Doubting Thomas

MORE LOST SPOILERS AHEAD. YOU'VE BEEN WARNED:

Strangely enough, I thought LOST was a little off it's game this week. This past episode just didn't "do it" for me, as the show normally does, and I think it has to do with the weak storytelling going on off the island, and it's a shame I didn't realize it until now.

On the island, it's answers, answers, answers, with some cool reveals, and some interesting (not redundant) questions asked. But, off the island? No dramatic tension. I think the best way for us to have seen the off island stuff played out, was to have seen them all get back to the island at the beginning of the season, and then, through flashbacks, shown us how we got to that point (both on and off). This way, we would have seen them on the island, working things out, and slowly coming to understand how they got there, à la season one. It was pretty clear at the end of season 4 that no one wanted to return, except Jack, so why drive this point into the ground with whiny characters? The audience knows they need to go back, especially since we're watching our on island characters suffer time flashes, migraines, nosebleeds and even death... So to see most of the Oceanic 6 so callously say "I'm never going back, even if it can help them" makes them (Sayid, Kate, Hurley and Sun) rather unsympathetic.

Also, while it's nice to have them back on the island, didn't it feel sorta rushed? Didn't it feel as if we missed something crucial, and now we have to see what happened in flashback? I don't know if I'm down with that.

My guess about how things panned out? The writer's probably felt the same things I felt; the characters were whiny, and they needed to just get back to the island, no questions asked, and we'll get to the details of it all later. I've trusted Team Darlton (Damon Lindelof, and Carlton Cuse, the show-runners) for 4 seasons now, so I'm up for some more. I still love where the show is headed with our Losties seemingly stuck in the 70s, posing as Dharma members, but the ride there seemed a tad bit bumpy.

The last podcast that Darlton put on noted that this episode (entitled 316) and next weeks episode, entitled The Life and Death of Jeremy Bentham, were actually meant to be shown in reverse order, and that they could have been shown in any order, with no real issues, but the writer's felt this one was the best to show first, for whatever reason. This makes me more and more curious about what is to come next week, and if it'll make this past week's episode better. Who knows. All I know right now is that this episode left me feeling empty. Cool ideas, interesting information about the island, but overall, no narrative thrust worth investing in. I dunno.

So yeah, I just needed to vent that, since I gushed so lovingly about the show not a few days ago. So quickly things can change. I still think this season is an intriguing shift in the show's mythology, really giving it all to us in one go. I don't know if it'll be successful, but it certainly should leave a good chunk of the show left for some juicy character moments, and not a lot of mythology, which has never been the show's strength (just the carrot at the end of the character stick)... So for now, here's to better shows, and satisfying conclusions!

cheers, and Namaste...