Yahoo News reported on LOST's back story from one of its co-creators.
LOST launched a television phenomenon by creating mysteries and Easter egg hunts like the numbers, the hatch, and The Others. It had high ratings from the 2004 pilot right up until the finale in 2010.
A common debate has been when the series jumped the rails to go out into filler tangents and story line dead ends. Some believe the middle seasons were merely filler episodes which distracted from the original intent of the show.
Co-creator Damon Lindelof all but admitted it when he recently said the original outline for the ABC series was a three-season run.
“There were all of these compelling mysteries and so we were saying, ‘We wanna have this stuff answered by the end of Season 1, this stuff answered by the end of Season 2, and then the show basically ends after about three years,’” Lindelof told Collider. “That was the initial pitch.”
“[ABC] were not even hearing it… they were just like, ‘Do you understand how hard it is to make a show that people want to watch? And people like the show? So why would we end it? You don’t end shows that people are watching.’”
Eventually, ABC allegedly agreed to set an end date for the show – but on its own terms: 10 seasons.
That never came to pass, as Lindelof eventually reached a compromise during negotiations around Lost’s third season.
Lindelof was set on a longer fourth season to wrap the story up which still involved “a number of the characters” getting off the island and later returning for the final run. When ABC offered just nine episodes, the two parties settled on slightly shorter seasons up to season six, a marked departure compared to the 20-plus episode seasons we got in the show’s first two years.
Despite the apparent directional conflict with the network, LOST moved forward, with all its flaws, to the controversial finale. Would have a concentrated LOST series have been better? Would more mysteries been solved? Would the End be different?
Let's look back at the first three seasons as a guide with the help of lostpedia:
Season 1 concentrated on the middle-section survivors and their fight for survival and rescue. This was the modern update of the Robinson Caruso shipwreck story. It is a classic premise to hook viewers with a familiar story told in a new way.
Major plot points included:
Finding a suitable camp location.
Half the survivors, including Kate, Sawyer, and Sayid settled on a beach near the crash site.
The rest, led by Jack, chose to live in the caves which are located in the jungle, near a source of fresh water.
Investigating the Island (searching for food and water, discovering the caves, and learning about the Black Rock).
Confrontations with The Monster.
Getting to know and trust each other (see especially Kate, Locke, Sawyer, and Jin).
There is a relatively long-standing animosity between Michael and Jin: the latter attacked the former in order to get his watch back, which Michael had found in the wreckage of the plane.
The survivors (especially Jack and Shannon) begin to question Locke's intentions due to his lie about Boone's injury and consequent death.
Trying to leave the island.
Building and launching the raft.
Hunting for Claire, after she was taken by the Others.
Opening the Hatch found by Locke and Boone.
Started to tell the survivors' story by introducing and using Flashbacks.
The early story was basic survival: food, shelter and water. Also, a means of rescue.
But the survival group was not unified so individuals personal instincts were more important than uniting around common leader. This was the early character conflict between those who thought they would lead.
The mysteries were unusual: the Black Rock ship found in the middle of the island; the Smoke Monster, the Others and the Hatch. The story pivoted from basic survival to danger from Monster, the Others and the Island itself.
Season 1 Finale: As the castaways brace themselves for an attack, Claire's baby is kidnapped, leading Charlie and Sayid on a dangerous chase into the jungle. While the threat of the Others bears down on the castaways, the raft crew continues their flight from the island - but when the hope of rescue appears on the horizon, they will soon learn that appearances can be deceiving. Charlie and Sayid stumble into a trap as they race to confront the kidnapper. Jack and Locke argue as they prepare to blow open the hatch. The raft crew is overjoyed to be discovered by a passing ship, but their elation is short-lived when they realize things are not what they appear. The hatch is opened, and what is inside it stuns the survivors.
Season Two focused on the Hatch. To find something scientific and out of the ordinary on the Island filled the castaways with hope (and food and protection) but also doubt (what was its purpose on the island). The writers were praised for effectively using flashbacks to flesh out the secrets of the characters.
Major plot points included:
The Swan, the Numbers, and pressing the button, all of which appeared to have been resolved by the end of the season.
The tail-section survivors, whose stories began and ended in the season, with the exception of Eko and Bernard.
The Others, including Tom, Goodwin, Klugh, and the fake Henry Gale (Ben).
The DHARMA Initiative stations/
Continued to tell the survivors' story by using flashbacks
Finale: Live Together, Die Alone: After discovering something odd just offshore, Jack and Sayid come up with a plan to confront "The Others" and hopefully get Walt back. Meanwhile, Eko and Locke come to blows as Locke makes a potentially cataclysmic decision regarding the "button" and the Hatch.
Season 3 mainly focused on the Others who had become the biggest danger to the castaways survival.
Major plot points included:
The Others (including Juliet Burke, Tom Friendly, Ben Linus and Richard Alpert), who they are, why they are on the Island, the way they live their lives and who leads them.
Contact with the outside world, including Penny; the Flame and Galaga being destroyed.
Desmond's future-telling powers, going back in time and Charlie's imminent death, and to a lesser extent, time.
The mysteries of the island, mainly pregnancy issues and the healing properties (see Mikhail).
The arrival of Naomi and the freighter.
Continued to use Flashbacks and during the final episode of the Season 3 they first introduced the Flash-forward idea that was used throughout all of Season 4.
Finale: Through the Looking Glass: Jack and the castaways begin their efforts to make contact with Naomi's rescue ship.
"Through the Looking Glass" means where nothing is quite what it seems. In Lewis Carroll's book, it can mean clocks that work backwards or "... a poor sort of memory that only works backwards."
Alice again enters a fantastical world, this time by climbing through a mirror into the world that she can see beyond it. There she finds that, just like a reflection, everything is reversed, including logic (e.g. running helps you remain stationary, walking away from something brings you towards it, chessmen are alive, nursery rhyme characters exist, etc.).
At the end of Season 3, current reflection shows series turned to pure fantasy and not reality.
But by the end of Season 3, LOST could have wrapped up its main stories without jumping the shark (literally and figuratively) with the entire Jacob Temple worship story which attempted to merge ancient religions with an old Greek surreal tale of sibling rivalry.
A three season run would have boiled the LOST story universe into easily absorbed plots:
1. The conflict and tension in the 815 survivors camp on leadership and direction for survival. A passenger class struggle between the middle section and the tail section who had more contact and suspicions about the Others.
2. The external conflict and combat with the Others who claim the Island and its magical properties as their own. The story would have concentrated more on the science cult's obsession with time, pregnancy and mental experiments (which could have easily explained the Monster as being the physical manifestation of mentally ill minds through the Island's unique electromagnetic fields). In other words, the Smoke Monster would have been the island Frankenstein, roaming the island after breaking out of its captivity.
3. The realization that the only way to leave the Island was through the Others assets (boats, communications, etc.) or through rebellion (the freighter coming back to dethrone Ben as the island leader.) It could have been an interesting dynamic on whether Widmore would be as evil as Ben or whether he would have rescued the 815ers then restore the "real" original research of the Island. This would have been a cleaner and more logical ending to the series as it avoids the pitfalls of supernatural beings and clear evidence of a purgatory premise. The main characters would be given an opportunity to "go home" on the freighter or "stay" to live a new life on the Island.
Showing posts with label Lindelof. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Lindelof. Show all posts
Thursday, July 2, 2020
Friday, August 18, 2017
REBOOT
Television is a sausage content factory that continues to re-boot old product.
One reason is that it is cheaper to produce if your company already owns the original content.
Second, if the original was popular, the theory is that you have a built in audience.
Third, executives love the concept of "evergreen" shows that continue to sprout spin-offs (like Star Trek).
