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Tuesday, May 25, 2010
A few unanswered "Lost" questions
Just two or three. (Spoilery. Companion to this post.)
Two things:
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18 comments:
Sadly, that's just scratching the surface.
Sounds tremendously, um, unsatisfying.
But for some reason it brings a kind of nostalgia, somehow with faint shades of the Cigarette Smoking Man.
Now that was a show. ;)
well, when you put it like that... sure it sounds like a bad ending.
al sends
Was that the rat from Ratatouille narrating the thing?
Yes.
I don't know whether to thank you or curse you...I was almost over this and now I find out that I didn't even realize how disappointed I was. Thanks
Don't shoot the polar bear.
Er, messenger.
Some of those things were answered indirectly.
The one that bugged me the most was how Smokey/Christian Shepherd appeared off the island, but couldn't leave the island.
So the smoke monster can inhabit dead people? Is that the idea? Did they even explain why Jack's father was in Australia to begin with? Reconcile with Clarie's mother?
Anyways, I was holding out that the explanation for leaving the island was some sort of teleporting technology that the Darhma people discovered. Keep in mind, the "others" left the island, too. And they brought Locke's daddy there.
It WAS satisfying to see Locke's father in a catatonic state in the sideways world.
Um, yeah, I think they covered pretty much all the questions in that video, including the one that vexes me more than any other: who in the world is Eloise, and why does she (even more than Desmond) seem to be the key to everything?
With LOST coming to a close, I decided to watch the pilot and see what all the fuss was about. I had read a little about the show on Christian blogs and the occasional references to C. S. Lewis, so I took the bait and watched most of the episodes before the big finale.
All I can say is, wow do I feel like an idiot. By the time I got to season three, I couldn't help but wonder if the writers had an over-arching narrative in mind, or were they making it up as they went along. By season six, the writers seemed as lost as the characters they created. It seemed pretty clear that they had written themselves into a corner. For me, everything hinged on whether or not they would be able to write a decent resolution for the final season. Without a satisfying resolution, LOST is little more than a Sci-Fi melodrama with countless rabbit-trails that led nowhere.
Also, after watching the final show (and hating myself for getting sucked in and wasting my time), the same thing occurred to me (referencing your post at Pyro) about the breathtaking narrative of Scripture. We all know that the Bible was written by different authors, in different languages, on different continents over a period of roughly 1500 years; yet there is this amazing narrative with subtle themes and threads woven throughout. It begins with paradise lost and ends with paradise found. The narrative comes together and the symbols and mysteries are explained. God did in Scripture and in history what the writers of LOST couldn't do with fiction in six short years.
I hope this doesn't sound silly, but in a strange way, I walked away from LOST with an even deeper appreciation of Scripture.
My main question is about Eloise. She and Desmond were the only two people who seemed to understand the nature of the sideways world. We kinda know why Desmond understood it, but why did Eloise? And if she understood it, why didn't she try to move on like the rest of the characters? Was she like Ben in that she preferred limbo to whatever pseudo heaven the show created (in all its Touched by an Angel kitsch)?
And why were so many main and recurring characters left out of the church (Eko, Naomi, Michael, Walt, Ana Lucia, Nikki, etc.) but the relatively minor Rose and Bernard were there (as was Penelope, who was never on the plane to start with)?
Eloise did have at least one bitter regret in her past, as Ben had many, didn't she?
JTW wrote:
"We all know that the Bible was written by different authors, in different languages, on different continents over a period of roughly 1500 years; yet there is this amazing narrative with subtle themes and threads woven throughout."
Yes, yes, yes!!!
That is exactly the point I love pointing out over and over again. The Bible's superficial complexity only helps to strengthen and reinforce its narrative simplicity.
"It begins with paradise lost and ends with paradise found. The narrative comes together and the symbols and mysteries are explained. God did in Scripture and in history what the writers of LOST couldn't do with fiction in six short years."
Yes! Absolutely!
Or to put it another way:
If a widely diverse collection three dozen authors writing over a period of 1500 years could create a single, coherent narrative based on real-world events in a way that the best writers alive today cannot do even in a fictional universe that they totally control, then doesn't that point to a greater creative intelligence at work than us mere fallible humans? Does it not testify to the plenary inspiration of the Holy Spirit?
(Edit of my hastily written previous comment.)
Alternate ending:
http://i.imgur.com/wtzBE.gif
@Casey lol
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