Monday, May 23, 2011

Remembering Lost...

Where do I begin? “At the beginning” just seems so… predictable. And linear. And Lost was neither of those things.



It’s a year later. On May 23, 2010, my favourite show came to an end. I remember that day… I was working on the final Finding Lost book in the series, trying to finish taking notes on the penultimate episode, “What They Died For,” before the finale began, because I wanted to be careful not to add any spoilers into any of the previous episode guides. I had this feeling of excitement, but also overwhelming dread. This rock was sitting in my stomach. Yes, there was a fear that the finale wouldn’t deliver, that it would have been built up so much in all our hearts and minds that it couldn’t possibly be as good as we needed it to be. But more than that, there was a sense that it would be over. All the questions would be answered. No more speculation, no more discussions, no more disputes, no more insane theories. All the things I loved about Lost were about to come to an end.

But I didn’t need to worry. The finale was polarizing, yes, but luckily (and I really do mean luckily because I’ve always felt so bad for the Lost fans who were unhappy with the ending), I loved it. I loved almost every single thing about it. And the answers weren’t offered on a plate. The speculation, discussions, disputes, and insane theories could continue!!

Unfortunately, I was only able to keep the intense discussions (and they were intense) going for a couple of days after it aired. After that, I had to switch gears and write a book based on all the notes I’d been making for months. Where other Lost fans were packing away their DVDs and needing time to themselves, time to digest what they’d just seen, I was forced right back to the first episode of the season and immediately began rewatching it all over again. I had to do my first live chat five minutes after the finale ended, and while “WTF?!” just scrolled by over and over again by thousands of confused Lost fans, I launched into my explanation of what had happened. By the following day, I was still there and hadn’t changed my opinion much at all.



I’m not going to analyze the finale. If you want that, check out my final book, Finding Lost: Season 6, where I devoted 22,000 words and 50 pages to a full analysis of “The End.” Instead, I want to talk about where we are a year later.

I want to know if there’s anyone out there who loathed that finale when they watched it, but now, with time, they’ve realized they no longer hate it. I want to know if there is anyone who had a discussion with someone else where the finale was put into a new perspective that made them appreciate the subtlety of it. And I also want to know who is still disappointed.

For me, I miss the show so much. But even more than the show itself, I miss the discussions. I miss the camaraderie that we Lost fans had week after week on this blog and countless others. I miss the weekly discussions that began moments after an episode happened and continued through to moments before the next one began. In the case of Nik at Nite, I miss that panicky mad scramble to get the post up the night of the episode.

I miss our haiku.

I miss the inside jokes and language that we used here that I haven’t seen anywhere else. The wacky definitions of verification words. “Palatable.”

I miss making fun of Jack.

I miss Jack. Terribly.

I miss the way we would gather together to take down the shippers in a massive organized, evil smackdown! (OK, that didn’t actually happen, but I miss that each of us were probably wishing it would, while putting on our polite faces and pretending that some of those people weren’t entirely batshit crazy.)

I miss coming up with superlatives to describe my affection for Desmond. And how others would come up with ways to describe their crushes on Sayid or Sawyer or Kate or Juliet.

I miss the torcha scrunchie.

I miss the photoshopped photos that were sent to me of people holding my books, or playing with their avatars, or playing with screen captures from the episodes to make other things happen.

I miss that we could have intense debates that would run so deep that someone could go and create a pdf map of Dharmaville to prove exactly where one person’s cabin was in conjunction to the next.

I miss the way we could actually have those debates without ever talking down to one another or being rude. I mean, when does that ever happen? Most of my family members can’t have a casual discussion without someone getting hurt, so the fact we could do this week after week was amazing.

I miss the personal emails I got from people off-list, and I’m happy that I still get some of those.

I miss the anticipation of next week’s episode and the excitement we found ourselves in week after week just imagining what would happen.

I remember.

I remember meeting the characters for the first time in season 1, and the twists and turns discovered through their backstories. I remember wishing Terry O’Quinn could be in every show I watch.



I remember the tension of season 2, whether it was with the new tailies being introduced, or the fact that ABC had wonked up the schedule so much it was difficult to keep track of everything, and I remember how the writers took what we knew in season 1 and turned it on its head.



I remember the utter grief of watching Charlie die at the end of season 3, followed by the thrill of realizing that the flashback we’d just seen was actually a flashforward.



I remember the excitement of season 4, the beauty of “The Constant” and the rivalry between Widmore and Ben. I remember wishing Michael Emerson could be in every show I watch.



I remember the complexity of season 5, and how much fun we all had trying to piece it together. And how it was the season where I realized I could no longer really explain to non-viewers what Lost was about.



I remember the crazy anticipation we all had leading up to season 6, the fan videos that were appearing, the way we were piecing together bits of the story we’d seen so far to figure out where the story would go next, linking John Locke and the Man in Black and learning of Jacob being in there. I remember this fan video in particular, and how it blew me away. I remember the creator emailing me asking if I’d post it, and I said sure, and within weeks it was everywhere, and even Damon tweeted about it. It’s still one of my favourite fan videos ever:



Breathtaking, isn’t it? I remember how season 6 built up quickly with every episode, and the panic that began to slowly creep in when half the season was gone and we hadn’t gotten many answers, and thinking the writers would run out of time.

I remember crying like I’ve never cried before when the show ended. I really don’t think I’ll ever cry like that again for another television show. I find it hard to imagine how that would be possible.

Lost was a show that ended with a simple message: that it’s not about where you end up, but the journey you took to get there. It’s about the connections you make in your life, which is why every character on the island seemed to have been interconnected even before they got on the plane. It’s about who you touch emotionally, and how those experiences and memories are the only things you can take with you to the next life. It’s about constancy. It’s about love and hope.

The sideways world turned out to be a place where everyone went after they died, with no memory of having been on the island at all, but instead working through their issues – the very issues that made each person so emotionally lost when they crashed on that island in the first place – without the island helping or hindering them along the way. When they came to a revelation about who they were or what their purpose was – a revelation that could only come through a connection – they could suddenly see everything, past present and future, clearly. And once they could see clearly, they knew that it was important to help other people come to that clarity, and only then could they move on to the afterlife. Jack was the last one to come on board, because he simply couldn’t step back from the minutiae of his life and see the big picture. But when he did, he saw that, like Dorothy and her ruby slippers, that the answers were there all along. And of all the people to impart the wisdom to him, it was his father:



Some fans have complained that the ending is too spiritual. Yes, the church setting could certainly make one say that, but the church itself is simply a visual cue in this case. It’s not meant to evoke a religion, but to suggest that the scene we are seeing in front of us is spiritual. That we don’t need to look to higher powers to find spirituality – it’s within us, and in the connections that we make. The friendships that everyone had on the island with each other, the connections and relationships they forged with one another, they were spiritual. They might not have seemed it, but in the end, they are what mattered. The church setting simply said, “What you are watching right now? It’s spiritual. Not in a God sense, but in an uplifting of the soul sense.”