Damon Lindelof was asked about the possibility that ABC would in the future re-boot LOST.
He understood the concept of the reboot, but he would not want to be part of it. He said his team tried their best to give closure to their characters. Any reboot of the series, he said, should not include the original characters for that reason. He said it would be interesting if another show runner took the mythology of the island and did something with it.
To be honest, a LOST re-boot would be a terrible idea.
For the two ends of the Ending spectrum, those who loved the character finale to those who hated it, those fan bases would have no compelling interest to watch a new LOST with their lasting strong feelings remain from the old LOST.
And if someone really wanted to do something different with the LOST castaway shell, well TBS tried and failed with the comedy, Wrecked.
ABC would like to try to re-mine the series "brand" for some profits. LOST was never a series that lent itself to syndication. As an hour long drama with twisting maze of plot lines, people cannot get into the series if they miss an episode or two. Half hour sitcoms like Seinfeld or MASH are syndication gold because each episode is a self-contained story.
Part of the problem with re-doing LOST is that much of the big premise foundation items are subject to open debate. A new LOST would probably have to answer those basic story elements which in some way would undermine the original series. For example, if the reboot is about the Island, the new show runners will have to state what exactly is the Island: a UFO, a dimensional riff in time-space, a magical place, purgatory, the afterlife, hell, a military base like Area 51, virtual reality grid, the imagination of a comatose patient, the madness of a mental patient, or something else.
For example, if the new LOST states that the Island is actually an alien base used for centuries to experiment on human beings (with the guardians as the immortal beings whose technology equates to "magic" to humans), then the themes of free will, self-determination and redemption of the original LOST characters are diminished since they were basically lab rats for superior beings. The "happy" ending may just as well have been a mental image implanted prior to extermination and autopsy.
If the new LOST was to follow the blueprint of the old series, would anyone really watch it? If another plane load of characters crash lands on the Island, what would be different? And the new show would challenge the alleged canon that the Island "was closed down" by Hurley and Ben.
It would be hard to take the DVD extra to create an entire series about Hurley and Ben closing down the island. Where is the drama in that?
Lindelof was clear he did not want his old characters or even any of the actors return to a reboot. He said the writers tried hard to complete each character's journey. Sending them back for another try on the island would lead to confusion between the stories. (In Star Trek universe, different spin offs kept their story lines apart but through the science-fiction manual of the Federation principles and technology. In LOST, there was not a deep set of iron clad rules and sci-fi principles to build a new tangent series.) So a hard reboot with the old characters would not work. And a series that focused in on the early days of the island would be fraught with open questions that were not answered in the original series, like who were Crazy Mother, Jacob and MIB?
Nostalgia for the series is fine. Continuing debates on show theories is fine. But to recast the show into something else seems to be a terrible idea.
One reason is that it is cheaper to produce if your company already owns the original content.
Second, if the original was popular, the theory is that you have a built in audience.
Third, executives love the concept of "evergreen" shows that continue to sprout spin-offs (like Star Trek).
Damon Lindelof was asked about the possibility that ABC would in the future re-boot LOST.
He understood the concept of the reboot, but he would not want to be part of it. He said his team tried their best to give closure to their characters. Any reboot of the series, he said, should not include the original characters for that reason. He said it would be interesting if another show runner took the mythology of the island and did something with it.
To be honest, a LOST re-boot would be a terrible idea.
For the two ends of the Ending spectrum, those who loved the character finale to those who hated it, those fan bases would have no compelling interest to watch a new LOST with their lasting strong feelings remain from the old LOST.
And if someone really wanted to do something different with the LOST castaway shell, well TBS tried and failed with the comedy, Wrecked.
ABC would like to try to re-mine the series "brand" for some profits. LOST was never a series that lent itself to syndication. As an hour long drama with twisting maze of plot lines, people cannot get into the series if they miss an episode or two. Half hour sitcoms like Seinfeld or MASH are syndication gold because each episode is a self-contained story.
Part of the problem with re-doing LOST is that much of the big premise foundation items are subject to open debate. A new LOST would probably have to answer those basic story elements which in some way would undermine the original series. For example, if the reboot is about the Island, the new show runners will have to state what exactly is the Island: a UFO, a dimensional riff in time-space, a magical place, purgatory, the afterlife, hell, a military base like Area 51, virtual reality grid, the imagination of a comatose patient, the madness of a mental patient, or something else.
For example, if the new LOST states that the Island is actually an alien base used for centuries to experiment on human beings (with the guardians as the immortal beings whose technology equates to "magic" to humans), then the themes of free will, self-determination and redemption of the original LOST characters are diminished since they were basically lab rats for superior beings. The "happy" ending may just as well have been a mental image implanted prior to extermination and autopsy.
If the new LOST was to follow the blueprint of the old series, would anyone really watch it? If another plane load of characters crash lands on the Island, what would be different? And the new show would challenge the alleged canon that the Island "was closed down" by Hurley and Ben.
It would be hard to take the DVD extra to create an entire series about Hurley and Ben closing down the island. Where is the drama in that?
Lindelof was clear he did not want his old characters or even any of the actors return to a reboot. He said the writers tried hard to complete each character's journey. Sending them back for another try on the island would lead to confusion between the stories. (In Star Trek universe, different spin offs kept their story lines apart but through the science-fiction manual of the Federation principles and technology. In LOST, there was not a deep set of iron clad rules and sci-fi principles to build a new tangent series.) So a hard reboot with the old characters would not work. And a series that focused in on the early days of the island would be fraught with open questions that were not answered in the original series, like who were Crazy Mother, Jacob and MIB?
Nostalgia for the series is fine. Continuing debates on show theories is fine. But to recast the show into something else seems to be a terrible idea.
Thursday, September 25, 2014
INTROSPECTION
E! Online posted an interview with LOST writer Damon Lindelof. In the article, Lindelof states:
That first season, really creatively, we weren't able to do any advance work until the first season ended, because we had a tiger by the tail. And because JJ and I had met so late in the game and put the pilot together so quickly and it was green lit without a script, blah blah blah. This sense that the audience was feeling that we were making it up as we were going along was a very real feeling and I was the one that was like, "Now there is so far to fall."
There certainly was no Twitter or Facebook presence, but you could feel the buzz happening around the show. And it was absolutely and totally terrifying and overwhelming. I was 30 years old and sort of driving this car with a sense of a tremendous amount of honking behind me. It was like, "Why are you all following me?! I don't know whether to go left or right!" So my memories of September 22 and 23 should be, "Oh my god, that was one of the greatest days of my life," and in hindsight, of course it was, but it just didn't feel that way at the time.
I hope it's remembered for the experience that happened in the six days in between the airings of the episodes. As a TV viewer, for so long I had been feeling, with the exception of some of the things that were happening on cable like The Sopranos, that there weren't really any water cooler shows that gave that feeling of, "I can't wait to see what's going to happen next." The last time I had really experienced that feeling on network TV was with the X-Files and then more recently Alias, which I was just as obsessed with as you were.
This is about as close as Lindelof has come to confirming some of the show's critics about the direction of the show. Yes, most fans were aware of the harried back story of the show: that ABC executives pushed for a drama-survival show, and roped in the "hot" TV property master, J.J. Abrams, to do the pilot. And then it as surprise hit with the critics and the viewers, drawing an a large, unexpected audience. Lindelof admits that this took everyone by surprise, and the staff struggled with the show because they could not "do any advance work" during the first season. He was aware of the audience feeling that they were making it up as it goes. But then the show became beholden to technique over substance --- the flash backs, the character back stories, and throwing out mysteries --- to double back and put a cohesive story line back together.
