Endings

[tmblue]

I feel like a lot of the big entertainment related things in my life are coming to a close all at once...

On Sunday, I watched (with the rest of the world) the last ever episode of LOST. Who was happy? Disappointed? Confused? Angry? I felt a bit of all of these things. I wasn't satisfied with the ending simply because so much was left unsaid and

Comments

[napchic]

hello you :)

i was okay with the end of LOST. I really was. i think spouse was a lot more unhappy at first, and then as it unfolded and I cried like a lunatic, it all seemed fitting.

He found a forum explanation that basically sums up my idea of it all in much more articulate terms, but here is my take, since i am too lazy to look that up. I am curious to get yours :)

I think the island was real. They lived real lives there. They really left and returned and it was a batshit place that really existed. I think the island housed a stone, tangible cork to, if not a type of hell, perhaps the sum of great collective evil, and the unique, electromagnetic properties of the island, somehow cycled by the waters of the island, formed a barrier to that evil. People ended up there by accident, by craft and by purpose. I think some were random wrecks. Many were likely potentials dragged there by Jacob or those who wanted to be. Some were mercenaries in the name of profit or science. It drew in a lot of people for a lot of reasons, i think. Perhaps even the most "evil" who died there, were pulled in to live in shadows as whispering ghosts... it's a big magnet... maybe :)... I think of the island almost as a clockwork black hole for evil... a kind of perpetual motion machine that pulled in and held all the evil it could.

The smoke monster is a crazy creation, but i suppose it could have been the evil inside that guy boiled out, or a person with impure intentions entering the heart of the centermost point of anti-evilness results in that. Maybe it was some natural defense reaction... I think Smokey was trapped on the island just like the evil under the cork... the "evil" souls who died there, etc...again, my evil black hole theory, I think it's what the island was designed to do. I still have no really good theory why uncorking the stone made Smokey mortal, or made Jake suddenly able to be hurt by him.

Previously the rule had been that anyone Jacob touched as a candidate could neither kill themselves nor be killed by anyone other than fellow candidates. So all I can say is that maybe opening the cork, was a type of "reset" button. Maybe when smoke john became mortal, the island recognized him as real John again, and he was a candidate once more. Who knows? but it was a clever enough way to dispatch him.

OK...timeshifting all that, happened, as far as i could tell, just because it happened. Some characters seemed more omniscient for it, but as far as I can tell from the storyline we were presented, people traveled back in time because it had already happened. There weren't paradoxes... just really broken linear time.

Also as far as I can tell, the great atom bomb that killed Juliet didn't do anything but send her into what some people were calling that alternate reality... but what I think was pretty clearly called a waiting area in the afterlife. That place they made, without consciously meaning to perhaps, that had no time, where they could find one another.

So there, in that place, these characters circled each other, not quiet aware of each other's true, former lives. They made a kind of "matrix," that wasn't completely pleasant, but was completely plausible.... sort of if you'd only partially remembered who you were. And they waited there for each other... for what might have been millennia.. based on that short exchange between Hugo and Ben outside the church. You get a sense Hugo is a different guy than the lost, broken-hearted guy who'd just found out Jack was dead.

I cried hard thinking back on Kate's words to Jack at the concert. She'd missed him for so long. I think she had. I think her whole life spent after she'd left the island... perhaps 60 or 70 years, she'd never stopped missing him.

I dunno. I could have gotten it all wrong... or mostly wrong... but Lord it did make me cry :) And I absolutely loved that the last frame of film bookended the first frame.

[tmblue]

Yeah, all of what you just said is exactly what I think. The alternate reality was just a limbo where each of them went the moment they died on or off the island. It did not have any 'time' or 'place' to it so even though they all appeared to be there at the same 'time', Charlie, for instance, was there right after his death in the underwater station, Jack went there when he died on the island, Kate and Sawyer and Claire, etc went there after they naturally died once they returned home, which is why it's been so long for Kate since she last saw Jack, missing him the whole time.

Here are some problems though... first of all, that one aspect of the show's mystery, the one part about the alternate time line, was really the only one that got explained. We had been watching this flash sideways thing all through season 6, so that bit was satisfactorily explained and I was fine with it... Now what about everything else?? They basically created a new mystery in season 6 and explained that one thing, so it was a self contained season... but then they left all the other seasons so open ended.