Lost was an intensely personal show. In a way, it was like a religion. You can read the bible, or go to church and listen to a church official interpret the bible for you, but in the end, you will still make your own decisions and have your own take on things. You will feel your own personal relationship to God. Religion doesn’t hand you the answers; it gives you the tools with which to find those answers. Life doesn’t give you answers, but if you follow the right path and connect with the right people, you will determine what answers work for you.

Lost didn’t offer up answers, but it gave us the story of people who were similarly seeking answers, and showed us how they went about finding them. We, too, need to look within and outside ourselves to find those answers. Our very discussions on this blog were a way of us looking for those answers within the context of the show. We connected to each other, and were able to find some of the answers we sought just by talking it out with each other.

“The End” was extraordinary. But for me, the real beauty of Lost was the fun in getting there, both in watching the show and discussing it. A year later, Lost is firmly entrenched in my heart as not just a TV show, but an experience I will never forget.

69 comments:

deeannjay said...

Thank you for this lovely piece, Nikki. I, too, miss Lost terribly and simply can't believe it's been a year since The End came and went. I commemorated the anniversary by purchasing The Lost Encyclopaedia, and just flicking through its pages I have been amazed at just how many themes were covered during the six seasons of this iconic show. I can't imagine any future TV series even coming close to the breadth and depth of the Lost story. I count it a privilege to have been able to share in the experience of watching this amazing series and discuss it with so many other people, to whom it clearly meant an awful lot.

StephenC said...

:(

Thanks for the piece nikki, very nice way to commemorate the greatest show ever !!!!

RickR said...

"I miss Jack. Terribly."

*nods*

*cries*

tattoedGenExer said...

Thanks Nikki, really lovely post. Now I have to do a re-watch of course. We're so lucky to have had Lost in our lives, and to have the memories and our DVDs.

Stephen 'Socks' Bowron said...

If I start talking, this comment is going to be as long as your post.. So all I'll say is

=(

humanebean said...

"I know you don't understand ... but if you come with me, you will".

Truer words were never spoken. In context, though, they express a thought that lead directly to the polarized reaction that resulted from "The End". As the seasons of LOST progressed, and casual fans fell away, finding the show too frustrating or demanding or just plain crazy, the passionate fans dug in, savoring every plot twist, obsessing over each Easter Egg and spending the days following each episode searching the web for detailed explanations of character names, literary references and scientific theories.

Many of us met here, sharing our love for the show, reveling in the debates, discussions and diversions that such passionate fandom generated. Nikki describes this perfectly in her post - there is little that I could add to her excellent summary. As much as we shared about our perceptions, hopes and predictions for the series' ultimate destination, we each harbored our own desires - for answers to mysteries that delighted us in particular, for payoffs to our favorite plotlines or character arcs, and for resolution, for satisfaction and, yes, for understanding.

Given the monumental task of wrapping up so many story strands and providing satisfactory answers to so many persistent questions, the challenge of crafting a soft landing for the final season of the show was monumental. The narrative structure the writers and showrunners selected was ambitious, at once congruent with the flash-backs-and-forwards of previous seasons and yet somehow tangential, vectoring us off in a new direction just when we felt we needed to be shedding extraneous detail instead of adding it.

As such, I was among the many initially dissatisfied with some of the elements of the final season and left feeling deflated by "The End". I thought I had ratcheted my expectations down to a reasonable level only to find that I had harbored my own hidden desires for answers to the many mysteries of the Island and a powerful need for an ending that would tie things together coherently, giving each character his/her due and framing the history of the Island in a context that would satisfyingly deepen the fate of our Oceanic survivors.

I loved the spiritual ending for the show but was disappointed to quibble with some of the scenes that lead us there. So many times in the final season we saw a recurrence of a familiar quote, a symmetrical repetition of a scene from prior seasons, seeming to drive home the point that we were coming full circle as Jack, Kate and the others looked at their reflections and tried to understand what they saw. In the finale, these flashes reached a crescendo in which the sideways characters experienced an epiphany that helped them let go ... and move on.
(to be cont'd)

humanebean said...

(cont'd)
Some of these scenes felt rather stilted to me upon first view, and slightly cheapened the memory of those earlier, more powerful moments when Claire first delivered her baby, when Sawyer was crushed by the loss of Juliet and when Charlie found within himself the courage to make the ultimate sacrifice. Sayid ends up with Shannon? My frustrated expectations overshadowed some of what was most powerful about the series finale.

But I had forgotten something important. My passionate love for LOST had not happened immediately, nor even as the show stretched into its terrific second season. For me, it was ignited early in Season 3 when I began my first rewatch. I went back to the beginning and viewed those early episodes with fresh eyes ... and was amazed by what I found. I watched flashbacks from a different perspective, with knowledge of later events, and it recontextualized the entire show for me. I found Nikki's blog and then her books and my love for the show launched into the stratosphere.

And so, it is fitting that my appreciation for the final season and for the eagerly anticipated finale, should grow out of my recent rewatch in anticipation of this anniversary. In the last few days and weeks, I took that journey again, sifting through the developments, listening to commentary on the DVD and, of course, reveling in the superlative prose of Ms. Stafford as I followed along in Finding LOST: Season Six

Yesterday, I watched "The End" again ... and I found myself at peace with so many things that had bothered me the first time around. Some things were still a bit rushed, perhaps by necessity, but as the show marched towards its conclusion, in the (for me) brilliant church ending, I found myself meditating upon Kate's words to Jack, quoted at the outset of this (overlong and overwrought) commentary. I didn't understand at first, but eventually I found myself taking the journey again and, as promised, I did.

I can't imagine another show having this particular kind of impact on my thinking, on my worldview and my heart. Thanks to all who made it happen: the writers, the actors, the showrunners, the fandom ... and not least of all, NIkki Stafford, who shared her own passion, her vision and her indefatigable spirit with us all on a nearly daily basis over six years, five books, innumerable blog posts, podcasts and more. I'm glad that I came along for the ride.

Given the experience of sharing this show with so many worthy friends, I know that I'd rather live together than die alone.

Anonymous said...

Nikki - - - thanks so much for this - - I'm still in mourning over the loss of this show. I just found that CafePress.com is having a sale on LOST shirts, signs, etc..

http://shop.cafepress.com/losttv?source=email&CMP=emc_20110523_25off_LOST&utm_source=cafepress&utm_medium=email&utm_content=20110523_25off_LOST&utm_campaign=Promo_Shops&pid=2529374

yourblindspot said...

I never expected to connect to a television program like I did with LOST, and I think that to a certain degree, even so long after the fact, I'm still in shock. Tv has always struck me as a largely shallow medium, and other than a few notable exceptions, it wasn't something that had ever attracted much of my attention. Even the shows that I enjoyed watching enough to seek out on a regular basis were still by my estimation a week-to-week crapshoot of tone and content and quality.

Watching LOST caused me to completely reevaluate all my expectations of what a television show could offer a viewer. The idea that my heart and soul and passion and curiosity and imagination could be so profoundly stimulated over and over again was utterly revolutionary, and I don't ever expect to find anything else that will resonate within me the same way again.