He concludes with the legacy that most viewers adhere to: that when LOST first aired, it was the community of discussion groups that were just (or more) important to the LOST experience than the actual episodes. The legacy of having a roller coaster ride instead of an orderly epic story is still the major sticking point.
That first season, really creatively, we weren't able to do any advance work until the first season ended, because we had a tiger by the tail. And because JJ and I had met so late in the game and put the pilot together so quickly and it was green lit without a script, blah blah blah. This sense that the audience was feeling that we were making it up as we were going along was a very real feeling and I was the one that was like, "Now there is so far to fall."
There certainly was no Twitter or Facebook presence, but you could feel the buzz happening around the show. And it was absolutely and totally terrifying and overwhelming. I was 30 years old and sort of driving this car with a sense of a tremendous amount of honking behind me. It was like, "Why are you all following me?! I don't know whether to go left or right!" So my memories of September 22 and 23 should be, "Oh my god, that was one of the greatest days of my life," and in hindsight, of course it was, but it just didn't feel that way at the time.
I hope it's remembered for the experience that happened in the six days in between the airings of the episodes. As a TV viewer, for so long I had been feeling, with the exception of some of the things that were happening on cable like The Sopranos, that there weren't really any water cooler shows that gave that feeling of, "I can't wait to see what's going to happen next." The last time I had really experienced that feeling on network TV was with the X-Files and then more recently Alias, which I was just as obsessed with as you were.
This is about as close as Lindelof has come to confirming some of the show's critics about the direction of the show. Yes, most fans were aware of the harried back story of the show: that ABC executives pushed for a drama-survival show, and roped in the "hot" TV property master, J.J. Abrams, to do the pilot. And then it as surprise hit with the critics and the viewers, drawing an a large, unexpected audience. Lindelof admits that this took everyone by surprise, and the staff struggled with the show because they could not "do any advance work" during the first season. He was aware of the audience feeling that they were making it up as it goes. But then the show became beholden to technique over substance --- the flash backs, the character back stories, and throwing out mysteries --- to double back and put a cohesive story line back together.
He concludes with the legacy that most viewers adhere to: that when LOST first aired, it was the community of discussion groups that were just (or more) important to the LOST experience than the actual episodes. The legacy of having a roller coaster ride instead of an orderly epic story is still the major sticking point.
Thursday, June 5, 2014
LOST, ESQ.
Esquire magazine had a recent interview with the LOST showrunners Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse. In the interview, TPTB made several interesting statements and admissions about their series:
Point One: TPTB wanted to make sure there was no ambiguity as to whether we were finished. We'll call the final episode "The End," we'll kill every major character off — and then not only kill them off but show what happens to them after they're dead. That's as far as you can go!
We thought about reincarnation but that was just a step too far.
Point Two: The TPTB thought early on that the story couldn't be told chronologically. We understood that one of the challenges of the show was going to be that we had to slow things down. There was a natural inertia of the show for them to get off the island or for them to begin resolving some of the mysteries on the island. The flashback, on a narrative level, became a way of slowing down the storyline but also starting multiple stories in multiple places in time. We wanted it to allow us the largest canvas possible so when you step back from the show and look at the overall image, there were interesting things happening anywhere in the image. So when one place was running low on story you could go start work on another area until you suddenly realized how it connected again.
Point Three: In the middle of season three, TPTB alleged asked ABC to end the show --- three years out - - - the idea that the narrative device was going to flip out of flashbacks and into flash forwards. Once we did that we assumed people would stop asking us if we were making it up as we went along because you have to move forward on the trajectory you've set up. Once we had the end date it really allowed us to plan out what it was that we were going to do for the remaining three years of the show.
Point Four: TPTB were aware that someone re-edited the entire series into chronological order. Lindelof said he wished he had the time to watch that and I love it when fans reshape the story to fit their own specifications. But for TPTB, so much time and energy went into designing these episodes. So the idea that someone unwound all that stuff just to tell the show in chronological order makes it the least interesting version of Lost.
Point Five: TPTB admitted that they trapped themselves into corners while writing the show.
"A lot of times we intentionally painted ourselves into corners. As Damon used to say, "Well, then we'll just walk up the wall." That was a fun part of the storytelling — to create challenges for ourselves."
Point Six: There were regrets in their stories. The only place we ever got stuck was when we did things we regretted doing, not that they were narrative cul-de-sacs but like Nikki and Paulo. That was an example of a story idea where once we'd initiated it we regretted having done it. Or, on a smaller scale, when we told the story of Jack flashing back to Thailand and how he got his tattoos, we really regretted that we had decided that was a worthy flashback story. That story became really instrumental in convincing ABC that we needed to end the show. We were like, "Okay, this is what flashbacks look like now so it's probably a good idea if we figure out how much longer this show is actually going to go."
Point Six and One-Half: The worst episode of Lost was the episode where Jack gets his tattoos in Thailand.Even the TPTB think it's cringe-worthy, where he's flying the kite on the beach. It was not our finest hour. We used Matthew Fox's real tattoos. That's how desperate we were for flashback stories.
Point Seven: TPTB knew early on how committed the fans were to the show. The show took on that of a cult life. Which is very rare because usually what defines a cult show is that there are not a lot of people watching it or it's on the verge of cancellation so people are rallying around it. But Lost had this huge viewership and it also had this cult fanbase. One thing we never predicted was that as the show was launching there was also the advent of social media. We were making a show that was intentionally ambiguous and was a mystery. All of a sudden there was this vehicle by which people could communicate with each other over the Internet. The show and social media just happened to come along at the same time, and it was the perfect thing for people to talk about over social media. We benefitted from this natural confluence of events. It was just sort of alchemy.
Point Eight: TPTB's favorite Lost fan theory? Cuse said there was a theory that it was all taking place in the dog's head. Lindelof remarked that one of the most popular theories during the first season was that they were in purgatory — that they had all died on the plane. That was not our favorite theory because it feels like we were saying it in season one, we were saying it in season two, and we're saying it three years after the show ended that it wasn't that. Cuse said " It's okay, nobody believes us." Another popular theory was that the island itself was some sort of crashed spaceship and the hatch only fed into that thinking. The idea was when they blast this thing open and go down they're going to be inside of some UFO and then the island is just going to lift off out of the water and blast into space for season two. There was a part of me (Lindelof) that was always like, "It would be so great if we actually did that!"
Point Nine: Lost posed a lot of really big questions relating to ideas like good versus evil, science versus faith, and life after death. Did TPTB think it successfully answered any of them?
"I think those are ultimately non-answerable questions and I think we tried to always be ambitious in our storytelling. We decided the worst thing we could do would be to play it safe. The show had become successful because we had made bold storytelling decisions and we had to continue to make them. We knew that some of these decisions would lead to a polarization among the fans. When you tackle unanswerable questions like "What is the nature of existence? What happens after you die? What is the meaning of our lives?" there are not empirical answers, but we tried to show how our characters were wrestling with those questions," Cuse said.
"When you talk about something like faith and science on a meta level, it doesn't matter what the show said. When the show ends there are still all these questions that are going to exist. Is there always a scientific explanation for everything in the natural world? Is there a God? The show isn't going to be able to answer that. But we were pretty clear and explicit in our storytelling as the show went on that we were committed to what would be defined as supernatural explanations for things versus natural explanations," Lindelof said.
Point Ten: The literary references, images of classic books on the show and music used on the shows had nothing to do with understanding Lost. Even if fans would digest all that literature or music, it might give you some answers to your life. But it would not give you the answers to Lost.
Point Eleven: TPTB's favorite episode was "The Constant."
Point One: TPTB wanted to make sure there was no ambiguity as to whether we were finished. We'll call the final episode "The End," we'll kill every major character off — and then not only kill them off but show what happens to them after they're dead. That's as far as you can go!