First of all, UnLocke (John in smoke monster form... I love this name for him) died, and I think the reason for that was because when he was created, it had something to do with a link to the 'hell' that lied beneath the cork, so 'hell' made him. When 'hell' opened up again, all of the rules that bound him were thrown out. He could leave the island now, but he could also be killed. So the point here is that he died, leaving Jack there to save the island, which he did and that's fine, but then what was the point in Hugo and Ben staying behind to guard the island if, in the end, their enemy was dead? I guess someone had to do it in case another new enemy was created. That's fine... I guess I'll allow that...

But then what about all the stuff with The Others and Darma? A lot of it was explained, but a lot wasn't. It just seemed like the writers tried to introduce a lot of BS throughout the show only to just let it dead-end and fade away. If, in the end, the whole point of the show was the characters and how they grew together and learned to let go and all that, and if the ending was all about their release from the cage of themselves into the afterlife, then why does anything else matter? I think this is an argument on both sides though because some could say that's why the ending was okay, not explaining the rest of the show... but that also just kind of smells like bad writing to me, the fact that the writers want you to just say "who cares" and forget all the things that made the show so great... the mysteries.

Here's a pretty good list of unanswered questions:

By character - http://lostpedia.wikia.com/wiki/Unanswered_questions
By episode - http://lostpedia.wikia.com/wiki/Unanswered_questions_by_episode
All mysteries - http://lostpedia.wikia.com/wiki/Mysteries

Some are less significant than others, but the ones that seemed so relevant to us before were still just tossed aside, which kind of makes me more frustrated than satisfied with the ending.

If they had been answering questions all along, gradually revealing the truths that we have all been waiting for, and THEN ended the show with this episode, I think I would have felt the same way and would have been much more moved by it. It was intense and sad and happy at the same time and I loved that they all found each other again, got another chance to be together, etc... but I needed resolution that I didn't get and that made it hard for me to watch without feeling anxious as the clock ticked, the episode drawing to a close before anything was answered. When Jack entered the church and I saw how little time was left for them to wrap up, I got really frustrated and that made it harder to just get into what was actually happening, you know?

Oh well. I don't regret a moment of watching the show and I still love it, but I just wanted something that they didn't deliver, and I think they promised more than what they gave in the end.

[napchic]

well, i feel better knowing i got a bit of it right :)

The only point you mentioned that I might have any clarity on is that even after UnLocke (that is so great :) died, there was still, like boiling mystery evil under the island... and he was only a bit of it.... maybe? it seems a bit more satisfying an answer...

but yeah, all the others and darma, ultimately i think was window dressing in what may have even boiled down to Jack's story. I don't know why it didn't bother me more, but it didn't. The X-files took such crazy ass tangents, and I got so fed up with it not explaining and linking up loose ends over the years... i dunno... perhaps it prepared me, lol.

I am going to look through those links though... spouse had a lot of your feelings about the end. I think he felt if the others and darma were all mostly red herring, they were a damn big one.

I mentioned this somewhere this week, but hands down, no fandom series I've ever followed, did it like Harry Potter. I really felt satisfied with how it ended... even if I ravenously devour fanfic... her story ended well for me.

[tmblue]

Agreed about HP. Everything made sense and tied up and it was beautiful :)

And see I have actually been using The X-Files as an example lately because after going back through and re-watching the whole series again with my boyfriend (he had only ever seen random episodes and didn't follow it as religiously as I did), it really does tie up pretty nicely. People weren't happy with the ending and lots said that it didn't answer everything, but in reality, the big mysteries of the series WERE answered. All the big elements of the main story arc were resolved in a pretty satisfactory way to me. It was left open ended, wondering if they were going to actually DO anything to try and stop what had been set in motion, but that's an okay way to leave something, wondering if they will go on and continue to fight or give up and live out the time they have left together ;)

But see with LOST, I felt like all the big arcs were left hanging, solving only one smaller part of the show in the end. That's why I think, ultimately, The X-Files had a much better handle on how to end a series and how to explain what needs to be explained, leaving little mysteries open ended because they didn't want to just TOTALLY have a nice neat little bow on top of the package, ya know?

