COp out just like BSG.

[Awesome Possum]

I thought I was watching a rerun of Ashes to Ashes - IT WAS THE *EXACT SAME* ENDING.

BSG may well have been a cop out, but it was within the theme of the show. Since when did dying souls need to jump through time and blow up a nuke? Seriously, why? For me this is the biggest televisual kick in the nuts - ever.

Only the side-flashes were the after-life. The rest was regular life, it was basically a big flash forward.

 

[Agent Richard07]

He said he picked them because they reminded him of himself and he had apparently watched over them for years. Maybe he does this for a lot of people and slowly narrowed it down to just them, finally arranging for all them to be on Flight 815.

I think he simply knew they were going to be on flight 815 in the future. I don't think he actually arranged for them to be there. That's the impression I got while watching the pre-finale special.

 

[Dac]

I thought I was watching a rerun of Ashes to Ashes - IT WAS THE *EXACT SAME* ENDING.

BSG may well have been a cop out, but it was within the theme of the show. Since when did dying souls need to jump through time and blow up a nuke? Seriously, why? For me this is the biggest televisual kick in the nuts - ever.

Only the side-flashes were the after-life. The rest was regular life, it was basically a big flash forward.

Ooooh. Still, what was Penny doing in the "afterlife"? She was never there, and Desmond wasnt shown dead. Same with Hurley and Ben. Why does setting off a nuke simultaneously not kill you while at the same time showing you the "afterlife"? Not to mention how the hell did Ben escape the falling tree and run around like nothing was wrong afterwards?

 

[Yminale]

I'm assuming they're telling the truth when they talk about how they wrote the show.

This is Hollywood. You never take what entertainment people say at face value.

They recently said Lost told the story they wanted to tell,

If you mean the story of how they string people along so they can cash in their checks, I have to agree with you.

and it's well known how they negotiated an end date with the network.

Which basically means the network decided not to renew the show and basically told the producers ahead of time.

The finale was bad, but it was bad because they wrote it bad, not because TV made it bad.

They've been writing bad because there was no plan. They basically went on tanget until they got bored with it and then moved to another.

 

[startrekwatcher]

TV shows should be about the characters first and foremost. Both BSG and Lost had fantastic finales.

If the writers want to write characters why saddle themselves with a complicated mythology they really aren't interested in doing justice to? I know here is an idea don't include it.

The screw-up on BSG's mythology is not as agregious as with LOST since it was never played up to the degree that it was on LOST and in that regard it will undermine LOST's legacy. How much I don't know?

TV shows should be about the characters first and foremost. Both BSG and Lost had fantastic finales.

This. Totally this. I never thought I'd see a more moving finale than BSG's, and now I'm up in the air. Well, let the naysayers vent if it makes them feel better... both BSG & Lost had finales that were true to themselves. Epic wins, both.

I disagree. Mysteries are answered all the time in many formats with satisfying results. LOST itself did so on many occasions just look back at S3-5. If one doesn't consider how the writers handled a critical component that they themselves introduced in evaluating the series and the finale then they are not judging the work as a whole.

How it will ultimately effect my verdict on the series won'tbe know fully for probably sometime--I need some distance to get a perspective but my feeling now is it does hurt it.

 

[RoJoHen]

You can call it a cop out all you want, but this show has ALWAYS been about the characters. The Island mysteries have always been secondary.

Stop making excuse for poor planning. The character were just there to get the story moving. "Lost" got dull when it was just about the characters and most people cared about the mysteries. Honestly you knew thing were going to fall apart once they piled on one new thread after another and never tried to create a cohesive narrative.

I'm not making excuses for anything. I have enjoyed Lost from start to finish, and the Island's mysteries have never been as interesting to me as what the characters are doing. The big question of why they were brought to the Island was answered. All the other random stuff about the Island didn't need to be answered because it ultimately had nothing to do with this group of characters.

But again, for me, the story was never about the Island. It was about Oceanic 815. The Island was just a setting.

 

[Jetfire]

I think the show could have done without the more outlandish magical stuff if they had no intent on explaining at least some of it...If the island is real and the flash-sideways part of an afterlife...then so be it...the island could have mysteries without them bordering on the ridiculous...IMHO. I think viewers would have excepted the island as the last part of an advanced ancient civilization or even alien in origin...something to fill that gap which they did not. Overall it was great seeing these characters and I liked the fact Hurley & Ben were given a chance to protect the island.

 

[Ryan8bit]

He said he picked them because they reminded him of himself and he had apparently watched over them for years. Maybe he does this for a lot of people and slowly narrowed it down to just them, finally arranging for all them to be on Flight 815.

Which begs the question of how that was arranged.

Often I got a predestination vibe from all his actions, especially the one where he is nonchalantly reading while Locke is pushed out the window. Something like that when paired with things like the numbers really seems to imply that they were bound by predetermined fate, and I can't help wonder about how Jacob knows so much about that.

Even his actions were questionable given that he enabled his candidates like how he gave the pen to Sawyer. Perhaps Sawyer was alone and in despair at that moment, but didn't Jacob just make it worse just to suit his own needs? I felt like his claim that they were all flawed was unfair given that he was a catalyst for their downfall.

I guess there's a lot to think about.

 

[Awesome Possum]

I thought I was watching a rerun of Ashes to Ashes - IT WAS THE *EXACT SAME* ENDING.

BSG may well have been a cop out, but it was within the theme of the show. Since when did dying souls need to jump through time and blow up a nuke? Seriously, why? For me this is the biggest televisual kick in the nuts - ever.

Only the side-flashes were the after-life. The rest was regular life, it was basically a big flash forward.

