Quote:
Originally Posted by Red Brooklyn
Fair enough, my friend. I'm glad you're enjoying the series. Again, I don't watch a lot of TV so perhaps I'm inexperienced or naive, but I'm never seen anything as gripping, satisfying and (pound for pound) rewarding as the first season of LOST. There are low spots. But the low spots of S1 still exceed the low points of other seasons. Honestly, I think the low spots of S1 exceed some bright spots in other seasons.
I think for me it's about the overall flow, but also just the intrege of beginings. I view each season as a visual novel with each episode being a chapter. Some chapters aren't as fulfilling as others, but the first "book" is still the best overall book. For me.
Season four, is wonderful. I give it a solid B. And your points are all valid. I can see why you're so attracted to that season. I think I felt the same way following S3 as well. However, going back and rewatching several times, it's lost a bit of sheen for me. There are a lot of characters that really begin taking a backseat to the overall thrust of the plot beginning in S4. That's my only real issue. That, and the fact that the season feels truncated by the writer's strike. I feel like there was a lot more that wanted to happen in S4. Of course, the flip side is that the show benefitted from less "filler." And the final stretch of episodes in S4 (The Shape Of Things To Come to There's No Place Like Home) is arguable the best run of episodes in series history.
On a personal level, I think the big "reveal" is the show's weakest. The island moving is a little wonky to me. After three stellar finale's with heart-stopping final events, I felt like the island moving was the closest the show ever came to jumping the shark. Most of the things that people don't like about the way LOST ended are a direct result of that event, and that story telling device. I see why some think it was the beginning of the end. However, part of the brilliance of S5 is how TPTB respond. What happens next made moving the island worth it, ultimately. But it still feels a little odd. Even now.
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A qualm: none of
Lost's first four seasons feel novelistic in scope in and of themselves. There are too many unresolved issues for the seasons to feel like complete books. My hope is that the series, once all viewed, will feel novelistic like the best dramas (The Wire, Mad Men, Breaking Bad, The Sopranos) are.
Also, if you've never "seen anything as gripping, satisfying and (pound for pound) rewarding as the first season of LOST" then please, please, watch the four dramas I just mentioned in parentheses).