I feel like in the end, there are sort of two ways you can end a mystery series:

1 - sit everybody in the show down and spell out the answers (kind of boring and routine, but things are laid out and it gets the job done)
2 - screw the answers and focus on the characters

The X-Files did #1.
LOST did #2.

That's why, at the end of the day, The X-Files wins the good story telling award... they answered things more than they didn't. LOST did the opposite. I wish a show could just do both, giving you a touching moment with the characters AND explain everything, but you know, that's what the second X-Files movie was for I guess :) (and BSG did that quite nicely actually, in my opinion) What shows need to do is to learn to answer more things along the way. LOST could easily have just given us little answers throughout season 6, or even earlier. Then no one would have expected it to all be neat in the finale. I would have quite enjoyed the finale on its own if so much hadn't been riding on it.

I'm actually about to start LOST over again (*groans slightly*) because my mom has gotten really into the idea of watching it after hearing me and my uncle spend countless moments discussing last week's episode :) hehe. So, I feel like this will give me a better grasp on what is leftover in the end, unexplained, and what I can live with :)

WALT for instance... yeah, I don't think I'm going to be able to happily live without knowing a damn thing about why he was 'special'...

[napchic]

i've forgotten so much, but yeah on X-files, i had completely obsessed friends who watched along with me, and I even had a friend pick up like around season six, so I rewatched most of the series with them, and I suppose i was so, so deeply into it that nothing would have fully satisfied me. Also, as much as I obsessively loved the show, I always felt it drifted off rather than ended. I think I could have sacrificed a season or two of meandering to have sort of punch out hard.

I wasn't obsessed with LOST, and perhaps that better explains why I am a bit more blasé. I watched every episode, but not with necessarily more hunger than MadMen. I didn't really strive to make the connections until honestly this last season, so there you go... I am satisfied because it answered my questions for the one, stand alone season I really, really cared about. But yes, LOST did leave bigger gaps than Files I suppose, and I will trust your memory better than mine on that :)

I will admit LOST had a very "magic box" writing style to borrow a term :) Or perhaps magic hat...I agree that many things appeared to be pulled from thin air as decoration or BS and many of those things remained just that. And yes, I have wondered about Walt time and again, and if he was somehow the best candidate that got away... or something else.

And it occurs to me that all this might bother you more because you are such a damn good writer. Things that are absolutely contrary to a universe's rules or voices that are out of character bother the hell out of me, but unanswered tangents.... well they do so to a lesser degree. I think I am just such crap at imagining plot, that i don't notice it as much when others fail as well. I notice more if the characters ring true, if the dialog sounds right, if the details are accurate, if they behave as themselves, but beyond that, i am generally willing to suspend my reason and go with something. Maybe that was my problem with the X-files, come to think of it. Maybe it wasn't the unresolved detail of plot, but the fact that I never really thought Mulder would leave Scully... even for a while. :) Dunno.

I am sorry it all pesters you though. It's awful to invest so much in something and feel cheated for your patience - to feel that you've been misled all along and there weren't ever really answers. If you find some satisfaction as the fandom continues to postulate, let me know... i think spouse would like to hear it, too :)

[tmblue]

That's very flattering but I doubt it has to do with my writing! hah, I just don't think I'm good enough to come up with something as complex as LOST. Doesn't mean they shouldn't have had a better plan, heh. That's why I wouldn't really ever attempt something like that to begin with... would be so terrified of not being able to wrap it all up and make it all make sense.

I'm okay with it in the end really. My boyfriend is a lot more upset about it. It's all he talks about now. haha. And to be honest, I agree about the characters and dialogue and all that being really important... the things I write outside of fandom (well, even IN fandom as you know with my R/Hr stuff) are always based around the characters and who they are because, in the end, that's what I find to be the most interesting about life, and therefore it is what I really enjoy writing :)

I actually have a short story that I've been sort of mulling over now that I'm done with it... it's an original story, unrelated to fandom, but if you'd like to read it, I'd be very grateful for feedback! ;)

[napchic]

I'd love to see it. ")

Keep in mind I am the most completely crap beta ever, but i'd love to read something you'd cooked up entirely.