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LOST 06.17/18/18.5: "The End" (Everything Else Was Just Progress)

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jett

D-Member
bachikarn said:
Casmir effect wasn't even referenced in the show. It was referenced in one of the Comic-con things. IIRC, they said "Casmir-LIKE effect" which can mean a whole lot of things. Most of the "physics" in Stargate is horseshit too. They are just a little better at hiding their horseshit with techno babble.

PS: Jett, I don't see how you can claim its 100% red hearing. Things can be open to interpretation.

It's how I see it. I'm sure Lindelof has an explanation for it, but I don't think it matters. This season has been nothing but red herrings. Even right at the end, with crap like Jack's neck bleeding, trying to make us believe that it is still a parallel dimension. :p
 

big ander

Member
So what I can piece together from this guys posts: if a work of fiction doesn't contain 100% real science, it's not TRUE sci-fi and we're dumb for not asking for more?

Fuck we're getting trolled so hard :lol :lol :lol

How about Juliets boobs?
 

ckohler

Member
Not sure if this common knowledge or not:

Michael Emerson gave an interview on Attack of the Show and said that the series box set will include an extra 12-14 minute special feature with him and Hurley on the island. He said, "You could call it an epilogue.. a lost scene.. that opens a window onto that gap of unknown time between Hurley becoming Number One and the end of the series. It's self contained although it's a rich period in the show's mythology that has never been explored, so who knows what will come of it.
 
If the Losties "created" the sideways, surely that's all the explination you need for the island being underwater?

Jack's neck bleeding stuff is hardest for me to understand. It's difficult to wrap your head around a circumstance that justifies it.
 
StoOgE said:
No, those of us with common sense just moved on.

Except for me.

I'm stuck here... but I'll soon find a loophole to kill duckroll, then I'm going to destroy this thread and leave.

The good news for all of you is earlier this season you created a Lost spoilers thread. You will all be able to reconnect there before moving on.

I didn't know when you told me I could make the OP for this thread that you were serious about destroying it.
 

Higgy

Member
lost-ending.gif
 

bistromathics

facing a bright new dawn
gdt5016 said:
I think the sunken Island is a clue that Jughead created LA X though.
I thought that is what they wanted us to think, but the finale and whole 'moving on' thing showed no connection between them. Also the reveal that Juliet's "it worked" was referring to the candy machine and not the bomb kind of pushed me to think the bomb didn't work as they'd hoped, and just sent them through time. This makes the sunken island just a weird, dangling, red herring.

TheGreatDave said:
If the Losties "created" the sideways, surely that's all the explination you need for the island being underwater?

that's all the explanation I have, and it feels awkward because the island was obviously put there in the premiere to drive home the idea that we were in an alternate timeline, which turned out to not be the case. My point being, I just wish they'd left it out altogether. The CG was pretty awful, anyways :\
 

SpeedingUptoStop

will totally Facebook friend you! *giggle* *LOL*
Mifune said:
Speaking of the Temple, does anyone else feel like all the claimed/Infected stuff was just a bunch of mystical mumbo jumbo on the part of Dogen? Like he didn't know what the hell he was talking about, and there was nothing actually "wrong" with Sayid? Sayid just believed he was bad because he was told so.

It's really the only way I can find any value in the Temple storyline. God, the handling of Sayid's character this season was terrible.
I like the Temple, but yea, I'm just gonna have to accept this as an excuse for the Infection stuff, because that shit was horribly vague.

The Temple was definitely something people wanted to see before S6 ever started. So, they spent about 30 minutes total screentime there. Some liked it, some didn't. Not a big deal, as I see it.




Also, how does Igoritza still even exist anymore?:lol Jesus christ man.
 

Nameless

Member
bistromathics said:
I thought that is what they wanted us to think, but the finale and whole 'moving on' thing showed no connection between them. Also the reveal that Juliet's "it worked" was referring to the candy machine and not the bomb kind of pushed me to think the bomb didn't work as they'd hoped, and just sent them through time. This makes the sunken island just a weird, dangling, red herring.



that's all the explanation I have, and it feels awkward because the island was obviously put there in the premiere to drive home the idea that we were in an alternate timeline, which turned out to not be the case. My point being, I just wish they'd left it out altogether. The CG was pretty awful, anyways :\

Then how do you explain Juliet being able to "crossover" in the first place due to detonating Jughead? Also "It Worked" came after "We should get coffee...we can go dutch" in LA X, but it came before in "The End" so thsn't quite add up. Furthermore the only other person to be exposed to that exact same energy(Desmond) is the only oat logic doether person who's able to consciously enter the flash sideways. That's not a coincidence .

