JuryDuty

I always encourage people watching this show to not worry about how it will end. Truth is, the mystery of the show is so deep and involved and climactic week-by-week, there's probably no way the finale will be completely satisfying. That is, this show isn't about the conclusion, it's about the ride. I think we all want a conclusion that wraps up nicely, and I believe they will deliver that, but I don't think everything is leading up to a killer ending. It's all about getting there.

SteelWill

You're kind of hitting on one thing I really don't like about the time travel rules they've set. Past, present, future, it doesn't matter. Whatever happens, happens because any given point in time is past to some future point. Since you can't change the past to affect the future, you can't change anything from whatever is supposed to happen. There is only one inevitable outcome and no matter what you do, that's what is going to happen. It is all destiny and nothing can change it.

calhoun07

Oh, that's an interesting theory. Kind of like how the bullet went through Locke exactly where he had his kidney removed so he lived and was able to heal faster by the power of the island.

So do you think if somebody dies on the island they can't come back to life? (I thought Charlie died when he was hanging from the tree but the island brought him back...I really don't think Jack did squat for him.)

FatTony

I think you're probably going to have a hard time accepting the rest of this show then. For the sake of argument, consider this (I'm totally just making this scenario up using Hurley to prove my point):

1980 - Hurley is born.
1990 - Hurley, 10 years old, is riding his bicycle down the street.
2004 - Hurley, 24 years old, crashes on the island as one of the Oceanic 815 survivors.
2005 - Hurley escapes from the island as one of the Oceanic 6.
2008 - Hurley, now 28 years old, attempts to return to the island on Ajira 316.
1977 - Hurley, still 28 years old, instantly appears on the island because he has been pulled from his current timeline (this corresponds with Hurley instantly disappearing from Ajira 316, which is what Caesar saw happen on the flight).
1990 - Hurley, having lived on the island from 1977 to 1990 and now 41 years old, is killed as part of the purge. However, Hurley as a 10-year old child still exists because he is riding his bicycle down the street. He has not yet been to the island and has therefore not been killed.

Hopefully this makes sense to you. If it doesn't, like I said, you're going to have a hard time making sense out of the rest of this show.

dsa_shea

But if what you get to in the end doesn't amount to much then it sort of negates the ride. It would be sort of like taking an eight hour scenic ride to end up in the middle of a field. The ride was nice but the final stop was uneventful. If it is about the ride only and the ending doesn't have some significance on a large scale then the importance of the Losties lives and their actions become far less important.

Big Boy Laroux

Maybe he's saying it's like a roller coaster. The ride is fun, and the ending is just, well, the ending.

dsa_shea

The ride is somewhat fun but knowing that this is what the Losties did rather than what they could do to alter the future kind of takes away some of the story's ramifications. We already know what Ben did in the past. I really thought that the island was calling them to fix the mistakes not to bring "them back" to simply discover what happened in the first place. I guess we'll see how this plays out but knowing this takes away the significance of Jacob asking Locke for help in season 3. I'm all for time travel stories but there must be a reason for it and it shouldn't be for simply telling the story.

vaporware

Christian=God + angels Jack
Richard=Satan + Dark angels Ben + John

I really have no idea. But it seems that eventually it's a battle of good v bad. And Satan can act good if it gets him to his end goal, so I've heard. So either side could be bad.

JuryDuty

Exactly. And I'm not saying it won't have a satisfying ending. I'm just saying it probably won't be a blow-yer-socks-off ending because our expectations are being set higher each week. It's pretty hard to meet those expectations for the whole audience. If I had to place bets, I'd say it will be a satisfying ending, but half the viewers will hate it. But again, IMO, that's ok, because it's not about the ending, it's about the ride.

Shows like Journeyman, Jericho, Battlestar Galactica--they all had endings like this. Satisfactory, but nothing that makes your jaw drop and blows you away. For all those shows, it was more about getting there.