Ooooh. Still, what was Penny doing in the "afterlife"? She was never there, and Desmond wasnt shown dead. Same with Hurley and Ben. Why does setting off a nuke simultaneously not kill you while at the same time showing you the "afterlife"? Not to mention how the hell did Ben escape the falling tree and run around like nothing was wrong afterwards?

They died years later, everyone dies eventually. Jack's father explained it to him if you remember. Time had no meaning there. The nuke had nothing to do with the side-flashes. We simply thought that it was, sort of how we thought that the first flash forward was just another flashback.

As for the tree, I'm guess it just pinned him down and didn't crush him. They got it off him off camera.

 

[Stone_Cold_Sisko]

I thought it was pretty effective... but I agree, they wrote themselves into a corner with all the mystical shit that happens on the island.

They never had any answers.

They deflected it pretty well by focusing the finale so heavily on the characters fate, and giving a pretty good answer for the flash-sideways.

 

[IndyJones]

I thought I was watching a rerun of Ashes to Ashes - IT WAS THE *EXACT SAME* ENDING.

BSG may well have been a cop out, but it was within the theme of the show. Since when did dying souls need to jump through time and blow up a nuke? Seriously, why? For me this is the biggest televisual kick in the nuts - ever.

Only the side-flashes were the after-life. The rest was regular life, it was basically a big flash forward.

Ooooh. Still, what was Penny doing in the "afterlife"? She was never there, and Desmond wasnt shown dead. Same with Hurley and Ben.

Death isn't linear.

Christian told Jack that some of the people died before him and some died after. I don't understand why so many people had trouble understanding that scene, were you all on bathroom breaks?

 

[RoJoHen]

Jack's father explained it to him if you remember.

I'm starting to think people must have collectively gone to the bathroom during this scene, because Christian pretty much laid it all out there very clearly.

 

[Dac]

Oooooh. Fair enough. This is why they dont normally air TV shows at 5 in the morning.

 

[Dac]

Oooooh. Fair enough. This is why they dont normally air TV shows at 5 in the morning.

 

[Awesome Possum]

He said he picked them because they reminded him of himself and he had apparently watched over them for years. Maybe he does this for a lot of people and slowly narrowed it down to just them, finally arranging for all them to be on Flight 815.

Which begs the question of how that was arranged.

Often I got a predestination vibe from all his actions, especially the one where he is nonchalantly reading while Locke is pushed out the window. Something like that when paired with things like the numbers really seems to imply that they were bound by predetermined fate, and I can't help wonder about how Jacob knows so much about that.

Even his actions were questionable given that he enabled his candidates like how he gave the pen to Sawyer. Perhaps Sawyer was alone and in despair at that moment, but didn't Jacob just make it worse just to suit his own needs? I felt like his claim that they were all flawed was unfair given that he was a catalyst for their downfall.

I guess there's a lot to think about.

Maybe it is just fate that they would wind up there. Like Agent Richard07 said, he just knew. I don't know if he was just working with fate or he somehow changed fate by interacting with them.

 

[Awesome Possum]

I thought it was pretty effective... but I agree, they wrote themselves into a corner with all the mystical shit that happens on the island.

They never had any answers.

They deflected it pretty well by focusing the finale so heavily on the characters fate, and giving a pretty good answer for the flash-sideways.

Well all the mystical shit comes from the glowing water fountain thing. As to what that is, I really don't know. I'm going with it the idea that is a big version of what was in the briefcase in Pulp Fiction.

 

[Delta1]

I'm assuming they're telling the truth when they talk about how they wrote the show.

This is Hollywood. You never take what entertainment people say at face value.

So, you assume everything they say is false? Or only those things that are contrary to your position are false, and everything else is true? If you have some actual evidence to support your position, please share it. Something more authoritative than a phpbb smiley, I mean.

 

[propita]

Just so I'm clear...the flash-sideways were the creation of the group as a whole until all were ready to move on together? So Penny joined whenever it was she died, since there is no "now"--no linearity of time.

And Ben was not yet ready to join them fully?

I take it that they didn't all die in the initial crash, did they? They all joined together in the church whenever it is that each did die (but again, there's no "now")?

Baby Aaron was there as Claire's manifestation of him? So does that mean the Aaron we saw in the church was not the real Aaron? Or whenever it is that Aaron dies, he moves on a a baby?

I'm confused.

 

[RoJoHen]

Just so I'm clear...the flash-sideways were the creation of the group as a whole until all were ready to move on together? So Penny joined whenever it was she died, since there is no "now"--no linearity of time.

And Ben was not yet ready to join them fully?

I take it that they didn't all die in the initial crash, did they? They all joined together in the church whenever it is that each did die (but again, there's no "now")?

Baby Aaron was there as Claire's manifestation of him? So does that mean the Aaron we saw in the church was not the real Aaron? Or whenever it is that Aaron dies, he moves on a a baby?

I'm confused.

I'm guessing baby Aaron was just something Claire brought with her, much like how Sun was pregnant even though her child had long since been born.

Otherwise, you pretty much have everything down.

 

[Agent Richard07]

Just so I'm clear...the flash-sideways were the creation of the group as a whole until all were ready to move on together? So Penny joined whenever it was she died, since there is no "now"--no linearity of time.

And Ben was not yet ready to join them fully?

I take it that they didn't all die in the initial crash, did they? They all joined together in the church whenever it is that each did die (but again, there's no "now")?

Correct.

Baby Aaron was there as Claire's manifestation of him? So does that mean the Aaron we saw in the church was not the real Aaron? Or whenever it is that Aaron dies, he moves on a a baby?

Interesting. I don't know if Aaron was really there. He could very well have been nothing more than Claire's manifestation but I'm not certain.