Choose to ignore it or not. But the bulk of the evidence points to jughead causing LA X.
 

SpeedingUptoStop

will totally Facebook friend you! *giggle* *LOL*
Nameless said:
Then how do you explain Juliet being able to "crossover" in the first place due to detonating Jughead? Also "It Worked" came after "We should get coffee...we can go dutch" in LA X, but it came before in "The End" so thsn't quite add up. Furthermore the only other person to be exposed to that exact same energy(Desmond) is the only oat logic doether person who's able to consciously enter the flash sideways. That's not a coincidence .

Choose to ignore it or not. But the bulk of the evidence points to jughead causing LA X.
I know it's a stretch of logic, but I also like to connect Juliet, a woman who helped create life as her day job, being directly connected to create this new life for all the Losties.
 

bistromathics

facing a bright new dawn
Nameless said:
Choose to ignore it or not. But the bulk of the evidence points to jughead causing LA X.
Whatever LA X is, the implication was that it is not something created by nuclear bombs, but created by those who die and need to find others in order to 'move on'. I realize there is no explanation for this no matter how hard you scrutinize, but to suggest it could have been the result of a nuclear bomb totally goes against the ending as I interpreted it.

edit: also, I'm almost positive Juliet saying "it worked" in the finale was supposed to be what miles picked up from her dead body. Juliet being able to flash around seems fishy, but chalk it up to her being close to death or being at the dead center of the EM/nuke blast (or both).
 

Nameless

Member
SpeedingUptoStop said:
I know it's a stretch of logic, but I also like to connect Juliet, a woman who helped create life as her day job, being directly connected to create this new life for all the Losties.

Its not a stretch. Jack's faith, Juliet's determination, Boone's, Locke's "sacrifice", Sayid, Sawyer, Kate & Hurley's loyalty, they all had a hand in creating the X-timeline "together". You can even go back to Charlie's and Boone's sacrifices which were paramount in the Losties reaching that point.
 
SpeedingUptoStop said:
I know it's a stretch of logic, but I also like to connect Juliet, a woman who helped create life as her day job, being directly connected to create this new life for all the Losties.

Oh man I so love that.
 

C.Dark.DN

Banned
Nameless said:
Then how do you explain Juliet being able to "crossover" in the first place due to detonating Jughead? Also "It Worked" came after "We should get coffee...we can go dutch" in LA X, but it came before in "The End" so thsn't quite add up. Furthermore the only other person to be exposed to that exact same energy(Desmond) is the only oat logic doether person who's able to consciously enter the flash sideways. That's not a coincidence .

Choose to ignore it or not. But the bulk of the evidence points to jughead causing LA X.
A bomb doesn't create how purgatory will look like. It fixed time travel, nothing more.

SpeedingUptoStop said:
I know it's a stretch of logic, but I also like to connect Juliet, a woman who helped create life as her day job, being directly connected to create this new life for all the Losties.
While an awesome thought, they are all directly connected with making it.
 

Staccat0

Fail out bailed
Igoritza said:
*Summary for brevity's sake: HOW DOES MAGIC WORK!?
Dude its fantasy.
Asking why magic works is insane.
You can take the answer and not like it, but digging deeper is pointless. ITs fiction. No one can be right.

Do you hold DBZ to this same standard?
DeathNote said:
A bomb doesn't create how purgatory will look like. It fixed time travel, nothing more.
.
I'm on board with this.
The "it worked" stuff was misdirection
 

Nameless

Member
DeathNote said:
A bomb doesn't create how purgatory will look like. It fixed time travel, nothing more.

just because it served as a purgatory of sorts. doesn't mean it was purgatory.

And people don't reach "purgatory" by getting blasted with electromagnetism.:lol They created an after reality to finish their journeys on their own, w/o the Island and to reunite.
 

Archaix

Drunky McMurder
Nameless said:
Then how do you explain Juliet being able to "crossover" in the first place due to detonating Jughead? Also "It Worked" came after "We should get coffee...we can go dutch" in LA X, but it came before in "The End" so thsn't quite add up. Furthermore the only other person to be exposed to that exact same energy(Desmond) is the only oat logic doether person who's able to consciously enter the flash sideways. That's not a coincidence .

Choose to ignore it or not. But the bulk of the evidence points to jughead causing LA X.


The evidence doesn't point to that at all. The reason Juliet crossed over when she was down in that hole is the same reason Desmond did when he got zapped. Juliet was in the heart of the Incident. Many people think Desmond was special in the first place because he got zapped in the face by the very same energy at the same spot. The next time he was at a near-death experience, he flashed over to the sideways. Zapped by the heart of the Island, newfound connection to the afterlife. Juliet did the same. If she hadn't died from all of the falling and the metal and the explosion, she could have ended up traveling all over time. Who knows. But there's no evidence at all saying the bomb created it.

