See ya in another life, brotha’

tumblr_l2oymtz0831qzh0fto1_500_largeI can’t possibly wrap up 6 years of awesome in one blog post, so I will try my absolute best. I’ve already made it clear on this blog before how much this show has meant to me. I have been there from the very beginning – attending the first ever LOST panel at Comic Con 2004 where they screened the entire pilot months before it aired – until the very end. I have grown so attached to these characters that they feel like my friends; my family. I genuinely care about them and their hardships and victories. So knowing that Sunday was the series finale had my stomach in knots the entire day. I didn’t want to say goodbye to my buddies.

Please be aware that the rest of this post will be full of SPOILERS. Please do not click on the link below if you have not yet seen the finale!

So I see there is quite a mutiny out there on the Internets regarding the finale. I don’t see why though, I thought the ending was very fitting and stayed true to LOST through and through. To me, it was always about the characters and their connections to each other and the eventual deep and meaningful relationships they formed. Other than the characters, LOST’s main focus was also on good versus evil, faith versus science and the human condition. So with all that said, I think the finale encompassed all those things in a nice, little neat package.

No, we did not get all the answers. But honestly, people. Did you expect to? I have to be brutally honest and admit that you are kind of an idiot if you did. When have Carlton and Damon ever made things that easy? To the people that believe the finale “dumbed down” the series, I think it did the opposite. So many doors were left open, open to interpretation for all us fans to mull over for years and that is exactly what made LOST such an intelligent show. It made the audience think. We weren’t spoon fed answers as we mindlessly watched the entire series, so why would the finale be any different? Plus, by leaving it open to interpretation, I think the creators did something pretty magical. LOST is not really over – we will probably be debating theories and opinions for years to come.

Now on to what I took from the those infamous last 10 minutes:
I believe that what happened on the island really truly happened. I know there are a lot of people out there that believe they were already dead while on the island, but that doesn’t make any sense to me. How could some have died if they were already dead? Catch my drift? I think the island was a test for all our characters – they were given a chance to turn their shit sandwich of a life around. The MIB thought these people could not change, that people were ultimately selfish and uncaring, while Jacob thought the opposite. He believed in the good of all people (despite his own tormented past). I’d like to think that Jacob was right and most of our LOSTies proved his point, with the exception of Michael whom we learned was punished by remaining on the island as one of “the whispers” for eternity.
And I found the flash sideways as a construct they all imagined so they could meet up and be together one last time before moving on to be really, really beautiful. The Sun/Jin “realization” during the ultrasound really had me teary, but Charlie & Claire’s really took the cake. I was a sobbing pile of loser. But why didn’t Ben want to go into the church? Did he feel like he had done our core group of LOSTies too many wrongs? Did he want to spend more time with Alex?  And why was Aaron born if they were all dead? I suppose to illustrate that that was Claire’s happiest moment so she wanted to go back to it when it was all done and over?

And how amazing was it that the show began with Jack opening his eye and they ended the show with Jack closing his eyes as he lay dying? So poetic and perfect. When Vincent trots into the clearing, licks Jack’s face and lays down next to him, I just completely lost it.  I didn’t fully recover after that and I don’t really remember anything else because my eyes were all foggy and misty and I was trying my best to wipe them with a napkin so that everyone else at the party wouldn’t see what a loser I was. Thankfully, when we turned on all the lights, everyone else looked just as emotionally ravaged.

I really liked that Jack handed over the “Jacob duties” to Hurley, because in my mind, he was the best for the job. He was always in tune with the island, more so than others and also was almost like a therapist to all those that died on it. Plus, he had a heart of gold. I truly believed Ben when he told Hurley that he was a great number one. And somehow, I could also believe that Ben was a great number two, atoning for all the sins he committed on our LOSTies throughout the series.

I hope I did the finale some justice, it’s hard to even type about it. I can’t believe it is all over but honestly, am so pleased with the way they ended what I believe to be an era of TV. I have a hard time believing that there will ever be another show like LOST again and for that reason, am so happy that I was able to experience it all from beginning to end: the joy, the sadness, the frustration, the enlightenment.

You may be LOST, but never forgotten.

xoxo

  • http://Www.sunnyglobaldiva.com Marilise

    Great review Mel! I thought the finale was 100% in the spirit of the show. I liked this interview that was in Entertainment Weekly recently–an interview with Terry O’ Quinn where he says something to the effect of, “if you’re still obsessing over the polar bears, then the show isn’t really for you.” my favorite momenta have always involved those chill/tear-inducing moments through the years where characters connected to each other in meaningful ways and I’m thrilled that the series ended with a sequence like that. People who are dissing it are largely either naysayers, in my opinion, or stopped understanding the show years ago.

