"Lost" producers discuss final season
David
Q&A: 'Lost' producers discuss emotional final season
by James Hibberd
Get ready return to the island one last time: The final season of
ABC's "Lost" is going to be an emotionally intense journey that harks
back to previous highlights of the series, with the ideological battle
between Jack Shephard and John Locke taking center stage.
By the time most major network shows cross the finish line, they're
limping in the ratings and creatively exhausted, wrung out by networks
and producers trying to mine just a few more hours. With "Lost"
producers having persuaded ABC to set 2010 as a series end date years
ago, the hit drama is going into its final lap with level of fan
anticipation rarely seen for the ending cycle of a broadcast show.
Below, executive producers Carlton Cuse and Damon Lindelof, give The
Hollywood Reporter their first full-length interview focusing on the
sixth season. What secrets will be revealed? How will fans react to
the ending? And what are Lindelof and Cuse's plans for life after
"Lost"?
Cuse and Lindelof assure that there's a satisfying cliffhanger-free
conclusion planned. And even after the May finale, there's almost
surely going to be more "Lost" to come.
THR: You obviously can't talk about the content of the ending. But how
do you think fans will feel about it?
Lindelof: That's a very cagey way of asking it. It's tough to
prognosticate. But the one area we're in agreement is there will be a
short-term reaction to the ending and then a legacy reaction that
comes six months, a year down the road, looking at the show as a
whole. Carlton and I were trying yesterday to remember what the final
season of "The Sopranos" even was about -- we couldn't remember much
about the finale itself except Anthony Jr. was going to go into the
Army and crashed his car and changed his mind. But we remember every
frame of the diner scene. What people take away from our finale is
going to be based purely on that two-hour episode, but our hope is
they'll be able to connect that experience to the six years that
preceded it.
THR: How would you describe this season in terms of its, say, tone?
What is it like compared to past seasons?
Cuse: We feel tonally it's most similar to the first season of the
show. We're employing a different narrative device, which we feel is
creating some emotional and heartfelt stories, and we want the
audience to have a chance in the final season to remember the entire
history of the show. So we have actors coming back like Dominic
[Monaghan] and Ian [Sommerhalder]. We're hoping to achieve a
circularity of the entire journey so the ending is reminiscent of the
beginning.
THR: Is there any one character's story line that you think
particularly emotionally resonates this season?
Cuse: Jack and Locke have always been at the center of the show, that
dilemma of faith vs. reason, and the conflict between those two
characters has been there since the beginning. It's very exciting to
bring that relationship to its conclusion, and we can't really be any
less vague about that.
THR: In the past few years we've had "Sopranos," "The Shield," "The
Wire" and "Battlestar Galactica" air final episodes. Any of them that
you felt concluded really well?
Cuse: I personally don't feel any of those were messed up, they were
all kind of appropriate for those stories. Shawn Ryan did a great job
ending "The Shield."
Lindelof: It really boils down to: Is it satisfying? Have you given
the audience an emotional ride that makes them feel they're satisfied,
that's a good meal? Every one of those shows had a different criteria.
The ending for "The Shield" was, asking whether Vic Mackey would get
some form of comeuppance for all the things he's done over the series.
That's a similar question that went into the "Sopranos" ending, which
is why people who didn't like the cut to black were unsatisfied,
because they felt, "I feel the resolution of this show has to be what
happens to Tony Soprano, and you didn't answer that question." The
"Battlestar" ending had 10 different things on its agenda other than
character resolution ... you have to admire it for the sheer audacity
for what it was trying to accomplish. That being said, the "Shield"
ending was phenomenal, and almost every fan of the show agrees with
that. Whereas the other shows -- and probably with the ending of
"Lost" -- there's some debate about the ending. "Did I like it? Did I
love it?"
THR: Have you boiled "Lost" down to a central question that the finale
needs to resolve?
Lindelof: The only question that's ever mattered to us is what is
going to happen to these people. What is the character resolution?
