Lost was very good until the end, but unfortunately, from the beginning it was very much about the end, so when they blew it, they blew everything for me.

It makes me sad, honestly. Looking at the lame and tired new shows set to premiere in the next few weeks (Ringer, anyone?), I miss the excitement that was waiting for and theorizing about Lost. It was appointment television in the way that nothing's been since (at least nothing on the networks).

I think I come at it from a different perspective, ZW. I think the moment Ben "moved" the island was when it started picking up steam and hinting at what was really going on. I've expounded on this at length elsewhere here during the original run, so I'll just recap:

Jayne's Analysis of What Happened to Lost and Why
Lost started out with a mission to do something really cool; unfortunately, "really cool" and ratings are often diametrically-opposed concepts. Once Brian K. Vaughn entered the fray and started hinting at explanations by way of Faraday, the sexy wet T-shirt infertility parade that appealed to so many housewives looking for another dose of Grey's Anatomy went away, replaced by a theoretical physics lesson taught by that guy who'll always be that hotter guy's schlubby, nerdy wingman.

The audience faltered. Women turned to the Oxygen network. So instead of continuing to connect the dots to a very special episode of "Ancient Aliens," we got a total reversal from what the writers swore it wasn't about. Yes, *the island* wasn't purgatory-- the sideways verse was. Whatever. And why were the metaphysical things like they were? Because Jacobs mother said so.

Lost became the manifestation of the chicken joke-- why did it cross the road? To get to the other side. Sure, Ok. But what motivated the chicken to cross the road? Oh... I guess we weren't clear enough in asking that sort of question early on, even though I'm pretty sure we did, what with the noise the smoke monster made and the EMPs and the crashed plane and the healing powers of the island. When so many hints are dropped about so many things, "Because I said so" fails to be a satisfying answer.

And so it is that due to this major wimping out/caving to the pressures of the network to make the show palatable to people who are scared of thinking or who still want to think of sci-fi as nerd stuff and nerds as losers, we lost what could have been something truly awesome. Since all of the breadcrumbs left in the early seasons essentially lead off a cliff into the big, cuddly arms of god (in an very ecumenical form), I can't go back and rewatch. I know what happens. It's like adopting a puppy you know was a congenital defect that will cause it to die in a few months. I can't do it. I can't fool myself back into the excitment. It's masochism.

And yeah... Jack bugged me from the end of the 2nd season (?) when he went all drunk and unshaven. I'm so tired of troubled heroes. His decision-making on the island also sucked. I can understand consistently making the choice that turns out to be wrong, but he seemed to get off on being whiney. Kate, too. The two of them deserved each other.