Lost has been great throughout, imho. While it certainly meandered a bit in Season’s 2 and 3, these meanders are only really irritating when you wait for new episodes week to week, and then get stuck with a character or story you weren’t as invested in. On DVD, this frustration really isn’t there as much since you never have to wait, and a lot of the diversions (aside from Nikki and Paulo, ugh) are actually pretty rewarding.
I think too many people have M Night Shamalyan syndrome, where all they seem to care about is figuring out the trick, and that’s all they’re really there for. That’s fun, of course, but it’s a really shallow way to enjoy a drama. And the show has always been about the great writing, the twists and turns in the characters, and so on.
I can sort of see SenorBeef’s point about the diversions from characters explaining things to each other, but the thing is, either you get over that or you don’t. The writers have done a pretty good job, I think, of mostly providing both plausible character reasons for why certain characters don’t WANT to reveal certain information and also letting actual characters on the show express frustration about the secrecy directly (Hurley is a good example). No, these reasons aren’t airtight, but they’re more than enough to allow a viewer to simply accept them in process and buy the characters… if they want to.
In Dharmaville, for instance, the characters have been slowly talking to each other, but they don’t get much time especially since they are all supposed to be pretending not to know each other and having other big events happening.
Again, you either accept this or you don’t, as part of the story and the larger mythology of the storytelling. I think getting too hung up on it is a waste of what is really a great show: one of the best in a looooong time.
I mean, a lot of the odd plot devices (time travel) and things that are used on this show could easily come off as gimmicks. But they are often used to full effect to tell great and creative stories.
