First Impulse: The "Lost" finale

I think it worked as a finale. It seemed crafted to provide numerous emotional high spots for longtime fans, and it succeeded in that regard. It was an entertaining hour and a half (too bad ABC stretched it out to 2 1/2 by cramming in commercials).

It didn't much change my opinion of the series, though, which is that it started very strong and offered many high points, finished up pretty well, but featured a whole lot of subpar moments and episodes in between which, now that we've seen the whole series, can be regarded almost as filler, or at least "stuff I didn't really need to see."

As far as the "character vs. plot" discussions you will surely see on the Internet this week, I say that while I never was one to demand every single plot element be "explained," (hell, I'm barely swift enough to keep up with the basics) it's a cop-out to shrug off big inconsistencies or dead ends just because "the show isn't about character." "Lost" on one hand looks like one of the most ambitious shows in history, but at some point it got away from its creators and often settled for frustrating meandering and pat sci-fi elements that didn't really add up, either at the time or in the end. Even within this very episode, there were many puzzling and/or disappointing bits that didn't seem "worth it."

It was entertaining enough, though, to keep me watching the whole way, though I might have jumped ship a few seasons ago had not my wife and I watched it together. "Lost" to me had elements of greatness but was never quite as good as its staunchest fans wanted it to be. I doubt that any kind of finale could have elevated the series from good to great for me, but that's not such a bad thing.

I abandoned any expectation of some grand, intricate design to "Lost" several years ago, and that approach really enhanced my viewing experience. Just sit back, enjoy, have fun puzzling over it, but don't think too much about it. It just doesn't hold up to that kind of scrutiny, which is why the show falls short of greatness.

Instead of complaining about what I didn't get from the show in general, or the episode in particular, I'm gonna try to admire what the show DID do: screw with the minds of millions of viewers, myself included, raise a lot of debate and discussion, and provide some decent entertainment value along the way.

Judging by the often contentious relationship between this show and many of its followers, plus the subsequent failure of many mythology-based TV dramas, I'd think it'd be a while before any weekly television program stimulates this kind of reaction. The fact that "Lost" itself is responsible for much of the fear that such a series won't work is part of its complicated legacy.