Shilex

The bullet hole misplacement seems to be way too major to be just a mistake on the producer's part. It was quite obvious to me that the bullet hole was in a different place (especially since they had the "previously on Lost" promo at the beginning). I know I was paying close attention just because I wanted to see if it was close to Ben's heart.

Cracksky's theory is an interesting one.

So should we know what that ancient building Richard took Ben into was? I remember a building similar to that where the island monster dragged that guy into a hole.

invisiblegt

The Temple.

ATX

the purge happened in ~1992-93

i came to this conclusion, because Horace said that he's been dead for 12 years in Locke's dream

and as far as Ben "remembering"; I thought the fact that Richard said *He won't remember anything and he'll lose his innocence... and he will be one of them forever* explains why Ben doesn't remember Sayid and them in the future

Rob V

What's really baking my noodle is what if Sayid never discovered his "purpose" and didn't shoot little Ben and leave him for dead?? Maybe Ben would have never turned out to be the person he is. Maybe he would have just hated his dad and Dharma but never would have sided with the Others.

Rob V

The deeper this show goes, the more it reminds me of Stephen King's Dark Tower series.

invisiblegt

Don't worry about the vase.

Rob V

Wondering if someone would catch my quote

Liver&Onions

As I mentioned in last weeks thread

http://forum.dvdtalk.com/9348997-post15.html

dsa_shea

I just hope the show ends as well as the story in between. A recent movie I saw that fits this bill is "Tell No One". The course of the movie is one great ride and the ending just tops it off. This show has been a good ride but I wouldn't classify it as great over this past season and I hope that it grinds towards the end that it at least justifys why we've spent 6 years watching it. I would have to say that the first two seasons of are my favorites as the series as all of the island stuff was squarely rooted in the here and now and not in time shifts.

d2cheer

Off topic, I could not buy the ending to that movie at all. It didn't sit well with me... but that is another thread.

Anyway the time travel stuff is getting a bit taxing for me. I liked the series better when it was rooted in the island mystery etc...

The way it is going clearly the losties are the ones that have caused the "incident". I like some others here are questioning the reason for the return as well... so far the "what happened, happened" stuff isn't doing it for me and I have found the last few shows pretty boring. Except for the ending to this one which was great and the the Miles/Hurley exchange which was pure comedic gold!
I have to stick with it though... hopefully it will pick up, probably what my main problem is all the other characters we keep getting introduced to and have to keep track of... I clearly don't pay attention as well as some do here.

Raul3

I don't think the losties will be there when The Purge happens. I'm thinking that they will come back to the future. If Ben don't remembered them in 2004, that means that he didn't see them in the past. So they may be coming back to the future pretty soon.

It will be kinda "funny" if they come back to the future and things actually changed.

Aphex Twin

Can someone update us on what is going on with Farraday again? What is he doing while all this is happening?

Noonan

As far as I know, we don't know yet. Sawyers group didn't mention what happened to him to Jacks group that just returned. Last I remember seeing him was when he saw the girl that may/may not be young Charlotte when they first got to 1977.

cracksky

We've only seen Daniel briefly in 1974 when he sees Charlotte as a small girl then again later when he's down in the Orchid dig site (which has to be before 1977). Some time in between there he might actually have left the island.

sb5

Didn't one of the O6 ask Sawyer about Daniel, and he gave some sort of brief "you don't want to know"-style answer? I might be misremembering...

Anyway, I'm guessing we'll get the the answer eventually.

dsa_shea

The thing about time travel is that what we believe is the outcome of the incident (the hatch, etc.) are all seen before the Losties reach a point in time where they travel back. This doesn't make much sense. Had the Losties been on the island and then traveled back, caused the incident and then traveled forward I could understand seeing those things then. This will ring especially true if two of the Losties turn out to be the skeletons in the cave. They were found well before the travel back time which would present them with the opportunity to be there and die to be placed in the caves. I'm not buying the whole time travel bit because of the things we're introduced to before other events happen that would cause them to exist in the first place.