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Post by mccloud on Jun 8, 2010 13:56:07 GMT -5
Shortcomings are in the eye of the beholder? I guess it's true of everything but it's how I feel By this last sentence, I'm under the impression that you have not read thoroughly all the other responses from people who did not like the ending. Not "did not get"..."did not LIKE." I'll try to synopsize mummi's point he has made repeatedly. The whole show was written to build to a frantic climax based on WHAT DOES IT ALL MEAN? And in The End, what it "meant" apparently wasn't important, it was the journey that was important. So the six seasons of mysteries and clues were simply ways to keep viewers. We were magnificently manipulated imho. Some others think so, too.
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Post by braindeadzombie on Jun 10, 2010 11:20:05 GMT -5
I'll try to synopsize mummi's point he has made repeatedly. The whole show was written to build to a frantic climax based on WHAT DOES IT ALL MEAN? And in The End, what it "meant" apparently wasn't important, it was the journey that was important. So the six seasons of mysteries and clues were simply ways to keep viewers. We were magnificently manipulated imho. Some others think so, too. Well, no one forced you to watch. I think... But seriously, once "Across the Sea" was aired, I gave up on the notion that Answers in the capital sense would be forthcoming. We the audience were given information that the characters not only had no inkling of but they had no clue in which questions to ask who. They just didn't care, how selfish... "What does it all mean?" That was never a question that crossed my mind, not even way back when in season 2 with the Hatch and the Numbers. "What's that", yes, but never "What does it mean?" My problem {my inability in seeing how bad the last season was?} is that the concept of "All" kept changing: Dharma, manipulative Others, duplitious Freighter folk, Time Travel and supposed Demigods and monsters. At which point do you admit "Oh, there's no way they connect." Mine was Time Travel, for which I wasn't here to post on. Still, "Follow the Leader" was amazing. Never was a mysterious character so immediately deflated... I ultimately watched Lost for the character drama which only caused in the finale with Sayid and Shannon. I loved the fact that they shared almost the exact same flashback. There was no monster {love between them}, it was all smoke.
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Post by Mod City on Jun 10, 2010 12:01:58 GMT -5
I'll try to synopsize mummi's point he has made repeatedly. The whole show was written to build to a frantic climax based on WHAT DOES IT ALL MEAN? And in The End, what it "meant" apparently wasn't important, it was the journey that was important. So the six seasons of mysteries and clues were simply ways to keep viewers. We were magnificently manipulated imho. Some others think so, too. Well, no one forced you to watch. I think... But seriously, once "Across the Sea" was aired, I gave up on the notion that Answers in the capital sense would be forthcoming. We the audience were given information that the characters not only had no inkling of but they had no clue in which questions to ask who. They just didn't care, how selfish... That's exactly when I let go of all that, too. I was just telling a friend that it purged me of a lot of that "need to know" that I should have known wasn't coming in the finale. Actually, watching the Battlestar Galactica finale last year probably prepared me for it more than anything. Like Mr. Atari, I also liked that finale, but I realized that many, many viewers were not happy with it. Much like the characters in Lost, I learned to let go.
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Post by Mr. Atari on Jun 10, 2010 12:16:41 GMT -5
Now that it's been a few weeks, I'm a bit more ambivalent to the ending. Some more random thoughts:
1) I know Ben ended on a sympathetic note, but he never really paid for his crimes. Sure, he was manipulated, but he still participated in a mass killing, shooting random people, and a vengeance murder of Widmore. But all the writers seemed to care about was the whole Alex drama. Seems like a bit of an easy out. At least Sayid went out a redeemed martyr.
2) The whole resurrection/"claimed"/soul-poisoned Sayid. I think the way they introduced the temple stuff, only to not explain stuff like Sayid was pretty weak.
3) Desmond. I don't mind that the sideways world turned out to be after they all died. What I mind is that I was led to expect that Desmond would somehow link the two. That was the setup for him since season 2. It turns out he just had a near-death experience in Widmore's shed, and he wasn't a link at all. In retrospect, that was a big letdown.
4) The unexplained mysteries don't bother me all that much (Dharma food drops, Christian appearing off-island, etc). What irks me more is the sloppy narrative (or editing) that makes Ben miraculously escape from the fallen tree, or Jack just magically appearing outside the cave after he sacrificed himself putting the carrot back in the hole. Those are some big plot holes, akin to the dead lady reappearing in Space Mutiny.
