Update: You should really read this open letter to anyone who thought the end of Lost was awesome. It is super well written.
Before I start, let’s just make this clear. I love Lost. I have been watching Lost and have been having Lost parties for the last three years. About thirty of us friends even have an e-mail list that goes wild after every episode with theories and discussions about what is happening and what we may have missed. I have been saying for a long time that I think Lost is the most brilliant of all TV show writing in terms of storytelling. You have to watch it like you read the Bible. There is multiple layers to everything that is going on. There is mystical realities, there is character analysis, there is culture references and it all accumulates into a beautifully told story about a bunch of people who find themselves stranded on this special island.
My wife and I watch Lost for two different reasons. I enjoy the mystery and the references and the hidden layers. My wife loves the characters and their story arches. Lost did both of these really well. Now it’s over. Six seasons of driving all over the city to watch each episode is now over. After everything, I’m pretty disappointed in how everything wrapped up. I know it’s their story and they can do whatever they want. But it’s my article, and I can also write about whatever I want. There is way too little critique out there for what actually went wrong, and way too much support about how powerful of an ending it all was. So here we go.
LOST Is Not A Book
Your Fans are important to the show’s creation
If Lost was a book, where I could enter the story and then exit it over a few weeks of reading, that would be one thing. They chose to make a TV show that extended over six years instead. This comes with an entirely different set of expectations and a different way of looking at your audience. The audience in TV now becomes a determining factor of how you are going to end, because they are part of the writing process. In a book, this is not the case (unless of course it’s a book series like Harry Potter). So along the way, Lost picked up a lot of fans who they simply ignored. While the creators may have thought all along this was a story about specific characters, based on their following, it was obviously a lot bigger than that. When the producers end up at places like Comic Con to do interviews, they have to be aware that the are writing a story for a larger group than those that just want characters to all end up happy in the end. Lost was not a book. Lost was a story that took shape while writing it. The least they could have done is allow the audience to give it more consistency and depth.
LOST Is Not Just About The Characters
Please don’t tell us the island was for nothing
Over and over again I hear people (who I didn’t even know cared about Lost) try to explain to me that Lost is a show about characters. As much as characters are part of this show, there is no point in saying that it is just about characters. There is way too much happening on this island to just pretend this is all about characters having some happy ending. Lost is full of time travel, invisible men, women who die when they give babies, mystical images of good and evil, ageless people, patterns, numbers and unknown rules. To not acknowledge these major plot points as being crucial to the story, is to forget the story you are writing. Lost failed miserably in creating a complete story. They opened up way too many cans, and nobody knows what worm belongs where. The characters were important, but they are not the whole show. Characters on many, occasions would run into mystery after mystery and act the exact same way every time (surprises, unbelief, angry). If it was all about the characters, then they would have evolved and eventually grown to accept the mystery over five years, but they really didn’t until the 6th season.
Across the Sea Aired Way Too Late and then Nothing Came of It
Jacob and the Man in black could have framed the entire last two seasons
Across the Sea was a great episode but it came way too late in the game. It was finally some answers to the questions we we posing back when we first met Jacob and Man in Black. Yet, despite all the great storytelling and fun myths, they failed to really give us anything. They only took us a few steps backwards instead of giving us anything in the source. We are still left with the same questions. Why is there a protector? How did this happen? Where did the light come from? How does the lady who kidnapped them know anything at all? How did the people on the island figure out anything about a donkey wheel? You can’t just keep saying “this happened” over and over again and go back and back. At some point you have to tell us where the story starts or how the story got there, not just keep telling you all the things that happened over and over again. Jacob and the Man in Black get introduced as the most important characters. They are the reasons everything weird is happening, and all we know is that they had a job to do.
Not Everything I Don’t Know is Mystery
Maybe you are just blackmailing us for the upcoming Lost Movie
I’ve seen JJ Abrams whole deal about his secret box that he has never opened and how mystery is really important yadda yadda. I love mystery, but not unnecessary mystery. When the writers say stuff like “oh we know the answer to that, we just aren’t going to tell you,” that is unnecessary mystery. Instead of mystery it becomes more like some weird kind of blackmail. If I was to go open JJ Abram’s secret box, and write down everything in it, and then forever tease him without ever giving him answers, that is not mystery. That is just mean. That is what Lost ended up as, mean storytelling bullies who would rather tease you than give you anything worthwhile to reward you for following along.
update: this video asks many good questions, and its hilarious.
