How not to do a season finale

[sigma7]

I have to admit, there was such rampant stupidity in that episode I was wondering if the creative forces behind Grey's Anatomy were working overtime. And not even in the "physics don't work like that" way but the "inexplicably inconsistent characterization from what we saw 30 minutes ago" way or the "no, seriously, none of you thought of that?" way.

Sadly, Lost is a show that works best when it's audacious both in questions and answers, not coy ("Oooh, what's in the crate? Make sure nobody refers to what it really is until the dramatic reveal"). But the idea that despite traveling back in time the Losties only manage to create the circumstances under which they were trapped? Done to death. Terminally uninteresting. Worse than a nuclear device that tumbles down a million-mile deep shaft without a hiccup and is still somehow primed to detonate when a kitten leans on it.

I was holding out for another game-changer, or at least an interesting reveal, a hook to keep interest up 'til next year. I don't know about you all, but I don't think I can sit through another episode of that, much less a season.

Edit: Does this mean the last season of Lost is going to be the last season of Buffy with the First Evil? If so, oh, God, count me so out. Bad enough the Lockebox reveal conjured memories of the BSG finalé (___ has been dead all this time) and the bomb the first season cliffhanger of Sledge Hammer!

Comments

[sigma7.livejournal.com]

I think Buffy should've ended a season or two early -- too much of the seventh season was spinning of the wheels, running out the clock. Which I think is a great deal of what I didn't like about last night's episode, either -- a lot of walking, a lot of gabbing about things we already knew, had explored in detail. (Last season's Lockebox was eerily similar; everyone obligingly referring to Locke as "Jeremy Bentham" was just too precious in an attempt to string the viewer along.)

I think the high water mark of the series is going to be the season three finale -- the "it was a flashforward all along" reveal was unexpected and opened so many doors and so much raw possibility that it's just too hard to follow up. Given that the Losties have had three years to ponder the intricacies of time travel and causality, has it honestly occurred to none of them (except Miles, last survivor of a doomed freighter) in all that time that they could have been enabling the incident all along? I could buy that only if they were all Kate, who seems to have fallen out of the stupid tree and hit every branch on the way down.

I think what I was hoping for was at least a smidgen of a clue as to where the endgame was taking us instead of just a fade to white. Jacob's been killed (?), Esau (can we call him anything else?) wins, the loss of Chang's arm and Radinsky's convenient escape makes it pretty clear the timeline's still intact.... And that's about all I got. Not even a dramatic turn for not!Locke. I'll be interested in seeing what they do in 2010, but I'm not on the edge of my seat by any means.

[wenchamok.livejournal.com]

I'm so utterly lost when watching "Lost" that I'm pretty much down to "Oooh, Sawyer shiny......" I think once this season comes out on DVD I need to get 'em all from Netflix and rewatch them. And possibly take notes. I swear, "The X-Files" mythology is less confusing than this.