On Sun, 16 Mar 2008 23:31:22 -0700 (PDT), Darren Delgado
<darrendelgado@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
>On Mar 17, 1:46 am, dgates <dga...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
>> On Sun, 16 Mar 2008 10:32:31 -0500, Gumby <gu...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
>> >Jimbo wrote:
>>
>> >> It seems like sooo many people look to the podcasts for some
answers.
>> >> What about the people who don't get the podcasts?
>> >> I do know a few people who watch LOST but don't get podcasts, as a
mater of
>> >> fact, one of them doesn't even use a computer or cell phone.
>>
>> >> My question is this . . .
>> >> Do you think that someone who only watches LOST as a weekly show
would be
>> >> able to keep up with it and not loose interest in it?
>> >> I know that some of the people I know that only watch the TV show
are
>> >> starting to watch other shows now and are forgetting to watch LOST.
>>
>> >> Do you think that the producers are trying to capitalize on the idea
of a
>> >> show that requires so much investment that the viewer will watch it
because
>> >> of the time and energy invested?
>>
>> >> In Economics this way of thinking is called a "sunk cost" and to
dwell on it
>> >> is a bad thing.
>>
>> >> If this is the case then "The Economist" may have a deeper meaning.
>>
>> >> Don't get me wrong, I like the show and have watched every one, even
read NG
>> >> posts but, I just thought of this and was wondering if anyone else
thought
>> >> this.
>>
>> >I don't do anything but watch the show and read this newsgroup. I'm
>> >enjoying and understanding the show thorougly.
>>
>> I enjoy the show too. But, to be fair, if you read this newsgroup,
>> you probably get all of the same peripheral information that anyone
>> else gets from alternate reality games, podcasts, etc.
>>
>> The ideal answer to the original question would be: The people who
>> check out all these other sources (podcasts, games, etc.) get the same
>> info that a normal user will evenutally get; they just get some of it
>> a lot earlier.
>>
>> Unfortunately, I suspect that's not the case. I think the people who
>> check out the other sources get much clearer answers than do regular
>> viewers. I think that the producers, for example, explain things in a
>> much less ambiguous way on their podcasts than the scenes we see on
>> the show.
>>
>> I could probably have named quite a few examples in the past, but I'll
>> try for at least one now.
>>
>> It is quite possible that the show will never explain exactly what
>> happened to 815's pilot, and if it was the same "monster" or
>> "beautiful white light" that Locke saw later. But the producers said
>> (something very much to the effect of) the pilot's reaction to the
>> thing was what caused it to kill him.
>>
>> I remember, also, on one of the catch-up episodes shown on ABC (I
>> think at the beginning of season 3), the producers said a few things
>> that were never spelled out on the show.
>>
>> Sorry, I don't have the best specific examples here. But what I'm
>> seeing is that:
>>
>> - those who check out all the podcasts, etc. will get more answers
>> than a normal viewer.
>> - a normal viewer, unless he's writing down a ton of notes, will
>> probably forget most of the mysteries that at one point puzzled him.
>
>This is a good post, I agree with about 95% of it. I think the degree
>to which the podcasts clarify things isn't as great as you suggest,
>but they do clear up some lingering issues. Because as you said, no
>show has writing that gets everything across the way they want it to
>perfectly in any show. You could probably do a similar podcast with
>any show slightly more complicated than, say, "Dynasty" and say the
>same thing about it.
>
>My question to you is, is that a bad thing? Pretty soon the
>distinction between "TV" and "the Internet" is going to be trivial.
>You're going to get your Internet through your cable box and watch it
>on the big screen HDTV in your living room same as TV. Shows will be
>offering more and more "added content", and stuff that you have to go
>download now at abc.com may be there in your lap to watch with one
>click right after fini****ng an episode. So this media-overlapping
>format is in a sense the beginning of a new form of entertainment. I
>think you're going to see more of this type of thing in general, and
>less concern for the people who can only watch the episodes and don't
>pursue other forms of media. I doubt that people watching TV series
>in 2025 are going to be overly concerned with having to go to "The
>Internet" to see some greater content related to their favorite show
>because it is going to be the same thing.
Well, this may be a very Dave-centered way of looking at it, but...
From my point of view, as long as the clarifications are coming from a
source that I choose to check out (like podcasts), then I'm happy. If
they're from a source that I don't choose to check out (like alternate
reality games), then I'm a bit bummed.
(Whoa, I just noticed that my newsreader says "Retrieved 108
bodies..." That must mean something! :-)
Anyway, back to the topic of what things the producers spell out on
recap shows (and podcasts), here's a list from the last recap show I
remember watching, "Lost: The Answers":
(Go to http://lostpedia.com/wiki/Lost:_The_Answers
and scroll down to
the section called "Answers given.")
==================================
Answers given
While this episode is mostly a recap, a few possible answers are given
- whether or not what the producers say is canon, or carefully edited
possibilities by them, is unclear:
* The plane was brought down when the Swan Station's EMP fried the
electronics due to Desmond's failure to enter the code in time.
o They did not say that the EMP caused the mid-air breakup
of the plane.
o Ben retrieved news footage of the missing airplane shortly
after it happened.
* Locke is methodically destroying everything that may be used as
an escape from the Island.
* The survivors are not in purgatory. They are alive and living
somewhere in the space-time continuum.
* The Swan is confirmed as the most im****tant station on the
Island.
* The manifestations on the Island (Yemi, the horse, Christian
Shephard, ...) are confirmed to be connected to the Monster.
* The term "magic box" is a metaphor for the entire Island.
* Desmond's turning the key in the fail-safe under the Swan
station prevented a "global catastrophe".
o It was because of this discharge that the Island's
location was briefly revealed to the outside world.
* The polar bears were brought to the Island by DHARMA, but
escaped from their cages.
==================================
So, I guess it's up to the individual to decide if those answers were
already "clear" even before the producers "spelled them out," or if
they were still "mysteries" in which we had only our "most logical
guess" theories.
I'm not sure if it would be fun to go through them one at a time and
debate how much -- say, on a scale of 0% to 100% -- they had already
been answered. But I'll try a couple.
ITEM:
"The plane was brought down when the Swan Station's EMP fried the
electronics due to Desmond's failure to enter the code in time."
ANALYSIS:
Well, we know that Desmond looked at the printouts from the Pearl
Station, found that apparently he had missed pu****ng the button on the
day that the plane went down, and decided that he brought down the
plane. But we also know that the Pearl Station deceived other people
on the island -- encouraging them to write notebooks full of
observations, and then just dumping those observations into a big junk
pile. And there was the weird fact that it looked like Kelvin
deliberately let Desmond see the rip in his outfit on that day.
So, like many of the mysteries, there a couple of possible
explanations, with the simpler one being the one spelled out by the
producers. I suppose it went from being about 75% certain to being
100% certain.
ITEM:
"The manifestations on the Island (Yemi, the horse, Christian
Shephard, ...) are confirmed to be connected to the Monster."
ANALYSIS:
I guess it depends how we define "connected to." But I seem to recall
at other times them saying even more explicitly, things like how we
can see that the monster is somehow looking at people's memories or
looking into their minds.
I guess it depends at what point you say "Okay, they've given us so
many clues to it that now they can just casually spell it out."
I'll skip this one.
ITEM:
Desmond's turning the key in the fail-safe under the Swan station
prevented a "global catastrophe".
ANALYSIS:
Absolutely not clear. The show has not given us a reliable character
where we can trust that when he says a thing, it's true. I put this
at about 50% at best. It seemed clear that *something* was going to
happen if Desmond hadn't turned the key, but that something could have
just been a big explosion for all we had seen at that point.
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