We thought about reincarnation but that was just a step too far.
Point Two: The TPTB thought early on that the story couldn't be told chronologically. We understood that one of the challenges of the show was going to be that we had to slow things down. There was a natural inertia of the show for them to get off the island or for them to begin resolving some of the mysteries on the island. The flashback, on a narrative level, became a way of slowing down the storyline but also starting multiple stories in multiple places in time. We wanted it to allow us the largest canvas possible so when you step back from the show and look at the overall image, there were interesting things happening anywhere in the image. So when one place was running low on story you could go start work on another area until you suddenly realized how it connected again.
Point Three: In the middle of season three, TPTB alleged asked ABC to end the show --- three years out - - - the idea that the narrative device was going to flip out of flashbacks and into flash forwards. Once we did that we assumed people would stop asking us if we were making it up as we went along because you have to move forward on the trajectory you've set up. Once we had the end date it really allowed us to plan out what it was that we were going to do for the remaining three years of the show.
Point Four: TPTB were aware that someone re-edited the entire series into chronological order. Lindelof said he wished he had the time to watch that and I love it when fans reshape the story to fit their own specifications. But for TPTB, so much time and energy went into designing these episodes. So the idea that someone unwound all that stuff just to tell the show in chronological order makes it the least interesting version of Lost.
Point Five: TPTB admitted that they trapped themselves into corners while writing the show.
"A lot of times we intentionally painted ourselves into corners. As Damon used to say, "Well, then we'll just walk up the wall." That was a fun part of the storytelling — to create challenges for ourselves."
Point Six: There were regrets in their stories. The only place we ever got stuck was when we did things we regretted doing, not that they were narrative cul-de-sacs but like Nikki and Paulo. That was an example of a story idea where once we'd initiated it we regretted having done it. Or, on a smaller scale, when we told the story of Jack flashing back to Thailand and how he got his tattoos, we really regretted that we had decided that was a worthy flashback story. That story became really instrumental in convincing ABC that we needed to end the show. We were like, "Okay, this is what flashbacks look like now so it's probably a good idea if we figure out how much longer this show is actually going to go."
Point Six and One-Half: The worst episode of Lost was the episode where Jack gets his tattoos in Thailand.Even the TPTB think it's cringe-worthy, where he's flying the kite on the beach. It was not our finest hour. We used Matthew Fox's real tattoos. That's how desperate we were for flashback stories.
Point Seven: TPTB knew early on how committed the fans were to the show. The show took on that of a cult life. Which is very rare because usually what defines a cult show is that there are not a lot of people watching it or it's on the verge of cancellation so people are rallying around it. But Lost had this huge viewership and it also had this cult fanbase. One thing we never predicted was that as the show was launching there was also the advent of social media. We were making a show that was intentionally ambiguous and was a mystery. All of a sudden there was this vehicle by which people could communicate with each other over the Internet. The show and social media just happened to come along at the same time, and it was the perfect thing for people to talk about over social media. We benefitted from this natural confluence of events. It was just sort of alchemy.
Point Eight: TPTB's favorite Lost fan theory? Cuse said there was a theory that it was all taking place in the dog's head. Lindelof remarked that one of the most popular theories during the first season was that they were in purgatory — that they had all died on the plane. That was not our favorite theory because it feels like we were saying it in season one, we were saying it in season two, and we're saying it three years after the show ended that it wasn't that. Cuse said " It's okay, nobody believes us." Another popular theory was that the island itself was some sort of crashed spaceship and the hatch only fed into that thinking. The idea was when they blast this thing open and go down they're going to be inside of some UFO and then the island is just going to lift off out of the water and blast into space for season two. There was a part of me (Lindelof) that was always like, "It would be so great if we actually did that!"
Point Nine: Lost posed a lot of really big questions relating to ideas like good versus evil, science versus faith, and life after death. Did TPTB think it successfully answered any of them?
"I think those are ultimately non-answerable questions and I think we tried to always be ambitious in our storytelling. We decided the worst thing we could do would be to play it safe. The show had become successful because we had made bold storytelling decisions and we had to continue to make them. We knew that some of these decisions would lead to a polarization among the fans. When you tackle unanswerable questions like "What is the nature of existence? What happens after you die? What is the meaning of our lives?" there are not empirical answers, but we tried to show how our characters were wrestling with those questions," Cuse said.
"When you talk about something like faith and science on a meta level, it doesn't matter what the show said. When the show ends there are still all these questions that are going to exist. Is there always a scientific explanation for everything in the natural world? Is there a God? The show isn't going to be able to answer that. But we were pretty clear and explicit in our storytelling as the show went on that we were committed to what would be defined as supernatural explanations for things versus natural explanations," Lindelof said.
Point Ten: The literary references, images of classic books on the show and music used on the shows had nothing to do with understanding Lost. Even if fans would digest all that literature or music, it might give you some answers to your life. But it would not give you the answers to Lost.
Point Eleven: TPTB's favorite episode was "The Constant."
Tuesday, June 3, 2014
THE SHOWRUNNERS TIMES
Damon Lindelof was interviewed recently by the New York Times. He still seems bitter about the reaction to the end of LOST. Lindelof still not quite over what happened with the community reactions after the
final episode of LOST.
LOST was both a critical and a popular hit when it debuted in 2004. He does not mention in the article that immediate reaction could have led to the series downfall. But the popularity show with a vibrant fan community using the web to interact after each show created an internal pressure to enhance the show with the clues, red herrings, misdirection, blind alleys and smoke monsters. Six seasons later, when the much-anticipated, much-podcasted, much-blogged-about final episode finally arrived, Lindelof and his fellow show runner, Carlton Cuse, felt they had brought the series to a satisfying close.
They believed that the show’s main character, Jack, dies while saving the world, and there was a well of light, and also the afterlife. However, a great deal of the fan base did not agree. For once, the ensemble cast was stronger than one main character. Second, Jack dies while "saving the world," but there was no explanation of what danger the world was in - - - or why Jack had to die in the first place. The "well of light" was a misconstructed concept which was not integrated into either the original story line or explained in any rational science fiction basis as being the key to understanding the series. The Jacob-MIB story arc did little to rationalize why Flight 815 crashed on the island and how the characters could save the world from immortal monsters. And we don't know who or what made up the monsters. Finally, the Season 6 sideways "afterlife" was a lightning rod to certain fans to scream that the producers lied to them in early interviews that the series was not about purgatory or the afterlife.
The show’s most vocal fan contingent was not pleased. After the finale, they took to Twitter, where Lindelof was an active and lively presence, to tell him how he ruined their favorite show and wasted six years of their lives. Critics similarly decimated Lindelof and Cuse; one declared that “Lost” “ended in the worst way possible.” George R. R. Martin, author of the “Game of Thrones” novels and a co-executive producer on their HBO adaptation, summed up the magnitude of the disappointment when he told The New Yorker his biggest fear in ending his own series: “What if I do a ‘Lost’?”
Lindelof was devastated. He’s a zealous consumer of culture writing, and those critics who blasted “Lost” were ones he otherwise respected and agreed with. He tried not to care, to remember that he loved the ending and maybe that’s all that should matter. “But it’s like no, that’s not all that should matter,” he says. “I didn’t make the [finale] up in my head and sit in my room and basically weep and applaud myself for having designed this great TV show in my brain. I put it out on the airwaves for millions and millions of people to watch, with the intention of having all of them love it, and understand it, and get it.”