The thing I miss the most about being in the midst of a new season of LOST is how thrilling it was to have new bits and pieces of the mosaic each week, fresh clues to turn over in our hands, and the feeling of being a valued mind in a collective that stretched all the way around the globe, unified and energized. I remember starting an internet search on event probability or Carlos Castaneda or whatever and then falling down the rabbit hole until suddenly hours had passed and left me with nothing but throbbing eyeballs and pages and pages of handwritten notes and a head that reeled with connections and possibilities. I remember logging in and reading reactions and riding that wave of 'What If' with the rest of you and feeling so enlightened and invigorated and... God, exultant! Intoxicated. You know?

And really, that's it in a nutshell: watching LOST, and being a part of that community of fans, made me so incredibly happy. That's what I remember best. And I'll never let go of that.

Linda345 said...

Nikki, thank you. Beautiful piece, beautiful memories.
Humanebean, I had a similar experience: I was initially disappointed when I watched the finale, found it stilted, and then I rewatched and those feelings fled. I just "got it" or at least got it enough to be very satisfied. I love the finale more and more every time I see it.

I don't know what to make of the fans--and they are fans--who were not able to feel that joy in the show as a whole. I suppose because, as Nikki says, this show was by no means linear, those looking for linearity would find their search futile.

I watch TV differently after watching Lost. I expect more from writers, and actors. Mostly, I look to be respected for my intelligence and not pandered to. Lost always took the lead and never pandered, and that's why I love it.

Quarks said...

Unfortunately, as a very late arrival to the world of Lost, this time last year I was only just starting to watch Season 5 on DVD, and then had to wait another few months for the final season to be out on DVD, by which time it was too late to be able to discuss it. Fortunately, with the rewatches going on I have been able to give my opinions a bit now, but I do regret that I wasn't able to become a real part of the Lost community while it was still on TV.

I have just watched the finale again, and my opinions are very much the same as they were when I first watched it: I love it. There hasn't been any other show which has made me feel so many emotions in a single episode, and I doubt there ever will be again. I can't say it better than Nikki, but I have to agree that Lost was so much more than how it ended, it was about the journey, the characters, the emotions and so much more.

Lost was the most phenomenal show which I have ever had the privilege to watch, and I don't think I will ever move on from it entirely. There are some great shows on the TV at the moment, and some great ones coming, but none will ever reach the standard of Lost.

I miss Lost.

Cue "Life and Death".

Anonymous said...

Thanks so much for this post Nikki! I thought to myself - It's May 23 - I bet Nikki will post something. But you made my day today. And the videos - I feel like I am right back in the middle of it and I miss it too! I bumped into someone 3 months ago who started asking me questions about certain "mysteries" that were never solved and I realized that he thinks he wasted 6 years of his life. I think of it as a tremendous journey, as you mentioned, and I was happy to be part of it.

Dusk said...

Reflecting on a year later, I believe what made LOST so great was that it made you care about the characters like they were a part of your real life.

It was so intricate and complex it had the themes of love, faith, destiny, family and much more, but it never truly hit you over the head with one particualr thing. Most of them had parent issues but they never sat in a circle to moan abut them. They ech haf their own journey to heal, but they came together to do it.

The fact that it incorperated physics, some different cultures, literary refrences, (thank you nikki, the summaries realy helped tie the show together)really made the show really excel at adding the the mythology, while still giving viewers room to breathe by giving the characters and story intresting developments.

This all created a super fandom that I know was super close, I wasn't at this blog for that, but I still got to trade my share of ideas in other places. The fact that I heard the UK supposedly aired it a 5in the morning over there so they would be on par with their North Americian fellow fans is a testament to that.

Part of what made LOST so great was the incredible actors, writers, music crew in the show itself, but a big part of what made it truly unique was how the fandom all Lived Together.

Marebabe said...

Dear Nikki ~ Thank you.
Dear humanebean ~ Thank you.
Dear yourblindspot ~ Thank you.

I don’t have much to add, because you have expressed so eloquently why we love LOST. I’ll just say that I am very pleased to note how my own responses changed upon rewatching “The End” yesterday. Oddly, even though I knew what was coming, I teared up on cue for every awakening, and when Vincent joined Jack in the final scene. And it helped me a lot to have some understanding about how and why NotLocke/Smokey could finally be killed, and to know what the writers were getting at with the sideways world and the whole “moving on together” thing. My enjoyment was GREATLY enhanced by not feeling utterly confused.

I love LOST. I’m so glad I made the journey with all of you.

Efthymia said...

I love LOST. It was a unique experience and I feel very differently about it than about any other show. Yes, I was disappointed that I didn't get many of the answers I was looking forward to getting. But "The End" still gets me very emotional, even just thinking about it, and I still can't revisit the show, because it's just too damn painful!

I know people who feel they wasted 6 years of their lives because the pay-off wasn't the one they wanted/expected, and I can't really understand them: first of all, no work of fiction can completely satisfy each individual invested in it (people ARE different, you know...); and, most importantly, LOST was more than its story (which I still find a most interesting one, anyway); as you 've already said, it was about the characters, and the thought-provokement, and the feeling of community with people from all around the world, and the understanding and acceptance of different views within this community, and the learning... LOST was more than 45 minutes of TV time, and I don't believe anyone who's felt that can claim that they wasted 6 years of their lives.

I'm very happy that once again we share something -even if it is sadness and nostalgia- over LOST.

Anonymous said...

Nikki and all the commenters - - - thank you so much for this. I feel like I'm in a room with friends - - with people who "get it". We all rode the wild roller coaster of emotions and bonded. THIS is what I miss the most - - - the dissection of the story and the hints, clues, wall art, interactions, and ALWAYS something we didn't understand and had to search the internet for answers and explanations.

Thanks to you all for sharing. I miss you guys!

Anonymous said...

Lost will always be my second or third favorite all-time show (The Wire & The Sopranos) I miss it too.

It's so hard not to laugh at the horrible wanna be's that they put out - Flashforward, The Event.

We never did a Season 6 Re-watch. Maybe we should - for completeness sake?

-Tim Alan

JS said...

You guys are making me cry again. I'm frustrated to be in a very disorganized airport waiting for my flight. I'd much rather be at my desk composing my thoughts. I rewatche from the candidate yesterday, and rewatched the end several times in the week following the finale. It made me so happy to spend my bday completely indulging in this experience and having two LOST numbers (42 on the 23rd) to boot.

With every watch the meaning is deeper for me, and I cried at the same and additional moments. They meant so much. I too was late to the party but was lucky to find you all just before the full rewatch so I watched then rewatched all 5 seasons before S6. I am so glad I found you, and know I am not alone in my love/obsession/sentiment.

LittleMo said...

