Lost

Polarizing doesn't even begin to describe the effect that Lost has had on the television landscape. Even now that it is over the show that seemingly made serial dramas cool again is still divisive in the popular opinion, with most people either loving or hating the series finale. After six seasons of wildly varying quality, it's not easy to classify Lost as simply "Bad" or "Good". I'd say more "Good" than "Bad", but we'll get into that later.

People like to say that Lost heralded the return of the science fiction serial. Given that the most popular shows of the 2004 were procedural series consisting of largely stand-alone episodes like Cold Case and CSI, it's easy to see why so many would love to pin the instantly popular Lost as the show that brought back science fiction serials to TV. People seem to forget that it was shows like Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Babylon 5, Buffy the Vampire Slayer (2nd Season), and Carnivale that brought the return of season or even series long story-arches and complicated sci-fi/fantasy mythologies back to television. You also can't mention the impact of Lost without also mentioning Battlestar Galactica. Battlestar premiered the month after Lost, with its own set of interesting characters and epic story. Despite its flaws, Battlestar Galactica was superior in both the story it told and how it told it.



Out of all those shows, Lost was poised to be the most commercially successful. Its first season was very well done, and its momentum carried into the early portions of the second season. The characters were interesting, the story was moving along at a good pace. The cliffhanger at the end of the first season was one of the most memorable in TV history. Then something happened that as a viewer and a fan I didn't expect. Lost got bad. Not just bad, but abysmally awful. The story ground to a halt and instead of resolving the questions that had already been posed to the audience regarding the mysteries of the show, more questions were piled on. Going into the 2nd season finale, I'd almost given up on the show. After that point, the show finally found its rhythm again, and Lost had more good episodes than bad. The creators of the show even announced that Lost would only run for six season, which I found encouraging as they would eventually be forced to resolve the riddles of the island. Still, I never got the feeling that the story was in capable hands and worried that the show would end with important questions still left unanswered.

Unfortunately and unsurprisingly, the show has ended and there are important questions that the creators of the show didn't even bother to address. While the characters of the show have all been given absolution and we now know all of their stories the place that the story was set, the island itself, remains plagued by an annoying lack of information. I've always found the mythology of Lost to be the most interesting aspect of the show, but the creators of Lost seem to disagree with me. They want me to be concerned with the characters, and go so far as to constantly label their show as "character-driven". As a result Lost has sometimes neglected to address the grand mysteries of the island and its denizens in favor of smaller more trivial matters like Jack's tattoos, Kate's crimes, and Sawyer's cons. After an entire series of these kinds of story choice, one wonders whether the minds behind Lost are even capable of answering a straight-forward question in direct terms. Instead, the creators have used the vaguest of answers in relation to the greater mysteries of island's nature. At this point, the notion of a "character-driven" show seems like merely an excuse for lazy or non-existent exposition.



Just as an example, it's like the creators of Lost have just served you a cake. You taste it, and get curious about it:

You: Mmm... this cake is delicious! How'd you make it?
Lost: I baked it.
You: ... Yes, I see that. Um, what's in this cake? I'd love to know the ingredients!
Lost: I baked it IN AN OVEN.
You: I see....
Lost: IT WAS A KENMORE.

One of the more infuriating flaws with the show was the interactions of the characters with each other, or more to the point, the lack of interaction. Many times over the course of the series, characters would be in possession of information that could help in the revelation of a mystery, and would purposefully (and many times illogically) with hold it from the rest of the characters. This would also often happen between characters that were supposed to be on the same "side". Secrets were long kept hidden from both other characters and more importantly, the audience, for no good reason.



This circumstance of sub-par finales seems to be a recurring theme with shows that have a supernatural component to them. When you look at more grounded shows and their finales, like The Wire and it's sublime "-30-", you get a satisfaction that you've been told a great story and can now move on. Shows like The X-Files, Buffy, Quantum Leap, and to a lesser extent Angel, all suffered from lackluster finales. Questions still linger, and there's no way anyone's getting a better answer than they've been given. An exception to this is the fantastic Deep Space Nine finale of "What You Leave Behind" that delivered despite its supernaturally spiritual themes.

All this said, there was definitely more good than bad over Lost's run. Several of the characters, such as Sayid, Sawyer, Hurley, Eko, Juliet, Frank, and Miles all grew on me. It's no surprise that all of my favorite characters have one thing in common in that they were all the most direct in questioning the secrets of the island and the other characters, especially Sayid, Eko, and Frank. Sun and Jin, but mainly Sun, were also among the characters that I enjoyed seeing week to week. When Lost did get around to solving a big puzzle, the results were the best moments of the show, and it's unfortunate that the finale did not do this to the extent that would've liked. The finale bordered on being grossly emotionally manipulative, and almost seemed to be trying to cover its lack of information with the farewell of these characters that we've been following for six season. The island itself and the power it wielded was by far the most interesting aspect of the show. Even now, the mysteries and questions that surround what could be described as a insignificant speck of turf in the Pacific continues to capture the imagination and doesn't stop being a source of fascination.



So what could've made Lost and its finale better? After seeing the entire series, it's plainly obvious that the story of Lost could've been told in a much shorter span. I mentioned Battlestar Galactica earlier as the superior to Lost, and one of the big reasons for this was the time it took to tell its story versus Lost's time to tell a similarly complex story. Lost ended up with 121 episodes over 6 seasons to Battlestar Galactica's 75 episodes over 4 seasons. While each season was about the same length, BSG chose to end its run after four seasons, and this was for the best. It kept the writers on-task, and helped to keep the pace brisk and the story focused. The story of Lost, with all of its repeating themes and unnecessary diversions, could have been told in an even smaller amount of time. I'm thinking that 3 seasons of 20 episodes would have been sufficient to cover the tale that we ended up getting from Lost.

