Comments on: Overthinking Lost: Season Four

By: rachel Beezy

rachel Beezy — Sun, 06 Sep 2009 21:30:36 +0000

Exciting news for LOST fans!

This Saturday, September 12, in Anaheim, CA, LOST cast members are going to be making a public appearance at Disney’s D23 Convention; additionally some really fantastic pieces of LOST history are going to be on display- including Kate’s toy plane, Hurley’s winning lottery ticket, Locke’s hunting knife, Sawyer’s letter and many other surprises! These items will be on view Thursday September 10 through Sunday, September 13, the entire weekend of D23, and will be up for auction after the series finale in May of 2010.

Look for the guys in the Dharma suits!

for the full story, go to profilesinhistory.com

By: manscaper

manscaper — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 16:02:06 +0000

“Thinking about all this stuff is giving me nosebleeds. In any event, it does seem like Lost is trying to set up some time loops here. ” nosebleed huh? hehehehe just wait until season 5 if you wanna talk about nosebleeds.

I LOVED season 4, after struggling through season 3 really believing the writers had no idea what they were doing or where things were going season 4 showed just how very wrong I was. It is awesome the way some of the big mysteries play out and some of the relationship dramas unfold. I started to love characters I didn’t like before, namely Juliette and started to hate some characters I used to like, such as Sayid who just keeps torturing and killing people season after season regardles of his oath(s) to not do that.

And The Constant is just about the best sappy ending in the history of TV. Desmond is such a strong character, and played by such a talented actor, that what could have come across as a cheesey romance plot was brilliant

By: Kevin

Kevin — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 05:51:04 +0000

@mlawski: oh, that’s a good point — as far as “overthinking” the music, I don’t know that you really can. There are no hidden clues or subtext to the music… though I should add that if there IS, I’m probably not educated enough in music theory to decode them. So you’re right, maybe this isn’t the best place to discuss it.

I will say, though, that what makes the music so good is that I think it stands alone as well-crafted, beautiful music — you can listen to it independent of the show and enjoy it. (I gave some of it to my parents, who’ve only seen a few episodes here and there over the years, and they loved it.) It’s one of the few shows — maybe even the only show currently on the air — to be scored each week by an orchestra, not a single person sitting at their synthesizer. And the instrumentation is quite clever — for percussion, Giacchino used the sides of… airplanes, though that pretty much went away after S1. (It also helps if you’re into gentler music — he scores action scenes well enough, but where he shines are the slow, quieter moments.)

P.S. If you’re curious for a listen… I recommend “Parting Words” from the S1 soundtrack, then probably “Life and Death.” But there are a whole slew of great tracks from across the series.

P.P.S. On second thought, there actually *is* something to “overthink” regarding Giacchino’s score — how he comes up with some of the awful puns for his song titles, or alternately what obscure media reference he’s making in them…

By: mlawski

mlawski — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 03:02:55 +0000

@nighten: That’s a great topic, and I’ll definitely keep it in mind, especially if Lost ever reveals to me what the deal with Christian Shephard is. Argh, why is he everywhere?!

@Kevin: Good point. I should have mentioned the music a long time ago, because it is amazing. Definitely one of the best TV soundtracks I’ve ever heard. I’m not sure there’s much to overthink there, and if there is, I’m not sure I’d know where to start. If you’ve ever read this site’s music-related posts you’ll soon realize I know absolutely nothing about music theory. I’m not really sure I’d like listening to it on its own, either. It works really well as a TV soundtrack–in other words, in context. But I’ll keep this topic in mind, too. Maybe I’ll come up with something interesting to say…

By: Kevin

Kevin — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 21:40:54 +0000

@mlawski: now that you’re all the way through S4… I’m curious if you have any interest in Michael Giacchino’s score for the show. I find it to be some of the most richly-themed music written for television, with an abundance of motifs that are repeated throughout each season. And most of the characters have their own unique themes — I’m particularly fond of Sun/Jin’s and Rose/Bernard’s. I know it has little to do with the more obvious elements of the series (plotting, acting, symbolism, character naming, etc.)… but it’s probably the most widely-praised piece of the show overall.

If you’re interested in soundtracks at all, Varese Sarabande has released music from the first four seasons on CD, available online through an Amazonian retailer (among others)… and you can also download through the iTunes store if you go that way. (I know I can recommend individual tracks to download if you’re at all interested for a taste… as I’m sure some of the other readers can as well.)