Great piece Nikki, you really captured the perspective one year on. And the comments from Humanbean, Yourblindspot, Quarks and everyone. We are one great big Lost family that have found each other !!
(oops that was corny!)
But that is the point of Lost. Its not just another TV show - its now a part of our lives, our development, our memories and our views. And that is why we will never forget it.
I am stuck at the moment in series 3. Series 3 and 2 were not my favourites so I'll just have to knuckle down, watch it and get through it for the later/better series. !
Initially I thought The End was wrong and I fervently disagreed with it. But now with time I see that that is how Carlton and Damon chose to tell the story, and they have left some hooks/vagueness where we can put our own interpretations on things, and indeed the whole series.
And that is what I now do. I see it through my eyes and for me it makes sense.
Though the idea of the sideways world having no 'proper' timeline still freaks me out. (I guess its the physicist in me that needs science to be able to explain as much of it as it can).

Anyway Lost is and unforgettable part of my life, and thanks to Nikki for helping me through it so well and letting our happy family here grow and thrive !!!

Francisco said...

Thank you Nikki. I miss LOST very very very much, just like you do...

"This is the place that you all made together, so that you could find one another.
The most important part of your life, was the time that you spent with these people. That's why all of you are here. You needed them and they needed you.
To remember and... to let go." :'(

Greetings from Chile.
Francisco.

Fred said...

@Nikki:And I also want to know who is still disappointed.

Well, I for one still am. It seems there are 3 sort of viewers of the show. Some like my friends simply view it as an entertainment, let it wash over them. Now that its over, they'll move onto Game of Thrones or next season's True Blood. Others are devoted, and the ending of the series does little to diminish their love of the show. And then there's me, quibbling about many points in the show and especially the end. (Some of my sentiments are echoed by http://mythicscribes.com/analysis/lost-finale/).

Oh, yes, I get it. The finale: love, peace, the ones we all touch, deep meaning, an emotional rollercoaster of an ending. The writers held true to their form in concluding the story as they did. But if "The End" truly was the end, then why the snippets tucked onto the DVD? They obviously knew not everyone would buy "The End" as the conclusion to the story. There had to be something more, and so we got some mini-scenes to satisfy those who wanted answers. Why not a whole new episode of Hurley and Ben on the island?

What I felt let down about wasn't the emotional tide that rolled over us with the final few shows, but that we were given something that was weak in terms of story. Compare "The Constant" (another emotional fest) with "The End", and I'd say the former comes out much better. I felt the writers started to let us down in the final season, something they rarely did in the first four seasons (even with the writers' strike foreshortening the fourth season). Oh, yeah, there was Nikki and Paulo, but when the writers figured out our dismay at them, they relished, as we did, in their demise. And consider how much narratively was going on in "Through the Looking Glass." This wasn't just a wending down of a single plot line, which is what "The End" became.

For myself, the best of Lost lies in the first four seasons, and even some of the fifth, with such episodes as involved Richard and Ben in the finale season. I always got the impression that the final season felt hurried, like the showrunners just wanted to be done with it and move on. So I'll always have some gripes about the way the show ended, even though I can appreciate its emotional ending.

The Question Mark said...

Nikki, I really like the idea of LOST being a lot like a religion in itself. A lot of people can get caught up in the intricacies & seemingly contradictory minutaie, but in the end when you're looking back on it all you realize it was just pure faith and the joy of sharing it with others that made the whole experience so absolutely wonderful to begin with.

Like many of y'all have said here, there have been great shows before and since LOST came along. Heroes Season 1 was spectacular, then it kinda petered out. FlashForward showed real promise until it was cancelled prematurely. Fringe is certainly great sci-fi and a terrific show from start to finish. But none of them...none of them are LOST. None of them have that...inexplicable *something* that makes LOST what it is.

Of course, no other show has given me such a great set of friends to discuss it with, either. I'm grateful to have shared that 6-year experience with all of you (even if I did only join the posting party in Season 4).

So, thank you to the LOST cast, crew, & creators, for telling such a grand and stupendous story that affected people on levels deeper than any other TV show could ever dream of.

And thank you to all of you guys, for being there every step of the way!

Lisa(until further notice) said...

I watched LOST, without fail, every week from the moment it came on TV in 2004. I soon got my husband and son hooked on it, and then, when my stepfather had to live with us for 6 months during the latter half of season 2, he watched it with us as well. It drove him CRAZY. He hadn't seen season 1, and all the Ben/Henry stuff was happening and creating so many questions and confusion. Everything I loved about LOST, the questions, the mysteries, the intense characterization, he couldn't stand. He enjoyed it from an entertainment standpoint, but would never be a fan :) To this day, he occasionaly asks me if anything ever got figured out and resolved on "that show" LOST. Cracks me up every time.

When Season 5 ended, I went crazy with anticipation for season 6. I immediately went to Netflix and started watching over from the very beginning and watched all 5 seasons in about a month or two. It was around this time, sometime in the summer, that I realized for the first time that there was an online #uberfanfestcommunity out there doing what I had been doing all by myself. I wanted in. Luckily, after some hits and misses, I stumbled upon this site and never looked back. I came on board part way through the rewatch and followed along by reading Nikki's wonderful posts and all the follow-up discussions by you amazing folks.

When season 6 began, I had already rewatched the entire series twice. And I was ready to enter into the discussions.

Experiencing LOST has been an amazing ride. One that changed forever how and why I watch TV. I had never been, and doubt I will ever again be, so involved with a storyline, its characters, its setting, its MUSIC, (I own all of the soundtracks and my kids just sigh when it comes on in the car :)) its actors and writers, but mostly, its heart and soul.

I had a few friends I could get into a decent discussion about an episode with, but nothing like I found here. What I needed was more intense than they were able to provide. I want to tell you that it's been a joy and a privilege. Thanks to all.

It goes without saying that I loved "The End" and was an emotional wreck throught the episode. To this day, I have difficulty getting through that episode without having a breakdown.
I miss LOST and am looking forward to another rewatch perhaps this summer. But in the year that's passed so quickly, I found I needed to step back, let go, and move on. But I'll be back :)

SenexMacDonald said...

@Nikki - thanks again for letting me follow you down that rabbit hole called LOST! Great reflection on the show/ending a year later.

Last year at this time, some friends and I drove down to Niagara-on-the-Lake and then Niagara Falls for the 24 weekend. We decided, after much discussion, to make it only a one night stay-over instead of two due to the LOST finale being shown.

Today, in honour of LOST's finale (and to visit a friend I have not seen in over a year), I drove down to Niagara-on-the-Lake. :)

This might become a tradition.

"I remember this fan video in particular, and how it blew me away. I remember the creator emailing me asking if I’d post it, and I said sure, and within weeks it was everywhere, and even Damon tweeted about it. It’s still one of my favourite fan videos ever:"

Ironically, this is the first time I have seen this video! Wow... I am blown away by it. Truly amazing work. And at this point in the post, I started to cry - again!

"I remember crying like I’ve never cried before when the show ended. I really don’t think I’ll ever cry like that again for another television show."

Nikki, I so agree. Prior to the LOST ending, the hardest I have ever cried over a piece of media was reading the final Harry Potter story. I read it after Justin read it. I could not put it down... so I sat on our bed, reading with Justin constantly bringing me tissues. I think I went through over a box and a half on that alone.