  • http://Www.sunnyglobaldiva.com Marilise

    Oops typo! I meant favorite “moments” ;-)

  • karina

    great post! but it makes me feel sad and empty all over again :*(

    found this today, super insightful: http://jezebel.com/5546559/lost-finale-recap-case-closed?skyline=true&s=i

    the more i reflect on the whole thing, the more OK i am with it (despite my gripes with the cheese factor of the church scene). but there’s one thing that i can’t let go of: after all of the atrocities that Ben committed, he was still given a chance for redemption, while Michael, whose sins pale in comparison, was not (despite clearly trying to do so by coming over on the freighter, sacrificing himself, and helping Hurley this season). its completely unjust, unbalanced and irks me to my core because the only reasoning i can see for it is that Ben did it all “for the island,” while Michael was doing it for his son. which symbolically could mean Ben was being rewarded for his blind faith. a concept that i loathe.

    aside from that though, i loved it. lol

  • Adri

    I pretty much agree with everything you’ve said. Yours is the only “review” I’ve read b/c I didn’t really care to see what others were saying. For me, it was a special moment and I like that I have my own interpretation of what happened and what it all meant. I will truly miss this masterpiece!

  • http://bandcrab.com Melissa

    HIGH FIVE! I completely agree with everything you said here. Especially about the haters – I think they were anticipating hating it, so whatever happened, they’d “prove their point.” Me? I just went along for the amazing ride this season, and was not let down!

    But yeah, had me wondering – how does a dead person give birth? :S

  • Aliza

    I guess I’m one of the haters, not because we didn’t get answers, but because it didn’t make sense. While I found every moment till the end beautiful and heartbreaking and perfect, I thought the end was poorly thought out. I never once for a moment thought they died in the crash, Christian clearly said that people died before and after Jack. The thing is, the flashes seemed to have been written as another timeline, not purgatory/heaven. My main sticking points are why someone would need a near death experience to “flash” if they’re already dead? In Jin and Sun’s case, in their heaven they get to have their baby and raise it but in Claire’s case, she presumably got off the island and was able to take care of Aaron so why would she be pregnant? I don’t think people are stupid for feeling a little let down because Cuse and Lindeloff played with semantics. They’re not all dead and this isn’t purgatory was what they said all along and although they weren’t all dead after the crash and the island wasn’t purgatory I think a lot of people thought it wouldn’t end with death and purgatory. It is still my favorite show of all time and I will remain a LOSTie for life but I think they could have done better.

  • Adri

    My interpretation of it is not really so focused on the heaven/hell/purgatory aspect of the story. My interpretaion is more science-related which reflects the whole theme of faith vs science on the show.

    I see the sideways flashes as an alternate timeline or parallel universe that shows what their lives would’ve been like if the plane hadn’t crashed (kind of like Back to the Future when Michael J Fox goes back to the alternate 1980s). However, the storyline from the island still continues as well because it actually happened. The storyline in the sideways flashes is sort of like a branch off of what happens when the space/time continuum is disrupted when they drop the a-bomb in the 70s. Their lives are somewhat different b/c they set a whole other timeline in motion. But, in the end, they find each other’s constants anyway and when they do they remember the island (similar to what was happening to Desmond and Faraday in the last season). For me, the church scene represents the meeting place where they all wait for each other after death to move on together. Their awakenings and realizations of their life on the island may also symbolize their actual deaths in the main timeline. Christian did mention that not everyone inside the church had passed away – that there was no real time there. So, to me, it was sort of a reunion place where they meet each other. Ben may still have been alive on the island and thus he had more work to do as Hurley’s successor.

    Again, I know this may not make perfect sense. But, like Meli said, I think the writers’ are geniuses and true magicians in the sense that they never reveal the secrets and they leave the audience to think and come up with their own interpretations of the story. Again, this show was unprecedented from day 1 and there has never been anything like it that only meets the audience halfway and makes them complete the story in their own way. It’s like a good book that leaves you wanting more and leaves your imagination open to continue the story in whatever way you picture it.

  • Adri

    I forgot to add that since Christian says that the people in the church died either before or after Jack (and this is happening while Jack is dying on the island) that the church scene was the time of his death in the main timeline so it was his moment of awakening and moving on. So, we see that scene from his perspective while the others may or may not have actually died yet. This is just their reunion place where the fabric of time and space does not exist.

  • http://www.melificent.com Meli

    I love everyone’s perspectives and debates :)
    Glad I could ignite them!

    Also, Karina, that was a great link! Thanks for sharing it!