by Fred
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Every December, right after our annual review, the investors give Patrick, Desiree and I our profanity coupons for the next year. I normally save them all for November, when the days start getting shorter, along with my fuse. But, in response to last night’s series finale of Lost, I won’t be able to resist an early outburst: after an unspecified length of time, all of the characters are dead? And reunited in an unnamed limbo? Headed one-by-one for an all-embracing white light? Led by a character named Christian Shepherd?
That’s your big finale? “In the long run we are all dead?” Well, yeah. No shit. I set aside an hour a week every Tuesday night for that? For six years?
(By the way I’ll need a receipt for that S-bomb.)
Quite frankly the present correspondent had already distanced himself a bit from this manifesto, which listed twelve specific mysteries that required explanation. By last night at least half of them were yesterday’s news anyway, and a handful of well-written essays leading up to the finale reminded us that the best film and television concludes with some well-crafted loose ends. Emphasis on “well-crafted.” Because now it seems that even this lesson in happy-smiley has again violated its own laws: Jack was demonstrably not “like” Jacob, nor was Hurley “like” Jack. (Unless the baptisms were red herrings, and Jacob survived the ages on willpower alone, in which case his return in “What They Died For” would have been impossible. And in which case, Jack would almost certainly have survived a single knife stick to the abdomen after being bathed in the source.)
And while I will dismiss the shots of plane wreckage during the end credits as too brief to be relevant, the equally brief detail of the sunken island during “LA X” stays with me. The finale reminds us that, in the afterlife, time has no dimension. Granted. So yes, after eons, the island will be totally submerged in water. Blame global warming or seismic activity or Milli Vanilli, but we can buy a submerged island … irrespective of time. (See the expended curse ticket, above.) But that sequence had a gritty immediacy that lent the “flash sideways” theory (at least it turned out to be a theory) an intriguing credibility.
Instead, nearly half of the eighteen hours of Season 6 screen time turns out to be footage from the world of the spirits. It’s terribly disappointing. Some of the show’s finest moments took place in last night’s conclusion. Jack’s biblical showdown with Locke was expertly written, shot, lit, and edited. Their encounter and armistice some time earlier was thrilling, awkward and bizarre all at once. Sawyer’s olive branch for Jack was touching, and, admittedly, his reunion with Juliet — while part of the afterlife sequence — was fantastic television. This is the Lost that we missed. Not at ten-thirty last night, when the credits rolled, but during the two-and-a-half hours leading up to them. Too many happy reunions. Too many knowing smiles. Too little Lost.
For those who haven’t read our May 2009 post, it speculated that a feature film “greenlight will follow some time in 2011.” That would have given the writers enough time to sort through the ashes (Jacob’s ashes?) and construct an informative and exciting companion piece. But their message is unambiguous, both on-screen and off: “Forget it.” Besides, after Season Six, are you still interested?
