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The LOST Epilogue is Bullshit

// August 9th, 2010 // No Comments » // Nerdgasm, Review, Rumor, Scifi, Television

So at some point the 12 minute epilogue to LOST (the one that producers Cuse and Lindelof implied would finally give some fucking answers) was leaked online.  It was quickly taken down in most places bc they want you to buy the DVD sets in order to watch it.

I managed to watch it here.  Go watch it now because it will be taken down, probably soon.  I’m not embedding it here, bc I don’t want the hassle.

Honestly, the whole thing was another major dick move by the LOST crew.  Of the 12 minutes they give you, 6 of them were another Dharma Initiative film which explained where the Polar Bears come from.  I think we can all agree, of the dangling plot threads left, the polar bear mystery was one of the least necessary for them to answer.  The last 3 minutes of it are by far the most interesting, and all they really do it tease you with good shit then tell you to kiss their ass, bc you’ll never see it.

Fuck the DVD set.   They should have just let the show end with the finale rather than be assholes about it.

(PS if its taken down by the time you read this, the only good part of the video should be up on Topless Robot.)

LOST: Why The End was both awesome and complete bullshit

// May 24th, 2010 // 2 Comments » // Nerdgasm, Review, Scifi, Television, commentary

There is nothing I can say that's funnier than the look on Charlie's face.

The End has come and gone.

Even if you weren’t a fan, it’s hard to deny that one of the most significant shows on television just passed.   The nerdiest show around has left an indelible impression on thousands of people across the world, leaving in its wake a challenge to other shows that will likely be unmet for a long, long time.

Okay so poetic ramblings dispensed, its clear I liked LOST.  So what’s up with the article title? Why did I call The End complete bullshit?

Well, because quite frankly though I consider LOST’s finale to be one of the best series closers I’ve ever seen, it was essentially 2.5 hours of sleight of hand.   The writers and producers of LOST spent so much time thrilling you and warming your heart, that you may have failed to notice they didn’t actually answer many questions, and the main one they did answer makes absolutely no sense.  For a show that’s main appeal is it’s mysteries and mythology, that’s either a really funny joke or incredibly fucked up. Sure, you were never going to get all the answers in a cohesive story (the reasoning of the numbers for instance), but I actually thought they would answer a few.

In truth, the finale actually posed more questions for me.  And that I think is very appropriate. Bravo you sadistic bastards.

Chief among the questions that needed to be answered is this: what is the island? Now, I know the first reaction many will have is that they already answered that in the Richard episode.   No they didn’t.  Jacob said the Island was the cork of evil.  If you actually think that constitutes and answer, you need your fucking head examined.   During the writers strike a couple of years ago,  a LOST writer held up a sign that said something to the effect of {I know what the Island is, do you?}, indicating that if the strike didn’t end well, fans might never have known the answer.  Imagine if LOST had ended then and there.  Now imagine you find yourself in a room with Carlton Cuse, and you ask him “what was the Island??”   He responds  ”it was a cork.”   Now imagine yourself standing over him after you just kicked him in the nuts.

The function of the Island may be to cork evil, but that doesn’t tell you what it is exactly.  Throughout the show, there has been a significant amount of evidence that the Island was reasonably sentient.  That’s not to say it was intelligent specifically, but if The Island wanted the Oceanic 6 to return,  then clearly there’s something going on there.

My final thought was that perhaps the Island was the Garden of Eden.  This seemed to fit somewhat with the mentions of Adam and Eve.   I have no idea if I was right.   I do reject the idea that the Island was Purgatory, despite the fact that it held so many ghosts.  I think the ghosts were there because the Island still needed them.  More on that later.

What the hell was the smoke monster? Again, we got a partial answer here. We know that the smoke monster was released when Jacob threw his brother down into the Goonies cave at the heart of the Island.   Subsequently the Smoke Monster took the form of Jacob’s Brother and occasionally other dead people until getting trapped in Locke’s form (or so it was implied; that might not be the case).  But what was it?  After the Jacob/ MIB episode, I came to believe that the Smoke Monster was Lucifer/ Satan.  It occurred to me that the “evil spirits” that possessed Claire and Sayid may have been other demons from hell.  If that was the case, then DeathLocke/ MIB/ Smokey was trying to get them all killed so more spirits could possess their bodies.  …nope.

Where did all the wine go? Okay yes, that is kind of a joke, but there are serious questions behind it.   What is with all the drinking? Jacob, Richard, Jack and Hurley were all given superpowers by drinking.  The first two got it through drinking wine (which I assume is a reference to the Blood of Christ) and the last two were forced to drink nasty, dirty water.   Which leads me to a better question.  Drinking the wine gave Jacob and Richard their abilities.  But drinking the water didn’t seem to do anything but make Jack stop being such a mopey tool.  Did Jacob give Jack a placebo? I thought maybe Jacob had turned the water into wine, but Hurley clearly drank brown water.  We don’t know what happened to Hurley, so theoretically he could have lived for hundreds of years.   I have my doubts though.