I'm not saying the bomb absolutely didn't, but to say that it did is a leap with nothing concrete backing it up.

The bomb together with the breach of the Island together were the incident, which among other things shot a few Dharma workers into nothingness (from the perspective of those that were left alive such as Chang).


edit: Also, as for whether she said "It worked" in the finale but Miles heard it episodes earlier, LA X exists outside of time. Juliet effectively said "It worked" at every single point in time from our perspective.
 

C.Dark.DN

Banned
Nameless said:
just because it served as a purgatory of sorts. doesn't mean it was purgatory.

And people don't reach "purgatory" by getting blasted with electromagnetism.:lol They created an after reality to finish their journeys on their own, w/o the Island and to reunite.
Desmond had a near death experience. Which in my book would let you see purgatory.
 

Nameless

Member
Archaix said:
The evidence doesn't point to that at all. The reason Juliet crossed over when she was down in that hole is the same reason Desmond did when he got zapped. Juliet was in the heart of the Incident. Many people think Desmond was special in the first place because he got zapped in the face by the very same energy at the same spot. The next time he was at a near-death experience, he flashed over to the sideways. Juliet did the same. If she hadn't died from all of the falling and the metal and the explosion, she could have ended up traveling all over time. Who knows. But there's no evidence at all saying the bomb created it.

I'm not saying the bomb absolutely didn't, but to say that it did is a leap with nothing concrete backing it up.

No one who died, ever, throughout the history the entire show even remotely hinted on gaining some awareness of the flash sideways. The ONLY two people who became aware of it in the OG timeline "coincidentally" happened to be exposed to the exact same energy from the exact same location. The very location of the event which the narrative hinted caused the flashsideways the entire season. To cast all the evidence off simply as red herrings is a cushy way of ignoring blatant evidence.

Even Christian Shephard's speech said flat out. It was a place they "created together". It's actually pretty jarring how everything adds up.
 

Staccat0

Fail out bailed
hey guys what did charolette say before she died again?
Nameless said:
No one who died, ever, throughout the history the entire show even remotely hinted on gaining some awareness of the flash sideways. The ONLY two people who became aware of it in the OG timeline "coincidentally" happened to be exposed to the exact same energy from the exact same location. The very location of the event which the narrative hinted caused the flashsideways the entire season. To cast all the evidence off simply as red herrings is a cushy way of ignoring blatant evidence.

Even Christian Shephard's speech said flat out. It was a place they "created together". It's actually pretty jarring how everything adds up.
so wait, when desmond got blasted and became unstuck from time, are you saying that that shit was in purgatory? I just want to be absolutely sure
 

Archaix

Drunky McMurder
Nameless said:
No one who died, ever, throughout the history the entire show even remotely hinted on gaining some awareness of the flash sideways. The ONLY two people who became aware of it in the OG timeline "coincidentally" happened to be exposed to the exact same energy from the exact same location. The very location of the event which the narrative hinted caused the flashsideways the entire season. To cast all the evidence off simply as red herrings is a cushy way of ignoring blatant evidence.

Even Christian Shephard's speech said flat out. It was a place they "created together". It's actually pretty jarring how everything adds up.


The narrative only "hinted" that it caused the flash sideways as an obvious red herring. Come on. The Island being sunk, the plane landing, Juliet's "it worked" were all clearly trying to get people to believe the incident and LA X were related when they weren't. I've been saying that all year long that there wasn't going to be any connection, there still isn't. They were there to throw everybody off to prevent anyone from coming to the conclusion that it was an afterlife.

I'm not saying that the blast Juliet and Desmond took has nothing to do with why they saw the sideways, I'm saying it has nothing to do with why it was created. We know of two, possibly three people who had glimpses of it (depending on how the ending is interpreted, Jack may have as well). Those people all got smacked in the mouth by the heart of the Island, something linked to rebirth and the afterlife if we are to believe Mother. They got an extra high dosage of that, and they were able to experience both sides when they were near death. There is a clear correlation, but nothing to suggest the incident caused its existence.
 

Nameless

Member
How many times do people repeat phrases?

Juliet: James.. I have something very important to tell you. Your fuckin candy bar dropped.

come on fellas
 

Archaix

Drunky McMurder
Nameless said:
How many times do people repeat phrases?

