Damon Lindelof on Lost

I found this (video) interview with Damon Lindelof on Lost to be far more satisfying than the ending of Lost. It was exactly two years ago that finale aired so I don't remember it in detail. I do remember that I felt emotionally satisfied with where the characters ended up (and how we saw them all) but I found the resolution to the all the questions raised by the show to be very weak.

I really appreciated his comments and wish other creators would talk about their work (I wish Kubrick had). I'm glad he wanted to talk to someone who was engaging him about their disappointment.

I'm glad he's not haunted with how the ending went over and am glad he's at least conflicted about it.

I do challenge him to show the 10 interviews where he said we "if you are watching the show for the answers to your mysteries then you will not be satisfied with the ending". Certainly not before the month or two before the ending. And at the beginning they clearly said they knew what was going on and said that the two skeletons in the cave (in the pilot?) were there to prove that they had a plan from the beginning. The problem was all the other questions that they raised in between, or at least the big ones.

I also liked his explanation of answers about the FAQs he gets, do you have it planned out and does the audience input make a difference. "There is a plan and when the plan doesn't work we change the plan" and "yes we really listen to what you say but 98% of the time we agree with you before you ask it." Those always seemed like the right answers.

I emailed with some friends (obsessively) after each episode of Lost aired. I appreciate I can now go back and look at those messages. Here are some of my thoughts (*spoilers*) after watching the finale. This was my immediate reaction:

"I would claim that the finale was just like the series. I kept wanting it to be about plot and it tended to ignore plot and stick with characterization. And the characters were (usually) strong enough to keep me interested. This was all about the character moments and the montages and they were effective. There was some seemingly good plot development on the island but it still was very vague. Sean felt everything was resolved satisfactorily. The sideways turned out to be purgatory, everyone dies at some point and ends up there, in the church with the people from the most important time in your life (except Michael and Walt). I also think Ben might have switched sides a few times too many in this episode."

This was the next day after watching the episode a second time:

"It was an interesting episode, very well constructed. Most of it was emotional scenes between two characters where an epiphany happens. I'm sure the actors appreciated the writing as they each had scenes where they had to convey the story with their faces and not with lines. The acting was uniformly excellent by everyone (if pressed, I'd say Claire was the weakest and Hurley missed a couple of moments). The size of the cast I think made it a little overwhelming but since we've gotten to know all these characters so well, it needed to spend the time and they did it well. I very much agree with Alison's point, "So they don't actually all live happily ever after, they die happily ever after."

"I'm perfectly ok with the explanation of the island's powers being a glow-hole. I'm ok with Jacob having magic powers by virtue of the glow-hole or his mother giving them to him, same with MiB. I'm less ok with the weak explanation of the actions of the purely human characters. Who started Dharma, how they found the island, what it is Widmore wanted, what's with the special children, etc. These were very big questions raised again and again in the series and they did just punt on them."

"My other problem was that no one was ever right. It was weird that Jack and Flocke could walk together to the glow-hole with Desmond and the others, both thinking they would succeed and all instantly agreeing on sending Desmond down on a rope (which appeared from no where). After Desmond pulled the cork both Jack and Flocke thought they were right and it wasn't really possible to know if they were or weren't. It was going to destroy the island and it did seem to take Flocke's powers (though he stayed in Locke form). But it wasn't clear at all that it was going to end life all over the world as Mother (and Jacob?) said. And I'm not at all clear about why MiB goes down the hole and becomes smoke but Jack and Desmond do not. Desmond's magic powers I guess and Jack's protector status, but Mother made Jacob promise not to go down there.

Ben said it well, that Jacob ran it one way with his rules and perhaps there's a better way. Same for Mother it seems. And Widmore and Dharma and Ben and the others and Richard (he still wants to blow up the plane at the end and that doesn't seem important at all). The point seems to be that no one really knows the right answers and we should be suspicious of anyone who claims to. Though even this is unclear.

Jack said that (real) Locke was right about everything and I have no idea what that refers to or if it's at all true. In their last scene Ben says he wanted what Locke had and he asks what he had? Ben says he was special, but really he wasn't. Well he was "lost" so Jacob made him a candidate but he never understood anything and ended up killing himself (which Ben only slightly put off). Flocke said he was a loser. Locke was just special at times because others were sheep and followed him. Maybe there's a deeper message that we can all be special if we keep trying but it seems pretty weak."