the final scene of dialogue in the series. ooh...that was an emotional scene!

Yeah, they pulled out all the stops for the finale in terms of visual effects/cinematography....And that fight was awesome! There's actually youtube clips where they gave Jack and Locke lightsabers and it's pretty awesome too! lol

Totally cool that you stopped commenting! And glad you enjoyed how the O6 got off the island. It's tough to come on here and comment after every episode when you know the next one is waiting for you. I'm impressed you did as much as you did.

You're totally welcome for the blog...and don't forget to check out the other stuff I mentioned in my last post!

Leta said...

In case you were wondering what happened to me, Mike, I'm back :) I did watch the finale last weekend. But I did not get to commenting because... after the initial viewing, I was really disappointed. I wanted to rewatch it and see if my opinion changes. I finally did today, and I‘m glad to say I enjoyed it much, much more the second time. It really was a great ending, even if some things were not exactly to my liking.

I went into the finale with a great mindset. I had my expectations high, but only because the writers of this show have never really disappointed me till then. I was sure there was nothing they could possibly do that I wouldn‘t like. Well, they managed to find that one thing. So the final conflict was a little anticlimactic; I envisioned it as something grander, but I can live with this. But the sideways turning out to be the afterlife? A major NO. I‘ve been pretty tolerant of ever more frequent religious and spiritual references on the show up till now, but this was just too much. I‘d have accepted it any other way: alternate timeline, past, future, whatever, just not this. I still loved the sideways story, just not the explanation. I wanted to delete the entire church sequence from my mind and to just go on enjoying the rest of it, but it kind of ruined the ending for me. I‘m still not happy with it after my second viewing, but I‘ve grown more accepting. I found that if I zone out a bit during Jack‘s talk with Christian („all of you created this place“ – eugh!), the rest of it is doesn‘t bug me that much.

That said, the earlier sideways scenes were amazing. I don‘t cry easily, but I did get teary eyed watching our beloved characters remember each other and their island lives (Jin and Sun! Charlie and Claire! SAWYER AND JULIET!!!) THAT was perfect. The ending scene with all of them meeting at the church was beautiful, too. I wasn’t able to really appreciate it the first time, but I loved it on the rewatch.

The island story – I’ve mentioned earlier that I expected it to be more dramatic. We never get this great battle they were promising us the past few seasons. In the end, it’s just Jack and MIB. It’s more intimate that way, but a bit of a let-down. I still enjoyed it on my initial viewing, and a lot more the second time. I loved the idea of going the round circle – all the nods to season 1 we’ve been seeing the entire season were employed with force in the finale. We go back to where it all started. I loved Hurley becoming the new protector and Ben – his second. After “Dr. Linus”, I’d have hated Ben to go out as a bad guy. I think you speculated that he might make some heroic sacrifice in the end, but I found this to be even better. He gets a second chance at running things on the island, a chance to learn from his mistakes and do it better this time. (He seemed to be doing a good job of it in the epilogue!) Under Hurley and Ben’s rule, and with no Smokey to ruin things, the island should have become a delightful place to be.

Some fun times – Hurley abducting Charlie, Miles DUCT-TAPING the plane (“I don’t believe in a lot of things, but I do believe in duct tape” – I’ve got to frame this and put it on my wall!).

And the very ending, with Jack falling down in the bamboo forest, Vincent coming to lie down next to him, the Ajira plane flying overhead, was perfect in every way imaginable. I think many of us speculated and hoped that the last thing we see on Lost would be Jack’s eye closing. This was great. I wouldn’t have wanted it to end in any other way.

To sum up all my ramblings, I did like the finale. Probably even love it after my second viewing. The “afterlife” still rubs me the wrong way, but everything else was great. I don’t care about answers. It’s a fitting end to a great series, and that’s all that matters.

Mike V. said...

Leta when you first mentioned the religious stuff bugging you I had a feeling this might not go over well. That's why I kept saying to keep an open mind. Lol I didn't want to spoil though. I have many comments but I'm on my tablet right now and too tough to type them all up. I'll have time tomorrow and koan to write a follow up that may make you look at the finale in a different light. (A little bit) In any case I'm glad you shared your journey on the blog and enjoyed the finale for the most part! I'll write more later! :)

Mike V. said...

Ok, I'm back! So here's my points supporting what was seen in the finale. Obviously, I enjoyed all the moments you enjoyed too and they packed an emotional punch especially with Giacchino's score on top of it.

The Island stuff - Yes they had often built up anticipation for battles on the show and the closest we got to something like that were a few gunfights in DHARMAVILLE. The problem with having epic scale battles is the ol' Television budget. LOST produced some pretty expensive episodes but there was no way they could've amassed a large scale battle to keep darkness of the world at bay. lol The sweeping finale shots from the helicopter always added to the epic-ness. And Jack vs. Locke I thought was a very fitting climactic fight. And of course, Kate killed smokey in the end.

And yes the final moments with Jack were absolutely perfect.

Now the SIDEWAYS. Naturally, I've had more time to think about this and process this in the scheme of the whole story. I forget what I actually said about it in the recap but I think my views have evolved over time. First of all....there was always a question to the GHOSTS that we had seen on the show. Where do they come from? Why do they seem all knowing? Mainly when in contact with Hurley, but there were possibly a couple other appearances. Basically, I've accepted that these ghosts that appeared were after they MOVED ON into the light to whatever was next. What was next? I'm getting there. They had already remembered their death and there in a place where TIME has no meaning. Hence them all showing up when they died even if it was many years after the people on the island died. Where else are there places where views on time can be altered? Ahhh yes...the island close to the electromagnetical source of life, death and rebirth. There just happened to be bright flashes of light every time they shifted too.

What did they get consumed by when Christian Shephard opened the doors of the church? A big bright white light.

What was their final mission? Save the island, fix the island, save the source of life, death and rebirth. Not sure if you noticed, but when Jack got the cave, the light was very dim. Over the years, people like DHARMA came to exploit the island's powers and steal its energies. Over time, the man in black/smokey was working his way to get off the island. We never were really told the repercussions of what would happen if he ever did succeed. But, it seems like the energy of this island was the glue that made the whole world stick together....and maybe realms BEYOND the living.

Mike V. said...

We know there were ghosts like Michael trapped on the island too....and from the epilogue we know Walt was supposedly going to help Michael (possibly move on?)....Maybe they were actually going to construct this sideways world....i don't know about that but people theorized that. I think it was a more of a subconscious thing that they all conceived a place where they would all be together again.

ANYWAY...I keep dancing around my points. SIDEWAYS wasn't really "THE AFTERLIFE"....it was a bridge from life to the next phase. I know this because of the 2 examples we have from the show. Desmond and Juliet (possibly Jack too). They were either in near death situations or dying. Sideways may occur in an instant before death but it seems like an eternity. Kind of like a life flashing before your eyes concept.

Juliet wanted to say to Sawyer "IT WORKED" on the island at the same time she picked up that candy bar and said it to Sawyer in Sideways. When we first saw it we were thinking she meant the bomb. She actually did say "we can go dutch" on the island as that was happening in sideways.

Desmond wasn't dead yet but he visited sideways. Same concept. I'd like to believe Jack was smiling at many things at the end. The plane getting away from the island...Kate being able to live a normal life. But still knowing he would be with her and the gang once again as he was experiencing all of that simultaneously.

And once that all powerful light consumed them in sideways? My feeling is they became ONE with the source. It's up to interpretation....sure some will think they went to heaven or Nirvana or whatever people believe. But in the terms of what the show has shown us, THS ISLAND was the source of life, death and rebirth. They were in close proximity to this all powerful source that controlled life which is why so many crazy things were happening (maybe even Sayid coming back). Becoming one with the source would let them appear to Hurley at important times on his journey....since time has no meaning to them.

And of course...the reason all of this was possible is because of what they accomplished (and mostly Jack accomplished) during their tenure on the island. If that light was distinguished....well we saw what was happening to the island. Maybe the whole world would've been sucked into nothingness.

Sure, it doesn't make perfect sense. There's a lot of gaps I had to fill in myself there. But, I kinda feel that's what they were going for. Yes, on the surface a very religious/spiritual/emotional ending. But, there are some fake scientific principals at play there too revolving around this powerful energy that fueled the island and much likely so much more.

Not sure if I got my points across there. But, hopefully it lets you look at all that stuff in a different "LIGHT" (pun intended?).

Bottom line, regardless of your feelings for the finale, it shouldn't take away from the awesome journey you had getting there. THE CONSTANT still l holds up. The whole show still holds up and is great on a rewatch.

Once again, I'm glad you took the time to comment along the way! Enjoy whatever you watch next!

Leta said...

Thanks for such a lengthy reply, Mike! And thanks for still wishing to go through this journey with newcomers :) I’m so glad I had this blog to help me sort things out throughout all of it. It wouldn’t have been half the fun it was without you and your recaps.

Your point about sideways being not an actual “afterlife”, but kind of near-death experience makes sense. I don’t know if that makes me feel better about it! Maybe a bit. And yeah, I too have connected the light in sideways with the light on the island. I think we were supposed to think it was the same. It’s like they never really leave the island, then. I might be okay with that :)

On hindsight, I think season 5 is still my favorite. It‘s funny, because most of my favorite episodes come from other seasons. But when you look at the whole thing, the themes, ideas and settings, it‘s a sure winner. Time travel and Dharmaville in the 70-ies, great stuff. Season 6, on the other hand, had some really great episodes and I liked how important the island quest suddenly became on the grand scale of things. But the spiritual undertones of it put me off a bit.

Don’t worry, my conflicting feelings about the finale (and the whole season 6) no way make me love the show less! I’ll sure be rewatching it at some point in the future.

I‘m now frantically going through the additional material from all six seasons. I‘ve ignored it initially for want of progressing with the story. After all that is exhausted, I think I‘ll catch up on Game of Thrones. I‘ve seen a couple of episodes but then decided to read the books first. However, I became too displeased with Martin‘s storytelling by the end of „Clash of Kings“ and quit. I‘m still interested in the story, though, so I think the show might be a better option for me.

Mike V. said...

No problem Leta! LOST is my all time favorite drama and will always be happy to discuss it. I appreciate the praise as always on the blog. :)

Sideways - you either love it, hate it or accept it lol I look at it as a nice way to say goodbye with some ties to the rest of the show. I loved it in hindsight. But I remember my gut reaction in that Jack/Christian conversation was like..."REALLY!?!?!?!" lol But then it all made sense to me shortly after and I resumed my crying.

I loved season 5. I'm with you. It's the most rewatchable from start to finish. Though that 2nd half of season 3 was pretty awesome too. I think it's a tie for me on those.

Glad to hear you still love the show. So many stick to the "i wasted 6 years of my life because i hated the finale" position. of course, you didn't hate the finale so there's that! :-) I think it helps to binge a show like LOST. People invest so much time and come up with solutions that if the writers don't top their own thoughts, it's a failure.

Game of Thrones is a great show! The books are fantastic too. It's a shame you stopped before A Storm of Swords. It's easily the best of the 5 books out! Just so you know, I recapped season 4 on my www.tvaddictsblog.com site...and we discussed the previous seasons too. It's my new obsession after LOST then Fringe ended. You should come check us out. Definitely a smaller group of people now than LOST at its height, but we love talking TV!

Peaceful Planet said...

Thank you for your work Mike in creating and faithfully maintaining this site. Here comes a long comment, it may even be a rant, so be prepared and thank you for the space to comment.

Watched the finale yesterday, have been working through the entire series day by day, for the first time. Truthfully, I find the ending saccharin, disappointing and disjointed, very much as an add-on. Trite!

Because there was such deep spirituality expressed at the end - a church filled with sacred objects and images of multiple faiths. Which seemed at odds with the violence fest, emotional and physical; that underscored the entire series, up to and including the finale.

I struggled with the violence inflicted by the Losties, Tailies, Others, Widmore
+ gang etc throughout. This was a far more violent media experience than I would usually choose for myself. Yet I was hooked and did follow through.

The experience of faith and spirituality was hinted at but patchy throughout: Eko, Rose were explicit. Locke and eventually Jack expressing a more philosophical than spiritual idea of faith.

The only 'true' personnages in this respect: Desmond, who was consistent throughout NB Cusick plays Christ in an excellent adaptation of John the Gospel. And oddly Ben, who appears to experience genuine catharsis. He is forgiven by Locke outside the Church in the final moments. But apparantly this is not enough? Whereas all the other miscreants get to pass into the light, without any sense of reflection or epiphany.

I had been expecting a worldly conclusion ie to do with Widmore, Mittelos? and Dharma Initiative. Side note - would have liked to have been shown more about the dharma behind the dharma initiative.

With the ending as is, and now having the purview of the entire series, if the script was handed to me, I would suggest a workover to develop the theme more strongly. In order for that ending to have any resonance or authenticity. Maybe the writers and editors have not the background in the themes of redemption, karma, forgiveness etc, which is why the moments of faith throughout felt like nail polish ontop of a bloodfest.

As is now, it feels like 'suddenly' arriving at a spiritual conclusion is a beautiful idea, but doesnt quite fit.

I'm sorry to be so critical, sorry because the drama was real for me, and I could have handled a more messy and complicated ending. Sorry that religion and spirituality were so crudely hoisted in at the last moment to save the day and make everything OK.

And, what do I watch now Lost is over?

Mike V. said...

Thanks for expressing your opinions on the blog Peaceful Planet! My response will be pretty lengthy too! At least your disappointment in the finale is clearly articulated and thought out. Not the usual "I can't believe they were dead the whole time" (untrue, and any fan that watched the entire series should get that) or "I have retroactively wasted 6 years watching this show! The Constant sucks now!" lol No one has said that, but that's basically what they're implying when they say the first part.

