LOST, did the characters get no good resolution?

[grude]

Locke- One of the most unique characters and character arcs to appear on TV in a long while, an easy fan favorite. I loved how they had an older character with a minimal romance story and a different quest than love, but what in the end was the point of his arc? Were the writers really laughing at the character from day one? That is what I never got about Locke was that the resolution was so seemingly random, he just turned out to be a manipulated fool whose only real accomplishment was turning Jack into a believer of the supernatural shit he saw going on with his own eyes.

Sayid- His last flashback seemed to say he was ALWAYS an nonredeemable psycho, from childhood on. Nothing but a human weapon to be used, with a last minute redemption.

Claire- Ok what was the whole point of the story of the MIB corrupting people like her and Sayid? They are pure evil, eh but now they aren't. Why did they bring up "the sickness" again in the last episodes if it had no meaning?

Sawyer- doesn't really end up doing anything despite seemingly being on MIB side, just tags along and makes half hearted moral decisions.

I think this bugs me more than the lack of answers, especially the way Locke went out. Goddamn this show burned me on getting into serial dramas!

[Kolak of Twilo]

The finale was so awful it ruined everything I enjoyed about this show. I've tried to watch it again in reruns but I quickly find it difficult to care what happens to anyone when the creators so clearly didn't give a rats ass about any of the characters they created.

[allotrope]

LOST was the archetypal example of the shaggy dog story, but taken to the next level.

I knew that it was theoretically possible but didn't think that I'd ever actually witness it. As the number of red herrings in a story approaches infinity, they form a sucking vortex from which no meaningful denouement can escape.

[fifty-six]

The show could not have failed in a more significant manner.

[well he's back]

Hated everything about that last season. Still had hope for the show til then. Writers betrayed viewers in addition to the wonderful work by all the great actors. All the character's arcs were screwed. Aargh. Still makes me so angry. I enjoyed the early seasons so much but can't bear to re watch. What a waste.

[Smid]

No, the characters never got good resolutions, some just disappeared (WALLLLLTTT? Mr Eko). There was never any real reason for the Others to be there, nobody ever asked fundamental questions and got them answered, and it all kind of fizzled out in the end...

I take the title to be the hours I 'Lost' watching that piece of crap.

[Mahaloth]

Originally Posted by Smid

No, the characters never got good resolutions, some just disappeared (WALLLLLTTT? Mr Eko). There was never any real reason for the Others to be there, nobody ever asked fundamental questions and got them answered, and it all kind of fizzled out in the end...

I take the title to be the hours I 'Lost' watching that piece of crap.

Mr. Eko died, not disappeared.

[carnivorousplant]

My Ex, Mrs. Plant v.2.0 watched this program.
I hope that she was really pissed off.

[silenus]

The show works best if you just regard it as a gigantic mean-spirited practical joke by Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse (spit!).

[cmkeller]

Locke wasn't being laughed at by the writers. His role in the overall drama was the Martyr - the Cassandra, the Jeremiah - the one who had the right answers, but no one would listen to him until it was too late. His resolution was a tragic one, but that's still a resolution.

Sawyer's resolution was just fine too. He and Kate end up being one anothers' consolation prizes.

Sayid and Claire didn't have much of a good resolution. The writers messed up in not being clearer about the nature of the "island sickness/smoke monster infection" that they both supposedly had. By the end of the series, both characters had proven that they have sufficient free will to do the right thing - Sayid to save the others from the bomb, Claire to go home to her child and to not hate Kate for taking him - but we're left wondering what was different earlier in the season, when they were helping Smokey. The guys in the Temple were no help to the viewers, though they claimed to know stuff.

The last season was very confusing. In the end, I do feel they did right by the characters (in the whole afterlife thing) and the overall broad plot (how to save the island from the smoke monster), but way too many details remained unresolved, and way too much time was spent on non-essentials (the Temple guys did nothing one way or another for our main characters' developments, and the afterlife world was way too elaborately described just to get characters together). They could have taken about half of the time allotted to the "afterlife world" without us missing much, and used it to better flesh out the hows and whys of what's happening to the characters in the "real" world.

[Wheelz]

I think get more entertainment from everybody bitching and whining about how terrible the finale was, 2 1/2 years later, than I would have gotten from a more satisftying resolution of the show itself. So I'm good.

ETA: More on point, I pretty much agree with cmkeller. Well put.

[Dr_Doom]

I don't see that any of the characters got a "resolution" in the end, because

"Hey, you were all dead the whole time anyway, so none of it even mattered!"

[Justin_Bailey]

Originally Posted by Dr_Doom

"Hey, you were all dead the whole time anyway, so none of it even mattered!"

Except, that's not what happened and it's never even implied that that's what happened.

[Bootis]

Originally Posted by Dr_Doom

I don't see that any of the characters got a "resolution" in the end, because

"Hey, you were all dead the whole time anyway, so none of it even mattered!"