What was up with the Goonies cave? When Jacob thew his brother down the cave at the Heart of the Island, the mere presence of his body released the Smoke Monster.  And yet both Desmond and Jack (not to mention 3 other people standing in the mouth) actually walk up to a literal cork and play with it. Mmm-hmm.  So Desmond takes the stopper out of the magic bathtub and Unicron screams and the Island starts to fall apart.   And then Jack just puts it back in and the bath tub fills up again.   That’s it?  Nothing was released from Hell?  Really?

What happened to Desmond? Widmore asked Desmond to do a job.  The implication was that Desmond was flashing sideways to get the LOST crew together to go to the sideways Island.  But that was a red herring.  The flash sideways world actually was Purgatory.  There would be no reason for Jacob to have Widmore send Desmond to  Purgatory. It doesn’t really seem like Jacob would even know about the sideways universe. So what happened to Desmond when the energy zapped him, and for that matter what the hell changed his mind?

And maybe the most important question.  Did Desmond ever get to see Penny and his son again? At last count, Desmond was stuck on the island with Hurley and Ben.  The plane had taken off.   Since you’re not supposed to be able to find the Island, this poses a problem for our favorite lovesick Scotsman.

Also did Hurley ever get laid?   Everyone loves Hugo.  We know this.  But it seems as though Hurley never managed to get any lovin’.  In theory Hurley could have been stuck on that Island for hundreds of years until his successor came along.  Meanwhile Libby died at the end of the second season without them ever getting together.  Joking aside, no one deserved to be loved more than Hurley, yet it seems like his was the cruelest fate.   Yeah, he eventually died and saw Libby again, but still… hundreds of years alone.

All of these were good questions that I sort of thought would be answered.  My mistake.  Granted, we did get an answer to what the Flash Sideways was.  Purgatory. Or sort of purgatory.  Technically it was a sort of Elysian Fields reference, a place the LOSTies created to find each other again, wherein they did not remember their past lives.

It’s an answer I’m happy with, but I can’t help but feel like this was the LOST writers laughing at us.   All the signs were there that this was an alternate universe.   The image of the Island underwater.  Jack’s imaginary son.  Both Sun and Claire still pregnant.   There was no real reason for these elements  (particularly the Island shot, which was unseen by anyone but the audience) except to screw with us.  I think my biggest question spinning out of the sideways Universe is about the exodus.  Why were some characters left out when they left?  Based on Desmond’s promise to Eloise, Faraday and Charlotte were left in the Purgatory universe.  And even after that very sincere apology and seeming redemption for Ben Linus, he wasn’t allowed to move on.  So why were character like Juliet and Libby allowed in?  And unless I just didn’t notice, neither Walt nor Michael were there.  Was it random?  This is probably the only question that will bother me in the long run.

Pushing aside unanswered questions, I loved the finale.  These are some of my favorite moments.

Miley Cyrus and Billy Ray do some... uhh... stretches.

• Sun and Jin seeing Ji Yeon. (sort of)
• Happy Hurley talking to Boone while Shannon and Sayid make out on a dirty street outside a bar.
• Claire holding hands with Charlie.
• Juliet and Sawyer(one of my 3 favorite couples)  reuniting.
• The final scene between Linus and Locke. (This may be my actual #1 moment.)
• Jack going all Leonidas on DeathLocke.

As you can see, almost all of my favorite parts were in the sideways universe.  Call me a sap, but I love happy endings.

And that may be the biggest surprise for me.  I was quite certain that the finale would end tragically, with almost everyone but Hurley dead. And yes, technically that is how it ended, but it was hardly tragic.   I think there will be a lot of people pissed off by the ending,  and I’ve even suggested that the whole thing was the writers laughing at us.  But I’m happy with it.  It’s rare that a show gives the audience satisfying character resolutions.  Almost every couple in LOST met some tragic end, either together (Sun and Jin) or apart (Kate/ Jack, Charlie/ Claire, Hugo/ Libby, Sawyer/ Juliet and presumably Desmond/ Penny, among others).  Yet in The End they all get to be together again.

In the end (pardon the pun), LOST wasn’t about the Island or the mysteries.  It was about the people whose lives were affected by it.  What’s amazing about LOST is that each of the main character and even some of the secondary characters would merit their own show, yet they manage to pull all these disparate stories together so well and give them complete plot resolutions.

Some people are saying its the best series finale ever.  I won’t go anywhere near that far.  One of the best? Certainly.  But I think the finale proved that they were making it up as they went along (at least until the last two season maybe) and that put a damper on the non- sideways scenes.  But still; great show, fantastic ending.

I hope the BSG’s writing staff was paying attention last night.  THAT’S HOW YOU DO THAT.

Does V Go Too Far?App

// November 8th, 2009 // 2 Comments » // Review, Scifi, Television

The history of Sci Fi is littered with allegory.  Some number among legends, others are quickly forgotten.  Earlier in the year I argued against the blatant political idolatry that had spread from mainstream media to the comics industry.