Having said that, obviously I disagree with your analysis! The show LOST was ALWAYS about redemption. It was the main theme throughout the series. The show was full of broken people who were in need of a clean slate and fixing. And they lived together working on these issues rather than dying alone.

The island was broken also, and we saw that over the years man was abusing it and seeking its power. In the end, DHARMA provided a great setting for some of the events our survivors went through but it wasn't central to the main story of these survivors seeking redemption. We know that Jacob and the Man in Black were pulling the strings for the visitors of the island over many many years. We can assume ancient Egyptians crossed paths with the island as well due to the hieroglyphics used in various places. We know this and we don't need to see it. It just flushes out the island as a living breathing character that has existed for a long long time.

I will agree that they may have dropped the ball with the Widmore stuff though. Yes, all I really thought we needed was Ben to get his revenge on Widmoe, but the season 6 arc didn't make much sense. I guess it did in that Jacob came to visit him and made him switch sides. And it was a means to get Desmond back to the island. But then who killed the Ajira 316ers? I guess we have to assume MIB.

Mike V. said...

Anyway, the Sideways realm. I look at it as a Coda on the series. It provided a means in the final season to do some mirroring on where these characters got their start and where they are now (I can't believe it was a coincidence that there was a mirror/reflection used in every character's flash sideways episode). It showed that even in different circumstances, these characters were destined to cross paths with each other. And, in the end it gave us a bittersweet sendoff that showed these characters remembering their time on the island as well as their deaths. Spiritual? Yes, and I'd argue that's always been part of the show (albeit, the Aaron Baptism episode in season 2 was probably the 2nd worst episode of the show next to Jack's Tattoos getting center stage). I think while they didn't focus on the science of everything in the final season, it was still present. They were consumed by a bright white light. We've been seeing a bright white light on the island as well....and there happened to be a light that was restored on the island. As I said, the island was broken, the light/source of life, death and rebirth was dim by man's desire for power over the years. Jack and crew took out the MIB, then Jack fixed the island by restoring the light. That electromagnetic power that makes the world tick. (as we can assume). I don't believe sideways was just a "this is what happens when you die" add-on. I think it was directly related to those actions of saving the island. I also don't think sideways was the AFTERLIFE. They clearly hadn't "moved on" to what was next yet. But, there were key moments in that final season that seemed to indicate that these events happened within seconds before death (maybe even less than that)...a whole "life flashes before your eyes" type moment. Juliet talking about going dutch with sawyer before death synced up in the finale....Desmond experiencing a near death experience and getting to visit. Jack smiling as the Ajira flight takes off but he is reunited with his friends before becoming "ONE WITH THE SOURCE". Yes, I think when they died they returned to the source of life, death and rebirth.

I think the ghosts that we encountered during the show (that mostly Hurley saw), were enlightened and moved on people who were omniscient about where things are and where they are going. They seem calm and very knowing of where things are going and they try to set Hurley on the right path. And of course, Christian Shephard kind of indicates how time doesn't play a role in that sideways realm. Perhaps it's the same after moving on. That's just my educated speculation though.

Mike V. said...

Redemption - Sayid is probably the biggest example of a character who should not have been in that church, right? Violent, killed many people. But, I think that's kind of the arc we were seeing for him in the final season. He talked about how much he hated himself and regretted his actions. He kind of died and came back (which is another thing that didn't add up with the show's "dead is dead" policy). But, in the end he did redeem himself by sacrificing himself to save the others to save the island. was that enough? I don't know. But, he still was hating himself in sideways too until Hurley gave him a talking to. Sayid's intentions were always noble and he always looked out for his friends.

Jack's redemption arc was a series long thing that showed him go from a man of science to a man of faith and stopping at very low points along the way before his rise. Sawyer, Kate, Jin, even Ben were all people who did some bad stuff but found some redemption in the end. Sawyer and Kate even earned a chance to live a new life after the island prior to reuniting with their friends in the next realm.

I'm just rambling now though. I respect your opinion, but it's totally not how i viewed the show or the ending at all. People were hell bent on answers to the nitty gritty, but they were just details flushing out this very complex world in the end. I loved the details. I obsessed over them. But, I would have had no interest in them if it wasn't for strongly flushed out characters in the end. So, I fully applaud the LOST team for focusing on them in the end. There was no way to tie up 6 years worth of crazy details and easter eggs and questions into a tidy bow that would've been satisfactory. It might be cliche' for them to say (which they did) life is messy with loose ends, but it's also true. Plus, the show left stuff ambiguous for it to live on in debates after it ended. And that's a good place for LOST's legacy to be.

What do you watch now? There's plenty of stuff out there. We discuss a lot of them on www.tvaddictsblog.com My current obsession is Game of Thrones, to which I've read the books as well. Fringe is a great show which I recapped 3 seasons. Recapping Walking Dead. If you haven't seen The Sopranos, The Wire, Breaking Bad or Mad Men then you're missing out on some of the greatest television from this golden age of drama. Sons of Anarchy, Justified, The Americans, House of Cards, Orange is the New Black...all great stuff.

Not sure if you were honestly asking or just closing up your comments on a positive note! lol But, there are some suggestions. Thanks again for your thoughts!

Peaceful Planet said...

Hi Mike, Thanks for taking time for a thorough and thoughtful reply. Your commitment to this site is awe inspiring to now lapsed and formerly sporadic blogger.

As you followed the series in 'real time' I am glad for you to have experienced satisfaction and the conclusion. I binged it, kind of, well usually two episodes per day, so most of this summer.

I felt bereft when Lost ended, so much so that that night I dreamed of hugging Hurley goodbye and saying he could stay as long as he liked. I watched Sayid pack a suitcase and leave. And I asked Ben to marry me! So the subconscious wants what it wants.

Yeah, a few days later I still feel that the ending was a bit pat, but am less inflammed in my personal feeling. I think there is a kind of mourning period when one has been so strongly attached to the characters and so emotionally committed to a series.

Thanks for your suggestions for what to watch now. As I mentioned, Lost was far too violent for me, it is because of the superlative drama, characterisation and probably setting, that I got hooked in the early days and committed.

My fave all time watch is undoubtedly Northern Exposure, which again I binge watched a few years ago, an ep per day. That was perfection imo and slightly surreal too.

I think I have now to do the grief work of acceptance and forgiveness and non-blaming of the creation team behind what was, let's face it, some magnificent television.

In my imagined ending, there would be greater ambiguity, with perhaps some characters leaving the island, but we don't know their ultimate fate. And a greater role for Widmore, and some kind of rebirth for Jacob... I dont know. I imagine that there is some pretty wild fan fiction out there.

The sideways realm, I agree was pretty inspired as a narrative device and perhaps there we had the satisfaction of 'happy endings'. Eg Hurley considers himself to be lucky, Kate is absolved, Jack has a son. Yes, that confirms for me that the ending might have been more cruel and brutal as per the tone of the series.

There, thats the power of TV. You have a long term yoga practitioner and peaceworker calling for brutality and bloodshed. Such is the genius of Lost.

Thanks for the conversation and happy viewing Mike :)

Mike V. said...

@Peaceful Planet - I appreciate the props. Always willing to discuss LOST!

Funny, I would think binging this series would lead to less disdain for the ending than the opposite. But, you mentioned the key thing that I always point to when I see people upset with how they decided to end the series. You had your own vision for an ending. There were so many theories out there of what was really going on. Complex, built-upon theories based on a couple words said in this episode or the next or a visual that the writers would have no way to have come up with them themselves while in the process of creating their show on a daily basis. There was a great side to the interactive internet discussions and buzz around LOST, but that certainly was the negative. There was no way to please everyone in the end. And, how do you end a show like LOST? A show that works based on the fact that you're always introducing more questions with every answer? It's very complicated....and in the end, they decided it was better to keep telling more story rather than to try and answer "Well what really was up with Walt or that Psychic?". They certainly did answer things in broad strokes that allowed people to interpret further.

Granted your issue was more with the conclusion to sideways and that's totally understandable. I added to the surface answer given on the show based on the surrounding episodes of the series to come up with the most satisfying conclusion for me personally (and I shared it here).

Never saw Northern Exposure, but I heard it was a good one. Funny, you asked what to watch next and I suggested almost every violent show known to man! lol (forgetting you said you're not really into that) Great character dramas though if you can get past that. Mad Men isn't very violent though. It's a think piece and it's very well done.

Thanks again for sharing your thoughts!

Rosie said...

So I actually finished the show about a month ago but I never got around to posting my thoughts/questions. I rewatched the finale yesterday to get some more insights and I've been reading a lot of the comments made.

First of all I just have to say that everyone is crazy. So many people had told me, and I had accidentally read spoilers on the web, that they were all dead the whole time. So I went into the finale thinking they died in the crash and this is all fake. I really tried to not think about this while I watched the show but it was in the back of my mind. Well I was in for a shock since they most definitely have not been dead the whole time. I don't even understand how anyone could have gotten that from the finale.
I have to say though that I absolutely loved how this show ended. I am so confused as to why so many people hate it. I really think that regardless of what the writers/producers did there would be a lot of hate. I just love that in the end it wasn't about the island or the mythology of it all or about the plane crash. They made it about the characters and their relationships with each other. I thought it was all so fitting how each person remembered their life on the island when they were with or were touched by the person that had the biggest impact on them; Sawyer with Juliet, Jin/Sun with their baby, Sayid with Shannon, Hugo with Libby, Desmond with Penny, Claire with Charlie and Aaron, Kate with her adopted son Aaron, Locke with Jack, and Jack with his father's coffin which kinda represented everyone on the island for him. The emotion that everyone had as they remembered was so amazing but I think one of my most favorite was the look on Locke's face when he recognized Jack. In that moment I realized how much Locke cared about Jack.

I loved that Jack got that scene with his Dad. That seriously has to be one of the best moments in tv history. Also I don't get how people could be confused after what Christian said. He laid it out pretty clearly. They all died at different times but they have been waiting for one another to all be together. I wondered if when the last one of them died then the whole scene with them being on the Oceanic plane took place and that was when sideways started. They were just waiting for the last one to die.

Jack volunteering himself to be the protector was so awesome. His transformation over the course of the show is so fantastic. However I think the fact that Hugo ended up being the protector for an extended period of time was also very meaningful. Jack was really always the leader of the Losties so he had his time and his death was the last thing he did for his people. In my mind he didn't become the protector when he drank that water, he became the protector when he woke up that day in the bamboo.

Rosie said...

Looking back on the whole show I have realized how much it focuses on parent child relationships. Almost every Lostie had an issue with or because of their parent(s). We also get to see Claire, Kate, Sun, and Desmond as they become parents. We learn that the MIB and Jacob had major mommy issues. Eloise, Widmore, and Daniel were another example of bad parenting and we see Eloise trying to make up for it in sideways world. Jack obviously had issues with his Dad which were thankfully resolved. This leads to what I find to be the biggest mystery of the finale...who is David? Obviously his purpose is to help solve some of Jack's daddy issues. I have read several theories about who he could be. One is that he is Christian as a child creating a role reversal of Jack being a father to his own father. Another is that David is Jack as a child so he is solving his own problems by being a father figure to himself. Another is that Kate was pregnant when she left the island with Jack''s baby (David) who Jack never got to know so he was Jack's child in the afterlife. I also read one where David is Kate and Sawyer's child which is why he is Juliet and Jack's son in the afterlife since neither of them got the chance to be parents with their true love. Another is that David is Aaron since after Aaron is born in sideways world we don't see David again.
My personal favorite it that David is Kate and Jack's son. I think David looks an awful lot like Kate and it's pretty cute to think that Kate didn't just go on to lead a life totally without Jack. I would like to think she had a part of him with her and was able to raise a son especially since losing Aaron would have been hard.

I thought the moment when Jack is telling Sawyer how Desmond has always been the secret weapon very interesting. Sawyer makes the comment that it is a long con and it suddenly hit me how Desmond was so crucial to all of this and him coming to the island really was the longest con. He had the job that absolutely nobody else could have and he had to be on that island.

The one thing I still am confused about is why Jack ever thought that it would be a good idea for Desmond to turn the light off. Did he not understand that it would be bad. Both Desmond and Jack act surprised when things falls apart but I'm unsure as to what they thought would happen.

Overall I love everything about this show. I thought the finale was very well done. I really don't think the writers were trying to trick the audience with anything. If they wanted us to know an answer then they gave it to us and if they didn't then they left it up to speculation but I don't think there were any hints of it all being in someone's head or them all being dead. I'm honestly not bothered that certain things weren't addressed. I feel perfectly happy with what they told us and I think it's cool that some things weren't answered because it allows fans to make their own ideas and theories.

Thanks again for doing this blog Mike. Even though I'm about four years late to the party I still loved having something to read that made my viewing experience more enjoyable.

Mike V. said...

@Rosie - Wow, great thoughts on the show and the finale! Thank YOU for sharing them. I'm with you, I have no idea how so many people were misled by the events in the finale. I have a couple theories (that are widespread and not just mine). The end credits they showed stock footage of the flight 815 crash. Clearly not filmed the same way the show was...and the show always ended with the LOST title. They didn't want to show an advertisement for another ABC show when it aired so they had the option to show something else while people could reflect for a few seconds on the ending. Of course, people took this to mean that they were dead the whole time and no one survived the crash. A theory that combines with this is that it was a theory people had early on in season 1...that they were dead and in purgatory. The producers dismissed this immediately...(of course, but they played into it a bit with Flash Sideways in the end)....so people who stopped watching along the way and just came back to watch the finale said "I KNEW IT!!! They tried to trick us but they really were dead the whole time!!" In any case, sometimes it boggles my mind how some people can't grasp these concepts. But, I try not to insult peoples' intelligence. :) lol You can see throughout the comments, I had to do some convincing but some people still refused to get it. (more of the comments were on the post I was forced to put up while I was writing the recap so there weren't spoilery comments on the penultimate episode recap.

