Comments on: Do Polar Bears Dream Of Bickering Humans?

By: SteveM

SteveM — Fri, 02 May 2008 14:50:44 +0000

I’ve found it’s become easier to explain things tho, if anything. The island IS big enough for a helicopter to land undetected, and they knew the bearing to follow etc.

And most of the characters realise it’s pointless asking Ben for answers - he’ll just lie or deflect it with some other important info, anything to keep himself alive. I forgive the dumbness of Jack, Kate etc. when they don’t ask the right questions at the right time tho I guess. I coped with this in The X Files and this is the 00s equivalent I guess (but rather more fun and thankfull it won’t run as long).

I am a total apologist ho for Lost, ah well it’s not like I PAY to watch it…

By: Andy M

Andy M — Fri, 02 May 2008 11:42:41 +0000

#6 has it, a large part of the annoyance for me is they have one of the Others *on their side* and their leader *at gunpoint* yet they haven’t asked them to explain anything.

By: pete

pete — Thu, 01 May 2008 22:25:18 +0000

Lost works in fits and starts, I imagine this weeks will be all about Jack’s mystery illness and when he had tonsillitis as a child. I moan now because of the USA Today article, I moan because there is another mini series that I will watch and if another character points a gun at Ben without pulling the trigger I will lose all hope (which i know I will due to the flash forwards). And whilst last weeks was very entertaining, it also suggested that a helicopter could land on the island with no-one knowing about it, which for the first 3.5 series would have been impossible (don’t start me on Desmond’s boat).

Perhaps the death of Charlie has affected me too much. Perhaps the fact that NO-ONE EVE DEMANDS ANSWERS from Ben, or Miles, or Juliet about even the basics about the island. But s04e10 is on the dl, and I will continue to feel worthless watching it.

At least in 24 I care about Chloe (and the Cougar).

By: SteveM

SteveM — Thu, 01 May 2008 18:31:05 +0000

For me episodes like last week’s do actually make me feel the dragging out of certain things was all worth it and if I’m that entertained by it then that doesn’t really feel like a problem. Spending more time thinking about/discussing the show than watching it is another sign of success, frustrating tho it frequently has been.

By: SteveM

SteveM — Thu, 01 May 2008 18:21:03 +0000

I’m surprised you’re doing this now after what was one of the show’s best ever episodes last week.

I think they’ve done rather well in threading many loose ends/mysteries together since getting the show’s end date confirmed. It’s also moving at light speed compared to s4 Battlestar Galactica so far.

By: Pete Baran

Pete Baran — Thu, 01 May 2008 16:19:51 +0000

No the rock is a pre-established hard place, where hard places are (one assumes) something bad. Though in comparison to what might be a soft place - say quicksand, or a endless rolling ocean - the hard place often seems safer.

I think endings may be over-rated, but Lost’s problem is that its de facto ending (they get off the island) is now not its ending because the flash forwards intimate a greater story beyond that. The other endings (solving of the mysteries) are, as Alan rightly hints, becoming less interesting when they seem to be increasingly the machinations of greater external forces (tedious CEO’s of corporations) who we knew nothing about until at least Season 2.

The big problem in some ways is that I am less and less interested in the characters interacting with the plot, as I have worked out that the characters are (with perhaps two exceptions Sawyer and Hurley*) incapable of any meaningful growth.

*I’d have included Sayeed in this too, but his flash-forwards seem to having him acting in an increasingly stupid manner.

By: Tom

Tom — Thu, 01 May 2008 15:07:01 +0000

Yes, the qn maybe is “are endings overrated” - cos when writers are working towards a plan, the networked brain of the Internet will figure out what that plan is before the writers get there - WHATEVER it is.

So as writers you’re caught between a rock and a hard place* - you need the Interweb to create your community but they are Deep Blue to your puny Grandmaster when it comes to working our moves.

*is the rock some kind of soft place then?

By: Alan

Alan — Thu, 01 May 2008 14:59:37 +0000

ok, so with shows like this there are bits where its clear they did have SOME idea of where they wanted to go (no rly, hataz), and had to hit the ground staking out the long game AND making cool stuff up on the fly in a scattergun ’see what sticks’ way.

the numbers were/are surely in the latter category (they first came in 3/4 of the way through series 1), and when they just lit the audience up i’m guessing they flailed around trying to find a way to play it out beyond the coincidences they kept throwing at us (as in the finale eps).

For the die hard ‘da vinci code’ internet fans they tried to defuse the numbers in a between-series on-line game thing. now it was far from satisfactory to most of those fans - but what would be? i mean the numbers are twilight zone stuff - it could only end with ‘it was the lottery numbers of the giant space baby GASP’

now separately, the more recent mysteries will there be “a satisfactory conclusion to the mess which is now taking in time travel, faking the death of hundreds of people and massive conspiracy theories? ”

I really like to think so, yes! OK, I AM A SUCKER. but in Lost’s tired phrase, the game has changed - and they seem to have stuff nailed down a lot better now that they have an actual END.

and you know what, i’m enjoying it LESS because of that. i’ve decided i don’t WANT nice explanations. i like the silly cool stuff thrown out that’s never resolved