The Ashcan

The LOST Interrobang: What Lost can learn from Harry Potter (S6E17) Part 2

Posted on 27. May, 2010 by theashcan in Television, The Lost Interrobang

I’m glad we’re all on the same page

When we started this LOST Interrobang recap series, our central concern about this show we loved was: “can its creators dish out all the needed explanations without resorting to exposition? Can they keep up the mystery without succumbing to just more mindfuckery?”

We agreed that good LOST episodes were a perfect balance of both qualities: ! and ?. Lesser episodes tilted too much in one direction or the other. Maybe because of that central concern over balance, never once did I imagine a series finale that would fail at both. With “The End”, LOST most certainly does end on exposition, and yet also leaves mysteries hanging, and also reveals that its final season was indeed a mindfuck, which would be OK if it were a good one, which it wasn’t. Yesterday you got our first reactions to the episode; today we delve a little deeper into points of contention.

Oh, and thanks for sticking with us! Keep reading The Ashcan as Jef and Anupa interrobang the upcoming season of So You Think Can Dance? (Just kidding) (Or maybe I’m not).

Jef: Ok word let’s pan out
One main character we didn’t talk about last time was Locke.
Locke and Jack had this opposition set up really early. It was destiny vs. free will, science vs. faith, whatever words you use to slice it
Did that gel for you in the end?

Anupa: Was it Jack’s destiny to make that choice? To take care of the island?
Does that even make sense?

Jef: That’s a good way of putting it.

Anupa: They were both destined to make the choices they made
Jack to take care of the island, Locke to visit Jack and ask him to fix him
I don’t refer to Smokey as Locke because it’s not Locke

Jef: That whole thread got muddled for me with the sideways whatever-its-called in a way. Jack seemed to end up with a destiny. Locke still just kinda died and waited for everyone in the afterlife.
One thing that gets me about the finale is that the science/faith thing just gets pushed aside. Which is fine I GUESS because I wanted it to end with the personal stories. But it’s weird that science reps like Faraday and Charlotte get left behind at the church. And the end message doesn’t seem to be about making your own choices or owning your destiny or having faith, it seems to be, just. You know. Friends rule.

Anupa: I feel you on that Locke tip… why was there this whole conflict, and so much emphasis put upon his unwavering faith in the island if that didn’t turn out to mean shit?
I mean, they brought it up too in this episode… when Jack and Smokey were lowering Dez into the light hole… they had that whole exchange where Jack said “you’re not John Locke” blah blah blah
Once again, they hinted at it but didn’t really resolve it or elaborate any further

Jef: Yeah Jack has said a couple of times that John Locke was right.
But…he was only really right about the island having some magic about it.
Locke didn’t have a purpose there. Well I mean on the larger scale his purpose was to die and have the Smoke take his face and yadda yadda which ends with Hurley fixing everything with bear hugs. But if I were Locke in the afterlife, I don’t think I’d be smiling about that LOL
I’d be like “What? I’m DEAD. Fuuuuuuck.”

Anupa: I don’t really see why Locke had to die for Smokey to take his body? Why couldn’t he just have inhabited Christian’s body the whole time?

Jef: Oh yeah, no doubt. The case for destiny is weak, even though the central story, Jack’s, ends on that note.
This gets me back to my point about wanting the last island mission to be a big team effort
If Locke tells us that everybody needs to go back to the island together, they should have recalled that in the finale. Everyone should have played their part.

Anupa: Well there were too many missions in the first place… which made for confusion

Jef: Yeah and the missions were dumb.

Anupa: LOL

Jef: “We’re going to blow up the plane.”
Like, why am I watching this when I knowww that notion is like three weeks old.
You have a guy who can hear the dead’s last thoughts, and a guy who has centuries worth of knowledge about the island, and another guy who can straight up talk to ghosts…and their end mission is still trying to blow up a plane?
You know what I CAN get down with?
The implied idea that Bernard and Rose are the neo-others in a Hurley world.
That’s just peachy.

Anupa: Whatchoo talkin’ bout?

Jef: Haha, just thinking about how the cycles have changed and how things are actually different.
So instead of a fucked up white dude with saviour complex and daddy issues, we have an aw-shucks Messican dude who loves everybody. And instead of the Others who kill and terrorize either in the name of the island or to control the island, we have Bernard and Rose there who are just sweet and want to live their lives.
It’s a different geography there now, so to speak.

Anupa: Right, there’s been a change in rule of law
It’s like Smurfland now

Jef: Haha yeah. They did that in a nice way without bashing our heads about it.
Was there anything you liked about it all?

Anupa: Thematically? Not really.
I liked scenes: I liked the fight scene between Jack and Smokey, the Rose/Bernard/Vincent scene, the Sawyer/Juliet reuniting scene got me choked up a bit
I mean, I was definitely invested in the characters, but more so into getting to the bottom of SO MUCH MYSTERY.

