The article that I intended to write in mid-December was Jumped The Snark’s list of the best shows of the 2000s (because I was the only blog on the face of the Internet that hadn’t weighed in on the matter). And at the top of the heap was going to be Lost, and not because it’s my subjective favorite, but because of what it represents, its overall impact. I won’t try to argue that it was the most tightly written, nimbly acted, nuanced, well-paced, consistently brilliant show of the last decade, because it’s probably not – that could be a number of other shows, from The Sopranos or Arrested Development or Veronica Mars or Freaks & Geeks or, from what I’ve seen in the first season, The Wire – but that’s not the point. What I believe sets Lost apart is that it was truly the first 21st Century television show, the first show of TV 2.0, because its reach expanded well beyond Wednesdays at 9pm. No other show before Lost permeated so deeply into other forms of media and popular culture. For several seasons, the morning after every new episode I spent a good hour reading recaps and theories and reader comments (and now, with Twitter, the feedback is even more instantaneous and somewhat overwhelming, but in a good way). For years now I’ve been listening to several fan podcasts as well as the official Lost podcast with Executive Producers Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse. The last few San Diego Comic-Cons have been dominated by Lost; they’ve become a highlight of the convention in a way that no other TV show had before. There were the multi-media ventures like the Lost Experience games, Find 815, and the “Missing Pieces” webisodes. Whenever the show dropped a literary allusion people immediately researched the book, and many even read the source text. It spurred interest in biblical history, in mythology, in ancient civilizations, and in Renaissance philosophers and enlightenment thinkers. It’s inspired people to learn. And it’s brought people together like no other show before. In many households (okay, apartments in Brooklyn) Wednesday night was Lost Night, a time to get together, order pizza, turn off your phones and have your minds blown, and then afterward commiserate over everyone’s mutual confusion. My first roommates were my roommates precisely because of our shared appreciation for the show; it created a bond stronger than friendship. For all those reasons, I felt that Lost was the best show of the aughts.
However, while watching the final season premiere last night I realized my argument was slightly off. I still believe that Lost was the best show of the decade, and all those reasons outlined above still apply. But, while under the spell of the show, I understood that I hadn’t given it enough credit. Yes, it’s spread through and utilized new media like no show before it. Yes, it’s become a multi-media experience. But it also deserves to be at the top because of the content, because of the strength, and the courage, of its stories. For the last six seasons Darlton and the team behind Lost have been staging perhaps the greatest (and longest) high-wire act in television history, almost certainly in network history. And the fact that Lost has been able to take these chances – flashbacks, dense mythology, mysterious corporations, flashforwards, time travel and, now, flash-sideways – on ABC makes their accomplishment even more impressive. It’s easy, and entirely correct, to look back on the 00s as the decade when the best shows on television slid way down the dial to HBO, Showtime, FX, AMC; but among this backdrop Lost could be found on a single-digit channel, delivering risky plot twists and head scratching game changers far beyond much of their cable brethren. The framework was more confined, but they found a way to do more, and they were never afraid to take a chance that might alienate their fans (save for Nikki and Paulo, whom I still sorta standby). And three years ago, Damon and Carlton did something else that was basically unheard of on network television, set an end date to their wildly popular show. They could have run the show into the ground, allowed ABC to renew it as long as it was profitable. But they wanted to honor their fans, and respect their own characters, and tell the story filler-free (and, clearly, this decision has been proven to be completely right, as seasons four and five were stellar down the line, and we haven’t’ had a repeat of season three “mini-season” misstep).
So as I begin to watch season six, and as the show inches closer toward its inevitable conclusion, we should realize that we’re lucky. There might not be a show like this again, at least not on network television. Is the acting always the best? No. The writing? No. The CGI? Definitely not. But no other show has competed with such a high degree of difficulty for such a long period of time. High risks, immense rewards.
Come May 23, when the show signs off with a 2-hour finale, it’s almost guaranteed that faction of die-hard Lost fans will be incredibly disappointed, unfilled, and maybe even angry. But then try to show me another show that can elicit the same kind of strong emotional reaction. If you can, I’ll revise the list. Until then, Lost will remain #1.