Everything That Happened On The Island Was Unnecessary
Why not just film it in a hospital?
All this time we have been reassured that the story is going somewhere, that all this has meaning and to just hold in there. This is just all a lie. They could have ended with that ending after one season and done the same thing. Essentially what the Lost writers are telling us is that all that stuff that happened in the middle meant nothing, it was all just filler so we could have Jack die where the series started and finally accomplish what he set out to do. Don’t give us that. The story was excellent, full of amazing twists and layers that I’m still unpacking. The whole flash sideways thing didn’t even start until the sixth season, yet for some reason it was the flash sideways that brought complete resolution to all the characters. This only tells me that they did not in fact have a good ending and they had to create it as they went along. Or what about the whole Adam and Eve reveal. I can’t believe they had to introduce one new character and one we barely knew to explain those bones. It didn’t even have any significance. You might as well put all these characters in a hospital and make another medical drama since everything weird and mysterious on the island seemed to have only happened for fun with no real meaning or significance of where they were or why they were there.
After all is said and done. Lost was still a great series. The finale was good, it was a great resolution to the characters and them finally finding what they were looking for. The purgatory style explanation was good and it worked for what they were trying to do. It wasn’t the ending I hated as a good way to end Lost, it was that they only ended half the story. I just wish that the writers saw Lost as much of a beautiful and deep story as its viewers did. Lost was not just about characters reaching resolve. Lost was about all the weird mysteries that they revealed to us. Now all those mysteries are void of meaning as we are forced to see Lost for something less than it really was.
I suggest a 7th season, that is all about the island and the mysteries and really aim to make this a story worth remembering. Anyone want to start that petition?
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I couldn’t disagree with you more. about nearly everything. well, except to say that I love Lost, and one of the reasons I love it so much, has been all the different ideas that it has opened me up to -the mysteries and the cultural references and the mythology – has been a key reason why i watched Lost. I even did several media interviews this week talking about the ideas, mysteries, mythology and so on is why Lost captivated me so much. But still, I ADORED the finale, and was bawling like a baby (Turtle will tell you). However, I have a few issues with some points you made here:
Books take shape while writing them, too! I’m a writer, and I read a lot, and have read a lot recently about the writing process. Most writers will tell you that as you write about the characters, you get to know them, and you eventually have to listen to them, like they are real people, and they will tell you what they will do next and so forth, and the characters drive the story more than anything. Writing ANY story – be it in a book our own screen – is a completely organic process. Darlton has said many times that they both knew the ending from the beginning, and it was THEIR story to tell, and while it was a collaborative effort with the writing team, the fans’ opinions really didn’t influence them much. Lost was a opened with the focus on an eye of a *person*, and we were introduced to complex people that many fell in love with. You say you loved the mysteries and ideas more than anything. So did I, but ideas don’t float in space, they exist in the minds of *people*. Lost was about how *people* respond to the unknown, respond to the mysteries, and take *leaps of faith* without needing to know why. Seems to me like you are stuck inside of old man-of-science Jack, demanding answers to everything and dismissing the idea that sometimes, without knowing why, we just have this sense that we are *supposed* to do something, even though it completely makes no rational sense. I prefer the Man of Faith, who responded eventually without needing to know why. We all live with that tension. It’s not wrong to ask questions and to want to know the answers or anything. I’m actually reading a book now called the Sacredness of Questioning Everything, and it’s brilliant. I just think that this was Darlton’s story to tell, and they wanted to leave the mysteries open for interpretation, for discussion. Sometimes asking good questions is more important than providing coherent, detailed answers. Lost got you *thinking* about stuff didn’t it? Then it did it’s job.
You said that Darlton were mean story-telling bullies. I for one think they’re geniuses, and they told their story the way they wanted to, and left us not merely with “happy people” – but *majorly worthwhile* themes to think about. Redemption through community and personal sacrifice, laying down your life for the ones you love. What is more worthwhile than that?
