“Lost” Finale: The Time is Now, But What Questions Will Go Unanswered?

ABC’s much-anticipated “Lost” finale will finally air Sunday, and its impending departure will leave the modern television scene without one of its most important shows.

Along with “24” (which ends Monday), “Prison Break” (canceled last year) and the early episodes of “Heroes” (which has been canceled), “Lost” represented a tremendous step forward in the world of serialized dramas, creating a ‘must-see’ mix of suspense and action that had viewers carefully analyzing each frame to identify clues for future plot twists. Granted, they spurred a lot of disappointing, if not horrific, pilots–“Vanished” and “FlashForward” to name two–but they, themselves, excelled in dialing viewers into what was unfolding on the screen.

The shows–“Lost” in particular–essentially provided a tangible counter to the notion that television was a mindless activity; even when the shows featured popcorn drama in the more mindless vein, there was still enough going on to make viewers think about what they were seeing. Those who have never viewed “Lost” and continually dismiss it as an updated “Gilligan’s Island” or a serialized version of “The Twilight Zone” have also clearly never spent time on the various “Lost” theory websites, in which fans have truly engaging discussions about how every minor detail impacts the big picture storyline.

The nit-picking does not always spur a pay-off. There has been admission on the part of those behind the show that many of the minor questions related to the island’s mechanics, the Dharma Initiative and the characters’ backstories will neither be relevant nor even answered by the time the show goes off the air tonight. By narrowing the storyline, the show has also made a number of the past question effectively moot. But the value in such analysis comes with the change in television-watching culture. One will not enjoy “Lost” as a background show, and the notion of making viewers pay excessively-careful attention to every detail on screen not only makes “Lost” special–it serves as an incredible opportunity for aspiring television writers who want to be sure viewers truly care about their product.

From this reporter’s experience in covering “Glee” for an audience of several hundred thousand, it is amazing how much attention viewers pay to even the most minor details on a show meant to be absurd, comedic and light-hearted. The development of that television-watching culture was definitely assisted by “Lost,” and while fans have astronomical expectations for Sunday’s finale, the reality is that no storyline on tonight’s show will be as important as how the show, over six seasons, made viewers appreciate the capabilities of television dramas.

That is not to say that “Lost” deserves a free pass for tonight’s episode. Over the course of the sixth season, the show has largely moved from “why” territory into “what” territory. After five years of creating mystery, the show opted not to conclude in a wholly explanatory sense and is instead going for forward-thinking action and drama. Questions such as why Jacob and his ‘adoptive’ mother were able to grant agelessness, how an island can “not be done” with someone and prevent them from death and why the numbers could be so significant to the actual characters will likely not be answered in substantial fashion; “Lost” clearly asks its viewers to take a lot of the supernatural elements for granted. Under notions like “fate” and “whatever happened, happened,” “Lost” is able to get away without offering practical explanations for so many of its pressing mysteries and storyline developments.

In pursuit of its conclusion, the show now asks viewers to essentially assume that everything they have seen prior makes sense and is plausible. Now, it is simply about figuring how out everything ties together and, presumably, how the ‘alternative’ timeline and ‘normal’ timeline will connect. While the show’s transition from mystery series to dramatic action series is disappointing for some, the one saving grace is the fact that the characters, above all, are what drives this series. From day one, “Lost” has distanced itself from other series by carving wonderfully believable, deep characters capable of stirring true emotion in the audience. And seeing their story come to a brilliant resolution should be capable of making up for the fact that so much of the backstory will go unexplained and unjustified.

That is not to say “Lost” can get away with ignoring the backstory and refraining from incorporating the various “rules” and “mythology” into whatever conclusion it opts to put forth Sunday night.

Matthew Fox referred to the series’ ending as “beautiful” but admitted that the culmination of a show like “Lost” will always be polarizing. What makes ending “Lost” even more daunting for the writers is that they not only have to figure out a way to make fans satisfied with how all of the characters ended up but also have to figure out a way to avoid glaring contradictions to past seasons. Of course there will be some continuity errors and of course there will be some leaps of faith. But if the resolution does not appear compatible with the motifs of the series, with the stories and emotions of the characters and with the mythology of the island and its impact on the universe, it will be flawed, no matter how emotional those final scenes are.

That being said, the intricacy of “Lost”‘s universe assures that successful attempts at emotional storytelling will hit harder than almost any television show in history. “Lost” has created in an environment in which you hope not simply for the characters’ survival but for their personal betterment. Through flashbacks, flash forwards and the current alternate timeline, “Lost” has jointly shown how miserable and how amazing the lives of the characters can become without the island being in the picture. In seeing those glimmers of hope and glimpses of terror, viewers are not just hoping their favorite characters do not die–they are hoping their favorite characters achieve what the presence of Oceanic 815 potentially allowed them to achieve (or allowed them to avoid suffering). If “Lost” plays into those scenarios while keeping everything believable and consistent with the backstory, “Lost” will end on a glorious note.

What questions do you want answered? Who do you think will die? What will the final shot entail? Comment away–and enjoy the series finale of “Lost” Sunday night. Following a two hour retrospective, the finale airs from 9PM-11:30PM.