When the final show aired, I think I started crying shortly after it began. Thank goodness for the commercial breaks to give me a chance to take a breath before beginning to cry again. By the time the show got near the end, I was heaving and sobbing so loudly, my cats kept coming in to see what was going on. I could barely catch my breath - let alone take the tissues that Justin kept giving me.

On re-watching these clips again, I find myself feeling the same and crying just as hard.

LOST was an immense part of my life. For a show on TV, the characters leapt off the screen as much as any other written characters I have loved. The depth of writing, the joy/pain/love/living that these characters experienced has made this show, for me, a unique and possibly never to be repeated experience.

I miss it and the characters every day. I am not ready for a full re-watch. I might not ever be but knowing that when I am ready that I can share my thoughts and feelings with you, Nikki, and with such a great bunch of people will make it, when it happens, all the more worthwhile. :)

shobiz said...

Thank you, Nikki. I was not much more than a lurker on your blog for much of the series, but I appreciated so many things you and your followers had to say. And I disagreed with many of them, too. No arguments today. As a huge lover of the entire show, including and especially The End, today I don't feel like debating or defending. Today, I just want to remember, let go... and move on. (Okay, maybe not the "move on" part.)

To those in my "real life" who gave up on the show before it was over, and to those friends, both online and off, whom I was unable to convince that the ending was worthy and that it honored everything that came before it, all I can say is: "I wish you had believed me."

Erin {pughs' news} said...

Thank you for this, Nikki. I knew I could count on you to write another wonderful piece about our favourite show.

I could never put into words my love for LOST so eloquently as you or Chris do, so I'll just say that a year later, I am still as invested in the show as I have ever been. I still think about it, I still defend it and discuss it with anyone who's interested! I doubt another show will ever be as important to me. And so, I most definitely, yet again, have to go back!

It's so nice to be here tonight with old friends. I've missed it!

Erin {pughs' news} said...

PS: Love what @shobiz wrote.

PS: Verification word: "crying"... Yes, I still am!

Blam said...


@Nikki: I miss the photoshopped photos that were sent to me of people holding my books

Hey! I sent you pics of me with your big Buffy book, Missy. Aren't we long past due for a volley of "Bite Me Readers (Lack of Comma Essential to Meaning)"?

VW: prophant — An oracular insect of the Formicidae family.

shobiz said...

Thank you, @Erin! Likewise. Well said.

Blam said...


I remember how season 6 built up quickly with every episode, and the panic that began to slowly creep in when half the season was gone and we hadn’t gotten many answers, and thinking the writers would run out of time.

Uh... Heh. Yeah. About that. *cough*

VW: recocoa — Enjoy a second cup of hot chocolate.

JS said...

Thank you, Nikki, for your beautiful essay. I feel the same way, and am so glad I found your books and your blog to share this experience. The first time I watched The End, I didn’t let myself cry because I didn’t want to miss any clues or hints, and was one of those that was confused. Luckily, I got to come here and discuss it, and with multiple viewings, let all the moments sink in. I think I can quote the whole thing! I practically did on my twitter feed today!! Watching LOST is not a solitary experience. Much like out beloved characters, we were better for doing it together.

I cried harder with every viewing that week, and have resisted watching it again until yesterday. I started my celebration of the anniversary by beginning with The Candidate, since I think that is really where “The End” starts. I am also in the middle of a re-watch, and just finished season three, so first watching Charlie die, then Sayid, Jin and Sun, was just overwhelming. I found myself, of course, crying at all the places we do, but also at some other smaller moments, like when Hurley is just grinning at Charlie at the flightline motel. After just watching them say goodbye to each other, knowing this is the first time they have seen each other since (except for Santa Rosa). Also, before the Jin and Sun scene, when Jin tells Jack that no, he cannot make it out with Sawyer without the oxygen, to take it, and Jack realizes Jin intends to die with Sun, that killed me. (side note, my friend is a hair and makeup artist and actually worked on DDK for a Letterman appearance sometime that summer, and she happened to remember I was interested in LOST. She touched him! She groomed him!! I managed to give him a lame “I will never leave you” message through her. My tiny brush with LOST fame.)

I get the religion comment as well. Three things I do not discuss with strangers – religion, politics, and the LOST finale!

I too, was late to the party but was lucky to find you all just before the full re-watch. I was one of those that was too “lost” during season 2 to follow, then it fell off my radar. I picked it up again in late spring 2009. In about 6 weeks I watched the first five seasons for the first time, then immediately re-watched them with you before S6. I am so glad I found you, and know I am not alone in missing this significant experience called LOST.

And, I miss Jack terribly too.

word verif: ishablew. Gesundheit !

Blam said...


I remember — and honestly loved — just about everything that you mention, Nikki.

Lost was not just the empty phenomenon that many on the outside enjoyed painting it as but phenomenal storytelling... until "Darlton" basically turned their backs on giving us a fulfilling sense of the show's mythology even as they kept feeding it with what amounted to unconscionably extraneous details. Even after the most maligned moments of the series in Season Three, I couldn't wait for it to return and made the (appropriately) fateful decision to pick up Finding 'Lost' — which led me here a couple of years later, once I finally had a working computer again, to great discussion and some truly valued relationships that mean more than any TV show ever could. Talking Lost with your merry band of followers — destiny, choice, love, redemption, time travel, crazy jungle squirrel-bone totem babies, only slightly less crazy alternate-universe theories scrawled on restaurant napkins — brought me cherished memories that will likely last a lifetime; if heaven exists, and I believe it does, we'll get to do this again there.

I feel that the show let me down big-time, though. And that opinion hadn't changed when I Netflix'd the Season Six bonus disc, whose commentary and "The New Man In Charge" epilogue were a big [insert Cee-Lo song title here] to those of us who dared call the producers on their stuff, nor, obviously, has it changed by now.

cont'd

Charles said...

Thank you nikki for your oh so eloquent posts over the years and for your amazing series of books which I always have close as I rewatch Lost time and time again. It has been a year since the show has ended and I miss it so much. There will never be anything like it ever again. As Damon and Carlton tried to show in the finale, the show was always about the characters first, and as such I would like to talk about a couple of moments that always bring a tear to my eye. One was early on when Locke built the cradle for Claire. So touching. And a second was when, just before leaving on the raft, Sawyer told Jack the story about meeting Christian in Australia. These character moments get me every time, and I hope always will. I will miss perhaps most of all the theorizing about the various mysteries of the island and the internet scrambles for better understanding of things like Enrico Valenzetti and vile vortices. Never has a show made one think and read like Lost had and still has one year later. Thank you Nikki and JJ and Damon and Carlton and the amazing actors and actresses for the creation of a show that has stirred more emotions in me than I would have ever thought I had.

Batcabbage said...

I also miss most
Of the things you mentioned, Nik.
It was a great show.

I miss the chats, the
Debates (never cross, always
nice), theorising.

But I think I miss
The haiku most of all. They
Were really quite fun.