Juliet: James.. I have something very important to tell you. Your fuckin candy bar dropped.

come on fellas


If you didn't see that "it worked" was a red herring from the start...I just don't know how I can continue to discuss this show :lol. Next you're going to be asking about Ben's box.
 

sc0la

Unconfirmed Member
Okay, it has been almost a week since the finale, and I think I am ready to talk about it in more depth. let me do standard caveats that this is all IMO, And I don't think the last episode was bad, I just don't like the resolution it brought to the series. I also don't think the wreckage at the end was Ajira or that the island was purgatory so you can separate me from the crazy group.

The short review is:
I didn't like it.

The long review is:
I think season 6 was fundamentally flawed in its conception, and the ultimate gambit of that plays out in the finale, making me not enjoy the episode on total. I don't have a problem specifically with giving the characters an epilogue, but from the beginning of season 6 I said I would be disappointed if that was what the entirety of X was. Either in the form of limbo or in a hard reset where they regain their experiences. So at the outset this wasn't going to be a resolution I enjoyed.

I think a big reason for disliking the X resolution in hindsight is how it minimized the impact of certain events throughout the season:

The impact of the deaths of Sun/Jin, Sayid and even Juliet were all lessened for me because I was watching everyone running around in X. I was believing that these characters were all alive and well still, and it took all semblance of tragedy out of it. Retroactively discovering that they were "dead and well" instead of alive and well did not fundamentally change this. In fact it may even reduce the emotional impact even further than initially, unlike say, finding out at the end of season 5 that Locke was really MIB and Locke was really gone.

This extends beyond deaths as well, X being purgatory just really lowers the stakes of all of season 6 for me. I was not convinced that the entire world and life itself were at stake if Smokey left. Damon & Carelton can say on a podcast that smokey is evil incarnate all they want, they didn't set this up within the framework of the show effectively, and where they did touch on it in the show, they ultimately diluted it with X or by other means. Did they really save the world? There is not sufficient information to make this assertion, and it's easy to interpret the characters who told us the stakes were immense were either lying, or just didn't really know themselves. I kept expecting things to go real bad in X to show was why this was still so important.

I also didn't like the way X was structured to intentionally mislead the viewer. The cold open from the bomb to LA X, the island being underwater, Juliets "It worked" from beyond the grave etc. I don't mind a red herring now and then, but this was fundamentally intended to mislead people who pay close attention. This is the opposite of what they did in the Season 3 finale where they left some clues out in the open.

I won't dive into how the hug-o-thon in the church was awful fanservice, or how X itself felt like fanfic, others have covered this better than me.
"Bu bubu bu bu it was a world created by flawed individuals!"
Who? Lindelcuse are flawed? You just told me how godly they were ;)

I understand the writers desires to give these characters happy endings, and I understand a fans attachment to that sort of resolution. We loved these characters, and they all deserved a happy ending. But Lost was a drama, and a lot of great drama and writing that D&C were inspired by has its share of tragedy. The only "Brave storytelling" was not giving in to the incessant whining of "Answers" and leaving the truly inconsequential things open.

But, my absolute BIGGEST complaint with the purgatory idea is that these characters somehow NEEDED this world to move on. I think it cheapens the growth they had during the show.

Don't tell me Jack needed to fix John, or talk to his Dad to be able to let go and move on. When he smiled at Ajira, and shut his eye with his last breath he had already learned to let go. When he told Flocke that he wished he could have told John he was right when he was still alive he had already learned to let go. When he saved Desmond and bathed in Radioactive Gatorade to return the cork he had learned to let go. These characters didn't DO anything in the X world that redeemed or completed their souls, they were just there and had memories of what they had already done. I think most of our favorite characters had come to these resolutions in their own time on the show, and to say that they all needed to see each other again to realize this is a disservice to the character arcs they had already established so strongly.

I would only really change one thing in the finale: when Hurley asked Ben to be number 2. They went so crazy for echoed dialog this season but they missed a PERFECT opportunity for Hurley to echo Jacob and say "What about you" in a completely different tone and to different affect. "I could really use someone with a lot of experience to help me... What about you?"

Now a couple of things I loved about the finale.
Jack's "falcon punch" on Locke
Hurley becoming the protector
Laurel and HardyBen + Hurley island bros 4 life:D
Having the balls to show more new mysteries knowing they would never be resolved (the cuneiform on the cork, the other skeletons in the source etc.)
The final shot with Jack and the dog
Richard's Gray Hair

In closing I leave with this to blow your mind on: The island was purgatory the whole time
for Jacob ... :D :D :D
;)
 

Staccat0

Fail out bailed
Archaix said:
The narrative only "hinted" that it caused the flash sideways as an obvious red herring. Come on. The Island being sunk, the plane landing, Juliet's "it worked" were all clearly trying to get people to believe the incident and LA X were related when they weren't. I've been saying that all year long that there wasn't going to be any connection, there still isn't. They were there to throw everybody off to prevent anyone from coming to the conclusion that it was an afterlife.