In the end if you've never seen Lost, don't start now. Don't worry about it until you've seen some of the other shows I've mentioned here. Don't bother until you've seen Serenity, Band of Brothers, The Pacific, and Arrested Development. After you've seen all that and you're still curious, add Lost to your Netflix queue and have at it. If you started Lost, but gave up along the way, you'd might as well finish now. Perhaps one of these days I'll write up an Essential Episodes of Lost guide for the good of the TV watching public, because for all its flaws there is some really good stuff to be found in Lost. Until then, namaste.

The Pacific

Whenever I tell someone that I'm currently watching "The Pacific", the first question I'm always asked is usually something like "So is 'The Pacific' as good as 'Band of Brothers'?". This is a deceptively easy question, and my usual answer has so far been a very simple "No." This is usually followed by a look of disappointment on the other person's face, as they begin to process what I've said and what that means. Generally it's taken to mean that "The Pacific" is not worth watching, but that's not what I mean at all.

When you get down to simple terms, the latest offering from the team that brought us the epic and sublime Band of Brothers doesn't quite measure up. That said, the bar was set so high by "Band of Brothers" that it would be difficult for any mini-series to meet or exceed those kinds of expectations. That said, The Pacific is worth watching, and does an excellent job in telling it's story. What must be understood is that "Band of Brothers" and "The Pacific" are not only different stories about different people, they're different kinds of stories altogether.

"Band of Brothers" was based on the book of the same name by Stephen Ambrose. The narrative mainly follows one character, and from there you get moments and sometimes entire episodes devoted other individuals. As characters are introduced, they fade out of the spotlight to let different characters get to the forefront, but stick around and continue to grow with the rest of the cast. This was a masterful method to provide development to literally an army of personalities, and by the end you care about each and every one of them. While the main character of the series never changes, you're still able to get to know the people around him by the end.

Conversely, "The Pacific" is based on the memoirs of three different Marines and their tours in the Pacific War. Robert Leckie's Helmet for My Pillow provides insight on the opening actions of the Marines at Guadalcanal to the bloody battle of Peleliu. With the Old Breed: At Peleliu and Okinawa and China Marine by Eugene Sledge both cover Peleliu, Okinawa, and the post-war actions of the 1st Marine Division. Finally Chuck Tatum's Red Blood, Black Sand illuminates the actions of war hero John Basilone on Iwo Jima. You can see that with this breadth of source material by different authors comes a disbursement of focus between three different characters. The mini-series has not one main character, but three in Leckie, Sledge, and Basilone.

The with the focus on the actions of these three Marines, the audience is treated to an in-depth look at their motivations, their reactions, and how the events that they take part in change these men. Unfortunately, the effects of war are somewhat universal, and we also get a repeating theme of the war breaking these Marines down both during their tour and after they return home. The audience is repeatedly reminded that war is awful and it can get a little heavy handed after you see different guys going through the same trauma over and over again. This is probably a testament to the brutality that coursed through the entire Pacific campaign.

Another consequence is that none of the supporting characters ever get a chance to shine through. There are a few that stick out, but many are left to stand around in the background or simply not make it to the end of the series. Again, this is most likely a reflection of the very real and extremely high causality rate in the front-line Marine units. While the "Band of Brothers" episode "The Breaking Point" had a very visceral and direct reminder of the losses suffered by Easy Company, no such moment exists for "The Pacific". Many characters are killed on screen, and the surviving characters talk of little else than their fallen comrades. There is a moment in the last episode where a character appears to suffer some Survivor's Guilt, but this is much more subtle than the end of "The Breaking Point" in "Band of Brothers", where the company's First Sergeant Carwood Lipton tallies the fallen Easy Company members in a church. Such a scene would also not have worked as well in "The Pacific", as the audience had very little time to know these lost supporting characters.

What all this means is that "The Pacific" is a different experience than "Band of Brothers". There is both a more direct focus on a smaller number of characters, and we get to know John Basilone, Robert Leckie, and Eugene Sledge very well. On the other hand, we do not get the rich cast of supporting characters that made up Easy Company. "The Pacific" still manages to serve up more than its share of action, drama, and personal struggles just like its predecessor, and that for me is enough to recommend it.

Treme

Treme is not The Wire. It's not Caprica, and it's not Battlestar Galactica.

I bring up Caprica and Battlestar as an example of two television shows, both made by the same people, both excellent, but very different from each other. Battlestar was more a drama than a space opera, but there was always the possibility that you'd get treated to a space battle or two. Caprica has no space battles, yet still manages to be entertaining because of the drama between the characters and the story that it's just beginning to tell.

Treme and The Wire have a similar relationship. Both are David Simon products featuring excellent casts, writers and stories of poverty and struggle. The Wire also had its share of action. It didn't happen often, but there was always the possibility that a gun fight would break out. Treme has none of that, and the most violence that's happened so far has been a single justified beating of a lowly thief.

So why watch Treme? With the possibility of violence almost gone and an apparently complete absence of special effects, what's in this show for you?

The music.

In order to like Treme at all, you have to either like or at the very least appreciate jazz. You have to possess some reverence for the city of New Orleans and her culture if you want to relate at all to Treme. The show will spend a significant portion of time devoted to featuring the stylings of many different musicians of New Orleans. Between the music, and the subtly-told storylines of the varied and increasingly complex characters, this is not a show for everyone. Like The Wire, Treme demands that you pay attention for its entire hour and rewards you with the best TV show at the moment.

If it's not for you, then it's not for you and that's alright. It's not a stigma to dislike jazz, and if you don't like jazz then you will hate Treme. Jazz is integral to the experience and the two are solidly intertwined. If however you are a fan of jazz or open to music in general, you owe it to yourself to check out Treme.