Getting a little more LOST
October 20, 2023 11:03 AM Subscribe
Over a year ago, YouTuber Billiam posted the second of his examinations of the television series LOST, and we discussed it here. Well, we now have the third [and not final] installment LOST Was Insane During The Writers' Strike which at a tight 3h30m summarizes the eight episodes that were aired around the 2007 WGA strike. Billiam promises the final installment will come shortly.
Related: Donald Moore thought that the 2007 WGA strike was good actually for the final season of Battlestar Galactica. He is wrong, but everyone is entitled to their opinions.
posted by Popular Ethics at 1:42 PM on October 20, 2023 [4 favorites]
posted by Popular Ethics at 1:42 PM on October 20, 2023 [4 favorites]
At this late date, so many big, promising, imaginative series have been marred by unsatisfying endings (it seems more like the rule than the exception that producers fail to end a show well) that I don't feel like it tarnishes my feelings about Lost so much anymore. I mean, I watched it week by week when it first aired and I own the DVDs for seasons 1-5 (yeah, lol) and honestly I still think it's in my top 5 series ever. (I was pretty cranky about the Christio-centric religiosity of the "flash sideways" parts of the final episodes for a while.)
But, honestly, for its time, I had never seen anything like it, particularly on US network tv. Those who watch it now in retrospect on streaming don't get how exciting it was like to watch it then, even when it meandered in the middle seasons.
posted by aught at 1:51 PM on October 20, 2023 [7 favorites]
But, honestly, for its time, I had never seen anything like it, particularly on US network tv. Those who watch it now in retrospect on streaming don't get how exciting it was like to watch it then, even when it meandered in the middle seasons.
posted by aught at 1:51 PM on October 20, 2023 [7 favorites]
Related: Donald Moore thought that the 2007 WGA strike was good actually for the final season of Battlestar Galactica. He is wrong, but everyone is entitled to their opinions.
An even more badly botched ending to a great series, sigh.
posted by aught at 1:52 PM on October 20, 2023 [4 favorites]
An even more badly botched ending to a great series, sigh.
posted by aught at 1:52 PM on October 20, 2023 [4 favorites]
I think the reason so many, primarily american, series end poorly is that their run is pushed further that the creators had originally scripted for. So, instead of a solid two-seasons-and-done, you end up with series that have to extend/expand the story three, four, five, or more years, and end up losing the handle on how it should end satisfyingly.
posted by Thorzdad at 3:03 PM on October 20, 2023 [8 favorites]
posted by Thorzdad at 3:03 PM on October 20, 2023 [8 favorites]
See How I Met Your Mother, but Lost and BSG in particular suffered from "we set up weird shit, and we didn't bother to think out why those things existed ahead of time, we left it to Future Writers to figure out." Oh, for a J. Michael Straczynski who thought out EVERYTHING beforehand.
I had to laugh at a "tight 3h30m" though. I'm interested in the topic but not for 3 hours and 30 minutes of it at this point.
posted by jenfullmoon at 5:59 PM on October 20, 2023 [4 favorites]
I had to laugh at a "tight 3h30m" though. I'm interested in the topic but not for 3 hours and 30 minutes of it at this point.
posted by jenfullmoon at 5:59 PM on October 20, 2023 [4 favorites]
I'm interested in the topic but not for 3 hours and 30 minutes of it at this point.
Oh, you're discounting the NINE hours of videos he's already done on LOST, linked in the previous discussion link above.
posted by hippybear at 6:16 PM on October 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
Oh, you're discounting the NINE hours of videos he's already done on LOST, linked in the previous discussion link above.
posted by hippybear at 6:16 PM on October 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
Thing about serialized American series is not necessarily that they're short stories stretched long, it's that the show runner doesn't know how long to plan for. A series made to be short might get orders for many following seasons. A series made to last for six seasons and a movie might suddenly have to wrap up as many subplots as it can and leave the rest hanging due to an unexpected cancellation. Some series end seasons on cliffhangers so that audiences will clamor for further episodes, to increase their chances of getting picked up. And some series might actually end up with the worst of all these scenarios combined: Lucifer was cancelled, wrapped up subplots, then a fan campaign saved it and it was picked up for streaming and had to continue from there.
posted by JHarris at 7:40 PM on October 20, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by JHarris at 7:40 PM on October 20, 2023 [2 favorites]
To me Lost is absolutely magical. I just love the mystery of it. I don't care if the mysteries are never resolved. The story and characters obviously have to be good enough to keep you watching, which they are. But I just love the discovery of mysteries. The way the characters would discover mysterious thing after mysterious thing. To me the feeling of being confronted with a mystery is more enjoyable than finding out an explanation for it. I just love how the characters are always trying to explore and understand the mysteries, endlessly. I just love being in that world, and the bizarreness of it. It's almost better if they never do discover the ultimate explanations. That for me would be dramatically satisfying, in a way.