All of your comments about bad parenting were most definitely a theme on the show. Of course, it's in the eye of the child of the parent....so we did see some of the reverse when Jack got to experience parenthood in the sideways world. It is very true that once you're a parent, you have a total new respect for your own parents. (Happened to me AFTER LOST lol, not that I didn't respect them already, but I realized more what they had to deal with when I start having my own)

So, I have to say that I never really theorized on who David was. I thought Locke saying "you don't have a son" was pretty clear that David didn't really exist. But, some of the theories you read are pretty interesting. Jack and Kate did have their little moment prior to returning to the island so she technically could be pregnant. And of course Sawyer and Kate did leave the island and could've rekindled their old flame having lost their TRUE loves. And very interesting that we didn't see David after Aaron was born. Never really thought of that. All interesting stuff, but I'm going to lean on the fact that who David is/was is not important...but more what he represented to Jack was the most important.

Mike V. said...

The Desmond/Jack stuff...and turning the light off. They may not have known exactly what was going to happen to the island....but Jack knew that it had to be done. He knew Desmond was brought back for a reason, and Desmond knew what he had to do. So Jack knew that they should go with this plan. And what was a sideeffect of the island crumbling?? The Man in Black became mortal again which allowed Jack/Kate to kill him and rid the island of Smokey for good. I thought it was clear that this HAD to happen. But then Jack had to be the one to FIX the island and restore the light after the darkness had gone. Another thing to note was that that light was pretty dim before Desmond pulled the plug...that calls back to all of the people that came to the island to exploit the powers and take the light (i.e. DHARMA being the prime example). The island was broken (just like all of the castaways)....throughout the show, the losties had to fix themselves and fix the island. Damon Lindelof actually tweeted the story of LOST in 140 characters (before he quit twitter due to too much backlash) and mentioned it sorta like that. It was a perfect way to sum up the show!

I appreciate you taking the time to comment Rosie and that you enjoyed coming here to read my thoughts and other people's thoughts on the show. Still excited that the blog keeps getting FOUND by new LOST fans! (ooh that was a bad pun!)

Anonymous said...

I LOVED the finale! LOVED IT!! I agree with everything you wrote. I never watched the series when it was on TV beyond the first few episodes. I just "netflixed" it for the last 5 weeks. Better late than never!!

I really, really wish they had explained more about Walt and I also thought it didn't need to end with everyone sitting next to their love partners in the church. Why not just one big happy reunion? The show was about more than the love matches.

I thought scenes when each person became "enlightened" were superb, the acting was awesome, especially Kate seeing her memories when she is helping Claire give birth in Sideways Land and Sawyer and Juliet at the candy machine - talk about buckets of tears!!!

Throughout the season I didn't quite get what was happening in Sideways Land, but once Christian explained "there is no now", I got it 100%!! What a great way to have everyone together again - and they did it so well I didn't even think about how Kate, Sawyer, Claire and others died! That's some good writing!

Thanks for the reviews of the shows, I am still going back and reading some but appreciate all the time and effort you put into it!

Mike V. said...

Hello Anonymous! Thanks for writing in! 5 weeks eh? Wow. I can't imagine watching this 6 year experience in 5 weeks for the first time. After all the endless theorizing and debating. There's no time for that in a binge and sometimes that is better to soak in the major themes of the show rather than focusing on the nitty gritty details.

Not sure if you're going to see this response, but there is more WALT in the series epilogue that was on the season 6 DVD/Blu set. It's on youtube now and called "The New Man in Charge" I have a recap to it on the main page of this site and a link to youtube.

There were more people in that church than just "love matches".....Locke was awoken by Jack. Boone was there too. Sure, romantic love was a strong method of remembering but there were other ways people woke up. Jack didn't fully wake up until he touched that coffin. I think in hindsight I've seen the sideways as even more powerful. I think the very fact that the sideways realm exists is because they were able to save the island. That source of light/energy in the cave was the source of life, death and rebirth. And they were consumed by light in the end. Pretty sure they became one with the source or something like that. Plus, it was just a great way to send off characters we had come to know and love. But, I totally get why some people hated it. (as long as they hated it for the right reasons and didn't think they were dead the WHOLE TIME....ugh.)

Good point on Kate/Claire...another 2 that had nothing to do with romantic love. Their love was for Aaron. Yeah, the Sawyer/Juliet one was one of the most powerful. They all had me in tears. Sun/Jin too. Whew.... Giacchino's score didn't help matters either. It was so powerful and beautiful.

Yep, the Sideways was explained very well in Christian's words at the end. It was clear that the people that got off the island may have lived out their lives but rejoined their friends in the end. There's even a question to how long Hurley reigned on the island...could've been as long as Jacob but as Christian says..."everybody dies some time kiddo" or something like that.

No problem for the recaps...I'm still glad people get use out of them as they continue to discover one of the greatest shows of all time! :-)

Anonymous said...

Hi Mike! Of course after I wrote above, I saw your posts about the “New Man In Charge”. Will definitely look up.

It probably took me longer than 5 weeks to watch the whole series...maybe 6 or 7?? Whatever it was I'm sure it was too fast. Still...I did think about everyone who watched for the whole 6 years and had to wait weeks and months for the next installment. It would have been fun to be part of the debates and theorizing!

Thanks for your take on the church scene. I was referring to everyone sitting with their love match as they went “into the light” For some reason it bugged me. At the same time, if you are going into the afterlife, I guess you would want to be sitting with the love of your life right?

I forgot to mention how impressed I was with Jack's last scene as well. I have watched it about a dozen times. The eye closing, the plane overhead, Vincent...all of it so great!!! Excellent acting! I wasn't always a big Jack fan, but man did he come full circle or what ?

Mike V. said...

AHh understood on the church scene. Never really thought too much of it, but yeah I would assume you'd want to be sitting with the person you love. Didn't notice where Boone and Locke were sitting!

Yeah, Jack had quite the arc. His character never bothered me, but I think I kind of always assumed it would end in some kind of heroic way so I was willing to go for the ride...even during his low points. But yeah, the ending for Jack couldn't have been handled more perfectly. It was good stuff!

Rob UK said...

Well I finally made it to the end of Lost - just as the year is reaching its end!

I came to the finale with very low expectations having mentioned I was watching the series through to a few people and being advised I'd be better off not bothering!

Even so I feel a little flat and disappointed to be honest - perhaps it's because the Lost experience is now over (apart from this Epilogue thing I'm hunting down)and I guess I need to process the whole thing a bit more before I really make my mind and heart up on the whole thing.

For some reason the biggest unanswered question in my mind just now is how and why Richard kept visiting the outside world and being involved in the corporation that seemed to be running so many things. Perhaps this was answered somewhere but I missed it. I guess that's just one of many that will come to mind over the next few days!!

I wasn't keen on the doorway thing at the end, but at the same time I guess it's possible to view a lot of the show metaphorically (much in the same way Shakespeare's Tempest is - also set on an island with a monster and shipwrecks!).

But one thing that makes me happy is Jack and Kate finally admitting their love for each other!

Thanks for all the posts Mike V - am sure I will be back to read through some of the stuff that follows!

Mike V. said...

Rob glad you finally finished! I'm out for New Years tonight so can't really respond point by point but understand your disappointment to an extent. Many felt that way. I also wanted to tell you I have a YouTube link to the epilogue in the new man in charge recap on the home page.

I'll try to respond more when I get a chance. Thanks for reading the blog and checking out future posts on my other site!

Happy new year!

Rob UK said...

Happy New Year to you too Mike V - guess we have more TWD to look forward to in little over a month!

Having slept on it (and seen the Epilogue!) I wouldn't say I was bitterly disappointed or "I've just wasted a 100 odd hours of my life on this show" angry or anything. I think I actually had a hangover from reading a Dean Koontz novel lately, I used to love his premise of introducing wildly supernatural stuff and then concluding with some reasonable (if pretty sci fi) scientific explanation - but lately he's taken to introducing some far out religiously inclined endings which have made me decide never to read any of his new releases again... I suppose I was aware of the producers' claims that everything would end up with a scientific(ish!) explanation at some point and that seemed to get lost (pun intended!). I so badly wanted the FSW world to be some kind of parallel timeline where the characters had never met, but there was some serious course correction involved with Desmond as the Constant and it would all resolve somehow when things were resolved on the island!

I think that's what made the religious overtones at the end of the Finale a bit disappointing to me, I think it was the mainly Christian stuff in there (as I am not one!) but I did enjoy the fact they could joke about it too! Though it irked me that Sayid ended up with Shannon when it would have been Nadia surely (throwing up the problems with traditional afterlife presentations as what happens when people have had 2 or 3 or more true loves over a lifetime?!)

Of course, in the end, it's a TV show and it gave me many hours lost in a different world, and if it created questions with no real answers, then that's a pretty good reflection of what life can do to us! Might as well get angry at Stephen (or Eloise!) Hawking for telling us the question doesn't make sense when we ask him what happened before the Big Bang, as get annoyed with the writers.

Years ago I majored in literature (which is one reason I try to just enjoy TV shows rather than analyse them a lot!) and one thing I learned was that meaning is co-created by the producer and the consumer. Lots of meanings are attributed to great authors that they perhaps never intended - or did they?!

Much as I felt a little bit flat with the ending, I think it would have been just as bad if all the questions had been answered. We probably wouldn't still be discussing the show now and it's still kind of fun to wonder what was really going on in the author's minds when they were writing the show. There's still a mystery there and we can either keep pondering it - or let go and leave (or should I say move on!)

I think it will be definitely worth a rerun at some point and certainly don't feel like I lost out watching Lost, I'm very grateful for the many hours of fun and entertainment.

I can see both viewpoints about The End and I pretty much in the middle now I've reflected. What happened happened (or didn't happen as the case may be!)

I loved the fact Ben found some redemption and Hurley ended up in charge! And I did enjoy the mirroring of the beginning and ending from Jack's POV.

And yes, you Kate Haters out there, I still love Kate and I always will :P lol :)

As always, thanks for all your blog recaps and making this part of the whole Lost experience for us late Losties!

Mike V. said...

ROB -

Finally have a few moments to myself to respond to you! Not sure if you'll even check back here or not. Totally understand your disappointment. The moment Jack said, "i died too?"....my initial reaction was an eyeroll! lol But then when I start thinking back on the season and really thinking about what they were trying to achieve, I thought the ending was beautiful and perfect. The show? Not so perfect, but I think they ended it really well. And I still love the entire thing, flaws and all. The thing I liked most about Flash Sideways was that they were able to revisit the roots of where this show started and reflect on where they've been. I'm sure I said this a lot in the recaps. But the final season was like a swan song for the island. They revisited all of the famous sets at least once and we saw for the most part what these characters used to be like before they met each other and came in contact with the island (albeit with a few slight differences...e.g. Hurley being really lucky)
Interesting that Richard is your biggest question, but I guess I get that having just seen the Ab Aeterno episode. It doesn't all add up, but the gist of it's there. He was working for Jacob. All of the different people that came to the island, he was the go-between. Ben never met Jacob (until he killed him)...he talked through Richard...and in Jacob's absense, the Man in Black summoned him and pretended to be Jacob...working on his long con to kill Jacob. (which also involved getting Locke off Island and Ben killing him too) So Richard was basically observing the different inhabitants of the island and reporting back to Jacob. Jacob was looking for his candidates and competing with Man in Black to prove his point that Man is inherently good while MIB attempted to prove they were corruptible. Anyway...since Richard was working with Ben he helped him in any way he could and perhaps recruiting Juliet was one of those things. Maybe they were all perplexed at why pregnant women were dying (in case you didn't figure it out...we finally hashed it out in the "new man in charge recap comments"...the Incident is the event that caused it....the hint was in the New Man in Charge with the pregnant polar bears near the Hydra station. (electromagnetic activity there....and the level of activity near the Swan was much much stronger.) He visited Locke all of those times because Locke told him to in 1954 (or whatever year it was).....That's what I loved about season 5....basically it ended up implying that our LOSTIES were the cause of all of them ending up in the island in the first place due to their involvement in The Incident and also Locke's time traveling.

Funny you should mention the Tempest, that was also the name of a DHARMA station featured in season 4's The Other Woman (which is rated low among fan favorites but not as low as the Jack Tattoo/Aaron Baptism episodes)

Mike V. said...

As for the doorway...being consumed by an all powerful light...I've processed this over the years....I wouldn't necessarily say this was them "going to heaven" or whatever religion it could imply. The stained glass window in the church showed symbols for all religions...so they weren't out to prove one right. I think it was more related to the Island. In the other polarizing episode, ACROSS THE SEA where we get MIB and Jacob's origin stories, we learn that this light cave is the SOURCE of Life, Death and Rebirth. This is what needs protecting....and it seems to keep the whole universe and any other realms in play (that's up to interpretation but due to some comments that if the light is extinguished...that's it for everyone, it seemed to imply world threatening implications)......Anyway, the whole Death/Rebirth thing is what stands out to me. We know the island is placed over a crazy pocket of electromagnetic energy, which we can assume is this SOURCE.....and it's somehow connected to life, death and rebirth...we've seen ghosts on and off of the island, we've seen monsters that take the shape of dead people...it's all connected. And we see Jack save the source and FIX the island (you know, because his character theme is that he needs to fix things. the island was broken, the light was dim from man's interest in the island and its powers...DHARMA being a key example....Jack fixed it in the end)....that smile on his face as he dies could be seeing the Ajira flight leaving with Kate, Sawyer, Richard, Miles, Claire, Frank able to live their lives.....it could also be him experiencing the Church....we know that Juliet experienced those moments in the split seconds before she died (we can go dutch, "it worked")....the Sideways realm may have happened in everyone's split seconds before death....and that all consuming light that took them in when the doors open? I prefer to think they were becoming one with the source of life, death and rebirth. Michael's spirit was still trapped on the island...in the epilogue, Hurley suggests that Walt can still help him. Maybe they helped somehow construct this sideways realm...we know Walt was special..we don't know HOW special.

