Seriously, I can't figure out what the finale means... any spoily comments welcome!
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Malevolent
2018 ***1/2 It's 1986 for some reason, and a team of paranormal investigators are making a big name for themselves all over Scotland. ...
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was it all always purgatory, or just the flash sideways?
You know my take is that ONLY the flash sideways was purgatory and everything that happened in the island was real.
The flash sideways was never actually that. They fooled us a la "Bad Future," when Jack's near suicide attempt turned out to NOT be a flashback.
The bomb did not go off, ever. Or it did but it changed nothing. The electromagnetic event that led to The Hatch happened, the gang was transported forward in time (back to the future, if you will). The alternate timeline was not anything that really happened at all, except as a commonly shared afterlife amongst all the key Lost players. And it only happened after all of them had died, which might've been a long time if Hurley inherited Jacob's longevity. Christian says "there is no now here," which makes what I just said possible.
I liked everything about the episode except that revelation. I was much more invested in it as an alternative universe. I especially liked Sawyer and Juliet's reunion, but I liked it way more as something that was really happening than as a What Dreams May Come kind of thing.
Maybe it makes more sense this way. So many of the characters get to fix that flawed thing in themselves. Hurley is a lucky guy, Sawyer's a cop, Jack's a father, etc. The show already established that there's some kind of afterlife. Buuuut, as much as I dug the way every little bit of it was written and presented (right up to and including "Jack, why are you here?"), I was disappointed. But just in that one piece.
Hurley told Ben, "You were a good 'number 2'", which also suggests that it was a long time before they all died. The theme of "letting go" was also woven into the season, hinting at the big reveal.
From USATODAY, "As it turns out, those now-beloved characters weren't just lost in the real world of the island. They were also lost in what many had assumed was an alternate "sideways" universe triggered by last season's atom bomb but was actually a gathering place for the dead as they wait to move on.
In many ways, the finale was designed to reaffirm what producers Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse have told us for years: The island exists; what happens there matters. If the light (which looked far less cheesy this week than last) had stayed out, the world would have ended.
But they also were reminding us that ultimately, for individuals, saving the world only delays the inevitable. We all die.
So in some ways the 2½-hour finale was two journeys, both centered on Jack, each illustrating the themes of individual redemption and group responsibility. On our world, he saved the island, handed the guardian job to Hurley, and died. (For the record, Kate, Sawyer, Claire, Miles, Richard, Lapidus and Desmond eventually left the island; Hurley and Ben stayed.) In the other world, the post-life purgatory where "now" does not exist, he was the final piece that reunited the characters and allowed all to leave — a reawakening of memories, theirs and ours, any fan had to cherish.
The finale was earnest and hopeful, and like all things that share those qualities, it likely will attract mockery in some places. But not here. Here, let's celebrate the joy in a TV job well done and well ended, and in realizing that there are rewards in maintaining faith in people and producers alike."
I just loved it when Hurley asked Ben to be his second. Ben looked like a little kid who just got offered a ride on Santa's sleigh. It was such a beautiful moment. In so many ways Ben was still a child and that moment embraced that.
thanks very much, jpx, and octo, for elucidating! it's sinking in a little... will try rewatching the ending again this weekend.
catfreeek, i loved what they did with ben at the end. he really was one of my favorite characters of the whole show. michael emerson is a genius.
He most certainly is, his facial expressions alone are an art form.
Didn't anybody watch Family Guy's Empire take-off instead?
Damn, that was on? We could've dvred both.
Dee vee arred?
I copied that Family Guy Empire last December. It's better than the New Hope episode by a mile.
Finally watched this on our DVR last night. I guess I can't really complain, since the entire show was such an ambitious one, and they wrapped it up well. My issues are all minor. Yeah, I agree with Octo that I didn't "like" that the sideways universe was a form of purgatory or having to come to accept that they're all dead or whatever. It kind of annoyed me, but ultimately, since the show kept me so entertained for so long, can I really begrudge the writers this choice? Eh, good for them, I say.
My other nitpicky "I don't like that," complaints were similarly personal and not based on actual literary critique. Just my own beefs. I really, really hated that Sun & Jin chose to die on that sub, since they have a kid back in Korea. When that happened, Octo and I were both outraged. I would totally tell Octo to leave the sub if I were trapped, and I'm sure I wouldn't have to tell him twice, as he would leave me to drown so he could take care of our baby. And that's the only choice, if you're a parent. The kid comes first, so their romantic love just seems selfish to me. The idea that their both entombed on the sunken sub isn't some glorious ideal to me; it's just a waste and horribly sad since there's an orphan back in Korea. They're undeserving parents. That's my biggest issue--and I guess the most thematically focused. This little sub story was completely ruined for me by their final choice, because the point they were trying to make was that these two are finally together forever. But to that I say, yucko, they both should have been shot way earlier if that's how they roll.
What the eff with Shannon being in the afterlife but not Said's other love of his life? I guess it's because Shannon was on the island, so I'll give that a pass....but then Locke's non-island squeeze was with him in the final scene Little inconsistencies like that irritate me.