I’ll leave you with a quote from Ryan McGee at Zap2It: “If The Island has taught us anything, it’s that looking and seeing are two different things. Charlie couldn’t “see” his guitar until he chose to give up his drugs. The cave is no different: Jack couldn’t see it until he was ready to see it. That’s the work he had to do all along. By bookending the series around a man opening up his eyes to the unknown and closing them as a man who learned what it meant to truly live, “Lost” encapsulated its’ primary thematic concern: what it means to live and learn through other people. They lived together, and none of them died alone. Not in the end. Perfect.” (full article: http://blog.zap2it.com/ithappenedlastnight/2010/05/lost-the-end-of-the-show-finally-arrives-in-the-series-finale.html ) And with *this* man, I couldn’t agree more.
Hey Jen, thanks for the comment. While everything you said, I do not negate. I think they told certain aspects of the story well. The character side of the story was about as good as it gets. I love David Dark, and I love asking questions, and I love mystery, and I explained myself in the post the different of mystery and holding things back. I don’t think you are actually arguing against me in any points besides the fact that you like not to know and I would prefer to know some things. The unfortunate side of someone else’s story is now the debate is over. Our e-mail conversations are over. There is no mystery to discover. The beauty of mystery and questioning is that there is an understanding that the answer does actually exist somewhere, if it didn’t then no one would ever care. In the case of LOST, it’s over. Nothing more to seek and discover.
I disagree with you that it’s over. I think it’s just the beginning. No more speculation about the end, now true analysis and discussion can begin. Right now thousands of people are the world are writing articles, doctoral dissertations, graduate papers (me), books (me), and creating podcasts, videos, and music about LOST. There is an academic conference about LOST (google Lost: The Conference) in Hawaii next January, and I for one am planning on attending.
Pearson Moore, my favourite cultural and spiritual analyst of LOST, has written a brilliant, well-crafted, and illuminated piece on the finale for those who were disappointed, angry, or confused. I’d recommend it highly: http://www.sl-lost.com/2010/05/25/so-you-could-find-one-another-cultural-perfections-in-lost-617-618-the-end-by-pearson-moore/
Peace.
This thing about man of science vs. man of faith, I think you’re right. Nathan and I are both thinking like men of science.
The exact problem – and I don’t mean your problem, I mean the blip in translation between people who liked the show and people who didn’t. The difference between your perspective and ours is that the show presented us with this exact dichotomy, men of science vs. men of faith. At the beginning, they split up into two camps, based on that very idea.
And Jack said that they all had to learn to live together, or they would die alone.
So as the show drew near, I thought we’d see an ending address both ideas, meaning the People Of Faith would get their spiritual, symbolic, (and in this case actual) ending, and the men of science would get their nuts-and-bolts, here’s-what-happened ending. And that the two endings would mesh, living together, you might say.
And so when it ended this way, to us, it was like they declared the men of faith the victors.
And the worst part was, they had every right to do it, because it was their story!
So naturally, we were angry. We weren’t thinking the whole time that we were on a journey from being ourselves to being you. And I don’t mean that as petulant as it might sound – we were truly alarmed to find that the show was all about us, being wrong.
And really, every time I listen for a while to someone who really liked the show, I really get what you’re saying. In fact, it’s a lot like talking to someone who’s really religious, since I’m not at all. I’m usually seeing someone so happy, that I have no interest in arguing about the thing that’s making them happy. So please don’t take it as an attack.
I just think there’s two kinds of people, and both kinds understood the end, it was just that only one side won.
Just got home from work and I’m too tired to write as much as I want to, but I have to vehemently disagree with your last point. Everything that happened on the Island mattered, and mattered deeply. I’ll write more tomorrow, but check out my early thoughts on the finale to get an idea of my perspective – http://imclaren.wordpress.com/2010/05/24/early-thoughts-on-the-end/
If everyone was going to go to purgatory and get a chance to kinda wrap things up there, Im not sure the island did matter. Plus the writers chose not to tell us why the island matters – a strong argument could have been made that MIB was right.
I felt like this thing/island that changed everyone (character dev.) over the course of 6 years was left completely in the dark. I honestly felt like the writers were trying to convince us that the island is worth figuring out – how? go back and look at all the questions that the Losties asked themselves, 95% island related.
I started off hating the finale but the more I think about it the more I’m shifting back to liking it. Felt like the “purgatory” was underwhelming at best, I felt like the final battle between Locke and Jack was confusing because I have no earthly idea what they are fighting about.
Lastly, I felt patronized by the fact that I was supposed to believe that there was some sort of runway on the island.
Bottom line – this is the story we have to work with and they wrote it the way they wanted to – open ended, so I guess all us who are like “What the hell was that?!” have to just deal with it and ‘move on’ – which I’m ok with.