There were a lot of fans who liked the ending. But four years later, the negative reaction to the ending still haunts Lindelof. Until last year, his Twitter bio read: “I’m one of the idiots behind ‘Lost.’ And no, I don’t understand it, either.” There, he welcomed his detractors, retweeting their most virulent insults.
If the showrunners ended the show the way they truly wanted to, then that is fine. It was their show. But fans expected more from them. The promises that everyone would have an explanation and that the story tangents would be wrapped up in a mind-blowing explanation never came. Instead, the weak explanation was that some mysteries should remain mysteries (or the fans can make up their own conclusions). As I have written in the past, a writer has certain obligations to his or her readers. One of them is not to write a grand, twisting mystery story then forget to publish the final chapter. And that is the gnawing cancer of the series: the lack of a visionary ending.
The End could have been so much better.
I think much of the negative reaction of the ending could have been cooled off if the writers-producers went out on a limb and fully explained their series premise and foundation plot points.
I think more fans would have understood and accepted the afterlife season if the producers told them by the end that everyone died in the crash, but their "lost" souls continued on in a human form on a magical island to stop the disastrous conversion of the real world and a spiritual realm.
I think fans would have also understood and accepted the premise that the 815 survivors were still alive, but living and trapped in a different dimension in time-space or spirit world. The reason no one could escape the island is that no one could return to the human world. If the fans saw the main characters come to some enlightenment to such a predicament, then we can see a road to the conclusion that the only way to escape this trap was to die and go to sideways heaven.
But by not writing a complete ending of the series, Lindelof and Cruse opened themselves up to the type of criticism they got from the fan community. Some believe they painted themselves into a corner by throwing out major plot twists and new questions just for the sake of keeping fans engaged in the series. But even those twists became unruly and confusing, such as the time travel story line.
Then the die hard fan base saw the detail in the set designs, especially the Egyptian hieroglyphs, the lighthouse dials, and the various science station experiments, and wondered how all this fit together as the explanation for the events happening in the series. Why did the producers put in such detail but not use it to make a clear and final statement of LOST was truly about.
They did say that the ending was to take their "character driven" story into a final "spiritual conclusion." However, there was little morality or redemption in the final season. Characters were turned into Star Trek red shirts. Evil people like Ben got to the same afterlife nirvana as a good character like Hurley. There was no judgment, no punishment, no moral trials. There was no life lesson being taught in the sideways arc.
All art is opinion based; and each object of art is judged by individuals based upon their experiences and personal tastes. Because LOST left a bitter taste in both the minds of the producers and a large portion of the fan base, that means there was a huge opportunity lost with this series.
LOST was both a critical and a popular hit when it debuted in 2004. He does not mention in the article that immediate reaction could have led to the series downfall. But the popularity show with a vibrant fan community using the web to interact after each show created an internal pressure to enhance the show with the clues, red herrings, misdirection, blind alleys and smoke monsters. Six seasons later, when the much-anticipated, much-podcasted, much-blogged-about final episode finally arrived, Lindelof and his fellow show runner, Carlton Cuse, felt they had brought the series to a satisfying close.
They believed that the show’s main character, Jack, dies while saving the world, and there was a well of light, and also the afterlife. However, a great deal of the fan base did not agree. For once, the ensemble cast was stronger than one main character. Second, Jack dies while "saving the world," but there was no explanation of what danger the world was in - - - or why Jack had to die in the first place. The "well of light" was a misconstructed concept which was not integrated into either the original story line or explained in any rational science fiction basis as being the key to understanding the series. The Jacob-MIB story arc did little to rationalize why Flight 815 crashed on the island and how the characters could save the world from immortal monsters. And we don't know who or what made up the monsters. Finally, the Season 6 sideways "afterlife" was a lightning rod to certain fans to scream that the producers lied to them in early interviews that the series was not about purgatory or the afterlife.
The show’s most vocal fan contingent was not pleased. After the finale, they took to Twitter, where Lindelof was an active and lively presence, to tell him how he ruined their favorite show and wasted six years of their lives. Critics similarly decimated Lindelof and Cuse; one declared that “Lost” “ended in the worst way possible.” George R. R. Martin, author of the “Game of Thrones” novels and a co-executive producer on their HBO adaptation, summed up the magnitude of the disappointment when he told The New Yorker his biggest fear in ending his own series: “What if I do a ‘Lost’?”
Lindelof was devastated. He’s a zealous consumer of culture writing, and those critics who blasted “Lost” were ones he otherwise respected and agreed with. He tried not to care, to remember that he loved the ending and maybe that’s all that should matter. “But it’s like no, that’s not all that should matter,” he says. “I didn’t make the [finale] up in my head and sit in my room and basically weep and applaud myself for having designed this great TV show in my brain. I put it out on the airwaves for millions and millions of people to watch, with the intention of having all of them love it, and understand it, and get it.”
There were a lot of fans who liked the ending. But four years later, the negative reaction to the ending still haunts Lindelof. Until last year, his Twitter bio read: “I’m one of the idiots behind ‘Lost.’ And no, I don’t understand it, either.” There, he welcomed his detractors, retweeting their most virulent insults.
If the showrunners ended the show the way they truly wanted to, then that is fine. It was their show. But fans expected more from them. The promises that everyone would have an explanation and that the story tangents would be wrapped up in a mind-blowing explanation never came. Instead, the weak explanation was that some mysteries should remain mysteries (or the fans can make up their own conclusions). As I have written in the past, a writer has certain obligations to his or her readers. One of them is not to write a grand, twisting mystery story then forget to publish the final chapter. And that is the gnawing cancer of the series: the lack of a visionary ending.
The End could have been so much better.
I think much of the negative reaction of the ending could have been cooled off if the writers-producers went out on a limb and fully explained their series premise and foundation plot points.
I think more fans would have understood and accepted the afterlife season if the producers told them by the end that everyone died in the crash, but their "lost" souls continued on in a human form on a magical island to stop the disastrous conversion of the real world and a spiritual realm.
I think fans would have also understood and accepted the premise that the 815 survivors were still alive, but living and trapped in a different dimension in time-space or spirit world. The reason no one could escape the island is that no one could return to the human world. If the fans saw the main characters come to some enlightenment to such a predicament, then we can see a road to the conclusion that the only way to escape this trap was to die and go to sideways heaven.
But by not writing a complete ending of the series, Lindelof and Cruse opened themselves up to the type of criticism they got from the fan community. Some believe they painted themselves into a corner by throwing out major plot twists and new questions just for the sake of keeping fans engaged in the series. But even those twists became unruly and confusing, such as the time travel story line.
Then the die hard fan base saw the detail in the set designs, especially the Egyptian hieroglyphs, the lighthouse dials, and the various science station experiments, and wondered how all this fit together as the explanation for the events happening in the series. Why did the producers put in such detail but not use it to make a clear and final statement of LOST was truly about.
They did say that the ending was to take their "character driven" story into a final "spiritual conclusion." However, there was little morality or redemption in the final season. Characters were turned into Star Trek red shirts. Evil people like Ben got to the same afterlife nirvana as a good character like Hurley. There was no judgment, no punishment, no moral trials. There was no life lesson being taught in the sideways arc.
All art is opinion based; and each object of art is judged by individuals based upon their experiences and personal tastes. Because LOST left a bitter taste in both the minds of the producers and a large portion of the fan base, that means there was a huge opportunity lost with this series.
Saturday, October 19, 2013
DOLMEN
I concluded watching a French miniseries that had many of the same elements of LOST: supernatural, stone glyphs, murder, greed, legends, dark secrets, extortion, blackmail, love triangles, betrayals, lies, revenge, beautiful scenery, layered story lines, mental illness, episode cliff hangers and stunning plot twists.
