LOST TV Show • Page 21

I meant a more specific thematic idea for this show, because yes of course it is. You can definitely say it about basically everything, regardless of genre. Lost was specifically about human connection tying us together through time and space and good and evil and was much more explicitly about those ideas than most shows.

 

Also I think I blocked all of my dumb theories for Lost out of my memory a long time ago. Lol. I would need to watch specific episodes to remember what I hoped for/believed. I’m pretty sure there was one big one about Walt and maybe Locke, but I’m blanking now.

 

You’re more than welcome to disagree but the condescension can go.*
Have you watched PLL? Just to understand where you’re coming from.
There are lots wrong with PLL don’t get me wrong it’s problematic af but part of the point I’m making is LOST is also kinda poorly written ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

I also have an extremely solid foundation of comparison (that I started to go into in my first post) and could explain quite elaborately all the similarities, not just in the shows themselves but also in the cultural context that went with it. (Ie dissecting theories every week, it being a very social show etc)

*edited to add: you were probably just joking but I took it a little too harshly so I apologize for that

 

Yeah probably, but if that’s the case then it’s just as moot to bring up that that’s what makes *this* show so good. Which again is what is argued about PLL

You’re right, you got me there!

 

Like I’m *somewhat* being facetious when I compare them but that’s only because I know how pretentious LOST fanatics are and can’t stand the idea of their baby being compared to something “trashy” like PLL.
But I could also go into a whole spiel about how society just loves to devalue things that are intended for teenage girls but hold things up as a masterpiece that are intended for adult men ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

I fucking love PLL but I can trash on it all day and call out all of its faults. Lost fans can’t seem to do the same lol like everyone thinks it’s perfect

 

You do know I’m a woman right? And I also agree that Lost has major faults, some of which we’ve gone over just today. It had huge holes and character missteps and random tangents that weren’t worth it. Tons of us spent years ranting about things that infuriated us or were annoying or unsatisfying.

I also definitely 100% feel that PLL is specifically absolutely not worthy of being in discussion with it or any other great show. Not because it is intended for young women, because I’m super against that and hate that things I loved growing up were either made fun or or if I liked something “not” specifically intended for my demographic I was treated like I didn’t really understand it or appreciate it by large portions of commenters.

I watched the first few seasons of PLL but found the whole thing so offensive that I stopped completely. I kept up through friends who stuck with it or random reviews to know that even the diehards were livid with how it ended and how the showrunner was so disrespectful to the fans and even the characters with how blatantly manipulative and poorly done it was dragged out and concluded.

PLL is a toxic mess of despicable people holding an idiot ball for eight years. It presented the relationship of a grown man and his student as romantic and sexy and good, it had the trans person as a villain trope, it treated mental illness horribly throughout its run, and countless other awful storylines. That’s not even getting to the writing itself which was so, so awful.

Compare Lost to teenage-oriented shows or make out there comparisons and theories all you want, but that one specific show is just so bad in every way.

 

Also in case I haven’t mentioned it, as much as I adore Lost and it holds an incredibly important place in my heart, it’s not up to the absolute top tier of television ever. It would go on a list of personal favorites without a doubt, and it would certainly have to be up there with like GOT if we’re just talking cultural relevance and national obsession/water cooler talk, but it isn’t perfect or incredibly close to perfect like a ton of other options.

 

Out of curiosity, what would you put up in that top tier of television? And/or personal favorites?

 

Lol okay

First of all yes I do know because you corrected me last time and I remember that.

Agree to disagree with sweeping generalizations like it not belonging in conversation about great shows. That’s honestly ridiculous.
I never at all compared the quality of the two, but it’s clear that’s what you inferred. I think I already made clear what I AM comparing, and said that there was much more beyond that that I’m not going to bother getting into because this is dumb.
I know and agree with all of the faults you listed (save for the exaggeration of how bad the writing is) like I already said I am more than aware of all of the faults because I DID watch all of the show, not only that but participated on a bigger scale of cultural conversation including and based on the lgbt website autostraddle. I’m just saying that those faults are something I know very deeply but you’re pointing them out in an attempt to disprove my comparison. But again I never compared the quality or overall “value” of the show. There are just very specific things that are similar/identical that, as someone who watched both shows, I couldn’t help but notice.

 

Also one last thing then I’m done and we can go back to someone explaining to me wtf the whole Walt thing was anyway (ie all the insinuation that he was ‘special’, etc)

But I would also argue that it’s even worth thinking about why PLL gets dismissed for those criticisms. Plenty of other culturally “great” shows have REALLY problematic jokes, themes, storylines, whathaveyou. But if they are intended for adult audiences (esp if male but not always- Friends comes to mind) they aren’t dismissed for these things. They are still allowed to be called great. I believe that PLL is still great (for what into is) despite its faults. I also feel that way about LOST. I also feel that some of those faults overlap between shows imo.