Lots of possibilities to still discuss. Lots of open questions closed once discussed and pondered. It may not be everyone's preferred ending, but it worked and I really enjoyed it. Plus, I bawled my eyes out! (still do if I try to watch again lol)

Okay, that's just off your first post...now i'll read your response to me! :)

Mike V. said...

Okay, so I covered the religion thing....so season 5 was all very sci-fi...and season 6 was very spiritual. (man of science, man of faith..eh??) BUT...everything that happened in season 6 was still grounded in the science that came before it, they just chose not to rehash it. in Across the Sea, they didn't even know what magnets were 2000 years ago...they thought it was magic that metal would try to go to that ball of light. But us educated folk know that it is magnetism. (just an extreme example of what i'm talking about) Sure, the ending was in a Church, but that was symbolic more than anything. Maybe not...it's certainly up to interpretation, but I like my conclusion on the ending. Faith and Science kind of met in the middle. Just like Jack and Locke. (Well Jack really turned over to faith when he returned to the Island)

Flash Sideways...i forgot to mention this, but I was glad it ended the way it did because I did not want it to invalidate the 5+.5 seasons that came after. I knew when that bomb went off that "whatever happened happened" because they kept drilling that into our heads on and off screen. But people were convinced that this was going to reboot the series. They got to have their cake and eat it too but make it all come together in the end. I don't think there was a cleaner way to do it. Plus, Fringe was already exploring the whole alternate dimensions/worlds concept (which was another Abrams property)...I'm sure they didn't want to rehash that concept.

I certainly have my issues with unanswered questions or unexplored storylines with the show (what the hell was up with Libby in the institution? Why did Eloise Hawking know about the man with red shoes was going to die by that building collapse? How would that have been in Daniel's journal?) but I can overlook those by just accepting that there are a lot of things that go into making the sausage and sometimes stuff like that won't add up. They decided to kill off Libby before they could explore why she was in that institution but there are clues in Hurley's Dave episode and the fact that her husband who died's name is David that you could theorize stuff. Hurley also is known for seeing ghosts...so maybe that really WAS David on the island and not him hallucinating...maybe it was the smoke monster trying to kill off a candidate?? lots of assumptions can be made)

I'm with you on the Nadia/Shannon thing....there were casting issues with getting Shannon for the season premiere (so she could be on the plane with Boone). I think she may have been filming Taken or something. They kept things very vague about who Sayid's true love was and I think it could've been either depending on if they could get Maggie Grace (Shannon) back or not. But...based on season 1/2...it could be suggested that Sayid did find his true love on the Island.

Mike V. said...

Good point on meanings....I say it all the time. We all came up with questions that the writers/producers couldn't possibly have considered or weren't even trying to bring up. And LOST was a problem of its own creation, every answer created more questions (they even brought this up with the Mother saying it in Across the Sea)...people would never be satisfied with the answers given because they'd always think there was more to it. The show was very intentionally ambiguous...but part of the fun of LOST was that it drove people to discuss the endless possibilities of what could be going on. In the end, they decided that's how the show should continue to live on. Sure, it could be considered a cop-out but there really weren't any answers that would satisfy the masses.

I was never a Kate hater, but I understood why people may have hated her. I thought for a pretty amateur actor, she matured very well over the show!

And yes, you Kate Haters out there, I still love Kate and I always will :P lol :)

No problem on the recaps...I'm glad you enjoyed them. Thanks for taking the time to read them and comment! I'll see you around the blogosphere!

tarantino88 said...

Well here I am, finally got around to watch the finale. I won't write a novel here, and I assume everything has been said and done in the last 5 years about it. I just want to say, it's the brilliant ending to the brilliant show, and that I'm glad that I was part of it and part of this community of yours, albeit some 5 years later :D I agree with everything you wrote in the recap, and all the other theories (and not really sure what they are) are absolutely not viable. Ever since the show originally ended I've been listening on daily basis about how the ending was bad, unsatisfying, or illogical, how producer conned the audience etc... well, like I said, i'm 100% happy with the ending, and especially the direction season 6 took with this Flash Sideways, which I absolutely had no idea where it was going until the finale, but when it's finally revealed, it makes perfect sense and it is the perfect ending to the show.

It's been a great ride, just like you promised back in season two when I joined here, and yeah, that's pretty much it, I wish you and your family all the best, I might join you for GoT season 5 in April on your other blog but I ain't promising anything :) Thank you for your recaps, and, in the words of Desmond, see you in another life brotha :)

Mike V. said...

Congrats on finishing one of the greatest shows and experiences of all time Tarantino!! Glad you enjoyed the finale and were able to look past what others just couldn't. Your summed up thoughts are exactly how I felt about the final season and the finale. It was a great way to send off a show that was pretty much impossible to conclude! lol They somehow made it possible and satisfying. I've defended the ending many times over the years and will continue to do so.

Don't forget to check out the epilogue that was attached to the season 6 dvd/blu-ray. It's no on youtube and I reference it in my "New Man in Charge" recap. We also revisited the show on the 1 year anniversary and I dove into some "unanswered questions". If you're bored, fun reads to check out.
And yes, you're more than welcome to join us over at TV Addicts Blog!

Thanks again for reading and contributing your comments. And of course for your props on the blog! You stole my Desmond "go to" line so I'll just go with NAMASTE! :-)

Bennyboy said...

@Mike V, Just finished watching the show for the first time ever. Loved it so much! Was glad I was able to make sense of some things by following along with your recaps the entire time. I have a lot of questions, but one BOOMING question that is making me itch to find the answer to. Not sure if you still monitor these comments but hope you can reply.

If Jacob had been prepping the members of the flight as candidates, then was it him that caused Desmond to not press the button on time (and causing the crash of 815), or was it fate that Desmond didn't press that button and the plane therefore crashed? Was this ever explained? If Desmond had continued to press the button as he was supposed to, would the candidates have eventually found their way onto the island?

Thanks again!

Mike V. said...

Hi Benny! Yup I get emailed with every comment. Thanks for checking out the blog. I'll be honest. I'm at the bar celebrating my anniversary so I'll be brief and may be incoherent. Lol but I can respond more thoroughly at another time.

thats a good question with Jacob. I never really thought about it. I don't think he made Desmond forget but he certainly touched people before that to ensure they'd get there. Hell how did that psychic know to put Claire on the flight? Maybe some destiny involved. I need to think more about it. More on Monday! Lol

Mike V. said...

Looks like I never got back to Bennyboy on Monday! lol whoops!

Brent and I had a nice Twitter conversation about these questions but I always feel the need to respond on the blog too!

Jacon leaving the island. I always had questions about everyone leaving the island. They seemed to do it with ease. But, I think with the exception of Jacob we're meant to think it was via submarine or boat following specific coordinates. And of course eventually by Ajira Plane! (and of course the donkey wheel time portal/wormhole!) So how did Jacob do it? Definitely an unanswered mystery. But I feel like being protector of the island has its priveleges. If you watch the New Man in Charge (I link to the youtube video of the epilogue in my recap of it on the main page)...you see Hurley, Ben and Walt leave for the island in a DHARMA Van. How did the DHARMA Van get there? We just have to assume that the protector has the ability to leave the island. They are granted almost god-like qualities with their extended lives and ability to draw people to the island. Maybe it extends to their abilities to transport on and off of the island. Just speculation.

Outrigger - Shadow of Statue people was always a strong theory for who was in the other boat. But the truth is, they wrote an answer for season 6, but then just couldn't make it logically flow with the rest of the story. Now Damon Lindelof, a little bitter from the attacks he gets post-LOST I'm sure, is saying it will be a mystery forever. Or he'll sell the answer to charity. lol Jorge Garcia had a podcast called Geronimo Jack's Beard during the final season of LOST where he'd read the script for an episode an give his reactions to reading the script (it would air after the actual episode aired). He mentioned that one of the scripts originally had the outrigger answer in it but then it was scrapped. And he wasn't allowed to share the answer.

Anyway, thanks Brent for reading the blog throughout your binge! Feel free to comment more or move on to the new blog for new discussions! (Game of Thrones, Walking Dead, and a slew of other stuff in the general talk posts)

Mike V. said...

It's not really rewatch blog posts...more discussions in comments with other people who were watching again too that summer. There's links somewhere. You can probably follow along while you're rewatching the seasons. I usually mention what episodes I watched before commenting.

I was talking about season 5 when Ben and Locke were talking. Once you know it's MIB/Smokey those scenes take on a whole new meaning.

No problem on the twitter conversation, I enjoyed it too! Enjoy the rewatch! And maybe we'll solve that outrigger one day. lol I'm sure Damon will crack one day and reveal it!

Anonymous said...

So, I just finished re-watching the show, and I've also kept up with your blog but this is my first time posting:) Your blog had been incredibly helpful and I love how you pointed out every single detail that would have probably gone unnoticed by me if it weren't for you. I cannot imagine how hard it must have been for you to create all of those detailed recaps in time! Thanks for your effort:) Anyways, the main reason I'm posting this is that at some point I had read one of your comments regarding the ending of the show and you had said that in retrospect you could see that the producers were going two ways with the show and you're glad they chose this one (or something along the lines of that, I don't remember exactly:]) And since I've loved your crazy theorizing and your way of seeing things, I'd be really interested in learning about your opinion on how else you thought they were going to end it. That is, if, of course, you're willing to share it. Thanks again for your great work, I really appreciated it:D

Mike V. said...

Hello anonymous! Thanks for reading the blog. I appreciate the kind words! Still great to see people finding relevance in the posts.

Honestly, I barely remember making that comment. But I have a guess at what I was talking about. It was probably how they ended season 5 with the "will they reset time or will they stick with 'whatever happened happened'?" And honestly, they really didn't answer that question until the series finale when it was revealed what the Sideways world was. Everything they had trained us from season 3 on was that you can't change the past. Whatever happened happened. The LOSTIES cemented their own fate with the island by actually causing the incident that led them to crash there in the first place.

The other direction they could've gone was by doing something crazy and saying this parallel world we were watching was a rebooted timeline where the crash never happened. They kept telling us the 2 stories would intersect at some point, so an intersection of 2 timelines would lead to some really bizarre storytelling. LOST did bizarre, but I don't think that would've fit with the story told to date.

So the fact that it resolved itself by that being after they all died, I think worked well. Plus, the fact that they were dead...yeah maybe it's a little corny and sappy the way it was handled (I like corny and sappy)....but the benefits they got out of that method worked pretty well most of the time. Final seasons are always a great time to reflect on "how the characters started and how they got where they were"...so it was a nice way to see our characters the way they were in season 1. Meanwhile, on the island, they revisited all of the famous locales for a final victory lap around memory lane. They did it right, they did the characters justice, and for the life of me I still can't believe how it left a sour taste in so many fans' mouths.

But whatever, I was satisfied! :-) ANd I'm glad you enjoyed my crazy theorizing. Thanks for reading and feel free to check out the other, less popular blog! lol(www.tvaddictsblog.com)

Anonymous said...

Mike,

Well, I have once again finished the LOST series. Certainly made me appreciate even more the brilliance of it -- and your blog too!

Strange thing though, I viewed The End (17 and 18) on Netflix and quite a few of the scenes were edited and parts deleted. I know this because I had seen The End before (actually 4 times now) and with the help of your blog, it was even more obvious that it had been edited. I called Netflix and they said I was the only one (so far, I hope), to report this. What a shame since NOTHING could be edited from this perfectly written and acted ending. The whole scene showing the plane crash after the ending is totally missing. I had read much debate about this which apparently only added more confusion. Did you discuss this? I have not read all the comments yet (671!). Also, I don't know if you have noticed, but some your blog pictures are not showing. Hopefully not a foreshadowing of what is to become of your incredible blog.


On another note, now that I am searching for another brilliant show (seems impossible), I watched two episodes of Person of Interest since Michael Emerson is in it, but I am disappointed. It almost seems as though they are copying some of the dialogue and concepts from LOST (ie; purpose, protection, numbers, time, etc.) and it is put together so "easy", without much thought or intelligence. So do you have any recommendations?

Thank you again for creating this masterpiece of your own synopsis, observations and theories all while engaging so many Lost Addicts. I am especially thankful that you summed up LOST by saying (paraphrasing) that it is a science fiction show with spiritual elements. This makes it much easier to process so my head doesn't hurt so much!

Best to you!

Mike V. said...

Hello Anonymous! Congrats on finishing the series again! Glad the rewatch made you appreciate the show more rather than any other effect. And I'm thankful you appreciated the blog's insight as well.

Screenshots - If you really look into ALL of the comments...I had a blog post for people to comment as I was writing the finale recap (it took forever). One thing that caused the delay was I ran out of storage to post pictures...what are the odds!?! So I used another site to store some of the pictures which is why they have disappeared. I've never had a chance to go back and replace them with other photos. So it just is how it is! :) The blog isn't going anywhere. I've renewed the URL every year!

Netflix edits - Well you know that "plane crash footage" after the end credits caused a major unnecessary debate about "what was real and what wasn't" with the show. People interpreted the ending in the absolute incorrect way. Some people still believe to this day that everyone was dead the entire time. It is NOT true. That footage was there as a period of reflection after that beautiful ending instead of having a promotion for whatever was next to air on ABC. So, if they removed it it may have something to do with that. I think I've watched the finale on Netflix before and I don't recall any scenes missing. That end credits footage was not a scene!!! But if you recall any other ones in particular I'd be interested to hear!