The six- part French miniseries from 2005 is called Dolmen. I found it by accident channel surfing the high numbers on the cable box to land on a secondary PBS channel showing International Mysteries.
The story is set on the fictional fishing island of Ty Kern (which is, in real life is an island off the coast of Brittany, France). The main character, Marie Kermeur, a young police lieutenant, who returns to her home island to marry her childhood love, Christian Bréhat, who is a local celebrity because he is a world sail boat champion. In Ty Kern, four families are connected by ancient rivalries and secrets: the Kersaint, the Le Bihan, the Pérec and the Kermeur. But on the day before the wedding of Marie and Christian, strange events begin to happen. The bloody corpse of a seagull is brought in by the tide, Marie is assaulted by strange nightmares a sea of blood and a woman's scream, her brother Gildas is found dead, and the town's menhirs (glyphs carved into large upright stones) begin to bleed at the dolmen, a megalithic tomb with a large flat stone laid on upright ones, found chiefly in Britain and France, near the island's lighthouse. Aided by an inspector from the mainland, Lucas Fersen, Marie decides to clarify these strange phenomena. It is now that a series of deaths begin.
Dolmen's story centers around Marie and the secrets of the island. It involved the re-telling of a local legend about ancient piracy, the island's sinister past, and tragic consequences which follow grim decisions in the past. The body count quickly piles up and the police are baffled by the silence of the town people and the fact that no one can explain the ghostly appearance of the bleeding menhirs. Suspects and conflicting motivations swirl throughout the series, as prime candidates suddenly meet their own demise, unraveling more mysteries.
Dolmen did in six episodes which LOST failed to do in six seasons: answer the questions posed in the beginning of the series, and show the clues that were previously scattered throughout the show as part of the final explanation. It was clear that the writers knew where their story was going to end up prior to shooting the first episode. They charted out the complex family relationships and back stories in order peel away the onion skin of island secrets one by one. And the show put in important clues randomly throughout the series which seemed like minor background material until the murder mysteries and "breaks" int the case began to surface. In the finale, there was no need to dwell on any lengthy verbal explanations to give the viewer enough information to say "Ah ha! That makes sense." And even this series ending left the viewer to postulate a final literal cliff hanger.
The story was so well done that I watched all six episodes even though it was broadcast in French with English subtitles.
As I finished the Dolmen series, which I do not know if it is available on DVD but I highly recommend anyone to watch it if you can, I read an article written by LOST show runner Damon Lindelof, who was asked by the Hollywood Reporter to write an epilogue of Breaking Bad when that series ended. Lindelof was a big fan of Vince Gilligan's hit drama where an unemployed science teacher finds he has cancer, and decides that he needs to cook meth in order to support his family. That decision leads the main character, Walter White, down a path of evil darkness. The fan base knew that there were possibly only three real endings for their show and the main character. They got a sentimental family farewell; they got Walter trying to make his own twisted redemption, but in the end he finally admits that everything he did, he did it for himself, so he could feel alive.
Successful creative people have an built-in ego which needs to be fed. So as Lindelof is writing a piece on Breaking Bad's ending, he detours to rant out about his own show's ending, and the negative backlash that he still gets from LOST fans.
Lindelof wrote in part:
I am a huge fan of Breaking Bad and have been a zealot of its Church of Awesomeness for years. It's spectacular TV -- spectacular storytelling -- and I am lucky to have borne witness to it. The opportunity to sing the show's praises one last time was not one I could possibly pass up.
And here's what I was not aware of but am now.
All story is reflective, designed to illuminate its own characters and the themes surrounding them. When a show is as brilliant as Breaking Bad, it's not just about the people we're watching, it's about those watching them. About us. In other words, the better the show, the deeper it forces you to look at yourself. On Sunday night, I took a good long look at myself, and this is what I found staring back …
I agreed to write this piece because I am deeply and unhealthily obsessed with finding ways to revisit the Lost finale and the maddening hurricane of shit that has followed it.
I am surprised that after all this time, Lindelof still stings about the criticism of his show's finale, comparing, I guess, the critics to a violent storm of crap. Anyone can read my views, opinions, criticisms and positives of the show in this blog; but I don't think I threw down the feces gauntlet to the show producers. What I, and many other viewers wanted was explanations (separating the wheat from the chaff, the red herrings from the real clues) for the mysteries and questions that Lindelof himself set up in the story lines. Fans had high expectations for the ending.
Lindelof continues:
And this morning? I am Walter White. Arrogant. Conceited. Selfish. Entitled. Looking for ways to blame everything and everyone but myself, even though it is perfectly clear the situation I find myself in is of my own making. And here's the worst part: I'm still naive enough to believe I can attain some level of redemption.
Redemption is a thing that saves someone from error or evil or the action of regaining or gaining possession of something in exchange for payment, such as clearing a debt. It is a personal decision for each viewer whether the show's producers and writers breached their promises in giving us a completed story. Fans spent their time watching LOST with the expectation that certain mysteries would be answered in a reasonable fashion. For a top notch show, they believed they were entitled to a mind blowing finale. TPTB never downplayed those expectations.
He continues:
Earlier drafts of this piece were a love letter to Breaking Bad. The show was a masterpiece. I listed the reasons why. We all know what they are. The finale? Fantastic. Not a false beat. * * * * And that would have been the piece you would have read had I finished it. But …
In the comments section of the piece I did not write, the following sentiment would have been echoed dozens of times over: "What the f--- do you know because you f---ed up Lost?!?" How do I know this? Well, for starters, my Twitter feed was pretty much a unanimous run of, "Did you see that, Lindelof? That's how you end a show."
Three years later, it appears that it is not just enough to love Breaking Bad's finale. You also have to hate ours. Yeah, I know. Waaaaaah for me. I should go cry into my barrels full of money. But I swear to you, I'm not looking for empathy. I'm just looking for a way to stop. And I can't.
Alcoholics are smart enough to not walk into a bar. My bar is Twitter. It's Comic-Con. It's anytime someone asks me to write an article even casually relating to Lost.
There is some twisted transference going on here. Why would people who loved the Breaking Bad finale automatically hate LOST's ending? How many cross over viewers were there? And why would a person have to filter a third party's work through their own series' fan issues? It seems narcisstic; vain, prideful, and selfish to transfer gratification derived from admiration of someone else's work to defend one's own accomplishments.
He goes on with this self-realization:
And what do I do? I jump at the opportunity to acknowledge how many people were dissatisfied with how it ended. I try to be self-deprecating and witty when I do this, but that's an elaborate (or obvious?) defense mechanism to let people know I'm fully aware of the elephant in the room and I'm perfectly fine with it sitting down on my face and shitting all over me.
And this is how pathetic I've become -- I'm using an opportunity to put Breaking Bad into the pantheon of best shows ever (where it undeniably belongs) to narcissistically whine about the perceived shortcomings of my own work.
God, I hate myself. But isn't that what's expected of me? Don't I have to do that? Is it possible for me to ever comment on anything I love without cheekily winking at the audience and saying, "But what do I know -- after all, I ruined Lost?"
It does bear mentioning that not everyone feels this way. There are fans who actually love the way Lost ended. And I can feel the abuse they've taken for having what has become a wildly unpopular opinion, which only makes me love them more. Unfortunately, these kind souls are vastly overwhelmed by, well, less kind souls. So now what?
I'm sick of myself for continuing to beat this particular drum, so I can't imagine how sick of it you are. If it's unpleasant and exhausting for me to keep defending the Lost finale, aren't you getting tired of hating it? And so … I, like Walter White, want out. To be free. And to grant you the same.
