The Five: Things I've missed the most about Lost

Definitely I can't wait for the return of Lost. I have to disagree about the Kate-Sawyer relationship. It has got to go downhill for Lost to stay interesting and there is a nice blog I read on that in http://lost-spoilers-blog.blogspot.com/ . Personally I've gotten "Lost" on after the show on Wednesdays, but with the move to 9:00 this season and now to 10:00 it's going to become a Thursday morning matter. I'd rather see lost at 8:00 to give time to discuss right after the broadcast for most people.

I just don't understand people who decide to stop watching a particular show, yet continue to read blogs about it and still comment on it.

I stopped watching CSI 2 years ago, and have not read 1 blog about it since. Why would I? If I no longer like watching the show, why would I like reading about it?

Oh well, to each his own.

First off, RedStar, "Shut the hell up" is taking it a little too far, no? Former fans have as much rights as casual viewers and diehards to comment on the show. Besides, it's not like this edition of "The Five" was insightful enough to spark an actual conversation. 2 of the five entries ("Random Stuff", "Eye Candy") apply to about 95% of television. Posts like this make me wonder if TVSquadders get paid per post.

Secondly, to all the hardcore LOST fans out there, as a formerly addicted fan who is now little more than a casual viewer, it is quite frustrating to be repeatedly told that my losing interest is a result of my own impatience. I don't assume that you continue to watch because you haven't figured out how to change the batteries in your remote, so please don't assume that I have the attention span of a goldfish.

I think Sean (#12) is on to something. I think much of the frustration of former fans comes from the LOST on TV being different from the LOST they thought would be on TV. Though I was much more interested in a character drama following the plight of a group of crash survivors on a mysterious-- possibly supernatural-- island, the LOST I see on TV is more action/adventure LORD OF THE FLIES meets ISLAND OF DOCTOR MOREAU, that's actually *not* what turned me off the show.

Personally, I feel that the show has taken a group of intriguing characters, killed a third of them, made a third of them annoying or just ignored them, and focused on relatively uninteresting combinations of the remaining third. Meanwhile, all the characters are nothing more than pawns in a big "What is the mystery of the island?" game and their personalities are rewritten as necessary to provide for sweeps week confrontations or bogglingly silly filler episodes. I write this without bitterness, just the understanding that LOST is a show I thought I would love. It turns out it is merely a show that I watch.

i love lost.

(testing the password sytem)

Hmm... misread that one bit as "you never know when a polar bear with an eye patch might appear".

Now there's a twist worth waiting for.

We better all stop bitching about the long hiatus, because its getting ABC thinking they are going to go with season 4 STARTING in January, leaving us all Lost-deprived for months on end, instead of different 3 month long spurts.

Lost seems to have turned into this real love it or hate it kind of show, and its too bad, because all of the 'hate it' people are, in the majority, ex-fans who don't have an ounce of patience to wait for an intricate, slow moving story.

This show is all about the big picture, and everything we have seen so far is to fill in the edges of that picture. The end game is something that will blow our minds and hopefully pull it all together (Or I will just have to kill Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse for wasting countless hours of my life)

Two and a half weeks till us 'love it' people can get their Lost on again...

BTW, Haters, why do you open a Lost article, write a comment, sign into your inbox to activate that comment...just to bitch. If you're done with the show, have quit on it, then quit, and shut the hell up so those of us that stuck with it can have a discussion about it. Jeez...

I think that a mistake some viewers make with Lost is thinking of it as a mystery story, when really it's a suspense story. Now, lots of suspense stories have mysteries that the characters unravel, and lots of mystery stories have suspensful portions, but there's a key difference: In a mystery story, everything builds up to the big reveal; the bulk of the story is setting up the clues and mysteries that lead to the big payoff when you learn what's really been going on. In a suspense story, however, if there is a mystery, it is there simply as a means of generating suspense, since things can often be more tense and fear inducing if you don't know what's happening. Unless you're going for full blown surrealism, there must be an answer to the mysteries, but that's not really the point; it's just there to justify the suspensful scenes along the way.

Take the movie Psycho as an example. There's a long scene at the end where a detective/psychologist explains why Norman Bates did all those crazy things, but that was just the denouement; the real climax was when you see the skeleton in the wheelchair and Bates attacks that woman dressed as his mother. Psycho wasn't meant to be the mystery of what's going on at the Bates Motel; it was a suspense story about some gruesome murders, unusual happenings, and general chills and thrills. The same goes for Lost. It's not really about figuring out what the Island is or solving the mysteries (though I trust the Lost writers will give us those answers); it's about the tension, suspense, and character developement those mysteries create.

I think that's why some people get so frustrated with Lost. They approach it like a mystery story, where dragging out the big reveal is a huge problem, as that's really all people are watching for; without the reveal, the story has no point. I approach Lost like a suspense story, however, where the journey is what's important, and the longer you go without answering the questions (and the more questions you pose) the more mileage can be gotten out of the story.

Not saying everyone has to enjoy Lost, but a lot of those who don't seem to want it to be something it was never intended to be.

I think the random stuff for me is the best. The stuff that gets my brain just pumping full of crazy, conspiratorial ideas. I don't think any other show has ever "turned me on" so much. I'm seriously jumping around with energy by the end of every episode. A Pentecostal church should want such fervor.

@ Squishy, Hugeliver, Innamorata: Thanks for clearing us all up about how you hate Lost. We were all wondering.

I've never been to a LOST message board, but I think I'll give them a try after the show comes back.

I've never really thought of Baltar as a villian. I'm assuming you're talking about the one on the new BSG.

Huh--It's as though #5 is being demonstrated right before my eyes (especially the crankiness)...