*** WARNING! Spoilers abound. ***
(Spoiler tag added above because it looks like i ruined Lost for one of my readers. Sorry, Nora!)
I didn’t like it.
I was already mad that Jin and Sun died in the 3rd to last episode, for no apparent reason. And i mean, i was pissed! I was telling people who don’t even watch Lost how disappointed i was.
The penultimate episode was titled “What They Died For”, and didn’t really answer any questions about why they had died. It still seemed purposeless to me. The Big Meaning Of It All didn’t justify their deaths in my mind. Of all the people on the island, Jin and Sun were the only ones i really cared got off the island, and back to their daughter. They were the only ones with a real-world reason to survive off-island.
All this season, i’ve been wondering how these flash-sideways things would tie into the main story. Was this What Would Have Happened if Jacob hadn’t chosen them all? Was this the real reality, and the island was just some made-up thing like a dream?
No, it turns out that the flash-sideways things were the made-up dream. The explanation was that it was a place that they had all created together as a way to find each other and remember the island, since that was the most important part of everyone’s lives.
I didn’t like it. It was so… emotionally manipulative. Everyone was figuring out that they were dead. You didn’t know at first exactly what they were figuring out, but they cried and seemed happy and huggy, so you assumed it must be something wonderful. I cried, like everyone else. But to me, that part overshadowed what was really happening on the island. When they were trying to get the plane off the island, i didn’t even think at the time that it was the “real” story.
Maybe that was the point. The reason we loved the show so much was yes of course the mysteriousness of the island, but it was more about the characters and the relationships between them. So maybe it was important to show how they all cared for each other and reconnected after they were all dead.
But it was so HOKEY. Let’s bring back Shannon for 30 seconds! And she and Sayid can makeout in the parking lot! Wait, what? I mean, it was nice to see her again, but i thought Nadia was Sayid’s true love. Sayid and Shannon only connected for like two episodes before she was killed off.
It would have been nice to see what happened to the ones that actually got off the island the second time, like we did with the Oceanic Six. Not that that was any picnic for any of them – it seemed to me during the flash forwards that they were all completely miserable off-island. But it would have been nice to see Claire reunited with Aaron.
By the way, when did The Numbers stop having significance?
And who the hell knows or remembers their flight number, ever?
I haven’t been completely happy with the show since Charlie died. Claire disappeared sometime before that, and that was annoying, and when she came back finally she was brainwashed and in league with the super baddie. And then Sayid turned to the dark side and that made me mad too. And then Jin and Sun died. Grr.
I’m not sure what i wanted. A happy ending, maybe? Some people have said that this WAS a happy ending. But i don’t see it that way. To me it was just a nebulous ending. Yes, the bad guy was defeated and yes there was a teary-eyed reunion. But it wasn’t real, and i think that’s what is bothering me. Most of what happened in the show at least tried to be somewhat reality based, if only loosely.
Lost will now become lost in my memory.
June 4th, 2010 2:25 pm
GAAH put a spoiler tag on that shit!
June 4th, 2010 2:30 pm
and yes, I read faster than I can decide to stop reading. It’s a curse I have. A single glance at the page showed me the title “The End of Lost” as well as the fact that you didn’t like it and two characters who died.
June 5th, 2010 10:08 am
I think I was the only one that didn’t cry with Lost. And unfortunately, Frank ruined the Jin/Sun deaths because he wrote the spoiler on his facebook status, and I was three episodes behind. The day and age of DVRs is a penalty for all who 1) want to discuss what they watched vs. 2) those that are unable to watch it right away.
I became “open-minded” about Lost and what it would finally explain, if anything at all. The ending was fine. I liked the twist of the sideways story.
But it certainly didn’t make me cry or feel that the end of Lost was as powerful a I read in the reviews the next day. So I felt kind of like an outcast, being a loyal, faithful Lost viewer from the beginning of time.
I think the think I liked most was reading that the show started with Jack, waking in the bamboo fields and the shot focused on his eye opening…to the end, where he died in the bamboo fields, with that one eye closing. That was powerful. But I didn’t see it while I watched it. I only knew this from a review I read.
To date, the most powerful ending to a show for me is the last episode of Six Feet Under (which, to me, was very similar in premise to Lost’s ending…which is probably why I didn’t enjoy Lost as much, since I compared it to Six Feet Under). I have Sia’s “Breathe Me” on my iPod and every time I hear it, I only think of Six Feet Under and Claire driving away. Beautiful. In fact, I am posting it on my blog now…