I'd like to make a pact, you and me. And here's your part: You acknowledge that I know how you feel about the ending of Lost. I got it. I heard you. I will think about your dissatisfaction always and forever. It will stay with me until I lie there on my back dying, camera pulling slowly upward whether it be a solitary dog or an entire SWAT team that comes to my side as I breathe my last breath.
And here's my part: I will finally stop talking about it. I'm not doing this because I feel entitled or above it -- I'm doing it because I accept that I will not change hearts nor minds. I will not convince you they weren't dead the whole time, nor resent you for believing they were despite my infinite declarations otherwise.
Lindelof proposes a pact, a bargain, with still angry LOST fans. He acknowledges their anger for the ending, and he promises to stop talking or trying to convince them to change their minds about the ending. It is not anger but disappointment. But Lindelof or the other PTB took us on their vision of story ride asking us to believe in the plot, its twists, its questions, its mysteries; to find clues, connect the dots, and watch everything come together. The problem continues to be that TPTB never have explained what happened in the series. That is is what is most upsetting to fans. Even if the ending's explanation of the premise, island, mysteries were bad, unbelievable, or contradictory . . . just give us your creative vision of how all the pieces fit together. And that is why some people continue to be mad, because no authoritative explanation for the missing pieces will ever come.
So Lindelof defiantly concludes:
I stand by the Lost finale. It's the story that we wanted to tell, and we told it. No excuses. No apologies. I look back on it as fondly as I look back on the process of writing the whole show. And while I'll always care what you think, I can't be a slave to it anymore. Here's why:
I did it for me. I liked it. I was good at it. And I was really … I was alive.
So, after several years of fans pondering the questions, asking for explanations, Lindelof will not clarify what the show's ending was all about in concrete terms. Instead, he declares he is slamming the door and closing the book on LOST. The End.
The six- part French miniseries from 2005 is called Dolmen. I found it by accident channel surfing the high numbers on the cable box to land on a secondary PBS channel showing International Mysteries.
The story is set on the fictional fishing island of Ty Kern (which is, in real life is an island off the coast of Brittany, France). The main character, Marie Kermeur, a young police lieutenant, who returns to her home island to marry her childhood love, Christian Bréhat, who is a local celebrity because he is a world sail boat champion. In Ty Kern, four families are connected by ancient rivalries and secrets: the Kersaint, the Le Bihan, the Pérec and the Kermeur. But on the day before the wedding of Marie and Christian, strange events begin to happen. The bloody corpse of a seagull is brought in by the tide, Marie is assaulted by strange nightmares a sea of blood and a woman's scream, her brother Gildas is found dead, and the town's menhirs (glyphs carved into large upright stones) begin to bleed at the dolmen, a megalithic tomb with a large flat stone laid on upright ones, found chiefly in Britain and France, near the island's lighthouse. Aided by an inspector from the mainland, Lucas Fersen, Marie decides to clarify these strange phenomena. It is now that a series of deaths begin.
Dolmen's story centers around Marie and the secrets of the island. It involved the re-telling of a local legend about ancient piracy, the island's sinister past, and tragic consequences which follow grim decisions in the past. The body count quickly piles up and the police are baffled by the silence of the town people and the fact that no one can explain the ghostly appearance of the bleeding menhirs. Suspects and conflicting motivations swirl throughout the series, as prime candidates suddenly meet their own demise, unraveling more mysteries.
Dolmen did in six episodes which LOST failed to do in six seasons: answer the questions posed in the beginning of the series, and show the clues that were previously scattered throughout the show as part of the final explanation. It was clear that the writers knew where their story was going to end up prior to shooting the first episode. They charted out the complex family relationships and back stories in order peel away the onion skin of island secrets one by one. And the show put in important clues randomly throughout the series which seemed like minor background material until the murder mysteries and "breaks" int the case began to surface. In the finale, there was no need to dwell on any lengthy verbal explanations to give the viewer enough information to say "Ah ha! That makes sense." And even this series ending left the viewer to postulate a final literal cliff hanger.
The story was so well done that I watched all six episodes even though it was broadcast in French with English subtitles.
As I finished the Dolmen series, which I do not know if it is available on DVD but I highly recommend anyone to watch it if you can, I read an article written by LOST show runner Damon Lindelof, who was asked by the Hollywood Reporter to write an epilogue of Breaking Bad when that series ended. Lindelof was a big fan of Vince Gilligan's hit drama where an unemployed science teacher finds he has cancer, and decides that he needs to cook meth in order to support his family. That decision leads the main character, Walter White, down a path of evil darkness. The fan base knew that there were possibly only three real endings for their show and the main character. They got a sentimental family farewell; they got Walter trying to make his own twisted redemption, but in the end he finally admits that everything he did, he did it for himself, so he could feel alive.
Successful creative people have an built-in ego which needs to be fed. So as Lindelof is writing a piece on Breaking Bad's ending, he detours to rant out about his own show's ending, and the negative backlash that he still gets from LOST fans.
Lindelof wrote in part:
I am a huge fan of Breaking Bad and have been a zealot of its Church of Awesomeness for years. It's spectacular TV -- spectacular storytelling -- and I am lucky to have borne witness to it. The opportunity to sing the show's praises one last time was not one I could possibly pass up.
And here's what I was not aware of but am now.
All story is reflective, designed to illuminate its own characters and the themes surrounding them. When a show is as brilliant as Breaking Bad, it's not just about the people we're watching, it's about those watching them. About us. In other words, the better the show, the deeper it forces you to look at yourself. On Sunday night, I took a good long look at myself, and this is what I found staring back …
I agreed to write this piece because I am deeply and unhealthily obsessed with finding ways to revisit the Lost finale and the maddening hurricane of shit that has followed it.
I am surprised that after all this time, Lindelof still stings about the criticism of his show's finale, comparing, I guess, the critics to a violent storm of crap. Anyone can read my views, opinions, criticisms and positives of the show in this blog; but I don't think I threw down the feces gauntlet to the show producers. What I, and many other viewers wanted was explanations (separating the wheat from the chaff, the red herrings from the real clues) for the mysteries and questions that Lindelof himself set up in the story lines. Fans had high expectations for the ending.
Lindelof continues:
And this morning? I am Walter White. Arrogant. Conceited. Selfish. Entitled. Looking for ways to blame everything and everyone but myself, even though it is perfectly clear the situation I find myself in is of my own making. And here's the worst part: I'm still naive enough to believe I can attain some level of redemption.
Redemption is a thing that saves someone from error or evil or the action of regaining or gaining possession of something in exchange for payment, such as clearing a debt. It is a personal decision for each viewer whether the show's producers and writers breached their promises in giving us a completed story. Fans spent their time watching LOST with the expectation that certain mysteries would be answered in a reasonable fashion. For a top notch show, they believed they were entitled to a mind blowing finale. TPTB never downplayed those expectations.
He continues:
Earlier drafts of this piece were a love letter to Breaking Bad. The show was a masterpiece. I listed the reasons why. We all know what they are. The finale? Fantastic. Not a false beat. * * * * And that would have been the piece you would have read had I finished it. But …
In the comments section of the piece I did not write, the following sentiment would have been echoed dozens of times over: "What the f--- do you know because you f---ed up Lost?!?" How do I know this? Well, for starters, my Twitter feed was pretty much a unanimous run of, "Did you see that, Lindelof? That's how you end a show."
Three years later, it appears that it is not just enough to love Breaking Bad's finale. You also have to hate ours. Yeah, I know. Waaaaaah for me. I should go cry into my barrels full of money. But I swear to you, I'm not looking for empathy. I'm just looking for a way to stop. And I can't.
Alcoholics are smart enough to not walk into a bar. My bar is Twitter. It's Comic-Con. It's anytime someone asks me to write an article even casually relating to Lost.