5) I didn't mind the carrot or the ambiguity of what was under that hole. Maybe it was a volcano. Maybe it was hell. Maybe it was the magnetic axis point of the island. Maybe it was "the light inside all of us". To me, it's like demanding that Rowling explain why the staircases move at Hogwarts. Or Lewis explain why you can't get to Narnia the same way twice. Or Tolkien explain how melting a ring can rid the world of evil. It's the rules of those stories' settings. I don't see why they can't remain unexplained.
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Post by braindeadzombie on Jun 11, 2010 11:30:21 GMT -5
Now that it's been a few weeks, I'm a bit more ambivalent to the ending. Some more random thoughts: 1) I know Ben ended on a sympathetic note, but he never really paid for his crimes. Sure, he was manipulated, but he still participated in a mass killing, shooting random people, and a vengeance murder of Widmore. But all the writers seemed to care about was the whole Alex drama. Seems like a bit of an easy out. At least Sayid went out a redeemed martyr. 2) The whole resurrection/"claimed"/soul-poisoned Sayid. I think the way they introduced the temple stuff, only to not explain stuff like Sayid was pretty weak. 3) Desmond. I don't mind that the sideways world turned out to be after they all died. What I mind is that I was led to expect that Desmond would somehow link the two. That was the setup for him since season 2. It turns out he just had a near-death experience in Widmore's shed, and he wasn't a link at all. In retrospect, that was a big letdown. 4) The unexplained mysteries don't bother me all that much (Dharma food drops, Christian appearing off-island, etc). What irks me more is the sloppy narrative (or editing) that makes Ben miraculously escape from the fallen tree, or Jack just magically appearing outside the cave after he sacrificed himself putting the carrot back in the hole. Those are some big plot holes, akin to the dead lady reappearing in Space Mutiny. 5) I didn't mind the carrot or the ambiguity of what was under that hole. Maybe it was a volcano. Maybe it was hell. Maybe it was the magnetic axis point of the island. Maybe it was "the light inside all of us". To me, it's like demanding that Rowling explain why the staircases move at Hogwarts. Or Lewis explain why you can't get to Narnia the same way twice. Or Tolkien explain how melting a ring can rid the world of evil. It's the rules of those stories' settings. I don't see why they can't remain unexplained. 1 "Good is not nice". Many of the Good guys in this show are absolute coldblooded murderers and Ben was one of the Best. I loved the point in the finale where Hugo wanted Ben as his Second because he had experience but since that experience was mostly the murder of three previous Island leaders {Jacob, Locke and Widmore. Does Dharma count?}, I had no idea what Hugo meant. 2 "Soul poisoned" Sayid and, not too forget, Evil Claire. Yeah, anything associated to the Smoke Monster {At least, I believe it was how Sayid was ressurected} is evil in the Other's book because they're all a bunch of idiots who followed Jacob blindly. "Jacob good, Unjacob evil." was their motto, Widmore included, and they died for it. I agree that the Temple stuff was absolutely weak in a narrative sense but "Sundown" was something special, wasn't it? It's funny that the ones who decided to follow the Man in Black were either killed by Widmore or by each other. Or do I mean tragic? 3 Desmond had a false eiphany in the Real world but a real one in the Afterlife because of Widmore's actions causing Desmond to apparently die. I myself give it a pass because it still made more sense that the Third season episode that introduced Ms Hawking and Desmond's strange placement in spacetime. Also, without his false sense of security, Desmond would never have gone into the cave to uncork it. 4 In "Across the Sea", the same thing happened to Jacob's brother as to Jack in the finale. The Smoke Monster came out of the cave after his live brother went in but the real and very dead body was also "Teleported" out as well. Eventually, anyway. Jack was alive but the situation seemed similar to me. Was I the only who wondered if Jack would/ did replace the Smoke Monster? As to Ben's part, I think it wasn't as if the tree was unmovable or Ben was crushed. The bigger point was that the rest of them were trying to free Ben in the first place. The group consensus was "Must save Ben!" and nobody thought "Well, why?". 5 Hey, that was what I was trying to say, only much clearer and to the point.
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