Any thoughts? Would love to hear!

By: Jess

Jess — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 11:42:19 +0000

“Oh, lordy… Am I a Ben Linus fan? I think I might be. I didn’t know that about myself until right now. ”

Haha, this was basically my exact reaction to that episode as well. :D

“Kate thinks about Sawyer all the fricking time”

As a Sawyer and Kate fan, I enjoyed this observation a lot.

By: nighten

nighten — Tue, 25 Aug 2009 17:39:42 +0000

@ mlawski: I assumed Desmond needing a constant meant a strong emotional bond, not some random object of familiarity. That likely implies that Desmond becomes more important to Faraday though, I suppose.

I’m curious to get your take on the father figure/issues as they relate to redemption, if you get a chance.

Am really enjoying your analysis each week. Thanks! :)

By: Kevin

Kevin — Tue, 25 Aug 2009 16:54:33 +0000

@mlawski: re “The Constant” — IIRC, Farraday says a constant DOESN’T have to be a person, it can be ANYTHING. But the key is: it has to be something that has a *special* meaning to you in both time periods.

It’s not like Des could have landed on the freighter, said “Hey! This is a boat! I knew about boats in 1996!”, and been fine. It’s got to be something really, really important… and for Des, the most important thing in life is Penny. (And given that we’ve never seen him talk to his parents, much less mention them, I don’t think they’re important to him at all… if they’re even still alive. Same with his friends — he’s had no contact with them for years by 2004, unlike Penny.) And it’s not so much a question of “understanding” what’s going on, or what time period you’re in — it’s being able to lock your brain down to some sort of personal consistency about your life. To “jump start” things, if you will, and get you back on track.

And re: the nosebleeds — honestly, I think it’s mostly a consistent, “filmic” way of showing someone gradually falling to pieces. Sure, they could have passed out instead… but nosebleeds, frankly, are cool. Mainly because it allows the other characters to go “Hey… your nose…”, and the victim to wipe quizzically at their face, only to see the blood and realize they don’t have much time left. I don’t think the writers cared that much about the biology or “science” of it… just that it worked effectively.

(Most importantly… it sounds like you’re already into Season 5. Yes!)

As for Egypt: did you know they Lost staff actually has an Egyptologist on the crew? Don’t know how long that’s been the case… but we’ll see if your alien prediction comes true. You never know!

By: mlawski

mlawski — Tue, 25 Aug 2009 15:47:03 +0000

@Tom P: No, I never got around to reading The Time Traveler’s Wife. I’d assume the book was better, if only because I really did not like the movie.

@Kevin: Re: your question about why the Island seems to be linked to Egypt, I have your answer: aliens. The aliens built the pyramids, didn’t they? QED. (No, I’m really not giving up on my “aliens did it” theory of Lost. Not now! Not yet!)

By: mlawski

mlawski — Tue, 25 Aug 2009 15:43:52 +0000

For the record, I DID like The Constant, a whole lot. I only said that it wasn’t my favorite Desmond episode — I think I prefer Flashes Before Your Eyes, personally. I know what I’m going to say next will be unpopular, but here goes: The Constant was incredible from a technical perspective–the flashes back and forth in time could have been very confusing, but they weren’t–and the end was wonderful. My issue was with the shady physics of the whole thing. I guess I can accept the whole “time travel makes your nose bleed” thing, even though it’s kind of silly; Dan said the nosebleeds were caused by a brain hemorrhage, but I’m pretty sure that would cause much worse symptoms than nosebleeds–like, say, a stroke. I also have other complaints about the nosebleeds, but those are season five-related, so I’ll save those for next week.

The nosebleeds are one thing, but this idea that you need a human constant to fix time sickness doesn’t make sense to me at all. Why does it have to be a person and not a place or an object, for instance? Surely 1996-Desmond recognized SOMETHING when he traveled to 2004–it’s not like he traveled to a time period that was so completely different his brain would explode trying to understand everything. I know it wouldn’t have been as wonderful an ending, but couldn’t someone on the freighter have played a Spice Girls song so Desmond could use that as his constant?

And, really, 1996-Desmond doesn’t know ANYONE else’s phone number? He couldn’t have called his parents? Or a friend from high school? Or are we to assume that everyone he knew changed their phone number over the last eight years?

Sorry, I’m being pedantic, I know. But when sci-fi stories don’t work on a sci-fi level, it bothers me, and I can’t enjoy the emotional bits as much.