It didn't explain 99% of the show's mysteries and made everyone feel like they wasted hours of their lives watching the series. The entire series was complete dogshit and is a classic example of what happens when writers get their heads too far up their asses. They feel like they have to make every episode have like 8 "twists." Complete garbage.
this post was submitted on 02 Mar 2025
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I also watched the series recently and didn't see anything wrong with the ending. But I was told to go in with no expectations of things being entirely explained, so for me, I just accepted that the island was an unsolvable mystery and enjoyed the other parts of the plot. It was a great show IMO.
As I recall, the main point of contention was that this was one of the first big "there's a big mystery and the whole series is one big story to unravel it and we totally have it all planned out, honest" series. And then it turned out that no, they didn't totally have it planned out, and they were just making crap up as they went and most of the profound "clues" people were trying to cobble together were basically meaningless.
Maybe the show runners managed to cobble something together out of them that was satisfying regardless, but still, it felt like quite the betrayal. History repeated itself with Battlestar Galactica, where the show kept insisting "they have a plan!" When no, they really did not.
There was a big mystery from the beginning, they all died in the plane crash, and they were building an afterlife where they were all together. They did reveal it gradually, with a mounting number of conflicting facts.
Battlestar Galactica also had an overarching plan, that they would end up on Earth and restart the cycle.
BSG is an interesting example. I'm in the middle of a rewatch. Yes on the Earth aspect.
But the opening credits always mention that the cylons have a plan. After the show was over Ronald D. Moore, the show runner, admitted they made up that line because it sounded cool. There was no cylon plan. Disappointing as that part of the show's mythology was teased and I would have liked to know more.
This is all true but I think it was still a good show especially compared to what else was on non-cable TV at the time. There wasn't any show that actually prompted conversation about it in my family the way Lost did. That they built its appeal on reckless overprinting of plot threads they could never satisfyingly resolve was a dirty trick, but everyone fell for it, so to me they still get credit.
One big issue, is even if they have a "plan" it goes out the window if the show is too successful(or unsuccessful). A 5 season arc now needs to last 6 or 7..
I know Buffy for example had been planned for 8-9 seasons. And then producers were like nope the 7th is it. So they had to try and wrap everything up in one season.
Something similar happened to Babylon 5, it was designed as a 5-season series and then they were told season 4 would be the end. So they hurriedly wrapped everything up for the season 4 finale.
And then they were told they were getting a fifth season after all once that was all locked in, so they had to create a whole season of filler for season 5.
Imagine if the 5th season was just a sitcom about the daily lives of the characters after the conflicts were resolved.
That explains a lot, Season 5 never felt like it fit the series
Twice, technically. Once when it was canceled with season 5, then again with 7.
You mean the Bob Dylan-ex machina didn't do it for you?
Boost isn't marking spoilers correctly and I'm confused... So be warned to anyone curious about watching it. (I recommend it )
I watched it back then, and enjoyed it, but I get why some people were disappointed. We were told it would be explained, and the explanations got kinda hand-wavey. We were told they weren't dead, and they weren't in purgatory... And while that was true, they did all die and end up in "purgatory" for the resolution to happen. (And if the flash-sideways weren't exactly "purgatory" five, but it was equally as unfulfilling and unexplained.) And all this happened when we weren't investing days and weeks into it, but years.
That said, it was still one of the best "first seasons" of TV ever. And back then the prevailing logic was that flashbacks were tantamount to narration; just not to be done in GOOD media. But Lost did it great. It often showed us motivations (and even the reason decisions were made) in the modern day, without informing other characters the reasoning behind those choices. Sure, sometimes they just felt like plot, but not usually.
Also, if you enjoyed Lost, go watch From. It's been renewed for a 4th season. Oddly, also featuring Harold Perrineau.
IIRC, most of the fan theories were that they were all “dead” on the island. The writers promised this was not the case from about season five onwards and yet…
But they weren't dead the whole time. They were only all dead in the final season's flash forwards and last episode.