Maybe you specifically would dismiss friends as being called great television lol but hopefully you can understand what I’m saying?

 

That’s cool, I see more where you’re coming from. I definitely did take you to be saying that they were similar in quality in comparing the writing or how well they were executed. I’m not sure I fully get what you mean still, but I understand that you aren’t serious about them being identical or something like I read.

I actually wouldn’t mind reading your more in depth reasoning if you want to PM me, even if it will most likely be a hate read with me yelling out loud to no one in my house. Lol.

And yeah I’m sorry if I’ve told you that before, I’ve just been called he like three times on here recently and I never remember who is aware or not and I feel like some of my posts would come across very different if that was assumed.

 

(Yes please PM me I want to talk about the culture of young women in entertainment and not derail this more ssshhhhhh.)

 

Sure I’ll pm you so we can get back to the real juice in here
And no worries, you’re definitely right ha I just wanted to be clear I know and that I was speaking on a more broad society level not personally towards you!

 

Okay so i've been brushing up on my LOST lore today of course but I am wondering one thing that I'm sure can be answered here, the sideways flash world, this is entered whenever someone died that hasn't "let go" yet, so we have to assume people like Sawyer and Kate, who I believe left the island ultimately and survived, their sideways world is after they had died whenever that may had been? Like we don't know their cause of death we just know that they died because they are now in the sideways world.


I hope that makes sense haha. Turns out I didn't get the ending as much as I like to pretend to.

 

Yeah, sideways world is only for people who have died but they all arrived there at the same “time” regardless of when they died in the real world.

 

Yep. Everyone has ended up there when they died, regardless of when or where that may be.

I kind of wish we had a Six Feet Under for everybody...

 

Aha! It seriously just clicked after reading this.

 

In regards to the ending of Lost, a friend of mine had his girlfriend watch it a few years ago and she had questions about it. He pointed her in my direction and I sent her this. Thought I’d post it here in case it helps at all. I’ll spoiler tag just in case.

If there's someone out there who has never seen Lost or is watching Lost now and doesn't want to know how it ends prematurely, DON'T READ WHAT I'M ABOUT TO SAY.

So the entire season six (which I agree with many is one of the weakest seasons in my humble little opinion) flash sideways world is actually all taking place LONG after everyone has died and is essentially a “waiting room” for the afterlife. Fans refer to it as "Flash Sideways" because the first few seasons featured flashbacks as a narrative storytelling device and then the later seasons used flashforwards in a surprise turn. The Flash Sideways is referred to as such because it's first presented at the beginning of season six as a sort of alternate universe where everyone's lives are askew, a stark contrast to what we've known over the last several seasons/years. It's a sideways world where the characters' lives have taken dramatic, and rather redemptive (we'll get to that), turns due to having never landed on the island. When fans were first introduced to this world, we all thought a million different things. Is this the world they created after setting off the bomb at the end of season five (as in an alternate universe or timeline that has somehow branched off from the original one due to the bomb)? Is this their second chance at redemption and the island is now the alternate reality they're trapped in? Do they have to somehow transfer consciousness from the island world to this new reality in order to save the day?

In reality, as Jack tells Desmond in the finale, there are no second chances. We only get this one shot. The island world is the only single reality and everything they've experienced there is real. In the flash sideways world, Jack is confused and essentially asks if they were dead the whole time, but Christian clarifies this by telling him it all happened and it was all real. The flash sideways world is a waiting room for the afterlife built subconsciously by everyone on the island so they could all meet up with each other again after they'd died. They would meet up in this world they made together to remember and to let go before "moving on" to the afterlife. Some fans like to refer to this world as purgatory because a long running joke/theory was that the island folk were dead the whole time and the island itself was, in fact, purgatory (a theory the showrunners had to endlessly deny for the entirety of the show's run).

So at the end when you see Jack lying down on the island (with Vincent lying next to him) and closing his eyes, that's the moment Jack dies and shows up in the flash sideways world (where we find him, once again, on Oceanic flight 815). After Jack dies on the island, Kate, Sawyer, Claire, Frank Lapidus, Richard and Miles all head home on the Ajira plane. They all live long lives off the island. While we don't see what happened to them after that, we can assume that Kate held to her promise and looked after Aaron with Claire, Sawyer probably returned to take care of his daughter, etc. Years later, after many, many years of life, they all passed away due to one thing or another (old age, sickness, etc.). This is why Kate tells Jack in the flash sideways world, "I missed you so much." She is referring to all her long years of life without him after he passed away on the island.

