Sunday, May 23, 2010

About the Lost Finale and Why It Was the Best Finale Ever Done (To My Knowledge)

Yes friends, I am a lostie. I watched lost since Part II of the pilot episode they aired on G4TV, I watched seasons 1 and 2 on G4 and sometimes even missed school to watch them at midday. I watched seasons 3 and 4 on loaned DVDs, I watched season 5 on ABC when it aired, and I've been faithfully watching this last season with great enthusiasm. Needless to say, I fucking love LOST.
Yesterday, at 10:30, this outstanding series ended the best way any show in the history of televised broadcasts could ever end. "But why?" you may ask. Well I will attempt to explain to you my friend, why this show is a big fucking deal.

Well I'll be honest with you, I would not be surprised at all to see studies, books, thesis statements, essays, history channel specials, and possibly even worship of the series in its aftermath. But let me begin by briefly explaining to you why the series was so good. Well simple, you see usually in good ol fashioned capitalistic business T.V Networks (NBC, ABC, FOX, CBS) the idea of bleeding out a show with good ratings is so overused that it can lead to the slow degradation of a series or to a bad finale. Under this idea, shows are expected to run for as long as they can and when they get old and sick, they kill em. This is why some series endings have been rather unpleasant such as the Seinfeld finale ( the gang sitting in a jail cell) or the Drew Carey Show ending (Drew downgrades to the same shitty life he started out with) and even Full House (I don't want to remember).

Here's where Lost is different. After the first season, Lindelof, Cuse, and Abrahams got their shit together and laid out the entire plans for the series, "6 seasons and it ends this way", and so they did. So right off the bat they realized that the show would die soon, so they might as well use their time right. "So they got their time right, what else did they do?" something ingenious. The entire show was made to basically make you realize that you will always be confused (lost) and you can't always keep looking for an answer because you'll just want to find another answer and so on and so on. You must basically accept this and move on. This is what the finale does so excellently in making you realize because the truth is that the human being is always looking for answers because he believes that will make his life better, but in truth, the only thing that makes your life better is having someone to be with or something to do. The characters reflect those same thoughts.

Linus thought that his power was what really mattered. But when he lost his daughter he came to realize that she was what actually mattered, and that his power was truly inexistent. Of course afterwards he was of great help to Hurley. One other idea that the finale proposes is that we all eventually get what we truly need and want, even after death. I'm not really one to believe in a heaven and hell, but then again I've never been dead. Who am I to judge what happens after death. And there's also reality. In the spirit of letting go and moving on, the answer to what is real is rather simple. Whatever you feel is what was matters, not what happened that lead you to said feeling. Your feelings are the only real thing you have and its the only answer you need.

Finally I must delve on the great Lost Quote "You have to let go!" and "You move on". Along with the knowledge of reality, letting go and moving on are the most constant human dilemmas in history. Some people remain angry at something that happened some time ago, other remain sad for events that happened even farther back, some refuse to quit a vice or habit because its the only thing that brings them happiness even though it harms them, and some refuse to quit pursuing something what they believe will make them happy at the cost of a steady stream of pain. Why we don't let go and move on is simply because we always want an answer to why we should let go, but the truth is we can get all the answer in the world and never let go or move on. and we won't. Why we have to let go is completely tied to reality, which is what we feel at the moment, and if what we feel is not good, then there should be no reason to hanging on or staying in place. We have to learn to let go and move on, and just fucking do it.

After watching this series, I've learned these very important lessons which I never thought I would learn in such a way. Lost was honest to god such a great series and this Finale has made me realize all these things in such a way that the moment I started applying these lessons I immediately realized what was wrong with me recently and managed to know what I had to do, let go, and move on. Like the characters in the series, we must learn these simple actions and stop trying to find answers to everything. The entire show all we wanted was answers, but once we had them we realized the real answer to everything was not in any timeline at all, but within ourselves. Because lets face it, we are all lost, and we will always be lost, so we might as well just say the hell with answers and do what really matters.

Don't ask why. Just accept, let go, and move on.
Lionheart


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