Jef: Yo I loved that flying-fist commercial break moment!
It was horrible and awesome at the same time.

Anupa: That was like one of the most interesting shots they’ve ever had on this show, I’d venture
Let’s go to a thought I texted you about last night when I re-watched some of the episode: The lingo
There were probably more examples of it than I cared to note, but the hospital scene when Jack is about to operate on Locke and they talk before going into the OR
Locke says, “See you on the other side” and then asks Jack if he thinks he can fix him. Jack’s response is something along the lines of “if I can fix you, I’ll be at peace”
I’m sure there were more examples

Jef: Watching it again, does that kind of stuff make you feel better about the reveal? Or does it annoy you?

Anupa: It puts the annoying reveal in context
And so, in hindsight, makes it less annoying
And it makes me wonder if, in a while, I were to watch the show again with the ending in mind I’d feel differently because my mind would be looking for different things
I mean, obviously so, and I feel like I’d have to practically skip a couple of seasons because whatever happens in them is left out but ya know?

Jef: I feel you. What you were saying yesterday about Juliet’s last words felt supported to me. So I think if I were to go back a lot more about the sideways world would feel better for me. Some of it already does. But I still think there’s too much crucial stuff that was designed just fool us and nothing else. And the endgame doesn’t play for me.
I still don’t know how I feel about Desmond’s role, etc.
Speaking of Dez, an aside about Ben:
Dez woke him up by beating the crap out of him, and it appeared like he did that solely because he wanted to punch the shit out of his face — understandably — but not because he was a part of Dez’s plan or anything.
I just thought that was interesting.

Anupa: That Ben’s “wake-up” didn’t involve a poignant moment per se, but just getting the shit beat out of him?

Jef: Haha, well yeah. And also interesting that Dez, who otherwise was Mr. Creepy Calm in the afterlife, had this obvious rage moment.

Anupa: Why do you think that was?
I’m mostly talking about why that was Ben’s moment, but also why do you think Dez gave in to that rage for Ben? He’s the obvious choice, but at the same time, he’s not… why waste that effort on him?

Jef: In a way I’m glad Dez did that — it would be off for me if Ben didn’t fully forgive himself but everyone else did. That someone else still wanted to get his shots in makes sense to me, but it doesn’t mesh with the “letting go” afterlife business.
And I guess yeah, Ben was eventually supposed to wake up in his own way after dealing with his baggage, but Dez took the opportunity to do it for him. Because of the high enjoyability factor of smashing his face.
Haha I dunno. I don’t hate it. It was just kinda off.

Anupa: Well, because yeah, Alex couldn’t set it off in him?
Like it negates the point of Alex being there, aside from the awww-factor
Was Alex in heaven?
And/or Rousseau?

Jef: Yeah who knows? Who are “real people” and who are just situations set up for the characters?

Anupa: See, that’s why it’s frustrating
Also, now, what the eff was the point of Dogen?

Jef: That’s what I think we’re supposed to assume about Aaron-as-baby. That it’s not actually Aaron per se, but yeah, it reads stupid when you see the baby there in the church.
Haha you mean on the island or in the halfway-Heaven?

Anupa: on the island
I’m sure if we go back to his sideways appearance, his cameo will be loaded with super-heavenly language
I feel like there’s something we’re missing

Jef: Yeah I’m still on that Dogen-was-stupid tip. I don’t see why him being alive kept Smokey away and I don’t want to think about the Sayid resurrection ever again LOL
Oh here’s a Dogen-related thought:
When Jack unplugged the island the magic was undone for a bit. Smokes and Rich-boy became mortal, Smokes could hurt the guardian, etc.
So did Jack kill Dogen’s resurrected kid?
Not that it matters. But, you know.

Anupa: I can’t answer that, but can we ask what was going on… why did he have to plug it back in?
I’m not even sure I understand exactly why they had to unplug, plug in the first place
Unplugging would make Smokes mortal?

Jef: Yeah, unplugging made Smokes mortal. That was their loophole

Anupa: okay so that was the plan?

Jef: That’s the thing: IT WASN’T A PLAN!

Anupa: LOL

Jef: Jack was all like uhhhhhh let’s try this!
It was painful for me because you have all these people on the island who could have made that way much more plus cooler
What if Rich knew something about how the cave worked? What if Miles heard the thoughts of the skeletons in the cave and because of that learned that whoever plugged it back in would die? And that’s what made Jack made the decision to kick Dez out and do it himself?
Because as it stands right now, Jack should have just let Dez do it.

Anupa: LOL trust me, he who can withstand pain
Guess what? That scene with the plugging-unplugging was like that part in Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince where Harry and Dumbledore have to cross the lake in a boat to get the locket in the middle because if they tried to swim they’d be fucked….But, a much smaller distance.