I’m struggling to see how anyone could think that the Island doesn’t matter. In my mind, the Sideways world (or whatever you want to call it) showed us that for these characters, the Island is in fact all that did matter. Jacob told Sawyer that none of them had it together before they arrived there – they were all lost, so to speak. The events of the six seasons, culminating in the incredibly purposeful task of preserving the light and keeping MIB from leaving, afforded these characters the opportunity to deal with the figurative baggage they had brought with them and connect with others in transformative ways. This Sideways world gave them a glimpse of what life could have looked like if 815 had not crashed, and helped them to see that while they had always wanted to be rescued from the Island, it was the Island that had rescued them all along. They needed all the events that took place in order to forge those lasting connections.
The finale was not perfect, and sure, there are tons of unanswered questions. Personally, I had made peace with the fact that this would probably remain the case; what I did want was a great story, not a list of facts about the Island. That’s what we got, and I too am OK with that.
As for the runway, we had seen that being built during the time flashes in season 5.
I’m going to go ahead and agree with just about everything you said. I did not dislike the ending, or how they placed it all together. I think I find myself in the middle of your analogy about the people that watch this show. I’m 1/2 about the characters and 1/2 about the rest of the mystery regarding this show. There were just too many unanswered questions. If they would have just taken the time to adress the biggest carrot on the show it would have been perfect. I feel that they could not do this because they wrote themselves into a corner. I think that when people figured out it was purgatory in Season 2 or 3 and they debunked that, they had to create an alternate purgatory for the characters to go to. It was gripping and interesting TV, but the fact that the Island wasn’t addressed is nothing less than disappointing. How did the donkey wheel get made, if all of the Esau’s dudes got murdered my Jacob/Esau’s mother? What is the island? What was with the Egyptian god statue and the blankets? What was with the temple? Overall, it was a great close to the show and the characters, but to not address these few things leaves way too many gaps for me to wrap my head around it all.
Overall I give the series a 10 for keeping me captivated, but I still want to know what the hell the island exactly was.
Someone took the time to write out a post with the exact opposite points as I made here, you can read that here.
http://thelisteningpost.wordpress.com/2010/05/25/the-end-lost-completes-the-journey/
I didn’t see anything over there that refuted your points.
He did start off with the same notion I was talking about – that you just had to be on the right side of the story, and I noticed that the post before that was about Christianity.
So I wonder how clearly this debate breaks on the actual faith line, in terms of real life religions.
Christian Shepherd on why the Island did matter:
“The most important part of your life was the time that you spent with these people,” Christian said. “That’s why all of you are here. Nobody does it alone, Jack. You needed all of them, and they needed you.”
I agree with your post completely. There was just to much stuff that seems like it was added because the writers thought it would be cool or pushed the story where they needed it to go. And no written because it worked with the overall story.
Dogen in the temple prevents smokie form going in. We never learn why or how, or how the temple got there.
When the Ocieanic 6 return to the island why are Jack Hurley kate and Syid sent back to the 70′s and Ben, Lapidus and Sun sent to present time.
It feels like the writers just wrote anything possible to make their point work that week.
During the interview last thursday with time magazine a viewer asked if locke was a canidate how come he was being dragged in the hole by the smoke monster. They thought he couldn’t harm canidates. Their answer was Locke belived so much in the island they wanted to see if he would still believe after the island turned on him. It just seems like lazy writting to me. They create rules we never know that can be changed at any point.
Oh, where to begin. . .
I totally agree with this post.
What became of Walt? What was his ability?
How did the Russian become immortal, or was that the Man in Black too?
Who was the woman that was raising Jacob and MIB?
How did Jacob go to and from the Island…magic? The lighthouse?
It was implied that Jacob made the rules of the Island. That made him a really sucky person, and I personally wanted someone to kick his ass.
I have to go to work, or else i would go on and on all day.
PS season 3 is all the evidence you need that they didn’t know or care that much where they were going with the story.
Hey everyone. I’m the guy who wrote the Open Letter To Anyone Who Thought The End Of Lost Was Awesome.
Listen, I’ve been staying out of the debates on the boards, because the site was pretty swarmed. That letter made it literally all across the world – I’ve found sites entirely in Polish, Czech, Spanish, with my link right there in the middle plain as day.
