Lost Finale
May. 25th, 2010 11:09 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
botiasAt first, I have to admit that I didn't get it. Then, when I understood, I was just happy that I understood. Now, I'm kinda disgruntled. I thought one of the big questions of Lost is materialism vs. faith. Is the island a magical place or just a really weird one? Is there a greater purpose to obeying Jacob, no greater purpose to obeying Jacob, or is Jacob just a figment of the imagination?
Some of these questions were answered before the finale, I know. Jacob is obviously an entity with a plan and a purpose, for example.
I thought the sideways world was an alternate timeline made possible by the bomb going off, that Jack had succeeded even though he'd believed he'd failed, a timeline in which Jacob/the island had not interfered with their lives at critical moments, not least because the island was 'swimming with the fishes'. The plane did not crash, Sawyer did not pursue revenge, Jin and Sun did not get married, etc. Jacob told all the candidates that he had brought them to the island because they needed it in their lives, that they had been unable to create fulfilling lives without it/him. But, he had played a key role in the way their lives had unfolded.
Now I feel kinda meh that the sideways world was a either:
A) a big yes to: Jacob is your path to heaven and knows what's right for you, and yes, there are souls and there is a heaven, boys and girls, and you get to be with the people you love, and how convenient that the characters had only one romantic 'love' each cuz awkward, yay!
OR
B) completely aside from the big questions of the show, had NOTHING to do with the events of the show, and was just the naturally proceedings from the eventual deaths of the characters, making it a really, really drawn out dream sequence in which the characters worked through their personal issues in their own heads without any real world consequences. And their personal issues apparently stayed the same as the ones we were familiar with even though some of the characters lived long after we were no longer acquainted with them.
*frowns*
But whatever, just the creativity and uniqueness of it made it great entertainment, even if it was not ultimately a work of staggering genius.
Some of these questions were answered before the finale, I know. Jacob is obviously an entity with a plan and a purpose, for example.
I thought the sideways world was an alternate timeline made possible by the bomb going off, that Jack had succeeded even though he'd believed he'd failed, a timeline in which Jacob/the island had not interfered with their lives at critical moments, not least because the island was 'swimming with the fishes'. The plane did not crash, Sawyer did not pursue revenge, Jin and Sun did not get married, etc. Jacob told all the candidates that he had brought them to the island because they needed it in their lives, that they had been unable to create fulfilling lives without it/him. But, he had played a key role in the way their lives had unfolded.
Now I feel kinda meh that the sideways world was a either:
A) a big yes to: Jacob is your path to heaven and knows what's right for you, and yes, there are souls and there is a heaven, boys and girls, and you get to be with the people you love, and how convenient that the characters had only one romantic 'love' each cuz awkward, yay!
OR
B) completely aside from the big questions of the show, had NOTHING to do with the events of the show, and was just the naturally proceedings from the eventual deaths of the characters, making it a really, really drawn out dream sequence in which the characters worked through their personal issues in their own heads without any real world consequences. And their personal issues apparently stayed the same as the ones we were familiar with even though some of the characters lived long after we were no longer acquainted with them.
*frowns*
But whatever, just the creativity and uniqueness of it made it great entertainment, even if it was not ultimately a work of staggering genius.
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no subject
Date: 2010-05-26 02:36 pm (UTC)Oh, absolutely! I think the idea of one soulmate per person is way too pat. They looked like they were paired up to go on Noah's Ark, with the exception of Boone and Locke (and if you ever shipped them together, boy you must be happy today).
completely aside from the big questions of the show, had NOTHING to do with the events of the show,
Well, I think it had something to do with the events of the show in the sense that the relationships they formed on the island mattered to them intensely.
And their personal issues apparently stayed the same as the ones we were familiar with even though some of the characters lived long after we were no longer acquainted with them. Yep. This is a problem for "and they live on in your minds after the finale" too, because it means that they are essentially static as people. Sawyer loved only Juliet, Kate loved only Jack, no matter how many years they lived after the Ajira flight took off. That's just -- sad.
the same way it's sad that Buffy "will never love anyone or anything in this world as much" as she loved Angel.I'm still processing, but by the time I'm done, no one will care about it anymore! :(
But whatever, just the creativity and uniqueness of it made it great entertainment, even if it was not ultimately a work of staggering genius.
I agree. It's like they consciously decided that emotion and thematics mattered more than logic and mythos. But when you dangle the mythos in front of us like a carrot, it's gonna piss me off that you can't pull all three off. But not as much as I thought it would, strangely enough. That's the part I'm still processing.
I agree with others who've said that should not have been a choice they had to make if they were truly spectacular story tellers. But maybe they knew their own limitations, maybe they were just lazy. But 2 out of 3 ain't bad, and I would have picked the same 2.
*sings cheesy Meatloaf song on my way out*
no subject
Date: 2010-05-26 04:12 pm (UTC)But when you dangle the mythos in front of us like a carrot, it's gonna piss me off that you can't pull all three off. But not as much as I thought it would, strangely enough.
I think it might depend on how much faith one had that they were going to pull it off. The show had gotten so wacky and wide-ranging that I had limited faith that they were going to tie it all together in the finale and knock my socks off. Maybe if they'd taken the time they'd spent on the sideways 'verse, which turned out to have little to nothing to do with the mythos, they could have done it, which shows how they decided to focus on the characters emotional lives instead.