I'm not saying that the blast Juliet and Desmond took has nothing to do with why they saw the sideways, I'm saying it has nothing to do with why it was created. We know of two, possibly three people who had glimpses of it (depending on how the ending is interpreted, Jack may have as well). Those people all got smacked in the mouth by the heart of the Island, something linked to rebirth and the afterlife if we are to believe Mother. They got an extra high dosage of that, and they were able to experience both sides when they were near death. There is a clear correlation, but nothing to suggest the incident caused its existence.
Now that we are in a spoiler free zone Darlton hinted pretttttty damn hard in that one EW interview after the premeire of LA X that Jughead didn't sink the island. They wanted people to be thinking about what other things might sink the island.

I'm not saying this facotrs into what you are saying, but it always seemed pretty clear that a bomb won't sink an island IMO.
 

bistromathics

facing a bright new dawn
so only the losties get to move on after death? what happens to everyone else who dies? My assumption was that LAX was just the losties' version of purgatory, but everybody else also has to go through this move-on process, just their own clustered versions if it. What do you think LA X is supposed to be, nameless?
 

Nameless

Member
Archaix said:
The narrative only "hinted" that it caused the flash sideways as an obvious red herring. Come on. The Island being sunk, the plane landing, Juliet's "it worked" were all clearly trying to get people to believe the incident and LA X were related when they weren't. I've been saying that all year long that there wasn't going to be any connection, there still isn't. They were there to throw everybody off to prevent anyone from coming to the conclusion that it was an afterlife.

I'm not saying that the blast Juliet and Desmond took has nothing to do with why they saw the sideways, I'm saying it has nothing to do with why it was created. We know of two, possibly three people who had glimpses of it (depending on how the ending is interpreted, Jack may have as well). Those people all got smacked in the mouth by the heart of the Island, something linked to rebirth and the afterlife if we are to believe Mother. They got an extra high dosage of that, and they were able to experience both sides when they were near death. There is a clear correlation, but nothing to suggest the incident caused its existence.

What's the point in dropping those red herrings? It's not like ANYONE postulated such an ending before hand. There is no other explanation, at all, why the X-timeline would even be reachable by anyone if it was simply a basic purgatory. None at all. A splintered plain of existence, an "after reality" if you will makes perfect sense however. You can't change anything, alternate realities are impossible in the LOST universe, but Faraday was right. They were variables, they could have a profound effect on things. But instead creating a clean slate, they create an "epilogue". A timeline for their consciousnesses to reunite after death.
 

Archaix

Drunky McMurder
Also, how in the world would Juliet know that she created LA X with the bomb? Even if her last thought really was "it worked" that's because she saw this other life where she was never on the Island. The same way Desmond thought that the afterlife was this groovy place that everybody should hurry up and get their asses to, Juliet very well could have been wrong. Again, that's assuming "It worked" wasn't just her experiencing that moment in her afterlife while she was near death.


edit: Faraday was right. When he said what happened, happened. He went crazy and then thought the bomb would change that because there are people, which flew in the face of all of his pre-insane-over-grief state rules about time travel (The rules, mind you, which governed all of season 5 and were proven over and over again even though the magic "people variable" were involved in all of those decisions). Then Jack agreed with him. So you absolutely know that Faraday was wrong. Pre-The End Jack agreeing with your plan was the most absolute way of knowing your plan was that of an idiot.
 

Nameless

Member
Archaix said:
If you didn't see that "it worked" was a red herring from the start...I just don't know how I can continue to discuss this show :lol. Next you're going to be asking about Ben's box.

How often does LOST throw out blatant red-herrings like that. Maybe it's the wine, but I can't think of any examples where the writers intentionally pointed the viewers in the ass-backwards direction the entire season, especially when there was no cause to at all. Again, it's not like this was a popular theory going into S6 and they had to detour people from figuring things out.

The red herring argument seems to a convenient way for people to sculpt the narrative to fit their personal interpretation of the ending.

We can go around in circles. But At some point they'll let is know the score.

I guess we'll have to see who's right.
 

