'Lost': Five missteps in Season 5
Last time out, I listed ten things I loved about the fifth season of "Lost." I contemplated doing a similarly numbered list about things I loathed, but decided against it for two reasons. One, no need to pile on the hate. I'm all about hugs and puppies as a general rule. Secondly, I realized that my problems with the season lay in five basic things. So, half the list, all of the complaints. It's win/win.
Those left behind. This takes two forms. First, the show had a difficult time in getting the Oceanic 6 back to the Island. Yes, we can take heart in knowing they didn't spend all season off the Island. But up until "316," off-Island action was stilted and paled in comparison to the on-Island activity. The second form? All the characters abandoned by the show this season, seeing little screen time and almost no character development. Sun, Jin, Des, Penny, Frank, Charlotte, our "Lost" nation turns its lonely eyes to you. Hell, even Locke and Ben were out of the picture for long stretches. Having an embarrassment of character riches is fine, but lack of focus on these characters was also a bit of an embarrassment.
The senseless life and futile death of John Locke. Maybe Season 6 will amend this. And I understand that on some level, making a central character this pathetic is a pretty damn bold choice. But Lord almighty, Locke fans have got to be PISSED at this point. Season 1's most interesting character, potential Island Savior, and man at the heart of the show's central conflicts? More like a man played like a fiddle from Day One. Maybe he was predestined to be the Island's Leader, only to fall prey to the machinations of Anthony Cooper, The Man in Black, Charles Widmore, Ben Linus, and a Nigerian prince who emailed him with a unique business opportunity. But as a fan, it's hard to think I've invested five years thinking about this man's life when all it led up to was his death in a shabby Los Angeles hotel room.
Lies, lies, lies. Until "The Incident," Season 5 centered around our characters at the seeming mystery of a three-way power struggle between Eloise Hawking, Charles Widmore, and Ben Linus. Potentially great stuff, except for one small caveat: we couldn't believe a damn thing any of them said. Best example? This exchange in "This Place is Death," after Sun asks Ben how he came into possession of Jin's wedding ring.
JACK: [Interjecting] You said John never came to see you.
BEN: That's true, Jack. I went to see him.
OK, so not only is that weak semantic sauce, but Ben also lies about the real circumstances under which he got the ring (taking it off Locke's dead body). Lather, rinse, and repeat a few dozen times for these characters and soon what they say turns into white noise: impenetrable, obtuse, and not worth analyzing. I stopped even trying to parse their intentions after a while, knowing the show would reverse course within a few episodes anyway. It's impossible to solve a mystery when you can't trust fact from fiction.
Inertia in the Initiative. On paper, going back in time to 1977 Dharmaville seemed like an awesome idea. I was totally on board with the concept. But setting aside the "whatever happened, happened" conundrum for a second, did a lot actually happen that was worth watching? The Dharma folk were largely pills, uninteresting at best or insanely grating at worst. As for the Lostaways that returned: since they spent most of the season unsure of why the hell they were there, which led to... lot of time talking about what they were supposed to do. Destiny might have called this season, but it also spent a lot of time on hold.
The reasons behind detonating Jughead. Season 5 was built towards certain milestones, and detonating Jughead was possibly the biggest. So why did that bomb give everyone on the show a case of the stupids? Faraday, King of "Whatever Happened, Happened," comes back to the Island to disprove his own theory and wanders into The Others' Camp with guns a blazin' to prove his point. Kate, Juliet, and Sawyer all come back to stop its detonation, but all relent for reasons that don't make much consistent character sense. And Jack? Jack, our nominal hero, wants to blow up the bomb on the off chance it gives him a second opportunity to be with a woman who will no longer know him. The show knew its cliffhanger months in advance, and yet botched its execution by installing artificial obstacles and sacrificing character for plot in order to achieve its OMG moment. Par for the course in most television shows? Absolutely. But "Lost" has managed to steer clear of such mistakes for so long that it was mind-boggling to see it sink to that level during its final hours of the season.
You've heard my gripes about the season; have any of your own to share?
Ryan also posts every 108 minutes over at Boob Tube Dude. He invites you to join the hundreds already in Zap2It's Guide to Lost Facebook group. He also encourages you to subscribe to the Zap2It's Guide to Lost Twitter feed.
Hey Ryan, I was just reading some of your past posts and a question suddenly came to me. If Jacob's touch has some special meaning, (Like the 70's Losties retaining their memories when they return to the present, granting them free will, etc.) what does it mean for Locke. Jacob touched him but he is dead now. What good did Jacob's touch do for Locke? Will it somehow "allow" Locke to be brought back from the dead for real during the sixth season?
Wow, I just posted this a moment ago and already half answered my question. Yes, I do believe that Jacob's touch saved Locke after being pushed out the window, but was that the only reason for it? What is the power of Jacob's touch.
I think that Jacob's touch gave John Locke life after that fall. That was another chance for him, and he did get to go on his "walkabout" which is all that he ever wanted. Besides that, he was a easily manipulated man who in Season one they started out portraying him as being "wise". He was being used by everyone who could the entire time. So I don't see him coming back except in flashbacks next season.
That's a helluva question, Phrank, and could be the monkey wrench in the whole "boom tube" theory. What happens when the person you (Jacob) have summoned is dead? Was Jacob's saving of Locke simply meant to keep him "available" for manipulation by the MiB, and therefore keep the MiB vulnerable to Jacob's counter-plot?
Damn, just when you start to think you've got everything figured out.....
Thank you Andrei. You mean I made sense?
Another odd thought, do you think that Locke remembers seeing Jacob when he touched him after the fall. Probably not but wouldn't it be cool if he did?
Im upset that whatevere happened did indeed happen, there was very little new information and i was bored watching the charcters go through the motions of events we already know the outcome for
I'm wondering if the MIB also had the power to "visit and touch" our Losties. If so, did he and will we see those scenes in Season Six?
Also, does a person have to be dead for the MIB to "impersonate" them? If not, could the MIB have been "impersonating" Jacob in some of those "touch visits"? Is (or was) Jacob actually "alive" in the mortal human sense?
I hold out great hope that we will see our beloved Locke again....
I can't believe you didn't even mention the whole love quadrangle mess! Juliet consenting to the bomb going off because Sawyer "looked" at Kate? Yeesh.
"The Dharma folk were largely pills, uninteresting at best or insanely grating at worst."
I think I'm gonna have to go ahead and disagree with you on this one. Okay, yeah, Phil was insanely grating, but he DID get what he deserved in the end. Radzinsky was about what I expected from the guy who designed the hatch --- pretty much a walking fruitcake. No complaints there. Most of the other Dharma folks I thought were interesting, it's just that there wasn't enough of them. I could have done with more scenes with Dr. Chang or Amy or little Ben.
(Okay, I admit, I included Amy mostly because Reiko Aylesworth was awesome on 24, and she's pretty dang easy on the eyes ... but hey, eye candy counts too.)
I totally agree with all with the total exception of Locke's death. I have been a fan of Locke since Walkabout and from a show perspective was absolutely floored BUT now in hind site, every John flashback showed he was a loser, pawn, manipulated soul. I do not feel cheated one bit. Actually stoked to see what will happen next year now.