UConn James

I don't think I've read and never got the impression that tgregg was a writer on LOST. He works at Bad Robot, and interacts with the core creators of the show, but also works on sundry other projects, such as "Cloverfield." I remember reading a few seasons back that he was and wanted to stay "LOST-pure"... But that evidently wasn't meant to be, and he has worked on LOST in some capacity, especially this season, but not (I think) as a writer, or a Head Writer at least. Nonetheless, tgregg has been a fantastic resource, and one who knew the line that straddles employee/fan and walked it like a pro. Further to when I'm going to change the avatar.... Still, I don't know. I'm still basking in the afterglow, two days later. This feeling really hasn't let up. I don't know when it will. The ending was beautiful. I feel like I'm sitting in the church with these people, and I don't really want it to subside or leave. LOST is like a new religion.

Doc Jensen's LOST Finale recap, Part I: And in the End.... Oh, wow! Deep. It was also a kind of flashback to the Swan computer.... BAM, it's triggered. Everything's going to hell, destruction is afoot. But there is a little bit of time for things to be set right again, for the numbers to be punched in and crisis averted. As someone asked here, not everything came spilling out of the bottle when the cork was removed. Evil was bottle-necked. But, if given more time, it would have been fully released. I don't want to quote too much from Doc's entry. His numbered sequence on page 6 is dead-on. The "if this doesn't happen, God help us all" and similar lines of "you and everyone you love will ___" are explained. MIB escaping (which required the destruction of the island) would mean no more souls for mankind, and no possibility of togetherness in the afterlife. MIB said, "I want you to know that you died for nothing." Perhaps it was that MIB had never known real friendship, had never had a community of people that he was linked to, like our Lostaways in the church were connected to each other. What Jack died for was not nothing.

Also thinking about Dave.... It was like his mindset was in the Sideways world, had figured out the sideways world... but was metaphysically in the real world. Also, the skeletons in the Light cavern. I wonder why people who B word about the Mother story aren't bitching that we don't get these skeleton's story. Just goes to show that the deeper you try to delve into the past (or the future) the murkier/more Impressionistic your answers will be. We are given Jack's story, full-circle. The other stories of these other bones aren't in the cards for us. It should be enough to know from this that this struggle has been going on from the start of time, and will continue until the end of time.

I don't know. Not ready to let go yet.

We have a bucket of those things from when my uncle worked at Ma Bell half a century ago. They can literally hold up the world. We had two holding a hanging rod in our coat closet for time out of mind and there was a good 200 pounds hanging on it. Another bedroom closet has a smaller wooden rod that I literally did a pull-up on, no problem. The screw sticking out 1/4" should not be a problem, except in force majeure situations, and then, a clock on a wall isn't your biggest concern. There's enough purchase on the screw for it to hold. Then again, these anchor bolts were made in the USA. Can't speak for the cheap metal the Asian companies use, but I have not been impressed with too many of our recent buys. Metals are super soft, strip so much easier.

If your afterlife consists of being with people on your Facebook page, I'm not sure I want to go there. As a small plaque we have reads, "HEAVEN is where you meet all the dogs you ever loved." Re-watching last night, I full-on cried when Vincent cuddled up with Jack. Kate said, meeting with Jack outside the concert tents, "I have missed you so much." There was some part of me that questioned whether the Ajira plane actually got off the island/island bubble, but that confirmed they did. Sawyer, Kate, Miles, Richard, Lapidus, and Claire (the Ajira Six?) lived out their mortal lives off-island. In my mind, Claire raised Aaron, as she was supposed to; Kate and Sawyer's relationship grew albeit slowly and respectfully of Juliet and Jack; Richard would find Isabella's grave and try to live the rest of his life (however it happened wrt the aging process either un-pausing or if it caught up rather fast); I imagine Lapidus maxing on a beach with sunshine and margaritas. But Miles, I'm not sure. He stops exhorting people, maybe he starts using his gift more responsibly... if he still has his gift. Could the opening of the Light plug have taken it back in the same way it made FLocke mortal? Also, thinking back to Richard Malkin and his daughter. Just wondering, now that we know what we know, if he experienced some small bits of "Island Enlightenment" when he touched Claire. For all of his bum's-rush explanation to Eko that he was a fraud, he really did see something. Been away for about a day, catching up on some sleep and 3 pages sprung up! Awesome post, tgregg. We've really appreciated your input, as much as you were allowed. IIRC, he asked to leave the show very shortly after getting a DUI in Hawai'i and went back to the UK. I guess whatever happened really soured him.

