Ya know, I’ve pretty much decided not to renew my subscription to the Dope this year - so I’ll be gone in a couple of weeks. The only thing I’ll miss is the “Lost” threads.
What’s great is that I’ll still show up in the thread for the season finale when one of the posts flashes back to a previous thread!
I would like to know the answer to this question, as well.
Woooooosh.
Now I’ve just turned 10 and I receive a little silver airplane for my birthday. Then a grey-haired lady appears and tells me that in my future there will be a tedious serialized television show in which people find little silver airplanes everywhere just like this one and I’ll never live long enought to know why. Then the kid next door hits me in the face with a tennis racket and I’m in 2004 sitting in front of the television. I’m watching the first episode of “Lost” and at the end the characters see the trees shake and hear a loud roar. “I wonder what that is? That’ll be interesting to know”, I think, naively.
Woooooooooossshhh.
It’s three years later. I’m at my computer typing, typing, typing . . .
It’s later that day. Somebody posts to this thread that, “We know what that was. It’s the smoke monster!” I reply that the words “smoke” and “monster” used together have no meaning.
Wooooossssshhhh.
Someody gets pissed that I find fault with the show.
Wooooosssssshhh.
It’s Wednesday, 10:59 PM EST and, on “Lost” somebody just conned somebody.
Thanks for the answer. You are just trying to piss people off. Everything else you write will automatically go into my blah blah blah filter.
Not really trying to piss anybody off. Some people have an emotional investment in a television show that I believe has become a drag. When I express this opinion it implies that their emotional investment is trivial and *that * pissess them off.
Here are some things from a recent article in Entertainment Weekly (minor spoilers, mostly teasers) :
April 18th "Sheds more light on Desmond’s future flashes and brings a new character to the island. April 25th “reveals the paternity of Sun’s baby and has an ending that will leave theory spinners reconsidering their scenerios.” May 2nd "fans will learn the answer to one of Lost’s biggest mysteries, ‘Something we set set up way back in season 1’ ". Not much info on the last of the episodes but May 9th is called “The Man Behind the Curtain”
Lindehof says he wrote the two hour finale mindful of the fact that fans probably won’t see the show again until Jan 08 when they are planning a rerun free season. They are still in negotiations with ABC as to when the series will end. I get the impression that the creators would like to end it next season but ABC is pressuring them for more.
At the end of the article Lindelhof says:
I want to see what Locke is thinking. I wonder what they’ve done with his dad.
When you have a thoughtful critique no one would fault you for it. When you roll out the same crap thread after thread, knowing what reaction it will get, it feels like trolling. I have no emotional attachment. I enjoy it, nothing more. I enjoy discussing it. I dislike thread shitting. It’s quite simple. “Doctor it hurts when I do this!” “Then stop doing that.” If you don’t like the show, stop watching. If you have nothing to add to a discussion why reply? I used to like ER. I stopped liking it a while ago. I don’t watch it anymore. I certainly don’t go into ER threads and tell everyone the show sucks and they are fools for watching it.
Well, no, that’s not correct. I honestly couldn’t care one teensy weensy bit less what you think about my “emotional investment” in Lost. I mean, it’s a television show. I enjoy watching it. If I stop enjoying it, I will stop watching it. If you don’t like it, it doesn’t affect my enjoyment of the show in either direction. It’s just… it’s a television show. It is trivial.
People get annoyed because… well, imagine that there’s a pizza place nearby. And imagine that you like going to this pizza place, because you like pizza. Mmm, pizza, right? So you go, and it’s a sort of friendly place, and people talk about the pizza. And sometimes it’s especially good, and sometimes it’s OK. And you chat about the sauce, which changes a little bit from visit to visit because the chef makes it from scratch.
But there’s this guy. He sits in the corner. He comes in every night. Has been for years. Every night, before he looks at the menu, he says sarcastically: “I wonder if they’ll have pizza tonight.”
Then he looks at the menu, "Oh, wow," he says, sarcastically. “Looks like I was right; they’re serving pizza.. Ha ha ha.”
Everyone is a little bemused, because hey, this place has always served pizza. The people come here because they like the pizza. Not to mention - well, it’s not just pizza. “Look,” you tell the guy in the corner. “I’m having a calzone.” But the guy in the corner just twists it: “well, it’s got bread and mozzarella cheese and tomato sauce; looks like pizza to me!”
And everyone eats their pizza. And the guy in the corner, he eats the pizza, too. Spends an hour in there, eating this pizza that he hates, when there’s a really nice Chinese place next door and a Fridays across the street. After dinner, everyone talks about the pizza. Some liked it more; some liked it less. But the guy in the corner, he’s still mad that it’s pizza.
And he keeps saying it. Day after day, meal after meal; “ooh, gee, I wonder if they’ll serve pizza tonight,” as if that’s a clever contribution. And no one is deeply hurt by this; it’s just a stupid pizza. But it’s tedious. They know it’s pizza. Why is he still here?
Thing is, that’s about how I feel right now. It’s not a big deal, but… we get it. You think there’s too much conning going on in Lost. OK. There have been deceptions inherent in every episode of the series since it began. Deception is part of what the show is about. Have you really been watching for three years hoping this would change?
And you don’t like all the flashbacks. Again, they have been happening since the show started. They’re not new. You don’t like them. We get that. We do.
And you don’t like the speed with which the island mysteries are revealed, which I just don’t understand. In this season alone we have learned an enormous amount about the Others, their purpose and their methods. We have gained a more nuanced understanding of the island’s evident healing powers. We have learned quite a bit about two of last season’s more mysterious characters - Desmond and Ben - and met a bunch of new characters. We have seen the “security system” - the black smoke monster which is pretty clearly the same thing that killed the pilot whether you want to admit it or not - more closely and gotten hints as to its nature. We have seen what happened to Cindy and the kids. We have an idea why there was a polar bear on the island, and why there was a shark in the water. They haven’t revealed everything because I’m pretty sure there are a few more episodes planned.
But you don’t think it’s moving fast enough. We get it.
Much of the show’s tension builds around a bunch of people on a plane, all strangers to each other with reasons to mistrust each other and having often conflicting agendas, all being thrust with Other untrustworthy strangers with conflicting agendas - with many trying to achieve their aims by manipulating each other.
So your interest in the show has waned - no problem. But really, to complain like a broken record that any episode may feature someone conning[sup]*[/sup] someone else (example, example, example, example) makes as much sense as complaining that the next episode of House may feature a… (wait for it…) puzzling medical case.
*while stretching the definition of “con” to fit enough situations to continue the rant
Of course, if everyone just ignored that post it would stand there, by itself, way back at the top of page 1. As it is, much of this thread has so far been devoted to discussing that one tiny post, however annoying it might have been. Go figure… 
Ah, but expecting any such post to go unremarked on SDMB is kinda like expecting an episode of House… you get the picture 
The episode hasn’t even aired yet, we have to talk about something.
And bravo Storyteller, you need to post more.
Ha, ha! At this rate we’ll be at page two before the opening scene!
(bump)
Not a chance!
Mmm, now I think I’ll order a pizza tonight!
I tried to watch “House” once, but couldn’t make it thru the first half. Beats me why people like that show. But then, I can’t make it thru “Law and Order”, either.
I love both “House” and all three "Law & Order"s. So I’d appreciate it if you wouldn’t say anything negative about them. It makes me feel like a fool for liking them.
You are made of flimsy stuff, if that’s true.