After each show, I’d
Race to Nik at Nite, and then
Devour Nik’s new post.

I’d make a comment
If I thought I’d have something
To add, not always.

Then I’d fire up
Word, and count syllables, five
Then seven then five.

Some were funny, some
Were downright silly. Some were
Ditched altogether.

Then I’d check the site
Every ten minutes or so,
Looking for THAT POST.

The Lost Haiku Post.
I couldn’t wait to see what
You all came up with.

I saved all mine. I
Read them sometimes. It makes me
Sad there’s no more Lost.

But fear not! We’re still
All here. Game of Thrones, Buffy,
Everything Nik posts.

Let’s stay a little longer, shall we?

humanebean said...

Bravo, Batcabbage!
How could we mark the day and
forget to haiku?

Looking back now
I recall with affection
the time we shared here

It's one thing to find
a subject that fires your mind
and fills you with joy

It's quite another
to find a group of like minds
and share your passion

All of the things that
made LOST a delight to watch
were magnified thus

I am grateful for
the mental journey of LOST
the ideas put forth

Imagination
is a powerful ally
the truest of friends

But if we do not
have Others to share the dream
it fades on waking

Instead, we came here
to read, to savor, to talk
together we raved

Nikki made this place
for us to remember and
move on - NOT let go

Why would we do that?
Why let go of something that
made us feel so much?

So we gather now
to reflect, to share, to thrill
once again with friends

I close now with a
literary reference
(so apropros, no?)

The Rubiyat of
Omar Khayyam seems to fit
the mindset of LOST

"The Moving Finger
writes, and having writ, moves on
neither Piety

nor Wit shall lure it
back to cancel half a line"
(not a Damon tweet!)

So, my friends, I hope
that time is kind to you and
keeps your dreams alive

for we climbed high
to the summit of LOST and
saw much from the peak

We carry that view
with us now and forever
it is never far

we can see it fresh
whenever we feel the need;
if we close one eye

; ]

Anonymous said...

I miss everything about the show. The characters, the debates we had on forums and with family and friends. The joy of each episode we watched, there's not a single thign I don't miss and I will remember this show for the rest of my life. It's something beautiful.

Marebabe said...

@humanebean and Batcabbage: Thanks for the wonderful haikus! I mean it - Wonderful!

Blam said...


Roses are red
Violets are blue
'Bean and the 'Cabbage
Do the haiku

Some rocks are black
Others are white
Get your Lost verses
On Nik at Nite

Come for the poems
Stay for the friends
Unlike finales
The fun never [*fwash*]

Blam said...

Okay... My couplets are showing up fine, but the rest of my longer comment from last night has just disappeared yet again. It showed up on the page at first, and it's in the E-mail feed; it went missing from the page almost immediately, though, both last night and now. If Nikki was taking it down herself, (A) wow, nice reflexes, and (2) she'd probably let me know privately what the problem was, so as I've just noticed that both that comment and one on Angel included hyperlinks I'm going to repost both without the HTML and see if they stick. I apologize to those of you who've subscribed to comments and will see the same thing repeatedly.

VW: poldo — Mitt Romney's hair.

Blam said...

cont'd

I was tremendously moved by the end of "The End" despite the fact that the would-be flashsideways scenes amounted to a colossal waste of time — manipulation worthy of Sawyer, Ben, and Jacob himself. People talk about satisfaction or lack of it with the Lost finale as if it were the same thing as satisfaction with how Lost concluded, but that equivalence is as false as the showrunners' premise that you either had to care about the plot or the characters and that there was a correct choice.

As I wrote on my blog a year ago:
"The End" did practically nothing wrong — there were certainly very few missteps or head-scratchers that occurred to me as it played — and had Season 6 been indicative of the rest of the series it would have been the perfect capper. The failure is really in the season that led up to this, not so much for what we got (even if some of it was rendered oddly superfluous) but for what we didn't get, or with previous seasons for introducing things that would never pay off. The previous 120 episodes, and particularly Seasons 1-5, wrote checks that "The End" couldn't cash, and it shouldn't have had to; Damon Lindelof, Carlton Cuse, and their staff had perhaps more time than any creative crew in the history of network television to craft not just a worthy series finale but a worthy finale season and they dropped the ball.

I think that a year having gone by since my first thoughts on "The End" went up without me fleshing them out — and there's a lot more to that post as yet unpublished, believe me — is indicative of just how little I wanted to think about Lost once it was done. Sure, I had distractions, but a year is clearly enough time to fix and update old posts about a subject if it's any kind of priority, so either I don't care or the frustration still paralyzes me enough that my sequence of posts on Season Six remains incomplete.

I wish that I could say my opinion on how things wrapped up — or, more to the point, didn't — has changed, not simply for peace of mind but to put an end to people I respect telling me that I just don't get it or that if I wasn't a fan of the way things played out then I was never a fan at all; honestly, though, I can't.

VW#1: subble — The last breaths of Jin and Sun as they broke upon the surface of the ocean. [What? Me heartless?]

VW#2: meduceu — A French gorgon.

humanebean said...

@ Marebabe - entirely my pleasure, I assure you!

@ Blam - Nikki (and others) noted over on her Facebook page that Blogger is wreaking havoc with people's posts/comments today. I haven't seen it myself but apparently quite a few folks are affected.

Fred said...

@BlamI wish that I could say my opinion on how things wrapped up — or, more to the point, didn't — has changed, not simply for peace of mind but to put an end to people I respect telling me that I just don't get it or that if I wasn't a fan of the way things played out then I was never a fan at all; honestly, though, I can't. So is that where Darlton got the episode title? Hmm, I wonder.

Like you i have my problems with the ending and most of Season 6. BUt we all know what "The End" was meant to convey, after all the Beatles said it best in "The End": "And in the end, the love you take is equal to the love you make."

Blam said...


@humanebean: @ Blam - Nikki (and others) noted over on her Facebook page that Blogger is wreaking havoc with people's posts/comments today. I haven't seen it myself but apparently quite a few folks are affected.

I really gots to join Facebook, everyone tells me — including my mother. 8^) I'm just afraid that I won't be able to keep up with posts over there and folks will think that I'm just ignoring them.

Anyway, I suspect that the links were what was causing the problem in the case of posting these comments, since it was specific to them, although at the same time last night my entire blog was systematically blocked either by Blogger or by someone else while Blogger wasn't letting me access it; that, at least, proved but a temporary glitch this time, as it was just restricted rather than deleted.

Written at 10:10 p.m., finally posted at 12:55 a.m. ...

Blam said...


@Fred: "And in the end, the love you take is equal to the love you make."

I was so glad that I'd been titling my Lost posts after Beatles songs when "The End" rolled around and I could get the episode title to match a post title for the finale. Moreover, yes, that lyric is a great message, one that comes through at the end of "The End" clearly. As I said, I found the last moments of the finale emotional and largely satisfying on their own terms, but by then the larger tapestry had become so warped, neglected, and/or shat upon that those moments didn't redeem the failure of the so-called conclusion to the series as a whole.