That's getting too involved in the timeline. As Christian said, there is no such thing Time in the sideways world/inside the church. It's kind of like, the end of time, or at least a point where the last of the castaways were dead (and, as Christian said, some of them died "long after" Jack). Throw out the concept of plausibility in the sideways world. From the start with the arrivals board that read something like Oceanic 815 was in a state of flux, there've been clues. That title itself had a particular meaning... Is this LA? and X = 'Wrong.' The sideways was a transition place/purgatory that had all the trappings of the real world, and it seemed to be and continues to be for those who don't/choose not to "let go." It doesn't have to have an air of reality, b/c it's not reality.

Oooo. That's a valid. That's a valid point!

Michael Emerson said on Kimmel last night that at a lot of times, it was like he was the only one for which this show was a comedy. And, when asked how many time he got the sh-- kick out of him, he said, "How many episodes was I in?... Double that." Also, it's interesting that Ben didn't go in the church for the reasons given already, that it would be kind of awkward, given all the things he did (but they were the things he had to do). I would also add that, tho he seems to know what's inside the church, it may be that he wants more time with Danielle and Alex.

That describes Hurley to a T. Jack was on the island to fix Jacob... to perform a little surgery, remove the cancer, and then get out. It was a nice touch that he is what connects Jacob to Hurley. Hurley has been such a positive character all along. It's right that it was him. Still, it's a little sad that he's taken away from his mom and dad. But he left them well, and when you look at it in that regard, it's kind of a coming-of-age story for Hurley. And then, too, it's like the island needs someone who is pure of heart, maybe a little simple-minded and innocent. And yet, Hurley has learned enough, lost enough naivete from this time to make his own rules for the Island. As I've written before, the way this show used Vincent was superb. I can totally dig on the word-flip dog=god, or at least 'the good reaper' of sorts. The scene with Rose and Bernard was a great conclusion to their story. When FLocke made the threat to Desmond that he would kill them, and further that he would make it hurt.... Sayid and Sun & Jin were losses, sure I wanted MIB dead as payback, but the 'make it hurt' part --- that's the first point where I really wanted the same for him. They got to live the rest of their days doing exactly what they wanted to do. They were not Adam and Eve. They were better than that. If people were "let down" by this show, then it's their own damn fault. You get out of it what you put into it. I will re-iterate that LOST is like an Impressionist paint, as far as some of the mysteries/properties of the island. If you're looking for a pixel-rich JPEG, you're not going to get it. Perfect clarity is not what our limited understanding of life, the earth, and beyond earth affords us. Before I forget, duey, I would just like to thank you again and to all of the other frequent posters to these threads over the years who've put in your observations, theories, etc. Some don't seem to have stuck with the show, and hey, it's a free country, but I think the payoff of following this show has been worth it and then some. It was really life-affirming at a time when I have needed some affirming in this area. Like I said, I took my dog's (and some close relatives') death really hard. And there've been times when I've said to myself that when LOST is over I may be ready to check out. I haven't been in that frame of mind for a while; I am better, I feel better even tho certain aspects that drove it are still there, mostly with the employment situation. But I'm glad to see this show end the way it did... with love and affirmation. A professor of mine once said that pretty much all of fiction can be reduced to "The Search for Family." That's right, and here were a group of characters who found a family even when their own biological family situations left a lot to be desired. In a way, a number of us now have a connection. This is what makes TBD such a great place. SDS is like our Jacob/Hurley. The submerged Island seems to have happened during/at the end of Hurley's reign. He was on the flight and it's made pretty clear that he's one of the ones who died "long after" Jack did. To quote Frasier Crane, and one of his big epiphanies, "I'm sorry, caller. I can't help you." You need to fill some of those potholes yourself. They won't magically be filled for you. But the more I read of your posts, the more I'm realizing that even when someone does try to fill the potholes, you run over them with a big Mack truck and blow them open again. There are some things you need to let go. How didn't you get this message from the show? It was an Eloise Hawking character who didn't want to lose her son. At the end of her natural life, whenever that was, she was still trying to arrange everything, trying to hold on to Daniel and not taking to task her own advice to Desmond outside the jewelry store that the universe does what it does and you can't change things appreciably. She couldn't "let go" and so it seems she remains/ed in the purgatory of the sideways world. I didn't see, I'll have to see it again, but did Dan go in the church? There was a point where I thought EH thought that Desmond was the MIB... drawing on her "this is a violation of the rules" quote. Yeah, having thought about it, that final shot seems to be that.