Jef: Haha yomg I was thinking about Harry Potter too, but the one where Hermione pulls this wicked time-travel plot out of her back pocket
What was that, Azkabahn?

Anupa: YEAH! The Time-Turner
I loved that shit. Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban was one of my faves.
Not AzkaBAHN, it’s not German
Or maybe it is

Jef: Yeah. The finale should have felt like THAT. Like all these pieces falling into place, and this wicked last-minute plan, and all of that.

Anupa: Yeah, it’s so true. JK Rowling should’ve written the LOST finale.
That’s the only time you’ll see me arguing for JK Rowling’s writing, because I love her ideas, but I’m not sold on her as the greatest of writers

Jef: If LOST were Harry Potter, Hermione would have just sat on the plane with her magic and waited for Harry to sacrifice himself. Like, what?

Anupa: If LOST were Harry Potter, Hermione woulda gotten them off the island in like season two
She woulda Expecto Patronum’d the Smoke Monster and made Polyjuice Potion to infiltrate the Others
DUH

Jef: LOL What Lost Can Learn From Harry Potter
Honestly.

Anupa: So, it’s the end of a buncha weeks of LOST blogging… what have YOU learned?

Jef: I’ve learned to live together or die alone, or die alone and live together forever, or SOMETHING, I don’t know. I learned that we have a destiny but sometimes that destiny is just dying. I learned that love conquers all but so does face-punching.
You?

Anupa: I’ve learned to never trust Damien Lindeloff and/or Carlton Cuse, ever again.
And also, everything is a religious metaphor

Jef: I’ve learned that JJ Abrams always gets out when the getting is good.
We also learned that black men don’t go to heaven, but neither do physicists. We learned that the most important time of Aaron’s life was when he was one day old, and that’s just sad.
In the end, do you hate Lost? Or just the finale?

Anupa: I hate the finale, which extends to the fact that I hate how much time I invested in this damn shit fuck!

Jef: Hahaha I feel you.
The girlfriend is watching from Season One right now and I saw some of it and remembered that the show really was great.
It had some of the best moments I’ve ever had with television, and maybe even movies.
I’ll see how I feel about it all after the hurt wears off LOL

Anupa: Well yes, and I think that’s why it hurts so bad.
It’s like being in a bad relationship
Just when you think it’s actually going somewhere, it fucks up
I don’t know if I can trust a TV show ever again!

Jef: Haha, I’ve been effed over so many times and I still go back.
I’m a TV masochist.
One last thing I wanted to say about the church scene—I know I make jokes, but I’m actually okay with who they chose to be there and not be there
Those were all the people who made real connections on the island. Eko didn’t, neither did Ana Lucia or Lapidus, and yeah, Michael went out on a really bad note.
Rich I’m assuming lived a whole ‘nother life and he didn’t really make friends so to speak.

Anupa: And that’s why Ben wasn’t inside

Jef: Exactly. And even Walt had his whole life ahead of him, I’m sure he has his own group of people waiting on him.

Anupa: Alrighty, I see what you’re saying
Though Aaron is then the one exception

Jef: The only one that bothers me is baby Aaron. That makes no sense. At least have him there as an adult and then have a moment that shows us Kate and Claire raised him right or some shit.

Anupa: WHICH WOULDA RESOLVED THE “YOU NEED TO RAISE YOUR BABY” ISH

Jef: EXACTLY.
And like fuck, Christian doesn’t even say what’s up to Claire and her kid before he bounces.
THE CYCLE CONTINUES.

Anupa: Wait, what about Penny though?
She didn’t forge a connection with any of the others, Dez yes, but that’s it.
Was it like, “oh shit hon, gotta make a pit stop at this chuuch before we cross over?”

Jef: Yeah, Dez.
You can tell who was mainly just a love interest subplot LOL
(LIBBY)

Anupa: (Charlotte)
Who looked SMOKING btw

Jef: Haha you so have a Charlotte thing.

Anupa: No it’s a ginger thing, for reals.

Jef: I’m kinda salty they gave me an Ana Lucia cameo but she was fully suited with the shades on. I mean, come on. Give me SOMETHING. Not even a good stare-down shot.
I would have loved if after Hurley said “Ana Lucia’s not coming?” The answer was “naww, nobody likes her.”
Any last words?

Anupa: No, just a slow-mo montage of me watching the episodes over the years set to epic strings

Jef: Perfect. Can I join? I caught some fish.

Anupa: u went offline
i’m assuming that means we’re done

Jef: Haha I’m here

Jef: hello?

Anupa: yes? I can see what you’re writing

Jef: Oh. wtf gmail
ruining our last interrobang

Tags: Christian Sheppard, Desmond, finale, Harry Potter, Heaven, Locke, Lost, modern relationships, religious things, Smokey, wtf