VW: cacturne — Short, romantic piano composition about desert plants.

Lostie said...

The Finale of Lost left me not afraid to die, knowing after i die i will be in a good place :-)

What i loved most bout Lost was the Music...every special moment was captured with that fantastic music !!!

Thanks Nikki...i didnt know u didnt like us Shippers, lol :-)

Batcabbage said...

Now a proper comment from me, rather than rambling in haiku.

While watching season 6, I liked it. Loved it even. It was great. When I thought it was going somewhere to do with the overall plot of Lost. Notice I said 'plot', and not 'theme'.

Then, after the finale and the 'big reveal', I was disappointed. Sure, it didn't answer many questions, and I was fine with that. But I was ultimately left unfulfilled by the 'after-life' plot that took up so much of that season.

After a years reflection, I still feel that it was out of left field, and completely not what I was looking for in an end season to a show I loved so much for the previous five seasons. Now, I'm not saying what they should have done, or suggesting that they should have done anything other than what they wanted to - I just didn't like it.

And although they always said that they'd seen the final scene from day one, closing on Jack's eye, mirroring the first scene, what I can't believe is that they'd had this sideways story, with nothing to do with the central plot of the show, planned from the start. Because, regardless of whether you look at the plot or the characters (and they really shouldn't be mutually exclusive - I mean, did they really say that? You either care about the plot or the characters? That's... that's delusional!), the afterlife sideways story did nothing to further the plot of the overall series. I didn't hate all of the sideways stuff. I didn't hate it at all, matter of fact. But it shouldn't have been the final season of Lost. In my opinion, anyway. :)

Sagacious Penguin said...

Reunion!!

Even when the show ended, I intended to keep writing about it. I had a lot of thoughts, ideas, etc, but as Blam has said, if a year goes by and you haven't written it... maybe you just don't want to.

To be fair to myself, my life got extraordinarly busy post-LOST -- like life-changingly busy (if you're curious, swing by the old blog to see why). But somehow I always found time to write about LOST previously, so maybe my desire to do so has been diminished, even if I haven't wanted to admit it to myself.

I'm one of those people who's generally fine with liking things that have flaws -- so it didn't bother me personally that LOST didn't stick it's landing 100% as much as it frustrated me how many people were made literally furious by it. I think I was made weary toward writing about LOST because at the time it became hard to write about it without having to put yourself on the defensive or else feel like an apologist for the show. And that took a bit of the fun out of it.

A year later, I've only watched a handful of episodes again, though every single one lives on very strongly in my memory. I got my mega blu-ray boxset, and can't wait to go through it all one day when the opportunity presents itself. But for now, I guess, it's been hard to jump into the discussion with as much verve as in the past since the reception is a good deal more hostile than those days.

My personal opinion? The Sideways world as an ongoing plot device was a mistake. I was never a fan of the "Ji Yeon" device where there wasn't a strong narrative purpose to Jin's Flashback other than a "got'cha!" reveal. With few exceptions, the Sideways world plots on an episode by episode basis seemed like this on a macro level. Mostly everything just re-enforced what we knew about the characters and their growth. If the Sideways World had been more clearly connected with Island happenings or the outcome of the Island story, I'd have less of an issue with it. But it's hard to shake the fact that the Island story could have been told just as well (in just about the same way) without the Sideways world component. The two should have been better and more literally integrated to make more satisfying storytelling. I couldn't care less about little details being left to our imaginations -- that's great -- but things like the H-Bomb going off, the Island being sunk in the Sideways, ought to have paid off narratively in a clear, satisfying way. This was undermined by how the Sideways World was handled.

But... that's my one complaint against a show that otherwise gave me what will quite probably be the best, most-involving viewing experience I'll ever have! Long live Lost!

Sagacious Penguin said...

Incidentally -- I recommended the show to my parents last summer after all the DVDs were out, and they watched it all in one go and thought it was fabulous. So I'm happy to say it holds up well as a story in one-go on first watch. :)

I wouldn't trade all of our discussions for anything, but I'll admit I'm a bit jealous that they were able to just jump in, watch it all, without their enjoyment pressured by years of speculation and too much communication with the show-runners.

shobiz said...

To those who were most bothered by the fact that LOST left "so many unanswered questions," check out this Lostpedia page: http://lostpedia.wikia.com/wiki/Portal:Mysteries

The truth is, they answered nearly everything in a way that was either direct or implied. They answered what the Island itself was, who The Others were, who Dharma was, who the whispers were. All the major character arcs got resolved. This is why I'm sad and confused about the people who hated The End.

EsDee said...

Nikki - Wonderful post!

Blam, Batcabbage & Sagacious Penguin - thank you for putting into words what I could not for a year. I was one of the disappointed, but couldn't exactly explain why. I did "get" the ending, I did feel the emotion, I did not need all the answers -- yet I was still unsatisfied and disappointed and couldn't really say why.

All in all, LOST is still one of my very favorite shows and I don't regret one second of the 6 years of watching.

And lurking on this site was one of the best parts - all of your discussions and theories just made the experience all the better. I never commented because I really had nothing more to add, you all covered it so completely.

Keep up with the Fringe and GoT discussions...they are somewhat filling the void!

Rebecca T. said...

Gah! My internet connection cut out just as I hit post!

Let's see if I can do this again.

I miss Lost in so many ways, but the thing that I miss the most is the community here. Reading Nikki's fantastic post and everyone's comments makes me feel like I've walked into a room of people I haven't seen in a long time and we're all so excited to be together again :)

All those things that Nikki mentioned, those are the things I miss the most: The haikus, the VW definitions, the inside jokes, the discussions, the debates, the randomness. I feel so blessed to have stumbled across this family before "The End" and it's become an integral part of the show for me. I can't watch an episode without thinking of something that was said here and it adds so much for me. This is something that could never be duplicated and I treasure my memories of it.

so thank you to all of you and a very big thanks to Nikki who made all of this possible!

Unknown said...

What an awesome post.

A bit that might amuse you: My friends are taking a Lost-themed honeymoon to Hawaii. They left on 5/23. ;D

Austin Gorton said...

Sadly, I remain terribly disappointed, not in "The End" as an episode but as a conclusion to the series, and thus with the series as whole.

My opinion hasn't really changed since last May, that, like Blam, "The End" was a fantastic episode but that the problems lie with the final season itself, and the fact that Darlton completely bailed on the narrative despite having the perfect opportunity to wrap it all.

If anything, one year removed, I'm more angry with Lost than I ever was, angry that a show sogood so completely failed to stick the landing, angry that I was so sure Lost would be the one show that got it right, the one show that was able to payoff all its plot twists and teases and loose ends, the one show that didn't introduce those things unless it already knew how they would be resolved.

I'm angry because so much of Lost was great, the characters, the performances, the pacing, the dialogue, the teases and twists, and it had such potential, to be this grand novel of television where all the pieces fit together like nothing before and it squandered that potential. I'm angry because the parts of Lost are greater than its whole, and it wasn't supposed to be that way.