If you haven't gotten enough clues to fit a good deal of that stuff together for yourself, then that's your thing. As someone who's always been more focused on the island mysteries than the characters, I'm pretty damn satisfied with what we got. You know, as I've written before, it seems apparent that we're not meant to get all the answers about the Light and what the Stone stopper was. If you believe Jacob's cork example, it was Hell, the devil, bad things that needed to be capped to keep them out of the world. Desmond himself could barely handle exposure to the Light's properties. The smoke monster was a form of electromagnetic energy that was MIB's, for lack of a better word, soul, and similar to how he inhabited Locke's body, the Smoke inhabited MIB's consciousness (one that couldn't die b/c of the rules Mother had made). Make no mistake, I don't think the Smoke Monster / Cerberus is gone --- it was around before MIB, and it would always have the chance of being released again by people who wrecked upon the island, which is why Hurley and those after him needed to stay. What we've seen is all we'll get from what the Protectors do. If that isn't enough for you, well, tough luck. As for the Others and the DI, those were entities that needed to exist to push our castaways to where they needed to be. They fulfilled Jacob's plan, they laid the groundwork for much of what happened. Hatches, supplies, they cleared the Ajira runway from the jungle.... It was not shown, but I would guess that a brief visit from Jacob is what started the DI... much the same as Widmore said Jacob visited him shortly after the freighter explosion and explained what needed to be done. Once Jacob's ideas left his mouth, tho, people were on their own in how to fulfill them. That was his style. I'm a little miffed. You give some large concepts of things you're not satisfied with. The Flash Forward season didn't give answers.... in what way? What in particular didn't have an answer about that? It was a storytelling conceit. Happens a lot in fiction. Jack died where his island journey started. It wasn't a reboot for the crash to happen again or something. It was a visual 'full circle.' The sideways world? That was a kind of purgatory where these people all needed to form a link with a constant in order to cross over. How was it created? Was it a working of Jacob? Jack? Is it God's waiting room (and to borrow from "Contact" this purgatory does appear to use imagery from places they knew in the real world)? We don't know, b/c it's beyond the human mind to understand. This is where it gets a little religious-y, but not of any particular religion, or religion as we know it at all. Religion is just a means to explain what will happen, this in particular what will happen when we die. Like I wrote, if you don't get it, then it's your thing. It's kind of like an Impressionist painting, and you want to see a 10MB photograph so you can zoom in, enhance and enlarge something in the background. Well, this show can't really help you with that. Yes, the Jin-Sun & Sawyer meeting in the sideways world was a great touch of them realizing their connection to Sawyer and not sharing the in-joke.

And I maintain, more than ever, that Green Day's "Time of Your Life" fits like a glove on this series. So make the best, of this test And don't ask why. For what it's worth, It was worth all the while It's something unpredictable And in the end there's right. I hope you had the time of life. Need to learn how to make a flash movie and compile some screencaps.

Didn't quite know what to make of that myself. The wreckage was originally washed out to sea by incoming tides. I think we need to at least entertain that they all did die in the crash... and that their time on-island was a psychic extra and happened on another plane of being. Real for their consciousnesses, but in terms of our corporeal human world, I dunno. But Christian's line seems to wrap that when he said that time didn't really exist in the sideways/purgatory world, but that some of the castaways died before and some died "long after" Jack. So it would seem that the O6 and the finale's Ajira passengers did get back to what we call the real world. And I'll just say that for myself, I have to believe that Kate and Sawyer stayed together when they got back. It might have taken some time to develop, but I really can't see them with anyone else, or living separate lives where they wouldn't see each other, all that they'd been through. Claire, we imagine, would go back to Australia and try to raise Aaron? Also, imagine Richard trying to live in the real world. He'd been off-island three times, the most recent in 2004 to scope out Juliet's sister for Ben. No papers, no SS#, no birth record (one that'd read he was 200+ years old)... what does he do? Probably will visit Isabella's grave, OK. I guess the one constant he'd face is an intractable Catholic Church.... Wonder too how fast his aging process will be, as it was hinted that the "gift" from Jacob expired. Just a little miffed why they would make that the final scene. What did it mean? (Then again, it was just a credit rollover photo.) I think it was a really cool, original way to end this show. In many finales we learn what characters did in the rest of their lives. "This one became a X and had 6 children..." but here, we get to fill in for ourselves what became of those who got on the Ajira plane, Hurley and Ben, and we know the rest of their eternity. Or is it their eternity? Will they one day be stepping through the bright light of the doorway? I'm going to have to go back and watch that mobisode that showed suit-Christian in the few minutes before the opening shot of the show, where he tells Vincent to 'wake up my son.' Same tie as he wore in the church last night? Yes, it is.

