I was sure you were referring to Nikki and Paulo as annoying gratuitous extra characters, but they were in season 3. At the time, we were all “WTF?”, but it was great fun when they were buried alive.
The show is frustrating as hell. Just when you expect that the writers actually have an idea of what they’re doing, they “deus ex machina” up another stupid convoluted mystery. After awhile you stop going “whoa!” and start saying “seriously, fucking just resolve ONE SINGLE THING in the show! Anything! Anything at all!”
I quit when the radio station in Antarctica found “something” (don’t know what) at the end of one episode, after having never been introduced in a previous episode, were on screen for a total of like 70 seconds, and then NOT MENTIONED AT ALL IN THE NEXT FIVE EPISODES. I have no idea if the random arctic explorer/researcher/whatever the fuck they were guys ever got brought up again, because I finally lost it when the next episodes were just more smoke and mirrors and zero satisfactory explanation.
Everyone on the island knows exactly what’s going on except the main characters. Nobody is saying anything. When asked who they are, the mysterious kidnappers/killers who have no obvious reason for being there say “we’re the good guys!”
That’s as much explanation as you ever get. Ever. I’m not kidding, here. You will never, ever find out what’s going on, because the writers have absolutely no fucking clue what’s going on. Stuff that happened in season one is completely, utterly forgotten by the writers now. We will never know why so-and-so did such-and-such to cause so-and-so’s death. (Im avoiding spoilers here on the one in a hundred jillion million kazillion chance that the thing is actually relevant to whatever ending the writers have in mind.) It’s like they just forgot it happened.
I can sense that I’m ranting, now. I’ll stop, but just remember that you will like this show about as much as you like sex, when no matter how hard you try or how close you think it is, the orgasm never actually happens.
Well, your complaints are certainly valid ones, but I have to take issue with the example you gave. Unless I’m misremembering that episode (finale of season 2?), it was clearly shown in that very episode that the arctic guys were working for Penny, Desmond’s girlfriend, who was searching for Desmond. And Penny’s search for Desmond did come into play later in the series.
In any event, Lost sure seems to provoke strong opinions on both sides. For me, I’ll echo what a lot of others have said. Season 2 and the beginning of season 3 are the slowest/hardest to get through. The unresolved questions keep piling up. However, (a few others said it was the midway point of season 3, but I remember it being about a third of the way through) it certainly picks up dramatically in season 3 and continues through season four. And those questions do start getting answered at a satisfactory pace, at least for me.
I just watched it cause the people were hot.
Well, thanks for all the opinions, good, bad, or indifferent!
I guess I’ll keep watching, at least for a while. Any show that provokes such strong opinions either way must have something going on that’s worth giving it a chance. I don’t know if there’s any other LOST novices out there, maybe we should compare notes a little later on.
Yeah, regarding that sort of thing, I do have a problem with
The bio-contamination? What the hell was that all about? They used it to create some tension with Desmond then the hatch was opened, some vaccinations were made available, and then everybody more or less forgets about it? The fuck?
As I recall
[spoiler]It was shown to be a fake, just one of many experiments by the Dharma Initiative to study how people reacted to it.
The guy in the hatch before Desmond knew it was fake, but kept Desmond in the dark. Until Desmond noted that the other guy’s environmental suit had a tear in it. [/spoiler]
(bolding mine)
Actually it was explained that even having a boat was pretty much useless in getting off the island. Desmond tried desperately to do it but ened up going in circles and ending up back on the island. Without the “magic” coordinates to follow you can’t leave.
I’d say yes.
There are some (very) frustrating bits, some huge annoyances and tons and tons of unanswered questions. But there’s good acting, a vague sense that it really is building towards something and a couple of really, REALLY cool mysteries.
I’d say watch through 118 (“Numbers”). That’s the one that got me hooked.
The other thing to help you through it is to just imagine that it’s a parallel Earth where no-one ever thinks to ask “Why”.
If you accept that they’re not going to ask “Why?” when something weird happens, it drops the frustration rate by 90%.
[list]
[li]Claire is told by the psychic that she has to raise Turnip-Head alone. She doesn’t really get into the “why not” aspect.[/li][li]Hurley when A) Danielle and B) Ben both admit that The Numbers mean something doesn’t ask “What do they mean? Why do they have such power?”[/li][li]Locke and the Whiney Doctor who’s name I can never remember but who I don’t like–When Desmond tells them that they’ll have to push the button or the world will end, there’s a lot less debate than there should be.[/li][li]EVERY time Ben makes a cryptic comment that by all rights should have someone point a gun to his face and say “Explain yourself, son, or plan to have a long chat with Jesus”, the characters simply accept it.[/li]
Oh–and it’s also the nature of the universe that EVERY character has “daddy” issues. Jack, Hurley, Walt, Kate, Locke, Charlie–every single one of them has daddy problems.
By the way–a question for other fans
Wasn’t there an episode where a plane flew overhead and dropped a ton of Dharma Inititave supplies? Was that ever explained?