By participating in and perpetuating the theory-school of Lost fandom, the show’s creators no doubt think they’re fanning the flames of the Lost phenomenon. But this afternoon I got thinking that maybe they’re actually doing the show a disservice. Not because I don’t personally go in for theories, mind you–I mean that they might think they’re building buzz, and therefore ratings, for the show when in fact they might be driving potential and actual audience members away.
Here’s the thing: How many times have you heard people say they can’t follow the show, that they have no idea what’s going on, that it’s over their head? But I don’t think Lost is over anyone’s head. Strip away the intriguing sci-fi elements and occasionally baroque flashback/flashforward structure and it’s an action-adventure show about sweaty sexy people shooting things and Frenching each other on a tropical island–a very very compelling and well-made one, of course. I think the greatest trick the show ever pulled was convincing people it was over their heads by making people think that instead of simply watching and enjoying it, you need to “figure it out.” As I’ve said, you can never figure the show out based on what you’ve seen because there are still two and a half unseen seasons chock full of information that will change the big picture. So if that’s the level at which you’re engaging the show, you will always feel outsmarted by it, and for many viewers that’s going to drive them away from watching it at all.
The other day some of the other commenters at Alan Sepinwall’s blog were picking over what it means that Baltar on Galactica was visited by his own “head” version. Could this be a clue as to who or what these ghost-Cylons really are? My theory, though, is just that it was a permutation the writers hadn’t tried before and thought it would be interesting. Why not just enjoy the performance?
Seems to me that you could draw an analogy between the sort of “audience building” LOST is doing and most of the comics output of the Big Two’s “audience building.”
By which I mean “servicing.”
I think the greatest trick the show ever pulled was convincing people it was over their heads by making people think that instead of simply watching and enjoying it, you need to “figure it out.”
Well… in your typical mystery, it’s not crazy to try to pick up clues from what’s going on to see where something is going; that is the whole idea behind a mystery. A well-constructed one WILL leave clues throughout the arc, so the ending doesn’t appear to be pulled completely out of someone’s ass.
If nothing that’s been shown so far can indicate anything and you can no-better guess what’ll happen now than you could after the pilot episode, then I have to ask: What has been the damn point of all these protracted seasons?
I don’t mean to imply that trying to figure out what’s going on shouldn’t be PART of your experience. Of course the show is a mystery, of course the mysterious elements are intriguing and compelling, of course that means you’ll try to determine what they mean and where they’re headed. My point is that a) the focus is on creating Grand Unified Theories rather than analyzing clues like a regular mystery, which leads to a far more frustrating experience if this sort of thing is not your cuppa; b) the emphasis is frequently placed first and foremost on this kind of interaction, rather than on the performances, the excellent cinematography, the drama, or just the simple fun of not knowing what’s going on and being brought along for the ride. Jim’s example from BSG is an excellent one: the near-panicked desire to decode every single thing that happens intereferes with the pleasure of not knowing.
Ah! OK. Then yeah, fuck those people.
Ah! OK. Then yeah, fuck those people. It’s part of that fandom thing: Treat everything like trivia, because it’s much easier to decode than interpret. It’s also far less pleasurable, but there’s a large segment of genre fandom that doesn’t really seem to get any PLEASURE out of their obsessions, so at least that fits…