Nameless

Member
Archaix said:
Also, how in the world would Juliet know that she created LA X with the bomb? Even if her last thought really was "it worked" that's because she saw this other life where she was never on the Island. The same way Desmond thought that the afterlife was this groovy place that everybody should hurry up and get their asses to, Juliet very well could have been wrong. Again, that's assuming "It worked" wasn't just her experiencing that moment in her afterlife while she was near death.


edit: Faraday was right. When he said what happened, happened. He went crazy and then thought the bomb would change that because there are people, which flew in the face of all of his pre-insane-over-grief state rules about time travel (The rules, mind you, which governed all of season 5 and were proven over and over again even though the magic "people variable" were involved in all of those decisions). Then Jack agreed with him. So you absolutely know that Faraday was wrong. Pre-The End Jack agreeing with your plan was the most absolute way of knowing your plan was that of an idiot.

The same reason Desmundo was like. "Jack, this shit don't matter. I've seen a place where 815 doesn't crash and everyone is happy". She see's her and Sawyer by a vending machine in some building obviously not on the Island. They've never seen each other Off-island. It worked. I don't see how you can the context clues that surrounded this supposed "red herring".
 

Archaix

Drunky McMurder
Nameless said:
How often does LOST throw out blatant red-herrings like that. Maybe it's the wine, but I can't think of any examples where the writers intentionally pointed the viewers in the ass-backwards direction the entire season, especially when there was no cause to at all. Again, it's not like this was a popular theory going into S6 and they had to detour people from figuring things out.

The red herring argument seems to a convenient way for people to sculpt the narrative to fit their personal interpretation of the ending.

We can go around in circles. But At some point they'll let is know the score.

I guess we'll have to see who's right.


They already have. The retrospective very strongly hinted that the bomb had absolutely nothing to do with the flash sideways. They talked about how it was made to appear that the bomb caused this other world we were seeing.

Nameless said:
The same reason Desmundo was like. "Jack, this shit don't matter. I've seen a place where 815 doesn't crash and everyone is happy". She see's her and Sawyer by a vending machine in some building obviously not on the Island. They've never seen each other Off-island. It worked. I don't see how you can the context clues that surrounded this supposed "red herring".


Desmond said that because he thought it was a good place. He had no idea it was the afterlife. He thought they'd end up there happy, not end up there dead. So again, if he had no idea that it was even the afterlife how would Juliet know that it was the afterlife and that she CREATED the afterlife? At best, she was wrong. She thought it worked, and that was an incorrect assumption.
 

bistromathics

facing a bright new dawn
scola said:
I also didn't like the way X was structured to intentionally mislead the viewer. The cold open from the bomb to LA X, the island being underwater, Juliets "It worked" from beyond the grave etc. I don't mind a red herring now and then, but this was fundamentally intended to mislead people who pay close attention.

yes this is the same point i have been trying to make and totally agree. its the feeling of being outright tricked rather than being set up. I wish I could live in Nameless's world where the bomb created X, but that is just not the way I saw the events going down.

scola said:
Don't tell me Jack needed to fix John, or talk to his Dad to be able to let go and move on. When he smiled at Ajira, and shut his eye with his last breath he had already learned to let go. When he told Flocke that he wished he could have told John he was right when he was still alive he had already learned to let go. When he saved Desmond and bathed in Radioactive Gatorade to return the cork he had learned to let go. These characters didn't DO anything in the X world that redeemed or completed their souls, they were just there and had memories of what they had already done. I think most of our favorite characters had come to these resolutions in their own time on the show, and to say that they all needed to see each other again to realize this is a disservice to the character arcs they had already established so strongly.
ooooh, very good criticism :)
 

sc0la

Unconfirmed Member
Nameless said:
How often does LOST throw out blatant red-herrings like that. Maybe it's the wine, but I can't think of any examples where the writers intentionally pointed the viewers in the ass-backwards direction the entire season, especially when there was no cause to at all. Again, it's not like this was a popular theory going into S6 and they had to detour people from figuring things out.

The red herring argument seems to a convenient way for people to sculpt the narrative to fit their personal interpretation of the ending.

We can go around in circles. But At some point they'll let is know the score.

I guess we'll have to see who's right.
There were even red herrings in the final episode. When MIB tells Ben he can stay on the island while it was at the bottom of the ocean or come with him on his boat, they were still making people try to guess what caused the Island to sink.

I wouldn't argue that the re herrings don't make sense when you think about X with complete knowledge, they obviously "make sense" but I don't think it is accurate to claim they were not there with the intention to mislead.

bistromathics said:
yes this is the same point i have been trying to make and totally agree. its the feeling of being outright tricked rather than being set up. I wish I could live in Nameless's world where the bomb created X, but that is just not the way I saw the events going down.
Yeah the only two other times i can think of being intentionally misled were MiB in Locke after Ajira, but in that case he was also deceiving the characters who's POV the show is told from and through the looking glass were jack tells them to go ask his dad, but he was stung out on Oxy and probably believed they could go ask him :lol
 

Archaix

Drunky McMurder
scola said:
There were even red herrings in the final episode. When MIB tells Ben he can stay on the island while it was at the bottom of the ocean or come with him on his boat, they were still making people try to guess what caused the Island to sink.