Here's one to the person who wrote to watch out for Hurley becoming Island Guardian, after having said "I'm just happy it wasn't me" last week. Chalk another one up for the reluctant leader being the one who's most meant for the job. Per Doc's instant reaction.... What we all thought was the appendectomy scar in LA X.... Nope, it was the knife scar. I was thinking, "He could still be OK, right?" Guess it's just the act of a special-knife stabbing that does in the Guardian. It would seem that FLocke's knife would now become similar to the knife Dogen had been holding, and in the Island future we're not shown, is probably the knife that would be used to kill Hurley. Hurley's reign would be something to see... but then again, I suppose it would be a lot of the same repetitious themes that the Island plays over and over. And, as the show said and as I wrote earlier, that wasn't our story. Also a nice moment when Jack cuts down MIB reciting a "This is like old times, eh?" as they were lowering Desmond. Jack has come to see Locke as a friend, someone who he cares about and will protect, after that finale in S3 when he said Locke was "neither" friend nor family. Are we to assume that underneath the Keystone Light is... what? Hell, literally? The shape of the hole seemed to have a demonic vibe. We'll have to see whether someone figures out what the writings on it say. Essentially, Des removing the stone turned MIB back into a human form, and Kate winds up being the heroine that she's always been described as --- she kills the MIB.

Yeah. I didn't get like it during the ep at all. And then about 20 minutes after, I started crying, the runny nose, etc.... Felt it for a few minutes. I think most of what got me was Jack dying with Vincent by his side. I lost my dog two years ago next month and I've had a very hard time of it. We recently got another pup, but the memories of our past friends don't go away. And so, I thought, 'That's not such a bad way to go....' Jack didn't die alone. Well, before we get into all that.... Now, recapping one hour is hard enough, and now we've got two and a half, and try to make summary statements of what it all means. It seems too big a task. We all saw what happened with who went where, who did what. So, after being told from the start that this show is not about characters in purgatory. True enough. the original timeline wasn't, but we learned that the Sideways world was like purgatory and Desmond served as a ferryman of sorts. For all those who griped about the Light a couple of weeks ago, how 'bout them apples?! The reason why it worked tonight was because it was established there. And it also made it pretty clear that this was not about all the Island Protector stories that came before or after. Hurley & Ben's little exchange suggests they were on the island for a long time and had their own war stories. As Jimmy Kimmel said tonight, this was Jack's story, his fixing Jacob's mistake (and we needed to see Jacob's mistake to get a line on what Jack needed to fix). Fixing is what Jack does. Some people left the Island, some stayed. What becomes of those who left? They lived their lives. Maybe Kate and Sawyer did eventually get together in the real world. We don't know. But that's not what's important, and we can fill some of it in for ourselves. What mattered was the time these people spent together, what they did that made them heroes. What happened to Richard, do you suppose? Seems like he now ages and lives out his life, but he is not in the church. Harold Perrineau, on Kimmel, said that some of the castaways were not in the church at the end. They weren't souls that moved on to whatever the church represented. Michael, Ana Lucia who was "not ready" according to Desmond, Rousseau and Alex, among others. HP said he thinks that people who don't deserve it remain on the island as the voices that whisper. I also think it's kind of fitting that Ben didn't go in the church, tho I don't think he would have gotten too harsh a treatment --- what happened, had to happen. It was nice to see him get some manner of redemption for all the stuff he did by being a "really good Number Two" to Hurley, for however long their tenure lasted. Really need to go back and see who was in the church... and who wasn't. I would like to write here that I think Christian Shepard may have gotten "Island Enlightenment" early in Jack's life, which turned him to drink, turned him into a bit of a cynic and someone who just didn't try b/c fate will just do what it does. Interesting, tho, that Christian does not stay in the church. He's not part of this group, really. Wonder what the previous groups' afterlife is like --- are Mother, Claudia, Jacob and MIB together? How long does the church stay last? And I guess that's something that's up to each of us according to our beliefs. Several religious symbols were in the stained glass behind Jack in that scene, but I don't think it necessarily has to be a religious reading. OK. Time to sleep on this a little. Read what Doc Jensen has for us tomorrow. A great bit of story. It's going to be very hard to watch drama again w/o comparing their quality to this. If LOST doesn't win Emmy awards this season, something is very wrong.

Yellow-fonted for a very vague spoiler about a love interest and a my theory on it: It's been revealed by some people in the know that we're going to be slightly surprised by Kate's final love interest in the Sideways World, but that it will be 'fitting for her character.' My guess is that it's going to be her childhood friend Tom from Iowa... or the policeman she married in the original timeline. Not going to be very satisfying for the Jack-Kate crowd or those hoping she somehow gets back with Sawyer/James Ford. But, really, I don't see how she was ever right for either of them. Always bounced b/w the two of them b/c they were there and each of them weren't quite what she needed.

