'Lost'

[Ronn! Blankenship]

At 04:49 PM Thursday 3/20/2008, jon louis mann wrote:
>I gave up on that show long ago.  I just passed along the link fwiw
>when I came across it because iirc some discussion of the show
>sometime back when, and thought it might be of interest to somebody...
>(Lotsa other interesting things at that site, which was recently
>mentioned in the Bad Astronomy blog.)
>
>. . . ronn!  ;)
>
>Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing?
>A: Because it messes up the order in which people normally read text.
>
>ronn, when do you think 'lost' jumped the shark?  i'm still still
>hooked, patiently waiting for resolution...
>
>. . . jon!~}



One thing not unique to that show is that most viewers will not 
appreciate it when things happen which may be subplots or may be 
integral to the main plot but because it's an open-ended series 
rather than something like a mini-series or even a series like "24" 
where you know everything of significance has to come together by a 
certain date when the concluding episode of the mini-series or the 
season will air.  Except to geeks who get caught up in the show and 
discuss it endlessly on the Internet (:P), having something 
interesting happen in one episode that is never referred to again 
until sometime the next season is frustrating, as is having an 
important part of this season's plotline depend on some obscure point 
from an episode which aired months ago or even in a previous season 
which you may have missed or if you saw the past episode don't recall 
that point.  And as some of my posts to this list over the year may 
have indicated, I have an above-average memory for insignificant 
details about things I read, viewed, or experienced years or decades 
ago.  Unless it is mighty compelling, however, I don't want to be 
forced to constantly trying to remember such things in order to 
understand what is going on in a TV show that airs once a week (and 
frequently not that often):  I get enough of needing to remember 
details from months, years, or decades ago because they relate to 
something I am doing now in real life.  When I want to be 
entertained, I prefer entertainment I can take or leave, rather than 
have to work at and constantly be wondering if this particular plot 
point is going nowhere or if I'm going to need to recall it in detail 
over a year from now.  Also, I tire of constant flashbacks, 
particularly if they don't serve to illuminate something specific but 
again you are supposed to guess what character flaw is being 
illustrated in one of the characters that will turn out to be 
important in some future episode.

(As I believe I have also mentioned here in the past, I am no fan of 
doing logic puzzles for the sake of doing logic puzzles.  I prefer to 
hone my skills on "real-world" problems to which I want to know the 
answer (which may include problems from abstract math or theoretical 
physics or the design of extraterrestrial worlds or plot points for a 
story I am working on or something like that which others may not 
consider as having much to do with the "real world" but as I said 
still not just doing a problem with a known answer for the sake of 
doing the problem.  No, I was never much a fan of homework, 
especially the "busywork" kind . . . )

But those are my gripes with the format.  Perhaps some of the others 
who report watching the first several episodes or perhaps the first 
season and then losing interest can share their reasons . . . (hint, 
hint) . . .


. . . ronn!  :)