I wouldn't argue that the re herrings don't make sense when you think about X with complete knowledge, they obviously "make sense" but I don't think it is accurate to claim they were not there with the intention to mislead.


More than that, I honestly didn't think anybody actually believed the "It worked" or the sunken Island weren't red herrings. Wasn't almost all of the sideways discussion about what actually happened to create that universe and how it would tie together? At least from Dr Linus when Ben's dad said that they chose to leave the Island, we knew that the incident couldn't have possibly caused it to sink and I assumed everybody moved on. Is the theory that the obvious red herrings were actually red herrings in their red herringness?
 

C.Dark.DN

Banned
Nameless said:
What's the point in dropping those red herrings? It's not like ANYONE postulated such an ending before hand. There is no other explanation, at all, why the X-timeline would even be reachable by anyone if it was simply a basic purgatory. None at all. A splintered plain of existence, an "after reality" if you will makes perfect sense however. You can't change anything, alternate realities are impossible in the LOST universe, but Faraday was right. They were variables, they could have a profound effect on things. But instead creating a clean slate, they create an "epilogue". A timeline for their consciousnesses to reunite after death.
The bomb creating this timeline is 100% unintentional and like an after death curse.

Christian said "this is the place you all made together so you could find each other". That's intentional, wanted, and made by everyone. Ben,Charlie,Rose, Bernard, Desmond, Penny, Eloise, Shannon, Boone, Locke, etc. had nothing to do with the bomb.
 

bistromathics

facing a bright new dawn
Archaix said:
More than that, I honestly didn't think anybody actually believed the "It worked" or the sunken Island weren't red herrings. Wasn't almost all of the sideways discussion about what actually happened to create that universe and how it would tie together? At least from Dr Linus when Ben's dad said that they chose to leave the Island, we knew that the incident couldn't have possibly caused it to sink and I assumed everybody moved on. Is the theory that the obvious red herrings were actually red herrings in their red herringness?
i didnt know any of those were red herrings until the finale. I was thinking they were gonna solve it desmond-style and jump everyone into LA X (which I then knew wasn't going to happen as soon as Desmond mentions it as his plan).

I thought Juliet said 'it worked' cuz it did, ben and papa linus left the island with everyone else (miles' mom), and the island sank cuz of the bomb.

It turned out Juliet said 'it worked' cuz of the candy machine, ben never really left the island, and the island sank cuz of ???
 

sc0la

Unconfirmed Member
Archaix said:
More than that, I honestly didn't think anybody actually believed the "It worked" or the sunken Island weren't red herrings. Wasn't almost all of the sideways discussion about what actually happened to create that universe and how it would tie together? At least from Dr Linus when Ben's dad said that they chose to leave the Island, we knew that the incident couldn't have possibly caused it to sink and I assumed everybody moved on. Is the theory that the obvious red herrings were actually red herrings in their red herringness?
Forgot about the island statement from dr Linus, but even then "it worked" was ostensibly about the bomb working on never making the plane crash, not on sinking the island.
 

Staccat0

Fail out bailed
DeathNote said:
The bomb creating this timeline is 100% unintentional and like an after death curse.

Christian said "this is the place you all made together so you could find each other". That's intentional, wanted, and made by everyone. Ben,Charlie,Rose, Bernard, Desmond, Penny, Eloise, Shannon, Boone, Locke, etc. had nothing to do with the bomb.
simple elegant truth. Spit it!
 

YoungHav

Banned
scola said:
The impact of the deaths of Sun/Jin, Sayid and even Juliet were all lessened for me because I was watching everyone running around in X. I was believing that these characters were all alive and well still, and it took all semblance of tragedy out of it. Retroactively discovering that they were "dead and well" instead of alive and well did not fundamentally change this. In fact it may even reduce the emotional impact even further than initially, unlike say, finding out at the end of season 5 that Locke was really MIB and Locke was really gone.
nice post and I 100% agree with this part. The deaths felt inconsequential to me, laughed hard @ all the crying here when Jin/Sun died :lol .
 

G-Fex

Member
Now I like to think that all those Christian Shepard appearances was really him, Ghost Christian Shepard. Not smokey, he just took credit.
 

njean777

Member
scola said:
Okay, it has been almost a week since the finale, and I think I am ready to talk about it in more depth. let me do standard caveats that this is all IMO, And I don't think the last episode was bad, I just don't like the resolution it brought to the series. I also don't think the wreckage at the end was Ajira or that the island was purgatory so you can separate me from the crazy group.