I'm angry because when I look back on Lost and think of all the great moments it had, they are all underminded by the thought "yeah, but, they never finished telling the story..."

Yet still I miss it terribly, and really, what I miss most are those things Nikki mentioned, the discussions here, the camaraderie, talking each week with people I've never met but still consider friends, the rampant theorizing and speculating, the haiku, clicking refresh on my browser, waiting for Nikki's post to appear, and the hope and the belief that when it reached the end, we'd have a complete and satisfying narrative.

Lost was one helluva show, and for all my anger, those are the things I try to remember about it, that I try to take away from it. It helps me remember the show more fondly...

Marebabe said...

@Blam: Thank you very much for “cacturne”. It made my afternoon! :)

Sinoda said...

I wish the show had kept Walt on and that one of the "effects" of the island was that he was aging and growing so rapidly (being special) and within the few months on the island he aged 6 years. They would have had to plan ahead for flashbacks, but not impossible.

Blam said...


@showbiz: I don't want to get into an argument, nor am I trying to dump on anyone else' satisfaction with Lost, but I feel that it's disingenuous for you (the generic you) to answer your own questions and then state that all questions have been answered — or even the ones you teed up yourself, necessarily. Frankly, I've scrolled through that page you posted and I was surprised that much of what was marked as fully solved was so marked, as well as royally hacked off all over again at what crucial information was sourced to podcasts and sources such as "The Lost Experience". Also, I appreciate your sympathy but I think that an extreme minority of those commenting here were actually displeased with the very end of the series; what you seem to be missing is that we're dismayed not by what the final episode contained but what the final season lacked.

VW: exesseri — Former accoutrements.

shobiz said...

@Blam, I'm sorry if my post came across as disingenuous; I most certainly didn't intend that. Although I admit that I wasn't a person who necessarily needed every mystery solved, I posted that link because, in all earnestness, when I found it a while back it really helped me deal with some minor nitpicks I had. I hoped it might help anyone who was frustrated at a perceived lack of "answers." Clearly, it doesn't work for you, and I'm sorry it brought back some anger and bad memories.

Also, I used "The End" as shorthand for the final season, so I should have been more clear on that. I didn't say exactly that "all" questions were answered, but I really do believe that that nearly all of the major ones were given a reasonable resolution, whether directly or implied. On this, we can certainly disagree.

I don't wait to argue, either, because in terms of debating Lost, I feel very much the way Sagacious Penguin does. It's no fun feeling like a defensive apologist for the show.

I have no idea if people who are angry with the final season of Lost are in the minority, I only know that they tend to be so vocal and passionate on the interwebs as to feel like a majority. There's so much anger and vitriol, and I really mean it when I say it makes me sad. I admit I wish you all felt the way I do -- I know you loved the show and feel betrayed. I'm grateful that I don't feel that way, and sometimes I just can't help trying, once again, to change someone's mind.

And no matter what, I do appreciate the discussion.

humanebean said...

Now, if that respectful back-and-forth between divergent opinions isn't a microcosm of the mature discussions to be found here on the Nik-at-Niteclub (and precious few other places on the 'nets), I don't know what is. Kudos all around!

Blam said...


@humanebean: You said it.

@shobiz: I've loved — and been utterly satisfied with — plenty of things that friends or the chatterati at large haven't (resolutions to epics, approaches to adaptations of beloved material, etc.) so I know how you feel. And I'm sorry for misspelling your screen name earlier.

@Marebabe: You're so very welcome.

Amy Lynn said...

Nikki, thank you for your lovely blog and expressing so eloquently how so many of us feel. I never thought I would feel this way about a show, especially a year after it ended. Thanks for keeping the gang all together like this.

shobiz said...

@humanebean: Right on! Thank you all. I've always appreciated the respectful tone here, even as frequent lurker/infrequent poster.

@Blam: Thanks. Ha, I didn't even notice the misspelling!

Batcabbage said...

@Blam, humane, & shobiz: I concur. This is totally making me nostalgic for a new Lost episode every week and an inbox full of nothing but intelligent, inciteful, and, well, just gosh darn fun emails with the subject [Nik At Nite] New Comment on Lost Season... Is it nostalgia if you're pining for only a year ago?

VW: agoan - the first word of the last sentence ever heard by the 'guests' of the Deliverence boys from Blam's comment a few columns up the main page. 'Agoan make you squeal, boy!'

humanebean said...

ba-da-BEW-bew-BEW-bew-BEW-bew-BEW

Oh, heck. That's as close as I could get to writing out the iconic banjo line.

SQUEEEEAL.

From the Wikipedia -

nostalgia: n. A yearning for the past, often in idealized form.

The term was coined in 1688 by Johannes Hofer (1669–1752) in his Basel dissertation. Hofer introduced nostalgia or mal du pays "homesickness" for the condition also known as mal du Suisse "Swiss illness" or Schweizerheimweh "Swiss homesickness", because of its frequent occurrence in Swiss mercenaries who in the plains of lowlands of France or Italy were pining for their native mountain landscapes. English homesickness is a loan translation of nostalgia. Allegedly, the first use of the word in a publication was in Sir Joseph Banks' journal of the first voyage of Captain Cook in the Pacific, when, near Java, he stated that the sailors "were now pretty far gone with the longing for home which the physicians have gone so far as to esteem a disease under the name of Nostalgia."


Hmmmmm ... seasick sailors ... Captain Cook ... Cook Islands ..... THE ISLAND! Yep, that's a LOST reference, all right. ; ]

Marebabe said...

@Blam, shobiz, Batcabbage, and humanebean: This is a perfect example of why it’s a good idea to keep checking back on Nikki’s posts for at least a week after they show up. I’m delighted to be a part of this civilized, smart, and funny group. You all rock, and I guess that means I also rock by association! What a swell club. :)

shobiz said...

@Marebabe: Again, as someone who has lurked here much more than posted, I am flattered. I've been reading all your LOST discussions for years, and it's wonderful to be a part of the discussion. I still feel like I should apologize for the somewhat blunt nature of my post with the Lostpedia page that started some of this. I will always love my LOST experience, and as many have already said, a huge part of that has been the online community I came to know and love along with it.

Marebabe said...

Right on!

Ricardo Cárdenas said...

Thanks for this article, Niki. I don´t think any other blog paid a tribute the way you did.

Sagacious Penguin said...

Nikki & Blam, you completely inspired me to update my LOST blog what might be one last time:

http://www.sagaciouspenguin.blogspot.com/

But who knows -- I never say never. Anyway, thanks for rekindling my love of talking LOST in a post-LOST world :)

"Wingrotl" -- what you totally don't want your Hippogriff to come down with a case of.

Anonymous said...

Okay, 2 years later and I still cry every time I watch Lost. It was a great mystery, brought people together in a way that they needed each other. You grow relationships and opinions abour every character, well not really characters, more like friends that you came to know and love within six years. I really miss the show. And I wish it never had to end. But the finale was so well done that you feel like you will see them all again. - Jennie