Now now, the ending of Lost may deserve to be hated for a lot of reasons, but this is not accurate.

[Dr_Doom]

Originally Posted by Justin_Bailey

Except, that's not what happened and it's never even implied that that's what happened.

In my heart, that is EXACTLY what happened.

And as we were told

"Whatever happened, happened."

[Dr_Doom]

Originally Posted by Bootis

Now now, the ending of Lost may deserve to be hated for a lot of reasons, but this is not accurate.

Feel as you may, but that is EXACTLY how I took it.

Complete waste of time, and anticipatory energy for me, in the end.

5 seasons of DVD box sets I have no interest in ever rewatching.

Phooey.

[Sister Vigilante]

What happened to the dog?

SPOILER:

I heard he was the only one to live.

[JohnT]

Oddly enough, we watched the final episode of LOST just the other night and loved it just as much as the first time we saw it. When Vincent walks up to Jack and lays down next to him... we just lose it. What a good dog!

The series is a glorious, confused mess... kind of like the 2012 opening ceremonies.

Different strokes/folks, I guess.

[cmkeller]

Sister Vigilante:

He lives, but he's hardly the only one. Other surviving characters include (not spoilering something that's 2 years old):

Hurley
Kate
Sawyer
Claire
Walt
Rose
Bernard
Desmond
Penny
Ben
Richard
Frank
Miles

[digs]

Originally Posted by JohnT

Oddly enough, we watched the final episode of LOST just the other night and loved it just as much as the first time we saw it. When Vincent walks up to Jack and lays down next to him... we just lose it. What a good dog!

The series is a glorious, confused mess... kind of like the 2012 opening ceremonies.

Different strokes/folks, I guess.

OK, can you explain why?

I would love to not hate the ending, and be able to rewatch the show without remembering all the time I invested caring about these characters, that I feel now was wasted.

So, please, someone, give me a reason to care again... [/anguished plea]

[JohnT]

I think it was because I wasn't wrapped up in solving the "mystery". I just liked the characters - the fact that their story made no sense didn't bother me.

[Rigamarole]

Originally Posted by silenus

The show works best if you just regard it as a gigantic mean-spirited practical joke by Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse (spit!).

It was the greatest con ever pulled in TV history. In fact, it was the ultimate long-con.

[digs]

They were great characters, and the writing was well-crafted, yet fun as well (remember the five different nicknames Sawyer'd have for each Islander? I think he called Hurley "Stay-Puft" at one point).

I know! I'll just pretend there WAS no final episode. The writers died suddenl--were lost in a plane crash over the Pacific-- and the series had to end with unresolved loose ends. (4,815,162,342 of them)

But that unfilmed last episode would have tied everything together "without magic" as was promised, and explained the relationship between Kate's horse and the polar bear.

[carnivorousplant]

Originally Posted by digs

explained the relationship between Kate's horse and the polar bear.

I went to a lot of effort to not watch this show because someone at work told me about the polar bear on a tropical island.
But I cannot help but be intrigued about the horse and polar bear relationship.
Was this a platonic thing?

[JohnT]

The horse only wanted to be friends, much to the polar bears remorse. There was a bizarre, almost pornographic, dream sequence that showed where the polar bear wanted to take the relationship, but the less said of that, the better.

[carnivorousplant]

Originally Posted by JohnT

but the less said of that, the better.

Of horse.

I mean, of course.

[John Mace]

The real meaning of the ending was... well, it all starts off as.... you know, if you look at it from a certain perspective.... Oh hell. It's complicated!

[JohnT]

What happened, happened. Deal with it, people.

[Fuzzy Dunlop]

Originally Posted by Dr_Doom

In my heart, that is EXACTLY what happened.

And as we were told

"Whatever happened, happened."

Do you hate many other shows because you completely misunderstand them?

For instance, maybe you hate the Sopranos because in your imagination you found out that in the end he never had that initial panic attack that drove him to Dr Melfi. He died and the entire series was a dream.

I wouldn't blame you. Personally I'm going to be furious when I decide in my heart that Walter White died before the first season of Breaking Bad and the entire series never happened.

[Dr_Doom]

Originally Posted by Fuzzy Dunlop

Do you hate many other shows because you completely misunderstand them?

For instance, maybe you hate the Sopranos because in your imagination you found out that in the end he never had that initial panic attack that drove him to Dr Melfi. He died and the entire series was a dream.

I wouldn't blame you. Personally I'm going to be furious when I decide in my heart that Walter White died before the first season of Breaking Bad and the entire series never happened.

Who says I completely misunderstand anything?

And further, who says I hate this show? I apologize for somehow offending you.

I absolutely detested the ending, and considering the major plot-device of the entire series was the mysterious island, which was pretty much glossed over by the explanation department, I can't see any reason why there mightn't be a whole host of mysterious theories I could surmise to explain that all the Losties were indeed dead the entire series long, and Christian's explanation was just a part of some further nefarious, mysterious scheme cooked up by a third faction apart from MiB and Jacob.