You know, it really looks like the vitriol has calmed down a lot, and that’s a good thing. I definitely calmed down as well, as you might have read in more posts over at Future Tom.
But I wanted to say that what Christian says, and what he means – they weren’t lost on me. No pun intended. It’s just that, saying that the answers to the questions we encountered are like the answers to questions we encounter in life, that really does smack of the “It’s all a dream” ending.
I know it wasn’t a dream, and I know that some pretty clever people have come over and made some really good points.
It just wasn’t enough for me, and I think the writers know it.
The points you guys are making up there, I agree with a hundred percent. It’s just not structurally a good idea, opening all these avenues in your story, and then not going anywhere with them.
Take Die Hard. I know, it sounds funny, but it’s one of the most structurally sound movies ever. Not because it’s believable, or spiritual, but because you don’t get a glimpse of very much in the movie that doesn’t eventually turn out to matter.
Even the guy on the plain, who tells McClain to unwind by making fists with his toes. He’s the reason for the bare feet.
It was clearly a play on our expectations. The question is, did they do it because they had to, i.e. they couldn’t come up with the answers, or because they were being artistic.
I think it would be easy to pretend to be artistic when you were really just overwhlemed by your own story. And I think it would be weird to not provide the answers, if you were actually capable of doing so.
So I think they ended it this way, because they had to, not because they wanted to. And either way, I don’t like it.
But I did write the letter, really and truly, just for the People Who Thought The End Of Lost Was Awesome who were going around calling people stupid, for thinking it sucked.
A lot of traffic came over from this site, and I wanted to drop by and thank everyone. The discussion surrounding the ending has greatly surpassed – in my mind – the end of the show itself.
And Nathan as for your points, I think they’re right on point, obviously. I made a point in my post of not really opening a debate, and instead addressing the hostility and insults, so I really appreciate the way you laid those out.
I know we talked briefly early on, and again, I’m really sorry for not getting over here earlier, as you were one of the first people to show up. As you might or not imagine, I was getting some absolutely comical hate mail, and trying to reply to the comments on my site, and what can I say?
My favorite point you made is about the Man in Black and Jacob framing the first two seasons. I think that if they really knew the story the whole time, then these two crucial characters would have been introduced very early.
In general, writers try to introduce as many characters as possible, early on. I’ve read somewhere that a general rule is the first three chapters, all the characters should have showed up by now.
I know that Lost breaks convention, so I’m not saying they were confined to a general rule, which I pretty much just yanked out of thin air – got that right. But it would be different if it worked – then they could say, SEE? We didn’t have to follow your RULES!
Now, we could argue about whether it worked for you or some other guy or for me. But I’m telling you, that letter flew around the world – many thousands of people read it and it’s still rising. I post something every day, and that never happens. So I think the letter spoke to people. I think it wasn’t just a bunch of morons – I think tons and tons of perfectly smart people disliked the end. And I think that means, ignoring the rule? Nothing to be cocky about.
Anyway, sorry to drop a little mini-blog in here, and sorry it took so long to get over here like I said I would.
Hey Tom, thanks for the comments.
In the end it narrows down to two things.
You can’t create a story without limits where anything can happen at anytime. Every story needs rules/limits/boundaries, and it is those that make the story unique and what it is. So make a crazy island where crazy things happen, but don’t do things that don’t make sense to the own rules that you set up. (ie. one person goes into the light and turns into smoke monster, the next goes into the light and nothing happens but they die). This guy explains this one well (http://lost-and-gone-forever.blogspot.com/2010/05/end-analysis-that-no-one-probably-cares.html).
I was all about having an ending date to the series, it’s good to have somewhere that you are aiming for. I was under the full impression that they were going to wrap up all their loose ends that they promised they would. Lost is still a good show and it is still a good story, I just don’t think it’s over. They could do a 7th season, focus on the mystery and completing the story and then it would be a phenominal series. Right now, in my mind, it’s just incomplete.
Thanks again for your comments and especially your letter, I enjoyed them!
It’s amazing how many people are still out there trying to justify the bullshit-ending (excuse my words, but this is the most friendly way I can express my own feelings) of Lost.
I don’t want to discuss tidbits which have been discussed a million times since “The End” – for the obvious reason that I will be marked either as a Hater or just plainly too dumb to grab it.
I just want to ask you one single question: How many of us would have got hooked to Lost if it had started the same way as it ended: cheesy and “all about characters”??