If you don’t watch LOST, then don’t bother reading this post. I really shouldn’t do this. I don’t really have time, and this is not really the place. But the show LOST has been a big part of our culture over the last 6 years, and Trent and I are huge fans. We were both crazy excited for the first season to come out on DVD in September 2005, and we talked about the show all summer, waiting not-so-patiently to find out WHAT WAS DOWN THAT HATCH? That first season was just STELLAR. Oh, by the way, the season 2 premiere we watched in the hospital, the DAY CARSON WAS BORN! Ha! And we had heard it is fun for the husband to get the wife a little “push present” and give it to her during labor. Mine? Was the Season 1 DVD! Ha! I still remember watching it in the middle of the night as I was nursing Carson. See? We’re big fans.

SO. Now it’s over, and I’m still a fan. They almost lost me a few times during the 6 years (Paulo and Nikki, anyone?), but knowing they had to wrap things up this month kept me hooked. I knew there was no way they could answer all the questions I had, or that you had, but I think they kept true to the nature of the show, which was about the characters themselves, whom we had gotten to know so well. I loved the themes about good and evil, love, sacrifice and redemption. Awesome! The finale was emotionally satisfying, if not logistically satisfying. Just great storytelling.

I’ve been on several different message boards, and to be honest, it’s a little too overwhelming! I have a dozen or so questions, and don’t have time to read through 25,295 posts to see if someone answered it, or if 25,000 of those posts were die-hard fans with bad spelling or angry fans with bad spelling. So, I’m creating my own little forum and invite your input.

My interpretation of the finale was this: that everything that happened on the island was real and actually happened. The crash, the hatch, the bomb, the time travel, Jacob, Smokey, moving the island…all of it. It’s a magical, mysterious place and this show is part fantasy and part sci-fi. But the Sideways world was some sort of in-between life, or purgatory, where all the characters met many, many years later, after ALL of them had died at different times. It was a place for them to be reunited before they went on to heaven or hell or whatever the writers or characters think happens next. Here’s a list of questions and comments that I can think of right now. I may add more later in a different color font:

*Why did the Others kidnap a select few of the Tailies, including the nice flight attendant and the children? Did Jacob tell them to do that?

*Did we ever learn what was up with Walt’s special powers?

*Why couldn’t women have babies there?

*What’s the deal with Widmore? I’m not exactly sure what he was doing back on the island this season, and his death was SO anticlimactic for such a central part of the plot. Also? Why was his wife Eleanor trying to STOP Desmond in the sideways world? What’s her deal?

*Very happy to see Rose, Bernard and Vincent alive and well. That scene was great.

*Not even one moment for a reunion with Desmond and Penny?! COME ON!

*Also? Nadia was Sayid’s true love, not SHANNON!

*Why did Kate switch from a black dress to tank and skirt in the church?

* Christian said the characters “created” the Sideways world so they could be reunited with the most important people in their life. Did you interpret that the Sideways world was created by Juliet blowing up the bomb?

*Why weren’t Miles & Pilot Frank in the church? They had become main characters that were well liked. Why didn’t Ben go in?

*Was there any significance to the shots of the wreckage at the very end, or was that just a final moment of nostalgia and bookending?

*Jack’s eye closing was PERFECT in my opinion. When I saw him walking through that bamboo, I called it. Loved it.

*Still a little unclear about how Desmond knew about the Sideways world in real time on the Island, just as he was about to be lowered into the light. He told Jack about a place where they’d all be happy and together. Did he “go” to that place during one of his electro-magnetic shocks? And was his whole purpose that he could withstand the electro, so he could be lowered into the light cave and pull the plug?

What are your unanswered questions? Comments? Answers to my questions? Do share! Please be respectful.