I could likely go through all the episodes and make citation after citation to support my theory, as well.

But I will never watch an episode of the series again, because none of the action ever mattered. "You're all just waiting to move on together. Except for her. And him. Oh, yeah, and a bunch of your highschool friends. And those of you who had a great relationship with your parents? Well, your parents are NOT invited. And the at-one-time seemingly integral-to-the-plot Walt? Not invited. But the rest of you can shuffle off to the Next Stage of Existence now. The End."

[Fenris]

Originally Posted by grude

Locke- One of the most unique characters and character arcs to appear on TV in a long while, an easy fan favorite. I loved how they had an older character with a minimal romance story and a different quest than love, but what in the end was the point of his arc? Were the writers really laughing at the character from day one? That is what I never got about Locke was that the resolution was so seemingly random, he just turned out to be a manipulated fool whose only real accomplishment was turning Jack into a believer of the supernatural shit he saw going on with his own eyes.

According to something I read (I don't remember if it was a fan theory or writer comment) the whole point of the Jack/Locke thing was that they were BOTH wrong. It's not ALL science and it's not ALL faith. Jack (allegedly) learned to trust science and faith, Locke stayed a credulous idiot until he died.

[Fuzzy Dunlop]

Originally Posted by Dr_Doom

Who says I completely misunderstand anything?

And further, who says I hate this show? I apologize for somehow offending you.

You didn't offend me. I've just never heard of somebody deciding they're going to make up their own ending to a television series and then hating it. It seems completely ridiculous. If you're going to ignore the actual ending at least pretend the ending was something you liked.

Bottom line: if you think they were dead the entire show you are 100% incorrect and misunderstood the show.

[Fenris]

No--there's a perfectly good fan theory that the last minutes of the show were seconds after the plane crashed and the show was Jack's hallucination...mainly 'cause the last shot we got (or one of them) was the plane, which Jack shouldn't have been anywhere near. .

I don't personally buy this theory, but a lot of fans do

[enalzi]

Originally Posted by Fenris

No--there's a perfectly good fan theory that the last minutes of the show were seconds after the plane crashed and the show was Jack's hallucination...mainly 'cause the last shot we got (or one of them) was the plane, which Jack shouldn't have been anywhere near. .

I don't personally buy this theory, but a lot of fans do

And it's a horrible theory, because ABC threw that in there as a "decompression" point. The LOST team had nothing to do with it.

[solost]

I've been trying to stay out of this thread because thinking of the ending of that show whose name I will not mention still drives me nuts.

My username was chosen because of the show, to post about episodes during the final season. My wife and I never missed a single first showing of an episode through the entire series (though admittedly that says more about the pathetic state of our social lives with two young children than
how much we were fans of the show).

My wife lost faith and kept saying during the last season that they were never going to get around to explaining anything, that the writers were just pulling it out of their asses, but I had faith that all would be revealed in a satisfying, loose-ends tying, completed Rubix cube of a conclusion. So I can sympathize with Locke's character.

Instead they try to explain the mysteries of the island with some quasi-mystical folderol about the golden creamy center of the island and Cain and Abel-like brothers who fight over it for several
centuries, or something. Then they try to inject heartfelt emotion into the whole mess by having everybody live happily ever after in heaven (not to knock those who enjoyed that ending, just calling it like i saw it).

It's not like they couldn't have come up with a better story- that "Lost Experience" stuff they did online to keep viewers' interest between the 1st and 2nd seasons was pretty intriguing. Like the idea that the numbers were an equation (Valenzetti?) that predicted the end of the world, and different factions like Dharma, Hanso and/or the others were frantically trying to change some variable in the equation and save the world. Wasn't that all supposed to be canon from the writers? But they dropped all those interesting plotline threads. And as this poster points out, it wasn't as if the science-fiction mystery stuff was dropped in favor of character development because the characters all had crappy resolutions. Oh yeah, except for the happy ever after in Heaven part.

Ok, rant over now.

[jackdavinci]

I guess I'm the only one who appreciated it LOL. Not only did the characters have several arcs, they got resolutions both in this life, and after death.

[Mauvaise]

Originally Posted by JohnT

I think it was because I wasn't wrapped up in solving the "mystery". I just liked the characters - the fact that their story made no sense didn't bother me.

Originally Posted by jackdavinci

I guess I'm the only one who appreciated it LOL. Not only did the characters have several arcs, they got resolutions both in this life, and after death.

Not the only one! Like JohnT, I watched for the character development, not for the mystery and thought this had some of the best character arcs I've ever seen. The mysteries were just a backdrop for the characters to evolve and I didn't need resolution to be satisfied. Because of that, I loved the series and the ending. LOVED the ending. I'm not ashamed to admit it either.

[CalMeacham]

[Rolling Stones] I Can't GET no....


Can't GET no....



Can't GET no...



Resolutionnnnnnnnn[/Rolling Stones]