As for other shows, I have plenty of suggestions! LOST will always be my all time favorite drama, but I wouldn't agree that it's the best constructed drama of all time. It just hit all the right notes and experiences for me to put it at the top of my list. We discuss plenty of shows over at TV Addicts Blog....but as for the Mt. Rushmore of Television look no further than The Sopranos, The Wire, Breaking Bad and Mad Men. They are all amazing shows. I'd probably rank Breaking Bad as the best because it is so singularly focused on one goal for the entire series and succeeds brilliantly! My new favorite obsession is Game of Thrones which I recap and also read the books. Great show, great reads. I also watch The Walking Dead and recap it. I'd never put that on my "BEST SHOWS EVER" list but it certainly is well made and has the world's attention right now. I'm sure I can think of more as I've watched a lot! FRINGE is another one I recapped once LOST was over. (started recaps in season 3). It evolved into one helluva show and is from some of the same people that put LOST together. With CBS shows you'd be hard pressed to find something like LOST. They first and foremost are into Procedurals. Every episode starts and ends with some kind of closure. There may be ongoing stories but they are secondary. Fringe started like this but evolved into a flat out mythology show...even their weekly cases revolved around what was going on with the characters at that time. Well made.

You're totally welcome on the blog. Thanks for reading! Feel free to come visit the other blog to see if there's anything that interests you there. And if you want to read more about LOST, check out the new book that was just published (i have links on the blog). My blog entries have been included in it!! Lots of good info to check out. Enjoy your next TV venture!

Anonymous said...

Mike,

Wow! (yes, I will use that LOST descriptive word!), thank you for answering so quickly and so thoroughly. I am once again impressed by your dedication!

When my daughter watched The End in July, she did not notice anything taken out as I just did. I hope I am not not seeing things, but here goes (I literally took notes):
Scene with Miles and Richard discussing grey hair
Long Con discussion with Jack and Sawyer (about Desmond used as a weapon)
Lipidus' comment on 5/6 hrs and the duct tape scene with Miles
Jack and Flocke discussing old times with Swan Hatch and John Locke
Comment about Desmond's wife and child (in cave)
Sawyer visiting Sun and Jin in hospital room
Eloise's interchange with Desmond about Daniel
Hurley and Ben's discussion outside church
Christian's explanation to Jack in Church seemed shortened.
Kate and Jack discussing "nothing is irreversible".
Charlie thrown in back of hummer by Hurley

I sure hope I am not encountering some technical difficulty and there is a simple explanation. Please let me know if you do watch it on Netflix and your experience.

I did watch Breaking Bad and Madmen. Yes, both great series but certainly not mystic or philosophical. I will tune into Fringe. Thanks for your suggestions!

Mike V. said...

Hello again Anonymous! It was just good timing that I saw the email notification not long after you posted. But you're welcome for the response! :) Any chance to discuss LOST is a welcome distraction from whatever I'm supposed to be doing!

I cannot imagine ALL of those scenes not being in the Netflix version of the episode. I'm definitely interested to check it out when I get a chance now.

Yeah based on what you're looking for FRINGE is probably a good one to check out. It's a science fiction show rooted in a strong Family Drama. But give it a chance to find itself. The 1st season has its ups and downs! But then it gets really good, then really weird. lol But it's worth sticking it out! And of course, remember to check out my recaps starting in season 3!

Anonymous said...

Mike,

I wonder if you have had the opportunity to watch "The End" again. I happened to go on "reddit.com" and sure enough, there has been some discussion about deleted scenes from Netflix.

I will contact Netflix again and try to resolve this. The finale just can not be edited!

I have taken your advice and have been watching FRINGE. Yes, it certainly improves after the first season. It is thought provoking however not to the degree as LOST but still makes me tune in for another episode!

Mike V. said...

Hello again! Unfortunately I haven't had time to revisit the finale. Funnily enough I had been inspired to return to season 5 and am watching a little bit here and there on Netflix. But I'd love to sit down and binge the whole show again one of these days. That's unfortunate to hear about the finale though. I'm glad I still have it on Blu-Ray (and still have it from when it aired on my DVR!!). Those scenes are too important to cut!

Good luck with your Netflix email!

Yeah Fringe takes awhile to heat up and get REALLY good. But season 2 and season 3 are fantastic. It's definitely a different show than LOST, but it does reach some similar emotional highs and lows. Enjoy!

Mike V. said...

Anonymous, I doubt you'll check back here but apparently this cut finale episode on Netflix is making waves after EW's Jeff Jensen found out about it. He's friends with Damon Lindelof and now Damon has an exclusive quote and is demanding the restoration of the full version!

http://www.ew.com/article/2016/01/07/lost-finale-netflix

Anonymous said...

Mike,

I just happened to check this blog after months--is it fate?!
So glad others (especially the important ones) are noticing this and will resolve it. I have not watched "The End" since I wrote to you and never knew if the problem had been fixed.

Btw, have you watched "Sense8"? Sayid from LOST is on it and it has some resemblance of LOST (depth, sorrow, finding the way, etc.).

Thank you for being on top of the mess-up with "The End" of LOST.

Mike V. said...

That's too funny! I already have an update too. Netflix responded to Damon and says they'll restore the full version as soon as possible. They had no idea either. Crazy!!

I have not watched sense8. I'll put it on my list though!

Good job checking in at such a coincidental time!

Anonymous said...

Mike,

I did report the problem, in great detail, to Netflix. I called a couple of times and talked to a service person but obviously it took someone with authority to have them look into it and resolve the issue. I am glad though because each episode and especially "The End" was so brilliantly written and acted. I have seen several series since, and none have compared to the genius and immense work of it.

Jason B. said...

First of all... Holy crap, I did not realize how long this was until I tried posting it and found out that I had to post 3 separate comments. I'm so sorry haha.

Oh man. I am just speechless. That was absolutely amazing. I haven't even started reading the recap yet (I will have finished it and probably read at least some comments before I post this), but what I had heard long before I started watching the show (not sure how many times, maybe just once) was that they all died in the plane crash (I began to doubt/be confused by that while watching the show, which I'll explain why below this). But that was definitely NOT the case! What happened, happened. Which, speaking of, this all but confirmed that The Incident was, in fact, caused by what our Losties did last season. The "sideways" world had nothing to do with it, but they did a good job making us think it might have haha. I like that Juliet's "it worked" at the beginning of the season was simply referring to a vending machine haha!

So as I said above, I started the series with the thought that it would eventually be revealed that everyone died in the plane crash because that's what I had heard at some point. I would've only been okay with that if at the very least each individual remembered everything that had happened to them. I just can't stand the idea of one person waking up from a dream or something and all of the other character interactions not mattering at all.
Anyway, it made a lot of sense to me for awhile (most of seasons 1 and 2) and it seemed like maybe each character brought things from their old life to this in between/after death existence. Things like Hurley's numbers and Kate's horse. I had even considered that Desmond was only there because of Jack meeting him at the stadium and that maybe he wasn't the real Desmond, mostly because of how big of a coincidence it was that Desmond happened to end up there too (of course I came to learn that there were many more and bigger "coincidences" than this and eventually that they weren't really coincidences at all haha) And these weren't necessarily things I liked or wanted to be the case, but with the information I had I was just speculating haha. I think the first really weird thing for me as far as that went was in season 3 when Richard and Ethan went off island to recruit Juliet (unless someone else was shown off island before that, but I think that was the first time). I thought how could they go "off island" if they're dead? They surely can't just go take someone else and bring them back. Then they had the whole unconscious thing during the submarine trip and I wondered if that was them killing her? Still confused me haha. So you can imagine my surprise when The season 3 finale showed a future Jack and Kate living off island and Jack wanting to go back. I sure didn't think anyone would get off the island haha. And then that whole time I questioned if in the end their interactions with family members off-island (Jack and Kate's moms, Hurley's parents, etc.) would not have actually happened because they were dead the whole time. I wouldn't have liked that much at all either. But when I found your blog and you always said that the writers promised that the island wasn't purgatory I pretty much fully came around to that. I still had my considerations of it up until the very end though, I'm glad it wasn't the case though. Sorry for such a long explanation of this haha, I just figured you'd get a laugh at a viewer's thoughts during the show after being misinformed that they were all dead from the plane crash. And long story short, I will NEVER trust other people's interpretations of a show or movie like this again without watching it myself haha.

Jason B. said...

After seeing the end, I can't see how anyone would think that everyone was just dead the whole time. Christian says "Everyone dies sometime, kiddo. Some of them before you, some long after you." Jack then asks why they are all here now and Christian says "Well there is no 'now' here." I knew for certain right then that this was something happening after everyone who was still alive in island time eventually died. Speaking of that scene, as soon as I saw the empty coffin I knew that the conversation between those two that you wanted was coming. Didn't you say that the actor who played Christian was offered to become a series regular this season? I wonder how that would've played out, would he have just been another Smokey appearance?

In the recap you said: "So yes, for whatever reason, unplugging that hole made smokey a mortal human being, capable of dying. WHY? We don't have to know why. Why not? Because we're not going to find out why!"
I don't know what you think of this now, maybe you even came to some conclusion in the comments. But to me it seemed like removing that "cork" took away most or all of the island's powers, including Smokey's immortality. Now I guess that would mean that he should've disappeared or something, considering he was basically a copy of another body on the island... but whatever haha, that's what I got from it.

Claire and Charlie's reunion was just too much for me. I lost it haha. All of them were great but for some reason that was the most amazing one for me. The only part that got to me more than that was seeing Jack laying by the bamboo and Vincent coming up to him. The only reason is because it really sunk in that I was at the end haha. I had seen a picture of that on Facebook back when I started Lost and I knew that whatever was going on in that scene was going to be the end. Back then though, because I was mislead, I thought that it was going to be Jack waking up to a new existence finding out that he was dead the whole time or something like that. Come to think of it, that thought kinda saved me from being spoiled by that picture that Jack died in the end haha.

I loved realizing in the end that not only did people like Sawyer, Hurley, Ben, Kate, and Claire remember their island existence and when Juliet and others died, but they also remembered the rest of their lives after that which we don't even know about! I'm not sure what the epilogue focuses on, but I'm gonna assume that it's probably not that. I'll be cool with whatever more they showed haha.

But I can't believe that they didn't have the other end of the outrigger scene! You were always worried that they might not and I was thinking "Nah Mike, they've got this." But nope haha. I'm surprised I didn't see you mention it in the recap or the early comments (the ones I read). Of course there were much bigger things that you were thinking about that probably made you forget about it for awhile haha. Let me know if you found out anything more about it, like if it was a plot they planned but it just didn't work out in the end (like the comic con video with Faraday and Chang from pre-season 5).

I think it's pretty safe to say that "sideways" wasn't JUST Jack's purgatory. I understand people having trouble understanding that time doesn't matter where they are, but you said it best in one of your comments: "time isn't an issue...they're all there at the same time...regardless of when they died. It's above our mortal understanding." And Christian even said that they all made it together.

I feel really bad for the people who didn't understand the ending. After reading some of the comments I can see where people got confused and started thinking totally different things. I wish there was just someway to make everyone understand! Haha.

Jason B. said...

Man... 681 comments. When I started reading this while watching season 4 I usually read all of the comments before going on to the next episode. But not this season haha. For the most part I read maybe 40-50 at the beginning (less as I got closer to the end) and then skipped to the end and read all of the ones from readers that watched the show much later.

I kinda wish I had been able to watch this show when it was airing (if I had been older haha) because I've experienced with TWD that you get much more attached to characters when you have those waits in between episodes and seasons. I know that all of those flashback sequences during the reunions as well as all of the returning cast/characters meant a lot more to everyone that watched the show throughout its run than they will ever mean to anyone binge-watching the show (even over the course of 7-8 months with a few breaks like me haha).

Haha just got to Rosie's comment and confirmed that we did hear the same "spoiler" that ended up not being true (I mentioned on the blog 2 episodes ago that I thought I might have heard the same spoiler that she did).

Annd I am glad that whatever problems with The End on Netflix were fixed before I watched it haha, all the scenes in your recap were definitely in there.

Well, I guess that's all here. I'm gonna go on and look at your posts following this one and if I have any comments for them I'll put them there. If not, I'll probably see you in TWD blog next week! Thanks again for the awesome blog and place to come back to when I'm in the Lost-mood!

Mike V. said...

SuperJ, welcome to the world of knowing everything and missing LOST forever! I'm glad you were able to enjoy the finale for all of its awesomeness and maybe even all of its faults! I don't mind the 3 posts of commentary. Trust me, some of my comments probably spanned longer than 3 posts. ...and did you see my recap?? lol

First off, I am so sorry that you were given the very popular false information that "they were dead the whole time." That is the #1 thing that annoys me about people hating the finale and retroactively hating the show. They didn't understand the ending. And there really wasn't much to understand. The show, as you said too, clearly laid it out. Yeah, I get the people that didn't like the whole "everyone meets in the afterlife and is happy in the end" stuff but if they understand the ending...then I respect their opinion. I do not respect people who to this day bash the show and still don't get the ending. As you can see I was fighting a battle with many people who thought the ending was up to interpretation. Sure, some of it was but not THAT! It all started in season 1 when after a few episodes people began to theorize that it was purgatory. And yes, there were some strong similar themes to that concept. The showrunners went on record saying it was NOT purgatory. So of course, when the final season introduced something "LIKE" the idea of purgatory, well everyone went bananas...."See? we were right the whole time and they lied to us to make us keep watching" Then the plane crash footage at the end of the episode (that wasn't even shot on film...it was stock footage of the set because they didn't want to put promos of another show during the end credits of such a monumental event show ending).....didn't help matters. Everyone was convinced that was part of the show and showing that no one survived the crash. COME ON!!! So there are people that disliked the whole approach to the final season...I say whatever! I've gone on record to what I loved about the final season time and time again. The mirroring to season 1...going back to go forward. Revisiting all of the popular locales for one final victory lap. Great character service and a bittersweet ending. (Totally called the final shot of Jack's eye closing too...but that wasn't too hard to predict!)