The short review is:
I didn't like it.

The long review is:
I think season 6 was fundamentally flawed in its conception, and the ultimate gambit of that plays out in the finale, making me not enjoy the episode on total. I don't have a problem specifically with giving the characters an epilogue, but from the beginning of season 6 I said I would be disappointed if that was what the entirety of X was. Either in the form of limbo or in a hard reset where they regain their experiences. So at the outset this wasn't going to be a resolution I enjoyed.

I think a big reason for disliking the X resolution in hindsight is how it minimized the impact of certain events throughout the season:

The impact of the deaths of Sun/Jin, Sayid and even Juliet were all lessened for me because I was watching everyone running around in X. I was believing that these characters were all alive and well still, and it took all semblance of tragedy out of it. Retroactively discovering that they were "dead and well" instead of alive and well did not fundamentally change this. In fact it may even reduce the emotional impact even further than initially, unlike say, finding out at the end of season 5 that Locke was really MIB and Locke was really gone.

This extends beyond deaths as well, X being purgatory just really lowers the stakes of all of season 6 for me. I was not convinced that the entire world and life itself were at stake if Smokey left. Damon & Carelton can say on a podcast that smokey is evil incarnate all they want, they didn't set this up within the framework of the show effectively, and where they did touch on it in the show, they ultimately diluted it with X or by other means. Did they really save the world? There is not sufficient information to make this assertion, and it's easy to interpret the characters who told us the stakes were immense were either lying, or just didn't really know themselves. I kept expecting things to go real bad in X to show was why this was still so important.

I also didn't like the way X was structured to intentionally mislead the viewer. The cold open from the bomb to LA X, the island being underwater, Juliets "It worked" from beyond the grave etc. I don't mind a red herring now and then, but this was fundamentally intended to mislead people who pay close attention. This is the opposite of what they did in the Season 3 finale where they left some clues out in the open.

I won't dive into how the hug-o-thon in the church was awful fanservice, or how X itself felt like fanfic, others have covered this better than me.
"Bu bubu bu bu it was a world created by flawed individuals!"
Who? Lindelcuse are flawed? You just told me how godly they were ;)

I understand the writers desires to give these characters happy endings, and I understand a fans attachment to that sort of resolution. We loved these characters, and they all deserved a happy ending. But Lost was a drama, and a lot of great drama and writing that D&C were inspired by has its share of tragedy. The only "Brave storytelling" was not giving in to the incessant whining of "Answers" and leaving the truly inconsequential things open.

But, my absolute BIGGEST complaint with the purgatory idea is that these characters somehow NEEDED this world to move on. I think it cheapens the growth they had during the show.

Don't tell me Jack needed to fix John, or talk to his Dad to be able to let go and move on. When he smiled at Ajira, and shut his eye with his last breath he had already learned to let go. When he told Flocke that he wished he could have told John he was right when he was still alive he had already learned to let go. When he saved Desmond and bathed in Radioactive Gatorade to return the cork he had learned to let go. These characters didn't DO anything in the X world that redeemed or completed their souls, they were just there and had memories of what they had already done. I think most of our favorite characters had come to these resolutions in their own time on the show, and to say that they all needed to see each other again to realize this is a disservice to the character arcs they had already established so strongly.

I would only really change one thing in the finale: when Hurley asked Ben to be number 2. They went so crazy for echoed dialog this season but they missed a PERFECT opportunity for Hurley to echo Jacob and say "What about you" in a completely different tone and to different affect. "I could really use someone with a lot of experience to help me... What about you?"

Now a couple of things I loved about the finale.
Jack's "falcon punch" on Locke
Hurley becoming the protector
Laurel and HardyBen + Hurley island bros 4 life:D
Having the balls to show more new mysteries knowing they would never be resolved (the cuneiform on the cork, the other skeletons in the source etc.)
The final shot with Jack and the dog
Richard's Gray Hair

In closing I leave with this to blow your mind on: The island was purgatory the whole time
for Jacob ... :D :D :D
;)

Def agree, The whole alt timeline was one of the biggest mistakes i have seen for a show. If it wasnt for the island parts i would have totally stopped watching it. The deaths of the characters this season were sloppy and like you said lessened thanks to the alt timeline.
I literally had my mouth gaped open when the last 15min aired, i felt like i was just cheated out of a good chunk of my time. I was angry at firs, but now im indifferent to the finale. It was meh, had some good parts (all island). I really wish they had a version of that episode without the alt timeline then i would have been great imo. ;)
 
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