Why couldn't Desmond just wake up and put the rock back in? The fact that it HAD to be Jack just for the literary satisfaction of Jack ultimately sacrificing himself for an ideal he resisted for a few seasons--yeah, I get it, but that seems like what we could call the writers' choice rather than any practical, plot driven necessity. I guess Desmond was plain tuckered out. Sure, okay, pass. A little forced, but pass.
So my hope (which doesn't matter but just to put it out there) was that sideways land was real and that the characters in it would go back to the island. In the "real" Lost, the island would be destroyed, so would the world, and then the sideways bunch would realize they needed to go back and protect the place, and they would get to do it minus all the hassles of being blown up and killed in various ways.
But then Jeff pointed out that in sideways land, the island was sunk....which we only know about from seeing it at the beginning of the season. So we get a shot of a sunken island that none of these people in sideways land could know about...which is a little weird. But fine, pass. Whatever. A lot of things could happen in sideways dead place that can't really be explained.
Great TV, all in all. I know people will poke fun, but I say hell yeah.
I'm using the term "sideways dead place" from now on.
I wasn't quite as outraged by the Sun & Jin bit. Jin never met the baby, which doesn't mean that he didn't have an emotional connection but I do believe it might make a difference and he had previously left Sun so his reasons for remaining could be justified. I, on the other hand, would have gotten out of there as quickly as possible. Drowning sucks.
Review roundup,
The New York Times says:
… I was by turns moved, engrossed, and deeply irritated. But mainly I was irritated, because in the end I’m a plot-centric person, and “Lost” was a densely plotted show, and the macro-plot turned out to be … well, a big nothing seems like an awfully strong way of putting it, but it was certainly close to that.…
The Los Angeles Times says:
Well, it could have been worse. It could have all been a dream. … the sound you heard 'round about 10 Sunday night was thousands of nonromantics wishing for a time slip that would give them those 2 1/2 hours and possibly six seasons back. …
The Chicago Tribune says:
… The first two hours were exciting and emotionally engaging, especially when the island castaways in the Sideways world began remembering their "real" lives. Those "flashes" were powerful and many cast members did some of their best work in those scenes. I got chills as I saw Juliet and Sawyer talk about that coffee date. Sun and Jin, Charlie, Kate and Claire -- all their recollection moments were moving and powerful. … But the last half hour or so took the finale to another level.
The San Francisco Chronicle says:
I loved watching "Lost." I embraced the characters. The ending pandered to my tastes in that way. But it failed on so many levels to answer questions that were important to people who invested time in them. It went out making about as much sense as it did coming in, which will undoubtedly be a disappointment. As a series finale it overjoyed the heart and annoyed the brain. But if I had to do it all over again, knowing how it all plays out, I'd still watch. …
Hitfix says:
… Even keeping in mind Darlton's pre-season warning about not answering every question, we end season six, and the series, with an awful lot left perfectly muddled, with a lot of story resting on the golden well of souls we were introduced to only two weeks ago, and with the sideways universe revealed to have no relation to the plot of the series, except in the sense that death is the end to every story. …
The Newark Star Ledger says:
… a conclusion that delivered gratifying codas for beloved characters, though it maddeningly side-stepped the show’s legion of unresolved enigmas.…
The Boston Globe says:
… the mixed episode offered an abundance of emotional resolution and vague metaphor, some of which was compelling (Sawyer and Juliet’s reunion, Jack and Desmond's farewell) and some of which was quite hokey (the cork?! the light? Locke becoming human again?). … Despite the disappointing muddiness and unanswered questions of the finale, I still felt grateful for it. One of TV’s most compelling pieces of serial storytelling came to an end exactly when it should have – before the rigors of TV seasons stretched the narrative too, too far out of shape. Viewers and networks always want more of what they love, but the “Lost” producers resisted temptation. They picked an end date and stuck to it, and for that – as well as six years of great mystery – they deserve respect. …
USA Today says:
… Thrillingly, cleverly, and in a manner that tapped into the simple, profound truths of great American works like Our Town, the show spelled out for viewers what it has been saying all along. Lost is about life and death, faith and science, spirit and flesh, and has always stressed that the title refers to the characters' souls, not their location. …
Time Magazine says:
… an epic, stirring two and a half hours of television, full of heart and commitment, that was true to Lost's characters as we knew them from season one. And through elaborate use of symmetries, echoes and callbacks—as well as some go-for-broke acting and a visual grandeur by director Jack Bender that matches the show's pilot—it brought them powerfully and cathartically full circle. …
I mean't "they're" entombed.
And also I actually did not intend any pun when I said "sub story" which proves that my opinion is not valid. I mean, how did I miss an obvious pun like that and still make it? Doy.
So Jordan, please be gentle. I bought your book after all.
I dvr'd the Family Guy episode but haven't watched it yet.
"Dvr'd" is perfect.
Just watch it and it was good.
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