I could go on and on about this show...and still do on occasion and never miss an opportunity on the interwebs to defend the show. But yeah...it's interesting to see your perspective with that knowledge going into the show. I can see how that thought gets complicate the further you get into the show.....and it proves who short sighted the audience that still came to that conclusion was when they still think that to this day. There are theories that some people that were casual viewers just checked back in for the finale and didn't see all the episodes in between that would dispel this concept. Anyway, I try to fix these people's opinions every opportunity I get!

Mike V. said...

As far as some of your questions...yeah I do address some of them in the other posts. And we even continue to talk about the show on TV Addicts Blog on occassion. The outrigger thing is something that continues to remain a mystery but Damon Lindelof has opened up about it. He did say that they tried to work it into season 6, but it just didn't flow with the story they were telling that year. Or maybe it was they tried to work it into season 5...I forget. But, the fact is Damon knows the answer and because he got so beaten up about the ending he decided he's not going to tell anyone. And maybe down the road he'll auction off the answer for charity. There was a blu-ray box set of the series that came out the december after the series ended and there was an easter egg that you could decode in the box set (not on the actual discs) that apparently revealed who the outrigger people were...but I don't know if Damon actually sanctioned that answer.

Uncorking the island...your theory makes about as much sense as anything I've come up with! My conclusion was...the Island was crazy...and crazy things happened on that island.....the cork was a maguffin for the episode and uncorking it led to the solution of the conflict.

All the reunions sunk me too...I do remember losing it in Claire/Charlies....Sawyer/Juliet's....it was rough stuff! Very effective!

Glad to hear the Netflix situation was resolved before you got to it!! Good timing on your part. If you got to it last week that may not have been the case!

I could comment a lot more, but it sounds like we might be seeing you over on TV Addicts Blog soon enough which is awesome! I'll admit, my dedication to the blogging on there isn't as hardcore as it was for LOST...that's partly due to my life responsibilities these days. :) But we always have good conversations so more people in the conversation would be welcome! Feel free to continue commenting on the LOST posts and I'll get to them when I can!!

Thanks again for reading and talk to you soon!

Jason B. said...

I just want to add here that I found this great video where Damon Lindelof himself explains the ending of Lost to someone who didn't understand it. That specific conversation starts at about 6 minutes in, and at 10 minutes in Damon even addresses putting the plane wreckage footage above the credits at the end of the episode (it was something ABC decided to do and it obviously backfired). I watched the whole video and he also talks about what his intended purpose with the show as a whole was and some other stuff. I was so happy to find it haha because it's the perfect thing to show people that just don't understand the ending. Specifically between 6 minutes and about 11 and a half minutes in the video.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B5chCMRsEVo

Mike V. said...

SuperJ - I'm sure I watched the video before. I'm a Lindelof obsessee lol...love all his work since LOST...Of course...anyone who hated the end of LOST calls him a hack and bashes all of his work...especially Prometheus and Star Trek Into Darkness. But I gotta say...season 2 of the Leftovers was pure Lindelofian awesomeness.

Definitely a good reference though whenever someone says "they're all dead!!"

zacisawhale said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
zacisawhale said...

Mike, thanks for the great recaps. I finished rewatching last night and the finale was much better than I remembered it being. I cant wait to watch it with my kids in 5-10 years(make them watch it) and look forward to it knowing it will still hold up then.
Also, it is hard ending a tv show. I think the best ones give a nod to all that has happened through the course of the show while also finishing the story and I think Lost did a good job of this.

Mike V. said...

Hi Zac (for short)! Glad you enjoyed the rewatch! I loved the finale. Great send off for the show and characters. And works much better on a binge watch than after years of dissection between episodes. I can't wait to show my kids too!!! And yeah I'll probably have to make them as well :)

Totally agree on approaching and writing a finale. I preached about it the entire final season if I recall! Lol

Feel free to visit my current blog if you happen to watch anything we discuss. I recap walking dead and game of thrones. But we had active discussions on westworld and tons of other stuff currently airing. Nothing as crazy as what I did for lost though!!

www.tvaddictsblog.com

Thanks for the comments!

Emma said...

So, I am done. Actually I was done on Tuesday but I've been in mourning since then ;) I have to say I absolutely loved watching it, but I am left frustrated like a lot of people. I know there are a lot of obvious questions out there so silly for me to add to them, but a few things that are bothering me:

Why, if Aaron was 3ish years old when Kate returned to the island, and then presumably continued to age throughout his life(!) was he a newborn in the afterlife with Claire?? She gave birth to him in sideways land so does that mean he spends eternity as an infant??

Sayid & Claire were mental on the island. But why? What happened to Sayid? Was it ever addressed? He was dead & then alive again but bad. But then he died a hero. Were we not supposed to question what made him come alive again after he died??

What was the point of Dogen et al? They didn't achieve anything other than killing Sayid & then being killed. Was he the king of the temple others or something? As no one ever mentioned him before he suddenly appeared.

Cindy & the kids??!?! What the hell was that about?! Did she just decide she liked the Others' lifestyle better than the 815 Tailers & join their gang?? Or had she originally come from the island??

Why were they stealing children?? To repopulate??

What rule did Keamy break by killing Alex?? And if Keamy hadn't been on the island before, why did Ben think he knew the rules?

Why, in the 'waiting room', was there no sign of any of the non-plane crash folk other than Desmond? And how did Penny get there if Daniel, Miles etc didn't? And what about Frank?! I loved Frank! And if everyone was waiting for Jack, where was his mum? And Ji Yeon? Was she not hanging out with her parents in the afterlife?

How did Desmond get off the island?

Charles Widmore - what was he actually doing? He tried for years to get back to the island - why? When he got there he just died & that's it??

Was there anyone left on the island for Hurley to rule?? Where did he live?!

Ok too many questions. But I am ANNOYED!!

But mainly because it's over and I want to watch it again ��

Thanks, Mike, for this blog - without which I would be completely clueless about what was going on. It would have gone completely over my head & although reading the blog doubled the time it took me to watch, it was invaluable & added to my enjoyment tenfold. Even many years later than it should have been. Thank you!


Mike V. said...

(This is going to take a few posts!)

Hi Emma! Welcome to the world of the known! Before I get into this, I want to make sure you watched the EPILOGUE to the finale that was on the final DVD/Blu-Ray. It's on youtube now and I like to it in my recap on the main page of this site. Look for THE NEW MAN IN CHARGE - Recap. It might answer some of your open questions. I'm going to keep going through your post now.

I will say that most questions can be answered if you put the pieces together from seasons 1-6 of LOST. Some of it is still theoretical, but that is essentially how the show lived and how it continues to live on. Some things couldn't be answered due to contractual issues with cast, timing in terms of where the story was, etc... But you can even make broad attempts at resolving them. For the most part the big questions were answered and the characters were serviced very well in the end. Here we go:

Aaron - lol....we had those questions too. I don't know if we ever had a good answer. But there's a chance that wasn't really Aaron. Most likely he grew up and had a normal life and the island wasn't the most important time in his life and he "moved on" with another group. But I'm just theorizing. I might have to look that one up to see what the most popular theory was.

Sayid - I'm with you on this one....Sayid actually DIED and came back but was this dark dude infected by the smoke monster. I think that's the biggest part. He was infected like Rousseau's crew. But the fact that he actually was brought back to life and that wasn't even addressed always bothered me. They always said Dead is Dead. And when we found Locke was in fact dead and MIB was pretending to be him this seemed to be true. But then Sayid had a change of heart and sacrificed himself for his friends to save the island....well then he wasn't just some infected dude in the end. Sayid is always a question mark for me. So I just learned to roll with it!

Claire - I think she went nuts being on her own for so long and then becoming friends with MIB (aka Christian Shephard....) She was on her own for 3 years without her BAY BAY!!!! lol She went a little nuts. But Kate saved her.

Dogen - The whole temple thing was teased in previous seasons and they had to pay that off. But yeah we learned that some of the others lived at this temple. And there was a healing fountain there. I'm sure it was all connected to the source of life, death and rebirth which is probably how you answer Sayid's weirdness too. But yeah, it's a weird story in the final season.

Mike V. said...

Cindy and the kids - If there was ever an opportunity for a side story it would be Cindy and the kids' trajectory on the island. We just ended up checking in with them once in awhile in seasons 1, 2, 3 and 6....but yeah, they must've bought into the OTHERS philosophy. I don't think there's much else to look into there, unfortunately.

Stealing Kids - with Walt I think it was because of his "Specialness" with the island. He was probably being recruited....like John. Alex, I'm not sure I remember why Ben stole Alex. But he was a demented dude. But they did have the pregnancy issue too like you mentioned so maybe they did want some fresh blood.

Keamy breaking rules - The Rules were a vague concept and probably used to cover a lot of loose ends. But yeah since Ben was being conned by Man in Black who was pretending to be Jacob he may have made up rules that Ben thought had to be followed. Or maybe it was OTHERS RULES in place and Widmore broke the rule by allowing Keamy to kill Ben's daughter. That's probably it actually. Their children were off limits in their rivalry...which is why Ben left the island and tried to kill Penny.

Waiting Room - lots of questions arose as to why so and so wasn't there and was. It probably came down to who was available and who made sense to be there in terms of their stories on the show. Desmond was a huge part of the show once he joined, and everyone loves Des and Penny so they both had to be there. The freighter crew, they played a role in these 815ers lives but not as pivotal I don't think. They made a comment that the people in that room are there together because the time they spent on that island was the most important thing they did in their lives. And they did it and made that place together. Daniel was in Sideways but he was going to move on with someone else. His mother was in sideways too. Ji Yeon probably went on to have a life without her parents and had other pivotal milestones...she never experienced the island. But if Jack ended up saving existence and the after existence, she had a chance to move on with the people that meant the most to her. (i have theorized that moving on was really becoming one with the SOURCE that was reignited on the island...explaining ghostly all knowing appearances to Hurley during the show's run)

Mike V. said...

Desmond - Jack says Hurley's first line of business could be getting Desmond off the island. (I think. i forget) But Hurley can freely leave the island as you'll see in New Man in Charge. Jacob could too. So it shouldn't be too difficult to get him off the island. Ben even says "maybe there's a different way to run the island. a better way."

Widmore - That was indeed a confusing story. You knew he'd get back there and when he did it was to fight MIB? It all didn't add up exactly. But Ben killing him was some good fan service.

Hurley - Surely more people came to the island during his rule, but it's a story that isn't meant to be told in this 6 season show. It would be cool if they ever did reboot the show with a new cast that Hurley would be protector. lol But I'm not anxious for anything like that to happen. I thought the show was pretty perfect as is (even with its flaws as we're pointing out here)

Wow...you came up with some good ones!!! I was worried with your investment in the blog and the show and the questions that you might be disappointed in the end. Most binge watchers are pretty satisfied by the end because they probably didn't get too in the weeds of theorization and tying up loose ends. There are a lot of people that absolutely retroactively hate LOST because of how it ended. But man the ride was so amazing even if I hated the finale I'd still love it. I can't imagine even being in Damon Lindelof's shoes trying to control this show as it blew up into unexpected massive success and having to keep fans on their toes with building an ever expanding mystery. To end that? I just don't know how you'd even wrap your head around it. I'm pretty impressed with how they did.

You're totally welcome for the blog! I'm glad you found enjoyment in it and I'm continuously happy that people keep finding this blog and finding it useful! Please feel free to check out the other stuff I've been working on over at www.tvaddictsblog.com (game of thrones, walking dead, and a discussion thread where we pretty much talk about everything, some archived shows recapped on there too like Fringe) There's other stuff to check on this blog too. Like the 23 mysteries post prior to season 6 and the 23 mysteries updated MID-season 6, The New Man in Charge recap and my 1 year later recap where I used the LOST encyclopedia and some of my theories to try and answer some lingering questions.

Thanks for contributing to the ever expanding comments on these recaps! Hope to see you around the other pages and blog!

Emma said...

Wow, thanks Mike - I wasn't expecting such a quick, nor detailed, response! I'm amazed you still remember so much detail after all these years (or are you regularly re-watching?! I think I might have to do that...!).

I knew you would put my mind at rest about some of my questions - even if that was by agreeing that there was no answer (I'd hate to think I'd totally missed an obvious explanation, so if there wasn't one, it's better than there being one and me missing it!).

Oh and for the record - Desmond is the best character that ever there was. I'm a little bit in love with him. So glad he had a happy ending!! I loved Frank almost as much but I'm pretty sure he went on to live a happy life :)

I did watch 'The Man In Charge' (thanks for the link in the blog!) but didn't want to refer to it in case someone was reading my comments before getting there! But my question involved Hurley and a lifetime WITHOUT ranch dressing?!?! WHY?!?!) :) I've read right to the end of your posts as I didn't want to miss anything. And of course the YouTube links connect to all sorts of other Lost posts, including one that just lists ALL the unanswered questions in quick succession which I wish I hadn't watched as it brought up so many other random questions I'd forgotten about :) Ah, the joys of Lost... :)

The interesting thing is that now I've finished watching, I can discuss it with friends. And almost all of them thought the whole show was Purgatory!!! That annoyed me, as I know it will you. I have had to explain that it's impossible to watch, and fully comprehend, the show without this blog as a guide through the myriad hidden meanings and sub-plots - and that they should start again, and change their opinions of what they think was a really rubbish concept for a show, a la Dallas shower scene. Oh dear...