A great writer can persuade more minds through creative subtext than by blatant pandering to a pandering to a particular audience.   As writers, I believe it is necessary for us to rise above petty politics and our love or hatred of a particular politician when engaging our audience. The point is to expose people to different ideologies rather than the rhetoric of political parties.

As of this past week, ABC (a television arm of the Disney Corporation) aired the pilot for the re-imagined 80′s show V.

V tells the story of an alien race referring to themselves as V’s, or Visitors.   The V’s promise the human race technology, improved life-quality and the potential for utopia.  While most of the human race embraces the Visitors, some believe that they have come to destroy humanity.

In essence, the new show is very similar to it’s predecessor.   But as the say, the devil is in the details.  Since the pilot’s airing, many have noticed certain similarities to the Conservative movement’s statements about the United States Government.  Some bloggers are arguing that the show is a blatant attack on the Obama administration and that the V’s leader Anna (played by Firefly/ Serenity alum Morena Baccarin) is meant to represent Barack Obama himself as charming but ultimately duplicitous leader. The staff deny these claims.

Still, it’s hard to ignore the similarities. And I have no intention of deny that it is clearly meant to echo the sentiment of a majority of the American populace.

While I agree that V is meant to be a political allegory, I disagree with the belief that is an attack on the President.  Instead, I would argue that it is more an attack on the strategies of Progressive Movement.   Granted, President Obama and his administration are at the center of the Progressive takeover, but one can hardly argue any particular personal similarities.This is a battle of ideologies and tactics.

The real questions that the media should be asking is whether V is (first and foremost) a good show and if it works as a persuasive allegory.

For a story’s subtext to reach an audience, first it needs to create that audience by way of good storytelling.   Second, the underlying message should never become distracting.  Standing on a soapbox isn’t going to change anyone’s mind, and no one wants to be preached to by a science fiction show.   George Orwell’s 1984 may be one of the greatest sci fi allegories of all time.  It demonstrates how a bloated government interested in “the greater good” can eventually smother the rights of the individual.  But what works for the story is the fact that it never mentions people or parties.  And in point of fact, I have no idea what political persuasion Mr Orwell was before his death.  It isn’t the point.

The author should never get in the way of his/ her story; either for ego or “the greater good”.

On the first part, V definitely succeeds.  While it wasn’t instantly addicting, it made me care about the characters and what was going on.  As to the second part….

V gets more right than it gets wrong. But it still gets a few things wrong.

If I were to start a perfect coup, I would follow the same methods as the Visitors.

• Appeal to their sensibilities.  Finding attractive, young people to spread your message is a good start.
• Tell them what the want to hear.  Promising people in turmoil that you are the answer to their prayers is easy to believe for most, because humans have a need to believe in something.
• Indoctrinate the young.  Children are great for the skillful manipulator.  They’re looking for something to believe in, and have a nearly oedipal desire to prove their elders wrong.  Convince them that you are the way of the future and their parents just don’t understand.  And once the future is yours to control, the present won’t be far behind.
• Keep them focused on your ideas rather than the details.  The point is to make the believe, to make them hope.  Because once they learn to rely on you for their salvation, you can convince them of anything.  Anything can be done for the greater good.
• Control the flow of information.  In the age of the signal, the man who can manipulate the media is king. If you control what information the people have access to, you can make them believe anything.

In the pilot of V, the Visitors promise the people of Earth a utopia where all are one under one government.  They promise Universal Healthcare.   All of the V’s appear to be young, attractive humanoids with a great sense of humor, making vague promises of hope and peace. They take children up to their amazing space ships and woo them into being ambassadors for the aliens in their respective communities.  When being interviewed by News Anchor Chad Decker (played by Party of Five’s Scott Wolf), the V’s leader Anna only agrees to be interviewed by him (and only him) so long as he follows her rules and never casts the Visitors in a bad light.

Those who argue that this is an attack on the administration need to take a step back.  The truth is that these actions work because they’re universal.  The cause and the people don’t matter.   It’s a process of manipulation.

While the show makes a few more specific references, they never commit the cardinal sin.  They never get specific.  Words like Socialism and Fascism never enter into it.   With the exception of the mention of Universal Healthcare which hits the  viewer with all the subtlety of a blunt axe, the story remains an ambiguous allegory.  It isn’t perfect, but objectively speaking, if you were to take a step back from the turmoil engulfing the American people, this story could work anywhere.

Anna is a charming, beautiful leader.  To sum her up as being Barack Obama ignores the fact that history is filled with such leaders doing the exact same thing, each with their own agenda.

The producers and writers of V have chosen to take risks by doing this story in the present societal atmosphere.   Did they go too far?  In my opinion, no. Before I started writing this article, I would have disagreed.  But as I reviewed what was truly there, I think it’s a fine line. While they may have alienated some fans, they tried something.   And for the time being it seems to work.

But at the end of the day, they’re telling a good story.  As a writer, I can respect that.