But I can't watch the linked video, unfortunately, as it has too many spoilers in it. Yes, I have watched Lost four times already, but I'd like to watch it again someday, which means I have to try and forget as much as possible about it in the meantime.
posted by mokey at 3:01 AM on October 21, 2023 [4 favorites]
But I can't watch the linked video, unfortunately, as it has too many spoilers in it. Yes, I have watched Lost four times already, but I'd like to watch it again someday, which means I have to try and forget as much as possible about it in the meantime.
posted by mokey at 3:01 AM on October 21, 2023 [4 favorites]
I’m excited for this. I loved lost. (I also loved The Leftovers, also a Lindelof project)
I even appreciated the ending. I don’t think there’s much else they could have done with the situation they were in. Honestly, find me a show or a book about MYSTERIOUS MYSTERIES that has an ending that satisfies people who want mysterious mysteries — it doesn’t exist!
posted by samthemander at 8:55 AM on October 21, 2023
I even appreciated the ending. I don’t think there’s much else they could have done with the situation they were in. Honestly, find me a show or a book about MYSTERIOUS MYSTERIES that has an ending that satisfies people who want mysterious mysteries — it doesn’t exist!
posted by samthemander at 8:55 AM on October 21, 2023
he story and characters obviously have to be good enough to keep you watching, which they are. But I just love the discovery of mysteries. The way the characters would discover mysterious thing after mysterious thing. To me the feeling of being confronted with a mystery is more enjoyable than finding out an explanation for it.
I understand this feeling. And yet, the fact that the mysteries have an explanation is essential, I find, to making it all work. I never got into Lost, but I understand there's a perception that the writers were making it up as they went along, which is not the way to do this kind of thing, because it becomes a matter of whatever crazy thing they think of to throw in this week. OMG WOW ITS A POLAR BEAR
My favorite counter example to this is Steven Universe, a very different kind of show, but the best I've ever seen at plotting and revealing its central mysteries. In the first season they didn't even ultimately know what kind of show it was yet, strict fantasy or dimension-hopping or almost hard sci-fi, but they knew, from the start, what the answers to its big mysteries were, and so in the end the reveal was terrific, one of the greatest moments in the history of the Cartoon Network. Oh, if that network hadn't spoiled it for first-time viewers in an over-credits promo on a previous episode!
But an important thing about Steven Universe's use of mystery is, it dropped effective hints, subtle ones, ones that made its resolution guessable. Viewers had suspicions from the start. I had a feeling that the mystery would turn out that way. With Lost, I understand (please correct me if I'm wrong), there was really nothing to guess. It was Heisenberg's Ending (in the sense of uncertainty, not of Breaking Bad), only decided definitely when it had to be.
posted by JHarris at 10:15 AM on October 21, 2023 [4 favorites]
I understand this feeling. And yet, the fact that the mysteries have an explanation is essential, I find, to making it all work. I never got into Lost, but I understand there's a perception that the writers were making it up as they went along, which is not the way to do this kind of thing, because it becomes a matter of whatever crazy thing they think of to throw in this week. OMG WOW ITS A POLAR BEAR
My favorite counter example to this is Steven Universe, a very different kind of show, but the best I've ever seen at plotting and revealing its central mysteries. In the first season they didn't even ultimately know what kind of show it was yet, strict fantasy or dimension-hopping or almost hard sci-fi, but they knew, from the start, what the answers to its big mysteries were, and so in the end the reveal was terrific, one of the greatest moments in the history of the Cartoon Network. Oh, if that network hadn't spoiled it for first-time viewers in an over-credits promo on a previous episode!
But an important thing about Steven Universe's use of mystery is, it dropped effective hints, subtle ones, ones that made its resolution guessable. Viewers had suspicions from the start. I had a feeling that the mystery would turn out that way. With Lost, I understand (please correct me if I'm wrong), there was really nothing to guess. It was Heisenberg's Ending (in the sense of uncertainty, not of Breaking Bad), only decided definitely when it had to be.
posted by JHarris at 10:15 AM on October 21, 2023 [4 favorites]
I listened to nine hours of this last night. I think it made me ill. Or maybe it was all the vodka.
posted by coolxcool=rad at 4:04 PM on October 21, 2023
posted by coolxcool=rad at 4:04 PM on October 21, 2023
Honestly, find me a show or a book about MYSTERIOUS MYSTERIES that has an ending that satisfies people who want mysterious mysteries — it doesn’t exist!
Whether it ends up being satisfying is up to you, but Dark on Netflix is an amazing sprawl of WTF that turns out to have been meticulously crafted like a fine watch.
posted by LionIndex at 4:33 PM on October 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
Whether it ends up being satisfying is up to you, but Dark on Netflix is an amazing sprawl of WTF that turns out to have been meticulously crafted like a fine watch.
posted by LionIndex at 4:33 PM on October 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
Seconding the amazing writing on Steven Universe that rolled with a few production changes.
But comparing bubblegum TV to animation might be a bit unfair, as SU probably got more time for the writers to adapt.
As SU came out the schedule was bonkers, and notorious for being bonkers. Some of that was the nature of animation but some that was the show working at its own pace from a studio allowing it to blossom
I hate Lost because it led to terrible writers working on Star Wars 9. We could have had a Stormtrooper revolt against the empire!
And I found it obnoxious at the time, but they were obviously under production pressures.
Actually that is what I remember most about my contempoary opinions about the show- that half the writing was cover for production snafus, like 'actor got pregnant' or 'child actor grew up faster than plot'
posted by eustatic at 11:31 PM on October 21, 2023 [1 favorite]
But comparing bubblegum TV to animation might be a bit unfair, as SU probably got more time for the writers to adapt.
As SU came out the schedule was bonkers, and notorious for being bonkers. Some of that was the nature of animation but some that was the show working at its own pace from a studio allowing it to blossom
I hate Lost because it led to terrible writers working on Star Wars 9. We could have had a Stormtrooper revolt against the empire!
And I found it obnoxious at the time, but they were obviously under production pressures.
Actually that is what I remember most about my contempoary opinions about the show- that half the writing was cover for production snafus, like 'actor got pregnant' or 'child actor grew up faster than plot'
posted by eustatic at 11:31 PM on October 21, 2023 [1 favorite]
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