Apologies to those who don't watch the show, but here's a link to an AP article about where exactly we left off when LOST season four concluded last spring.
And here's the thing: these questions represent about .01% of those the show has opened and not answered. For example, here are questions posed from the two-part pilot episode, 83 episodes ago.
What is the smoke monster?
Why did he kill the pilot of Oceanic Flight 815?
Why was Jack laying in the jungle instead of the beach like everyone else who survived?
Where is the polar bear from? What was it used for?
Every episode has a minumum of two or three unanswered questions like these, and frankly, it worries me. I worry the writers have fallen in love with being clever and posing all of these mysteries. I worry they won't be able to tie up all the loose ends they've unraveled so far.
And if they can't, boy will I be upset. I've invested waaaaay too much time in this show for it to crash and burn.
But on the other hand, if they can tie it all up in a satisfying and logical way, best. show. ever.
That last part is a concern, too. LOST is flirting with, if not openly courting, time travel. And time travel is a very, very tricky concept to deal with in fiction. For those of you who have read the Harry Potter books, notice that after the concept of the time turner was introduced in Prisoner of Azkaban, J.K. Rowling got rid of them entirely in Half-Blood Prince without really using them in books four or five.
I believe this is because she fully realized the problems inherent in using time travel in her books. If time turners exist, why not go back and stop Voldemort before he became powerful? What rules govern their use? Do villains have them?
And in general, what about paradoxes? Can an individual kill their own grandfather? What happens if they try? And if you go back in time to stop something bad from happening, then the bad thing never occurred, and you have no impetus to go back in time in the first place.
It's ridiculously complicated and very easy to make a mistake. The other problem is that it's tempting to just give up and say, "Aliens! It was all aliens!" That's where illogical comes into play. The writers and producers pride themselves on having a smart show, one based in actual science and literature. So far, while vague, the principles the show has introduced make sense (if you do enough research).
So I need you to be on your A-games, LOST writers. Don't crash and burn. Make me proud.
5 comments:
I thought of you and our time-travel conversation while I watched Smallville this week. What did you think?
I thought it was handled well. They kept it simple. The 3009 crew didn't travel back to change anything, but to prevent something from being changed. And nothing in the timeline was altered.
LOST, on the other hand, is much more involved in its use of time travel. We'll see how they do.
Well, I just got into LOST about halfway through Season 4, thanks to a gal I met. lol Anyways, I became addicted pretty much right away. Though I didn't really know too much of what was going on, it let me know enough, or so I thought. G4TV has been broadcasting the show from Season 1 on, right now I'm on Season 2, and have about 20 episodes DVR'd and waiting to be watched. Anyways, I remember at the end of Season 4 when Locke moved the island, how he went down into that shaft thing, and it was apparently frozen down there if I recall. Polar Bear? Also, those two guys that called Penny to let 'em know they had found an Electro Magnetic Anamoly, when Desmond triggered the fail-safe, they were somewhere extremely cold as well. Polar Bear? I'm thinking maybe they're farther south than they realize, and like Desmond said earlier, the island is kinda' like a snow globe. LIke I said before though, I don't really know much as I'm missing two seasons of information.
Some good points, Mookoo. However, the Kahana is outside the snow globe of the island and is still in a warm location. And it was Ben who turned the wheel and moved the island.
But who knows? I'm just excited for Wednesday.
Oh okay, the Kahana, see yeah, I'm not really sure what that is. lol I also could have sworn it was Locke who moved it, but I do remember it being Ben now. Thanks for refreshing my memory a little bit. And you're right, we'll just have to see, and I'll have to restrain myself from reading your posts until I catch up. ;p
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