[itvnetop]

I got the ending. I just didn't like it at all. When it comes to television, I love character-driven arcs. Lost definitely has that- but its core audience didn't argue about which guy Kate was going to pick or whether Sun and Jin's love was enough to get off the island. You take a look at every nearly every Lost forum before the finale and the majority of the posts discuss the mysteries.

The finale wasn't poor writing- in its own box, it was actually well done... one of my writer buddies actually said that although he felt the ending was a copout, the finale (on its own merits) was emotionally satisfying. I totally grasped the finale's themes of love, faith, the potential of one's life and the acceptance of death. But it's as if the writers just thought, "Well, we definitely don't have time to make everyone happy with the questions they want answered. So let's just hope we can rely on some of our fans to believe that this show was always about the characters, first and foremost."

Another friend told me to appreciate the journey of Lost, rather than the ending. I'm a David Lynch fan, so I appreciate certain mind-bending narratives that are all over the place... Trying to follow his films will only confuse- you're suppose to immerse yourself into his madness. And herein lies the problem. Lost wasn't sold as a Lynch-type of show.

The creators intentionally threw in a bunch of easter eggs throughout every episode, recaps before each season/episode to remind viewers of major turns, introductions of supernatural sci-fi tropes galore... all within a framework of traditional (albeit, creative and often unanswered) story-telling. While the "more answers bring more questions" mantra was there, the average Lost viewer isn't watching every week to learn new plot devices that will eventually become irrelevant or meet new characters that have absolutely no bearing on the actual story by its end (random japanese guy at the temple anyone?).

I think there's only a few ways to look at the finale: a) the writers ran out of ideas or b) they intentionally had this ending in mind for a very long time. If it was the former, I almost give the a ending a pass- lazy writing (even in a series finale) isn't uncommon. But the reason I'm kinda ticked is that I believe it's the latter: The creators aren't dumb. They understand timelines and had six seasons to go where they wanted. Meaning they provided six seasons of mysterious island MacGuffins in order to land a sentimental knockout punch that seemed (to me, anyway) inconsistent with the mechanics of the entire series.

In comparison, here's a few series finales that I thought were absolutely amazing: The Wire, Six Feet Under and The Shield. None were exactly "tidy" bow endings with complete resolution... they managed to leave certain elements up to interpretation/discussion while staying true to their respective series' makeups.