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As usual I was a late starter with this one, despite everyone I know pleading with me to give it a try. I am now fully involved though, caught up with the new episodes and entrenched in all the online speculation and alternate reality gaming.

Lost picks up the mantle of its network TV predecessors Twin Peaks and The X-Files by establishing a mystery (or mysteries) and a mythology as it's hook and keeping the viewers in the dark about the true nature of it all for as long as possible. Lost takes all this to a new level with the complexity of its mystery and how far outside of the boundaries of the show that it takes its mythology. There are countless questions that the series has raised thus far and if you take the time to trawl around the internet you'll find clues to an even greater backstory. This show sure knows how to reward it's faithful and devoted audience. But what makes it unusual is that this is basically an extended Twilight Zone episode created by a couple of sci-fi/comic book geeks and somehow it has become one of the most popular shows on TV and actually won an Emmy.

The reason is the show can be enjoyed on so many levels that it is pulling in a wide range of viewers. Even if you stay off the message boards you can ponder the show's many unanswered questions that range from the basic (Where have they crashed? Where do those voices in the jungle come from? What is that unseen monster? Who are "the others"?) to the more complex (How did they actually survive that crash? Are their memories of their past real or constructed? What do the numbers mean? Why do so many of the characters have daddy issues?) And even if you are only mildly concerned with the overall mystery of the island you might be caught up in the interesting backstories of each character, revealed in piecemeal by flashbacks. Or by the sexual tension between Kate and Jack or Kate and Sawyer. Or by the friendships, comraderie, antagonism and distrust that is developing between all of the survivors. There is a lot to enjoy here.

Hopefully all of the questions that keep piling up will not eventually drag the series down the way it did with The X-Files. I hope there is a clear end in sight and if it's going to take a few years, the creators had better plan to answer those questions over time in a way that will keep us hanging on for more.

Posted at November 11, 2005 06:17 PM