Anyway, thanks again, Mike, for guiding me through and answering my many niggles all these years on. I'm sure I have many more questions (how did Richard adapt to life in the real world in the 2000s when he was from the 1800s?! Where did he live?! He can't have had any friends to call upon and none of his Others pals were around to put him up...! If I were him I'd have stayed on the island and hung out with Hurley and Ben...!) but I will satisfy myself that regardless of what isn't addressed or answered, I loved every minute of watching the show so no 'disappointing ending' will take that away. And I look forward to watching the whole thing again one day with a new perspective!!

Emma

Mike V. said...

No problem Emma! I actually haven't rewatched since maybe 2012? But when the show was on I watched from the start every summer/off-season. And I watched them twice the week they aired (first time taking notes, 2nd time just appreciating the episode without puzzling over the thing lol) And of course I've been talking about it for 13 years so I just kinda remember stuff. :) But I highly recommend the rewatch. Some stuff ties together as planned, but really just to not theorize about what's going on and just enjoy the story and character development. It's quite a ride!

Desmond was absolutely the best!! Once he was introduced I just wanted more Desmond! And sure enough he became series regular. Every episode about him is fantastic. Frank was an awesome addition too. Agreed.

Makes sense about The Man in Charge. Almost broke my own rule!! :) I just feel when you get to the series finale recap, we're in open territory to discuss everything. lol

As i mentioned with those questions you'd forgotten about. Some of them probably weren't even intended to be questions. But we fixated over them over the years. One that I obsessed over was the psychic Malkin who told Claire she must get on flight 815. He eventually claims he's a fraud but I always thought there was going to be more with him. But he wasn't a series regular and I think he ended up on 24 for a season and they probably couldn't get him back. But they may not have had big plans for him anyway.

Ugh...yeah a lot of people just did not grasp the ending...or got confused by the end credit sequence. Some people probably gave up for seasons and tuned in for the finale and gloated that they figured it out in season 1. Ridiculous!!! But at least you can explain the right answer to them! :) I've had friends that felt cheated by the end too. It's half and half. But if I go to the LOST subreddit it's full of people who LOVED how the show ended and it's nice to get into discussions about it there. reddit.com/r/LOST Every once in awhile there's a new viewer that I'll point them to this blog. lol Because a lot of the sites out there are full of spoilers. Here each recap is self contained which makes it perfect for binge watchers like yourself!

Touche' on the DALLAS scene.

With your Richard question...remember he was off island a lot recruiting (Watching over Locke, recruiting Juliet, etc....) so he was probably fine adjusting. As for where he lived...I dunno....Ben had a wealth of money and I'm sure Hurley wasn't going to leave them all high and dry.

Thanks again for contributing your thoughts. Always nice to talk to a new fan!! Keep firing away questions if you have them!

Onigirli said...

Jack tells Smokey "You're not John Locke. You disrespect his memory by wearing his face, but you're nothing like him. It turns out he was right about mostly everything. I just wish I could have told him that while he was still alive."

That was my favourite scene!

Onigirli said...

That's all, folks. I loved that shot at the beginning of Alt!Sawyer looking at his broken reflection in the mirror he punched, the music that played along during the opening montage was just beautiful, this is the song https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NztoCfmACww starting at 2:30 that peak was just beautiful.
Thanks again for everything you and your commenters filled up here. See you in another life brotha

Mike V. said...

Thanks Edriss for sharing your journey! Sorry I couldn’t keep up with every comment but I definitely read them! Be sure to check out “the new man in charge” epilogue. I have a link to YouTube in my recap on the main page. And also check out tvaddictsblog.com for other stuff I’ve recapped (in much less detailed fashion) and discussed if you’re interested! Glad you enjoyed the blog!

Onigirli said...

Don't worry about comments left un-responded, I'm aware of the inconsistent notifications system and sometimes there isn't really anything to be said even for the ones you found, and considering how there's 700 comments on this page alone frankly I'm surprised you didn't just put up a disclaimer that you can't be bothered to read any after the 50th lol! I'm sure you're grateful for each one but at the same time they can become a chore. I'm more than happy to read through any replies to me that did get through but I won't hold you to that. And yeah I noticed there's a few posts of yours here after the finale, I'm still debating whether to watch that epilogue or not (initially I mistook it for that one parody 'deleted scenes' sequence that was shown on a talk-show I watched that aired immediately after the finale, but I was thrilled to find out that your link was actually a legitimate epilogue that I missed out on). But I like flirting with the idea of allowing myself some unwatched footage of the show to delay my goodbye for as long as possible. I'm curious as hell but I also want an excuse to HAVE TO GO BAAACK somewhere down the line.

I just want to add I loved that scene of alt!Kate seeing Jack again, like before Jack finally got on board there was just something strangely arousing about Kate basically taking the lead here against a confused Jack when it's always used to be the other way around. She was so tender with him as he backed away from her in fear. That was seriously good acting from her actress because I've always felt Jack and her never matched the chemistry she had with Sawyer but then that scene, with her overflowing affection whenever her eyes are on him convinced me they really are perfect together. Even before the end when they're all finally seated and Jack's looking ahead she's still just eye-fucking him lol. It was lovely.
There was something oddly funny and disturbing about Desmond screaming "No! NOOOOO!" down in the hole after Jack's whole conviction that it was the right course of action. Smokey's amused "I guess you were wrong, Jack" just makes me grin every time. Because his howling totally was the sound of someone realizing they messed up (I was relieved to see Desmond didn't die right there no matter how "assured" his survival would be considering the well-earned fan love towards him).
And I absolutely loved the shot of Jack weeping/laughing in relief while letting the water flow over his outstretched hand as the light bathed him, and the blood on his face was both upsetting and a really good touch. The screencap you have of it is great but it looks really nice in motion because you can see his shoulders shaking and everything. Superb acting. AND I LOVED JACK LEAP-TACKLING LOCKE FROM THE HIGHER GROUND. What a way to start the final combat even though Locke basically won that one.

Anyway, I'm gonna check out your 1-year post-mortem thingy. Happy New Year!

Mike V. said...

Hi Edriss, yeah I know...I went above and beyond with my responses! The funny thing is sometimes people were just talking to each other in the comments and I felt the need to put in my 2 cents. I was just so thrilled to have people chatting about LOST and everyone providing such insightful comments...it was a great time, but yes it certainly was taxing. lol (I saw you couldn't hold out on watching the epilogue! Probably better you did. The more you held on to it the more you may have expected from those 12 minutes. It wasn't much, but it was fun)

Kate seeing Jack again...your description really makes me want to watch the finale again. But, I think I just need to watch it ALL again. All I need is something really easy to get. TIME! LOL okay, maybe not that easy. Jack's final moments (really Jack this entire final season) were on point. He did a really good job. Agree on the Jack/Kate chemistry too. The Jack/Locke hill fight. I forget if I shared in comments. There was a great YouTube edit of that fight that added lightsabers to the fight. Any fight is improved 100 times with lightsabers! lol

Happy New Year to you as well!

Onigirli said...

If you're asking me if I think if it's worth your time to revisit the show in full, then: YES
Don't make a burden of it, whenever you stumble upon that unexpected pocket of lollygagging-time you should rewatch it. It really is a therapeutic experience regardless of whether you feel compelled to complete the run.

Mike V. said...

Oh I know it’s worth it! I’ve rewatched so many times during its run and once when it was all done. But it’s been 6 years now since the last time I did it. Just saying I’m ready again! :)

Lesley said...

Hi Mike

Well it took my husband and me 3 months to watch LOST which was a nice pace and I loved it all over again. Thank you so much for your blog which I read religiously after each episode (and most of the comments too!). I loved how respectful you were towards other people’s opinions/ ideas even when they were clearly wrong! In return you created an atmosphere where people were able to share their thoughts without fear of being abused. The only time it seemed edgy was on the post while everyone waited for your finale recap, no doubt because of their frustration and not having you to keep it calm. 17000 hits while you got your recap ready! Wow that is some testament as to how highly regarded your recap and thoughts were.

Anyway here are some of my thoughts in not such an organised manner as you:

The first time I watched Lost when it was live, around season 5 I had already thought that the final episode could not be the best thing ever. For me it was all about the journey and you can’t expect to have week after week of “Wows” and “I didn’t see that coming” and expect the programme to go out with a bang. So when the end came I was pleasantly surprised and perfectly satisfied. I had thought that it would have been better if Ben had killed Flocke because he was so passionate about the island but then we wouldn’t have had Kate’s classic line before she shot him.

This time around I was able to see more of the nuances of the show and with your help saw other things too. Now here’s the tricky bit. My husband watched it with me. He rarely watches TV without falling asleep and the programme held him throughout which is praise indeed. Unlike me he just watched it and let it all wash over him. He didn’t think about theories or look at your blog or anything. He just rocked up and watched it. Because of this he wasn’t left with questions at the end to frustrate him like other people were. For instance he had totally forgotten about the outrigger which taxed you so much! I didn’t even tell him that the producers had said way back that the island wasn’t Purgatory so if you weren’t armed with that piece of information it would be easy to read the finale in that way. When the final credits came up he said “so they all died in the plane crash then?” My immediate reply was well yes that is one theory but the other one is that it was real and they are dead in sideways land and the writers have left it open to interpretation. I was doubting myself on what I had thought last time (and forgot what Christian had just said) and was so glad to read your recap to clarify all the points and then confirm to him that the island was real. As far as people getting the wrong idea I can see how that happened especially with that ridiculous picture of the plane crash after the credits. ABC certainly have a lot to answer for. So many of the viewers’ complaints throughout the show seemed to come from their dodgy promos! I noticed that lots of people were wanting answers about many things that had already been answered but gave them a break. Sometimes a big question was resolved in one sentence and if you had happened to talk at that moment (not everyone was as glued to the story as us!) and if you didn’t have the benefit of reading your recap some things were easily missed.

Libby in the mental hospital. I was OK with that. I just took it that she was in there because she’d been having these flashbacks about the island and thought she was crazy (as she was there voluntarily) and she was heavily drugged because that’s what doctors do if you are not compliant. I didn’t worry about whether that fitted in to any timescale because I rarely overthought anything!

With regard to the criticism of the finale I think a lot of that was because the show was a victim of its own success and made people think about it too much instead of just letting it happen. I hope that as time has gone by that most people have come round to our way of thinking that it is the best TV show ever!

Many thanks again.
Lesley

Mike V. said...

Hi Lesley, you’re totally welcome for the blog. It’s for people like you that keep it still running all these years later. So thank you for checking it out! LOST was certainly a show that I was passionate about and you can tell from the time I dedicated to it. I really can’t wait to watch it again. Just gotta figure out WHEN! I appreciate your words about respecting opinions and being kind. I’ve always taken the “high road” on internet communications when many people anonymously like to shame anyone they can. I just see no point in it. So that already made the comment section on this blog a nice haven away from the rest of the internet! Sure, sometimes it got a little out of hand, but we had a pretty good batting average!

Thanks for the kind words on the blog hits and high regard of my finale recap. Whew, that was a stressful day. Good thing I had taken off from work! Of course, if you read or even just scanned through that post before the blog went up you could see I was falling victim to responding there to everyone and delaying my recap. Lol (We call that these days, “pulling a George R. R. Martin!” HA!)

I absolutely agree on the finale. I still loved the finale, but it’s not my favorite episode nor did I ever expect it to be. I was just expecting closure and we certainly got that. Any TV show only works based on how much viewers can relate or invest in its characters. I loved that the show focused on that in the end (as it always had). The ride they were on was crazy and ridiculous. And sometimes I found myself talking to friends in bars about it and then realizing if anyone who didn’t watch the show heard us they would think we’re insane (which happened on more than one occasion).

Interesting take on Ben killing Flocke…that certainly could’ve worked based on his past experiences with ol’ Smokey. Ben was manipulated by him. But totally makes sense that between Jack and Kate they handled it.

I had my daggers out ready to attack when you agreed with your husband about the plane crash! LOL But I read on to see you were set straight by the blog. And just for the record, Damon and Carlton did eventually address this in the media/podcasts that they had nothing to do with that post credits thing. That was purely ABC. I get it though…it was such a beautiful ending, they didn’t want to put a 30 second spot promoting another show while the credits rolled. They wanted to give us some time to decompress. You could also tell the camera used was different than the camera used to record the actual show. But yes….some people couldn’t piece it together in the end. And that’s fine. That’s the most annoying part of finding people still bashing the LOST finale to this day when you find out they thought they were dead the whole time. But it’s all good. Glad you and your husband were able to get the answers you needed!

Outrigger – yeah I really wasn’t that upset that it was never answered. And eventually Lindelof spoke about it saying that they did have an answer for it, but they couldn’t fit it into season 5 with the way the story went and they made a conscious decision to keep it a mystery. Lol Maybe one day they’ll reveal it!

Libby – Yeah…I’ve made my own head canon about it and I’m sure I posted it on this recap (or maybe the 1 year later recap). Her dead husband’s name was David (Revealed in the s2 finale in a Desmond flashback)….Hurley’s imaginary friend at the asylum was called Dave…..Hurley eventually could see dead people. Libby may have gone crazy watching Hurley talking to someone named Dave…..eh…it kinda works!

Mike V. said...


There definitely is a clear difference between Binge Watching LOST and the way we watched with too much time to think about it. Most binge watchers come away feeling the show is wonderful. When I watched the show the first time around, I watched with my notepad (for the blog of course) and really dissected. Then after posting the recap I’d watch again throwing out all my questions and just to appreciate how awesome this crew was at making TV. It was so well done. rewatches, I never worry about the questions…I just appreciate the story and the characters and it never fails to entertain me.