Having re-watched the pilot ep tonight, pondering the significance was of Jack waking up so far from the wreckage... and as Jacob said, near the "Heart of the Island." Jack said he blacked out when the plane hit turbulence. Wondering now whether it was something more akin to a timeflash (e.g. the candidates arriving in 2007 post-Incident, in 1977 post-Ajira, etc.) or some other anomaly. Tomorrow at this time, we'll have seen it all.

Something I just thought of.... There've been a few comparisons of Ben to Napoleon this season. Perhaps his most famous line was, "Apres moi, la deluge" --- literally translated "After me, [comes] the flood." Note that Ben's command of the Others came to an end, and the Island, in the Sideways world, was completely flooded. Also have to go back and point out the comedic value after Richard was thrown into the jungle by Smokey. Some of Michael Emerson's best acting on this show has been silent (see: guilting Hurley into giving him half an Apollo bar). Here, Ben sees the ageless wonder flung into center field, he turns around calmly, and sits on a Dharmaville porch chair. No dying on his feet, huh? Terrified look on his face, just waiting. And then it doesn't happen. Also, Jacob's quote to Hurley was interesting. 'After this fire burns out, you won't see me anymore.' Is this alluding that the other candidates' candidacies / their 'special powers' end once the new protector is anointed? Finally, Locke saying in Jack's office. "I'm ready to get out of this chair." Upon this second viewing, I flashed on the figure sitting in the chair in Jacob's cabin.... Exactly what it means, right now I don't know. But I think that was a pretty plain linkage.

How very Jacob-like of you, duey.... "Now that, I can do!" I'll be watching straight through, broadcast feed. Old-school (and, w/o a DVR, our only school). Will be watching with my best friend who's in town for the weekend. Hooked him onto LOST back near the start. From-scratch pizza, rhubarb crisp, Vanilla Coke and TV history. Awesomeness. I can't wait.

That was generally agreed upon here to be introduced in Latin, then in a kind of "The Hunt for Red October" fashion, they used a chime to indicate a switchover to English so we wouldn't have a show full of captions (and it makes it a little easier on the actors, don't you know). You must go with the premise that all the while, these people were speaking Latin.... just it's been translated / spoken into English for us. Just like HFRO went under the auspice that Russian was spoken on the Soviet sub.

Points from the Doc, re-enforcing the Compatibilist nature of the candidates being drawn to the Island. Was it pure Free Will? No. Nor was it pure Determinist: Further to duey's thoughts of the Light, Doc both elaborated and offered a competing theory of what will happen. I can dig it. But I'm not sure that it will be distributed to all of humanity. It might be enough to remain among our Lostaways. And, it seems that might be the case in the Sideways world, as these people seem to have much better lives:

Doc Jensen's LOST recap (how many of you are sick of the word "penultimate" by now?): The Will And the Way... To the End On his Friday posting, Doc amended the date of the "Across the Sea" goings-on to ~500 B.C. This was in response to a quote from Carlton Cuse.

I dunno. It's kind of weird to write on paper, but it's really changed my perspective/philosophy on life vis-a-vis we're only here b/c there is some purpose or other that we have to fulfill, after which time, we go. Stop being worried all the time about this or that trivial matter... trivial crap will tend to fall into place and work out in the end. Now, I don't advocate playing Russian Roulette to see whether your time/purpose is up, but there is a refreshing take-charge/do-what-you-need-to-do attitude there.

To a certain degree, absolutely. I have made from-scratch pizza on LOST nights for the past six years. It's a routine. And it's ending. But, as I've written since S1, this show is like a Dickens novel come to screen. And with any novel, the end comes, and before you know it, there's another novel you want to read. Now, I don't think there are going to be any shows that can even touch LOST as far as getting my interest. I could be wrong, but probably not. Most of the rest of what we watch is PBS. You scavenge what you can and fall into/adapt to other routines. I'm probably going to start doing pizza on one of the weekend nights... Sundays for football season. Saturday pizza & movie night for the rest of the year. We may start a Netflix subscription and catch up on some classics and such. And we'll always have the DVDs/BD of LOST to revisit. Nothing wrong with re-reading and re-re-reading your favorite title every so often. This is also why, as I've written, I see it as a nice touch that not everything will be answered in this show. I will still be able to reflect from time to time. In a similar way to the death of a loved one, it's not gone if you're still thinking/wondering about it and remembering the good bits of your experiences. Along with the S6 set, that is slated for a late-August release... IIRC, the 24th. We've gotten all the DVD sets along the way, but now that we have Blu-ray, it's tempting to upgrade, but we'll see.