Just the bullshit they fed everyone to cover up the bullshit ending. People argue this point as if it makes any difference in the quality at all, but it doesn't.
It's been 14 years since I've seen the finale, but I think that the ending with them all together in some afterlife, was both different and enough from the original theories in season one that they were all in purgatory. It was like people who weren't even watching heard that the ending was they were all dead, and said that they called it in season one.
That being said, my memory of the final season was pretty lackluster, and the expectation was that everything would be explained and tied together. For the most part, the original questions were answered with even more questions and philosophical metaphors, that just confused people even more leading up to the final season.
It was a cop out. Let’s all meet at the church and kum ba yah.
No pay off and few answers after all those seasons.
Let’s all meet at the church and kum ba yah.
As a character literally named "Christian Shephard" leads us into the gates of heaven. 🤮
The whole fucking show was absolute garbage. It couldn’t be more obvious that the writers had absolutely no coherent story, no vision. I regret having watched it.
I understood that after the first 20 minutes. Maybe that's because I'm not an fan of all those tv series to begin with...
It's been so long, I don't know if I even remember why, but it felt like they didn't answer all the questions they had strung us along with.
I'm still waiting to know who added a whole ass island teleportation stirring system, but I guess the point of the ending is that there's shit that not even the mythical beings that we meet know or understand, because they themselves were simply thrust into the island long after most of its mistycism started.
I'm not saying it was aliens, but...
It was me. I did it. All my fault
I think in hindsight, the ending is not that bad. Especially when you compare it to disasters like Game of Thrones and Pretty Little Liars. I haven't seen the series in a few years, but I think watching it now on streaming is a completely different experience than tuning in every week.
I found it hard to follow the mysteries and plot week to week. To be fair, I was young, my attention span was short, and I didn't participate in any discussions or forums which would have been helpful for understanding.
A lot of people didn't understand the plot in the church was a sort of alternate reality where people were reunited in the afterlife. So people were upset that they were dead the whole time and that was too obvious. But that is not the plot, it's just how people misremember it.
Love it or hate it, I think the ending wrapped up enough of the plot to be respectful to the audience that fell in love and watched all those seasons. I personally kind of appreciate that some things felt unanswered. It made the whole tv show seem more mystical without being tied up in a perfect bow. But I am not prone to poking too many holes in the fiction I consume. I find it relaxing to just suspend my disbelief and enjoy.
So what makes the ending in the church alternate reality? And if so why wasn't the ending of the show in the "main" reality? Granted I pirated this show as it came out and watched with my wife so I don't remember a lot.
I'm one of those people who thinks the ending is simply wow, they were dead the whole time. Which is what I had been saying since like episode two or three of the first season. And having it in a church just ain't cool after what they've seen in their (after)lives.
It has been several years since I watched the series, so I forget some of the 'lore'. But as I remember the finale, there are 2 timelines or realities going on. The island good vs evil and the church reunions.
The church is a reunion of people who have lived and died on the island. The plane crash still happened, the events on the island still happened, it wasn't some collective fever dream or purgatory that the passengers were living. The church just shows the characters after they died, but they are reunited with people they bonded with on the island. For example, Charlie is reunited with Claire. Those two people wouldn't know one another if they did not survive the plane crash.
If someone has seen it more recently, maybe they could provide a better example? That's the best I can describe it.
Wasn't the rest of that season them showing how the people lived after they left the island but before reaching the church? It has also been years for me.
I'm exactly the same as you, I never got round to it at the time, finally did and couldn't see a problem with it at all tbh.
I thought the final couple of seasons were excellent in fact.
I didn't even finish watching it. Its just some weird "oh no we left the island but we gotta go back" like wtf. And then there was a ghost thingy on the island, and like wtf I lost track of the story.
I loved it.
In my personal opinion, the show went off the rails in season 2. I would have liked to see the show end with most of the main characters going back to their lives and taking the lessons learned on the island with them. I don't like that most of them die on the island. But I'm clearly not a typical Lost fan. I can't speak for those who liked most of the show and hated the ending.