So what about that whole redemptive turn their lives seem to take in the flash sideways world? Notice, for example, how rather than killing his father with poisonous gas amidst "the purge", Ben is now taking care of his father, notably by helping him with his oxygen tank. Also note that in our reality, Ben allows Alex to be sacrificed. In the flash sideways world, he is threatened by principal Reynolds who says he'll write a negative letter of recommendation for Alex. Ben is unwilling to sacrifice Alex's future in this world and thus backs down. This is a common thread amongst all of the characters in the flash sideways universe/waiting room. Sawyer is a cop rather than a conman. Jack has a loving platonic relationship with his ex-wife Juliet rather than the broken, vicious one he had in life. In this world he finds Claire and they become loving siblings. He even has a son whom he is able to tell "I could never be disappointed in you" after explaining his complicated relationship with his own father. This is Jack's way of exorcising his own demons and this is essentially why the sideways universe exists for these people. If you notice, in every single episode during the flash sideways world, the characters are seen staring into a mirror or reflective surface. In this waiting room, they learn to better themselves before "remembering" who they were in life and then moving on into eternity.

This is also why Ben chooses not to leave with the group. Hurley sees him outside the church and asks if he's coming in. Ben says no because there is unfinished business for him to attend to. He says this because the people he is meant to move on with are the people whose lives he ruined or affected profoundly (Alex, Danielle, and his father). Ben must help them remember and then receive their forgiveness before moving on with them. Ben spent the rest of his life on the island with Hurley attempting to redeem himself for the things he'd done in the name of Jacob. This is why Hurley tells him "You were a real good number 2" and Ben responds "You were a great number 1." On the island, Hurley took Jacob's place as protector of the island and Ben took Richard's as the helper. They lived presumably very long lives together on the island until they finally passed the torch onto someone else. So who would they have passed the torch on to? Well, in order to get that answer, you have to watch the epilogue the producers shot for the complete series DVD/blu-ray. Once you do, you’ll find that Walt is recruited by Ben and Hurley to return to the island because he is special and they need his help. This is where you get another answer to the "why are the dead people on the island, like Michael, trapped there?" question. Those people didn't get a chance to redeem themselves and are thus trapped on the island with unfinished business. Michael made a lot of terrible mistakes and that's why he's stuck there. Michael needs help to move on and he's going to get it from another source...his son, Walt. The assumption among fans was also that Aaron would eventually join Walt on the island and they’d be the new Jacob/Richard and Hurley/Ben. Walt would help Michael’s soul move on from the island, and then they’d meet again in the “waiting room” where they’d presumably have a much happier and healthier father/son relationship before moving on.

Oh and I like to go back and watch the end of this scene after Mr. Eko died in season 3 and imagine that, retroactively, this is actually the first flash sideways we ever got without realizing at the time what it was:

 

The Hurley and Ben arc/scene was so good I’m tearing up just reading that recap. Ben broke me so often.

Also why didn’t I just say the flash sideways is the dot in Jeremy Bearimy, it’s so succinct.

 

I got emotional reading this lol

 

This was better than anything I read on the internet today. Can you explain why/how Walt would help Michael's soul move on? It's been a little while since I saw S6 so I'm forgetting the Jacob/Richard and Ben/Hurley dynamic and purpose.

 

I’m not entirely sure how he would do it exactly to be honest. He was shown to have special abilities throughout the show and I’ve seen some interesting speculative theories about his powers deriving from electromagnetism. If true, it ties in to the island which essentially runs on electromagnetism. In one episode we see that he influences birds' flight paths because birds navigate using the Earth's magnetic field (he wants to show his mom’s boyfriend a picture of a bird and then that exact bird hits the window and dies). It’s possible that’s how he guides the knives Locke has him throw as well. Later in the series he projects himself through time and space to visit Locke and tell him to get up. He sees things in his mind and they happen (the right piece in a game of checkers, dead bird, projecting himself, etc.) so maybe his ability will be used to assist the dead in seeing and finding their pathway off the island. Perhaps they’re trapped in the magnetic field around the island and Walt, having had years to hone his ability (contrasting the moment the frenzied nature of his powers accidentally kill that bird by sending it on a collision course with the window), can properly guide them through it. I’m not entirely sure, but I think it’s left up to us to interpret how Walt will effectively communicate with the dead using his special abilities.

 

This is reminding me of how I always wanted to make an edit of Those You’ve Known from Spring Awakening tied to the last episodes and all the people coming back together/the cyclical nature of the island.

 

Oh! And the “Hurley Bird”. Y’all are correct in that it doesn’t get explained on the show. They do directly explain it in that epilogue that was posted though. How you may feel about that is, well...your mileage may vary. The Dharma Initiative genetically engineered large birds called “hy-birds” (a play on hybrid) to test how animals adapt to the island’s unique properties. The bird’s cry sounds like “Hurley” and it has a wingspan of 16 feet.

It’s one of those questions you get an answer to on the epilogue and then you’re just like “oh.”

 

I don't think i'm gonna do a full series rewatch at the moment, I watched S1-S5 last year then moved to a new place and never watched six, so I think i'm gonna pop on season 6, i'm excited.