So yes, in the long run hopefully people will look favorably upon the show. The more people that watch after it aired the more there is a chance for that. Just look at FRIENDS. Still the most popular comedy among the youth due to Netflix (still my favorite comedy of all time). Look at Star Wars. The prequels were bashed by the old star wars fans (I’ll say I equally bashed them and loved them lol)….but now as the kids of then grow up, they are praising them as their favorite star wars films and bashing the sequel trilogy for various reasons. This world of everlasting content is an interesting time to be alive and to see how varied opinions can be across generations.

The thing that scares me is that one day LOST will inevitably be rebooted/restarted……and I’ll be conflicted on if I return to this blogging world. Maybe I’ll be retired by that point and will have a lot of time on my hands! 

Thanks again for reading the whole way through. And feel free to check out other stuff I’ve done since on www.tvaddictsblog.com ! (definitely not as in-depth as LOST was, but I have kids now! Lol)

Lesley said...

Thanks for taking the time to give such a detailed answer. Yes I couldn't believe afterwards that I allowed myself to doubt what I knew to be true because of that stupid plane crash scene after the credits! I have never seen Friends. My son loves it so I guess I should borrow his DVD collection and find out what the fuss is all about!
Anyway thanks again.
Lesley

Mike V. said...

No problem on the detailed response. Doesn't take much to get me talking about LOST! Especially in the finale recap (unfiltered, totally spoilery!)

Do they still show that plane crash scene on Hulu? I haven't watched the finale on streaming in a long time.

FRIENDS...oh yeah I was a die hard fan from 1994-2004 (well...still I guess). And of course LOST started in 2004 and started my new obsession! The show just never gets old for me. And seems to still resonate with the younger generations (case in point!) The whole thing is streaming on Netflix if you have it. But DVDs work too as every episode has extended footage too. Enjoy!

Lesley said...

I watched it on the original DVD. I'm surprised it was in it though considering the furore it caused after the live watching. I suppose it was already in post production phase.

My son has got Friends on DVD so I'll borrow his.

Anonymous said...

Well it’s 2019 and I finally finished Lost after “binge watching” for a year lol! Your blogs helped explain a lot to me! Still not sure why the others were after the Losties in the beginning and the whole Widmore connection . But I truly enjoyed it!
Did the writers ever work on another show? What currently do you like which is just as engaging or even another past show similar that you would recommend?

Mike V. said...

Hi anonymous! Glad you were able to find the blogs useful! I’m actually rewatching and in season 3 right now. The others were pretty much under the employment of Jacob and sometimes the smoke monster (Ben was conned into thinking he was getting orders from Jacob). And they had an epic debate/game over proving the corruptibility of humanity. The others were always making lists and talking about good people vs bad people. There also were the pregnancy issues so they were obsessed with stealing children too. There’s more to it but that’s the gist. Widmore was there during the jughead timeframe and when he was banished he became obsessed with getting back there. I need to rewatch season 5 and 6 to figure things out a little more. But eventually he went back because of Jacob and to bring Desmond I think.

Other shows from the writers. Co creator Damon Lindelof went on to do The Leftovers on hbo. I loved it. Seasons 2 and 3 are some of the best tv you’ll see. But you have to suffer through season 1 to get there which was a book adaptation and pretty depressing. Still good though! He’s doing The Watchmen for HBO this fall. Can’t wait! Carlton Cuse (other show runner) went on to do Bates Motel which was really good. Different type of story but same production values. You can look up both their names on IMDb for their other credits.

JJ abrams (other co creator but only co-wrote the pilot) - went on to do films such as Star Wars 7 and 9 among other big films. Lol but he did co-create Fringe which was an amazing show. Season 1 was more procedural (monster of the week stories) but they got heavily serialized by the end. I started blogging that in season 3 or 4. I think 3. (tvaddictsblog.com). Game of Thrones of course was amazing. Ending was a bit rocky but I enjoyed it. It felt right just that they rushed to get there. Still an amazing show if you haven’t watched. I blogged seasons 4-8 but discussed them all on my other blog.

Hope this helps! Thanks for spending time on this site!

Mike V. said...

Breaking Bad - not sure if you saw that when it aired. It’s a more focused story on one man’s specific journey but it was so well done. Maybe the closest thing out there to a perfect story from start to finish with no loose ends.

Mike V. said...

Keep forgetting stuff. Don’t forget to watch the LOST epilogue. I have a recap on this site as well as a YouTube link. It’s called “the new man in charge”

Anonymous said...

Ok thanks so much! I have not watched game of thrones yet but it’s def on my list. I just didn’t want to start it while still watching Lost lol. I will def put the other suggestions on my list. And I do want to rewatch Lost again too!!

Victoria said...

Hi!! I realise I haven't written in FOREVER - my boyfriend and I got SO into the show that I literally didn't have time to read all the entries and then I had fallen too far behind to pick it back up :( I CAN'T BELIEVE IT'S OVER!!!!! Some tears were definitely shed and I have a feeling that my life will feel a little empty in the next few days when I don't have anything to watch when I get back home after work. I just can't believe I'll never see the characters again! :'( I have to say that I liked the ending a lot although I was a little confused by it (i'm sure you'll have explained it in your blog post though which I'm about to read now). If you have any recommendations for any similar shows then i would love to hear them, although I'm sure nothing will be quite the same again :( Thanks again for this blog, it's nice to have something to keep the magic alive for a little longer <3

Mike V. said...

Hi Victoria! No problem on falling behind on the recaps! I totally understand the temptation to just keep going. I’m in season 4 on my rewatch myself. :) I’ve been commenting briefly on it on my newer blog (www.tvaddictsblog.com) in the latest post. But nothing too crazy. lol Glad you enjoyed the finale. I was a big fan as well! I did explain to the best of my ability in the recap. Also check the main blog page. There’s a couple other entries after the finale about the Epilogue (includes link to YouTube to watch as well) and also a year after the finale I checked back in with some thoughts on some of the mysteries people still thought were mysteries and not answered. I probably have thoughts since then as well so if you have any questions feel free to fire away. I’ll try my best! You’re totally welcome for the blog too!

Other shows...well stuff I’ve watched since LOST that I loved: Fringe (recapped season 3 onwards), Breaking Bad, Game of Thrones, Walking Dead (recapped this since day one but i’m pretty tired of the show these days lol). Thrones has probably been my biggest obsession since LOST. I read the books and recapped from season 4 onwards. I was content with the ending but looking forward to how George wraps it up too in the books if he ever gets it done. As for SIMILAR shows to LOST? That’s a tough ask. Many tried to replicate it but never succeeded. I recapped FlashForward and The Event and Terra Nova. All had big premises but they just didn’t have that lightning in a bottle that LOST had. Handmaid’s tale now has the flashback format and a bit of a mystery going on...and there is the idea of wanting to escape a specific area in the story and learning more and more about the world they’re in...but it’s no deserted island. lol Pretty crazy show though! Anyway, we’re also looking for the next best thing on TVADDICTSBLOG and talk about a bunch of different shows so feel free to check in on us there. There’s just a handful of people compared to the LOST days but It’s all good. :).

Thanks for checking out the blog and I’m glad you found it helpful. Good luck finding your next obsession!

Simon Sandiford said...

Thanks to being off work today I have managed to make it to the end of this blog and comments. Given it was the Finale I didn't want to speed read the comments and so digested them all... Except when the topic turned to Flashforward as I have just started watching that now, so don't want any spoilers!

I wrote my end of show feelings on the interim blog post so won't repeat it again... A couple of extra points though....

Widmore... Everyone seems confused but I saw his story as being quite clear (or as clear as anything on Lost)... He was there in the old days, knew the main secrets of the island and wanted to get the secret to life, time travel etc that Dharma were investigating... But once he was banished from the island he couldn't find it again, so has been trying to find it to continue his work to make himself richer and more powerful by finding everlasting life etc... He said as much a few times during season 5 and 6 I think.

Back to the plane scene at the end... I get what you say about they wanted to not show another trailer... So why didn't they just not show another trailer? Most TV shows here in the UK didn't used to have trailers for the next show on the credits... They do more nowadays... But the credits and the theme tune is that moment to reflect... A picture of the set isn't. I remember back to the 90s and Channel 5 in the UK showed all 693 episodes of Prisoner Bell Block H (the original 80s series that is the forerunner to today's Wentworth) and the iconic theme tune as expected would play straight after the cliffhanger and it was the wow moment and you needed the credits to reflect with the theme playing... Prisoner CBH was famous for its wobbly sets and so attracted some criticism for that, mainly light-hearted... But it meant that the announcer that spoke to announce the next programme would do it while the Prisone4 CBH credits and theme was still on so he could make a jibe at the wobbly sets etc. The fanbase in the early days of email communication bombarded the channel to complain and so for what was original season cliffhangers, they left the credits and theme untouched. They didn't actually show it with season breaks in the UK and played all 693 episodes straight through!

About the Lost plane set over credits... You say that nothing is relevant after the Boom Lost! But I have seen many shows where normally that is the case but occasionally they do a quick scene either midway through the credits or just before the final slide... Dream On from the 90s.. I'm sure the US version of the Office and Parks and Recreation and Arrested Development did... So the first thought would be to believe it is relevant... It really looked like it was showing a "despite how the show just ended, here is the truth" scene.

I've already seen now the Lost epilogue and that does give a few interesting snippets so I'm going to read your remaining blog posts and comments... Hopefully not 700+ though!

With Flashforward blog posts, the comments section is different... The posts are backwards with newest at the top and can't see how to get notified of a reply even though I signed up for an account on it. Either way I'll catch your posts on that too before I come back for when you hopefully do Better Call Saul final season as I am up to date with that and will be able to join in almost live with comments 😀

Mike V. said...

Hi Simon! Running out of blogs to continue the discussion here. :)

End credits - you’re right that that would’ve been the easiest. Just to roll the credits. But you never see that on us network tv. They’re always promoting something. Or some kind of video needs to be playing while credits roll. But for lost they could’ve made an exception. I really don’t think they expected the confusion and thought it was a nice moment of reflection on how far the show came. As for nothing after boom LOST I stand by my point. Yes tons of shows have post credit scenes or tags but lost never did. Ever. Once that boom lost happened it was “wait until next week”. Maybe for a finale you could expect a different treatment but it wasn’t the case.

Widmore - I think the confusion was more around what his motive was for helping/hurting the losties. I forget. But he really just had a gripe with Ben I think. And in the end he was sent by Jacob if I recall.

Flash forward - wow I almost forget even covering that show. I did experiment with changing the comments section there to see if it would work for tv addicts blog. The commenters didn’t like so I never switched it anywhere else. Don’t be expecting another lost with that one. They had great concepts but the characters needed a little more flushing out (another tribute to why LOST was so successful). You can feel free to comment but I barely remember that show! Lol

TV Addicts. I’m not really recapping anymore. No time with kids and work stuff. But I post discussion threads. Us remaining people definitely love Saul and will be discussing. I’m rewatching BB right now.

I’ll see you on the remaining posts!

Ben said...

Not sure you'll see this but just letting you know I love your blogs! I just finished bingeing the show for the first time and after every episode I'd read your blog and the comments to see what the live reactions were like. I was 1 (I'm turning 20 in a few months LOL) when Lost started airing, but my parents loved it, although they hated the ending and made that very clear when I told them I was watching.

My best friend however, said that people just don't get the ending so I held an open mind. I loved it!!! I can see how people got confused but for me it was pretty obvious, and very very sweet. I think it works best when bingeing, perhaps. Some of the comments here are very stubborn and funny but I really don't get how people can refute a character clearly saying "It was all real"...

Just thought I'd say thanks for these blogs - they really added to my experience! Wishing you and your family all the best!

Mike V. said...

Hi Ben! Yep I still see the comments. :) thanks for reading during your binge and thanks for the props! I agree. The show works much better as a binge when you don’t have as much time to think about all the different possibilities. But half the fun with this show was doing exactly that. So I wouldn’t trade any of it! After each episode aired and I wrote my recaps I was able to toss all that aside and rewatch the episode and just appreciate how good the show was as dramatic tv. We never saw anything like that on network television and it never happened again. It was flawed but it was awesome. I’ve always believed the journey is more important than the destination. And ending you don’t love doesn’t mean you wasted your time. I just happened to really love the lost ending. People disliked it for various reasons. Many just didn’t get it. Others just thought it was a cop out. Others just built up bigger ideas in their head of what the show was all about. But if you think about how many people were watching the show and all the different theories each person had, you realize you can never please everyone. I think over time more people have appreciated the ending but in the thick of it people have a hard time. Glad you were able to have a different experience! Thanks again for reading and for dropping a note!

Kessler said...

Getting close to 15 years since the show ended, so I did a rewatch and read a lot of your recaps, I just wanted to thank you for actually paying attention to what the characters say and do so that you didn't fall into the trap of thinking everyone was dead and in purgatory the whole time. Still insane to me that people thought that was the case with how clear the ending is in making sure that the audience understands everything on the island was real.

Mike V. said...

Thanks Kessler! Seemed pretty clear to me for sure. The post credits thing really confused people. Lol but people also stopped watching and came back to watch the finale without knowing what was going on. And people were sharpening their knives expecting to be disappointed. It’s really tough to end a show and especially end it to 100% satisfaction when there are so many theories and questions the writers never intended to make or answer. Game of thrones was similar. Yes the ending was rushed but there was no way to wrap that show up and satisfy everyone. Especially when their source material ran out.

Anyway. September will be 20 years since it started! Think I might be finally ready for another rewatch. I’ve been getting the itch!

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