Lost
I don’t really have time to watch anything new, or rather, I do have time but can’t be bothered. So I thought I’d check in with my thoughts on the biggest TV program of the moment. Most people in the UK won’t be getting the new season till June, so if you want things to be a surprise, I suggest you not read this. Those people lucky enough to live in Belgium are about 5 or 6 episodes in, and those smart enough to get Bit Torrent and download new episodes as they’re broadcast in the USA, like me, are right up to date with the 19th episode of season 2.
Just to make it clear here that I’m not going to get into speculation on the nature of the island and all the other quandaries and enigmas that have been set out. I’m looking at what we have so far in the way of television and how entertaining it is.
I missed the first season when it was first shown in the UK because I was working early shifts and had to be in bed. I picked up the season 1 DVD box set back in November, though, and got through all 26 episodes in just a few days. It was a genuinely very tense thriller, interspersed with excellent character material. The mysteries were compelling and the slow build worked very well, hitting a crescendo midway through the season with the discovery of the hatch and running with it till the season finale.
(Again, spoilers from here on in.)
The second season continues directly from where the first left off, with Locke and Kate deciding to go down the hatch, going missing and Jack going after them. What they find down there is a guy who has to press a button every 108 minutes. He does a runner and Locke takes over as button presser. In the first season, Locke was, without a doubt, one of the best developed and most interesting characters of the bunch. He was more ‘at one’ with the island than anyone else and the one most engaged in discovering the island’s mysteries. This is, of course, what led him to the hatch, but he’s spent most of the latest season stuck in there. Hunter-gatherer, shamanistic Locke is no more, dedicating his faith in fate and the events on the island to the pressing of a button. Simply, the character has been castrated. The most recent episode starts toward rectify this, but it may well be too late.
And I think this shows perfectly well the problem with the series. From the very beginning, the creators have insisted, in retaliation to claims that they’re making it up as they go along, that they know exactly what is going on, that they know what the big reveal will eventually be. It’s just a matter of getting there. But as the show is renewed each year, the ‘getting there’ part takes much longer, and so they have to find diversions for the characters. Locke, as one of the most proactive characters, was castrated for a good reason: by sticking him in the hatch, they cripple the plot, stop it from progressing. Now, the hatch may be part of the wider mystery and Locke's obsession with it is mostly in character (he's blindly faithful, he's looking to justify Boone's death in some way, his confidence has been shaken), but this does all whiff a bit of killing time. And really, that’s what they’re doing.
(There’s also the problem that, no matter how long the series runs for, the pay-off will always be the same, and people who don't realise that risk ultimately being disappointed for the amount of time they’ve invested. Let’s hope the producers know when to end it.)
That’s not to say the new season hasn’t had its highlights: the introduction of the tail section survivors, including the awesome Mr Eko, darker character turns for Charlie and Sayid, Claire remembering what happened to her when she went missing in season 1, and the continued excellent character material provided in the flashbacks. But while the first season did an excellent job and building real suspense, the latest season seems much more scattershot. It is much less structured and too involved in taking the scenic route to the eventual explanations, and as a result the questions surrounding what's really going on which drove the series through its first season are losing interest. The new season is in its run-up to the finale now, and is picking up the pace, but they really need to either provide more explanations or find a more interesting way of delaying them. I'm sure I'm not the only one getting bored, and unless the series gathers some momentum, I'll probably not bother with the third season.
Just to make it clear here that I’m not going to get into speculation on the nature of the island and all the other quandaries and enigmas that have been set out. I’m looking at what we have so far in the way of television and how entertaining it is.
I missed the first season when it was first shown in the UK because I was working early shifts and had to be in bed. I picked up the season 1 DVD box set back in November, though, and got through all 26 episodes in just a few days. It was a genuinely very tense thriller, interspersed with excellent character material. The mysteries were compelling and the slow build worked very well, hitting a crescendo midway through the season with the discovery of the hatch and running with it till the season finale.
(Again, spoilers from here on in.)
The second season continues directly from where the first left off, with Locke and Kate deciding to go down the hatch, going missing and Jack going after them. What they find down there is a guy who has to press a button every 108 minutes. He does a runner and Locke takes over as button presser. In the first season, Locke was, without a doubt, one of the best developed and most interesting characters of the bunch. He was more ‘at one’ with the island than anyone else and the one most engaged in discovering the island’s mysteries. This is, of course, what led him to the hatch, but he’s spent most of the latest season stuck in there. Hunter-gatherer, shamanistic Locke is no more, dedicating his faith in fate and the events on the island to the pressing of a button. Simply, the character has been castrated. The most recent episode starts toward rectify this, but it may well be too late.
And I think this shows perfectly well the problem with the series. From the very beginning, the creators have insisted, in retaliation to claims that they’re making it up as they go along, that they know exactly what is going on, that they know what the big reveal will eventually be. It’s just a matter of getting there. But as the show is renewed each year, the ‘getting there’ part takes much longer, and so they have to find diversions for the characters. Locke, as one of the most proactive characters, was castrated for a good reason: by sticking him in the hatch, they cripple the plot, stop it from progressing. Now, the hatch may be part of the wider mystery and Locke's obsession with it is mostly in character (he's blindly faithful, he's looking to justify Boone's death in some way, his confidence has been shaken), but this does all whiff a bit of killing time. And really, that’s what they’re doing.
(There’s also the problem that, no matter how long the series runs for, the pay-off will always be the same, and people who don't realise that risk ultimately being disappointed for the amount of time they’ve invested. Let’s hope the producers know when to end it.)
That’s not to say the new season hasn’t had its highlights: the introduction of the tail section survivors, including the awesome Mr Eko, darker character turns for Charlie and Sayid, Claire remembering what happened to her when she went missing in season 1, and the continued excellent character material provided in the flashbacks. But while the first season did an excellent job and building real suspense, the latest season seems much more scattershot. It is much less structured and too involved in taking the scenic route to the eventual explanations, and as a result the questions surrounding what's really going on which drove the series through its first season are losing interest. The new season is in its run-up to the finale now, and is picking up the pace, but they really need to either provide more explanations or find a more interesting way of delaying them. I'm sure I'm not the only one getting bored, and unless the series gathers some momentum, I'll probably not bother with the third season.
posted by Ryan Stephens at 8:00 AM
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