60 - …and found

It’s Lost again tomorrow! Hoorah! Lost is my favourite currently airing TV show - then again, that isn’t saying too much since it’s the only TV show I actually watch.

Throughout Lost’s life, we’ve been treated to a number of gimmicks that let us get off the island and see the characters in a more domestic, urban setting. We had the flashbacks, the flashforwards, a handful of heroes actually getting off the damn rock for three years and now… the “flashsideways” as they’re so fondly referred to. The weirdest one yet, even harder to wrap your head around than bonafide time travel, these segments see our characters in an alternate universe where the plane never crashed.

More than that though - Jack’s got a kid and Ben is a teacher and everyone from Lost apparently makes up the better part of California’s population. Without some context or explanation for these things, I’m at a loss to know what to even think.

One of Lost’s predominant themes is redemption. By crashing on the island, almost all of the characters have gone through heaps of character development to make them better people. Just compare the Season 1 angsty, antagonistic, conniving, stealing Sawyer with his Season 5 counterpart. Just look at the changes in husband-from-hell Jin, complete loser Locke, drug-addicted Charlie and narcissistic Shannon.

By rewinding time to 2004, we lose all that character development and completely undo that redemption. I watch these flashsideways and ask “should I even be paying attention?” and “should I care about these characters?”

I’m sure that there’ll be a reason for the Lost X timeline, some kind of point to the whole thing or the universes will collide at some point. Right now though, I just want to focus on the characters I’ve been following for 5 seasons, not some weird alternate universe versions. Time will tell…

It’s taken me 6 seasons to actually memorise the numbers. 4 8 15 16 23 42. Hooray for me.