There is some twisted transference going on here. Why would people who loved the Breaking Bad finale automatically hate LOST's ending? How many cross over viewers were there? And why would a person have to filter a third party's work through their own series' fan issues? It seems narcisstic; vain, prideful, and selfish to transfer gratification derived from admiration of someone else's work to defend one's own accomplishments.
He goes on with this self-realization:
And what do I do? I jump at the opportunity to acknowledge how many people were dissatisfied with how it ended. I try to be self-deprecating and witty when I do this, but that's an elaborate (or obvious?) defense mechanism to let people know I'm fully aware of the elephant in the room and I'm perfectly fine with it sitting down on my face and shitting all over me.
And this is how pathetic I've become -- I'm using an opportunity to put Breaking Bad into the pantheon of best shows ever (where it undeniably belongs) to narcissistically whine about the perceived shortcomings of my own work.
God, I hate myself. But isn't that what's expected of me? Don't I have to do that? Is it possible for me to ever comment on anything I love without cheekily winking at the audience and saying, "But what do I know -- after all, I ruined Lost?"
It does bear mentioning that not everyone feels this way. There are fans who actually love the way Lost ended. And I can feel the abuse they've taken for having what has become a wildly unpopular opinion, which only makes me love them more. Unfortunately, these kind souls are vastly overwhelmed by, well, less kind souls. So now what?
I'm sick of myself for continuing to beat this particular drum, so I can't imagine how sick of it you are. If it's unpleasant and exhausting for me to keep defending the Lost finale, aren't you getting tired of hating it? And so … I, like Walter White, want out. To be free. And to grant you the same.
I'd like to make a pact, you and me. And here's your part: You acknowledge that I know how you feel about the ending of Lost. I got it. I heard you. I will think about your dissatisfaction always and forever. It will stay with me until I lie there on my back dying, camera pulling slowly upward whether it be a solitary dog or an entire SWAT team that comes to my side as I breathe my last breath.
And here's my part: I will finally stop talking about it. I'm not doing this because I feel entitled or above it -- I'm doing it because I accept that I will not change hearts nor minds. I will not convince you they weren't dead the whole time, nor resent you for believing they were despite my infinite declarations otherwise.
Lindelof proposes a pact, a bargain, with still angry LOST fans. He acknowledges their anger for the ending, and he promises to stop talking or trying to convince them to change their minds about the ending. It is not anger but disappointment. But Lindelof or the other PTB took us on their vision of story ride asking us to believe in the plot, its twists, its questions, its mysteries; to find clues, connect the dots, and watch everything come together. The problem continues to be that TPTB never have explained what happened in the series. That is is what is most upsetting to fans. Even if the ending's explanation of the premise, island, mysteries were bad, unbelievable, or contradictory . . . just give us your creative vision of how all the pieces fit together. And that is why some people continue to be mad, because no authoritative explanation for the missing pieces will ever come.
So Lindelof defiantly concludes:
I stand by the Lost finale. It's the story that we wanted to tell, and we told it. No excuses. No apologies. I look back on it as fondly as I look back on the process of writing the whole show. And while I'll always care what you think, I can't be a slave to it anymore. Here's why:
I did it for me. I liked it. I was good at it. And I was really … I was alive.
So, after several years of fans pondering the questions, asking for explanations, Lindelof will not clarify what the show's ending was all about in concrete terms. Instead, he declares he is slamming the door and closing the book on LOST. The End.
Saturday, May 5, 2012
A SECOND CHANCE?
Variety had a recent article on Damon Lindelof, one of the creative forces behind LOST. Lindelof was commenting about how social media was changing the way producers of content got immediate feed back from viewers.
And for content creators, it's key to let audiences know producers are listening to them, he said.
The article stated that Lindelof began posting his first tweets after the finale of LOST paying more attention to the platform while on vacation in Italy. He would retweet negative posts about the finale and comment on them to let viewers know, "I hear you," he said. "It started becoming therapeutic for me. The idea of acknowledging that sentiment" can be a powerful tool to connect with audiences, he added.
After LOST ended its run, there was a bitter feud between die-hard fans and TPTB over the direction of Season 6 and the sudden purgatory ending. TPTB dismissed the charges that they owed the fans answers to all the questions they raised in the various story arcs. TPTB said that LOST was a "character driven" show and they wrote the finale to give the characters their final reward. The negative comments led to show runners going into retreat mode, and the series quickly faded from mainstream consciousness. But at least Lindelof now admits that he understands the bitterness of a lot of fans on how "their" series ended. Time can heal some wounds.
However, the article also made a strange relevation. Lindelof said he has no interest in revisiting "Lost" anytime soon.
"It's been two years (since the series wrapped) and we told the story we wanted to tell," Lindelof said. But he admits ABC might look for ways to bring back LOST in some form. "I do feel like the world has not seen the end of 'Lost,' but I'm not going to have any involvement," he said.
Lindelof isn't bitter about the idea, however. "It would be hypocritical for me to say I'm going to do 'Star Trek' but I don't want anyone to touch 'Lost,' " he said.
A new LOST show? It is like selling a salvaged automobile as a quality used car at an auto auction. As the backlash cooled enough to have some other writers "re-boot" the series (as a franchise as Disney likes to have in its inventory)?
The difference between LOST and the Star Trek franchise is that Roddenberry's vision of his universe was complete and had the sci-fiction continuity that made the premise of deep space exploration work. LOST fumbled the ball on created a coherent Big Premise of the island, sci-fi physics properties or explanations of the mysteries to capture the imagination of the disappointed die-hard fans.
It is also easy to see why a re-boot could happen: most of the LOST cast have not gone on to bigger and better projects. Most are available for re-casting in a new series. Except, re-shooting the program with a better plot analysis is like trying to put the toothpaste back into the tube.
A LOST sequel or prequel would have major obstacles to overcome. A prequel would have to deal with the transition from the military rule of the island to the Dharma period. One would then have to really explain the science properties of the Island and why it is so important. This is something TPTB refused to grasp in the original series. A sequel could involve the Hurley-Ben "rule" of the Island realm, but does that really matter anymore?
Besides, the Numbers (viewers) don't add up; there was a steady decline in viewership after Season 1 and a fall off during the uneven Season 6. There is no pent-up demand for a return to the Island.
To re-boot LOST today, you would have to overwrite a brand new set of characters and concepts over the existing Island structures and mysteries. And you would have to come out of the gate with clear explanations of the hieroglyphs, the Smoke Monster, and the Island's special properties and how they all tie together "to save the world." You would have to re-create the show in a manner that had the hooks in the die-hard viewers, who were blogging, commenting and screaming about their own magical theories, speculations and desires for the show. But that fan passion is gone. With franchises like Star Trek, that passion never went away, even when the producers stumbled with offerings like Star Trek the Movie or Deep Space 9.
I don't know if a nostalgic "what if" things were done differently could successfully re-boot LOST.
Besides, the Numbers (viewers) don't add up; there was a steady decline in viewership after Season 1 and a fall off during the uneven Season 6. There is no pent-up demand for a return to the Island.
To re-boot LOST today, you would have to overwrite a brand new set of characters and concepts over the existing Island structures and mysteries. And you would have to come out of the gate with clear explanations of the hieroglyphs, the Smoke Monster, and the Island's special properties and how they all tie together "to save the world." You would have to re-create the show in a manner that had the hooks in the die-hard viewers, who were blogging, commenting and screaming about their own magical theories, speculations and desires for the show. But that fan passion is gone. With franchises like Star Trek, that passion never went away, even when the producers stumbled with offerings like Star Trek the Movie or Deep Space 9.
I don't know if a nostalgic "what if" things were done differently could successfully re-boot LOST.
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