That the audience feels like the characters had an arc -- a beginning,
middle and end. And I'm satisfied with that. All the crazy island
mythology stuff, we love it, but it's like terrorists attacking Jack
Bauer -- it's stuff that happens in order to tell cool character
stories.
THR: You mentioned a narrative device, I'm assuming it's not a
flashback or flashforward?
Cuse: Musical numbers. If you love Bollywood movies, you will love
this season.
Lindelof: The show never rests on its laurels. Not because we're
trying to be artsy, but the show demands constant shifts to best tell
the story. We've known what we were going to do for a couple years
now, and there's been a tremendous amount of work setting up the
premise so it would work. But we're still wondering, "Will it work?
Will the audience understand? What's the reaction going to be like?"
THR: Since there is no footage being revealed in advance of the Feb. 2
season premiere, is there anything you can say to tease it?
Cuse: We ended with Juliet pounding on this atomic warhead. There's
Jack's prediction that the bomb will reset events and the plane will
never crash. There's the possibility that it doesn't work. We want the
audience to be pondering what is the consequence of Juliet hitting
that bomb. Our cliffhangers are designed to frame the question that we
want audience thinking about.
THR: Now that you're this far along, do you have a favorite season?
Lindelof: The first season is probably my favorite season, you forget
in hindsight all the pain that goes into doing the show.
Cuse: I'll say Season 5. We did something radical (by introducing time
travel) and embraced the sci-fi roots of the show. We were concerned
about doing this. But the fact people liked last season was enormously
gratifying.
THR: Do you have any plans to pitch a new show, on ABC or elsewhere,
for next season?
Lindelof: No. We don't. The world works in mysterious ways, but our
full-time job for the last six years has been coming in here and
working 70- to 80-hour weeks on "Lost." The idea of going back into
the fray Brett Favre-style is not alluring to us. When we finish
"Lost" we will disappear to our undisclosed locations then think about
things for a while.
Cuse: I think the one thing that's pretty certain is neither of us
have a great [urge] to do something that's this dense, sprawling and
serialized. You need to exercise different creative muscles.
Lindelof: My hope is to rip off other successful shows.
THR: Like you've been ripped off?
Lindelof: Exactly. Maybe a show about vampires that work in an ad
agency and one is a serial killer.
Cuse: Especially if the lead character is also cooking meth.
Lindelof: Oh, I hadn't thought of that. Almost guaranteed an Emmy.
"Breaking Bad Men."
THR: Could somebody still do that "Lost" pilot today?
Lindelof: When you look at development season last year and shows like
"FlashForward" and "V" and go, "Those shows are very expensive to
produce with the size of their cast and their [ambitious] premise."
But what's sort of strange is that they're a lot more overtly sci-fi
from the get-go. With the exception of a loud noise in the jungle and
it's weird that there's polar bears on an island, there were no
science fiction elements in the pilot of "Lost." In "Jaws" you don't
show the shark until an hour and a half into the movie. We feel like
you have a better chance making a "Lost" now because they want their
sci-fi to be stealth. You go to an "Indiana Jones" movie and they'll
say it's not sci-fi and you're like, "But their faces melted off!"
THR: You guys have said that you'll take the David Chase route and
skip town for the finale. What are your plans?
Cuse: We'll be watching the last episode here in L.A. We traditionally
have an intimate viewing party. We celebrate by renting out a
restaurant and set up big TVs, and then afterward we will disappear to
parts unknown.
THR: Who's going to write and direct the final hour?
Cuse: Damon and I will write, Jack Bender will direct.
THR: Any J.J. Abrams involvement?
Lindleof: We're going to invite him to the party. He's got about 10
different plates spinning. His contribution will be what is has been
the last five years or so -- as an incredible supportive fan, which is
pretty cool for us.
THR: Looking back, is there anything you would have done differently?
Cuse: The journey had to be the way it was. We both feel no regrets.
The meaning only becomes clear in hindsight, and we're still on that
journey so the meaning is not yet complete.
Lindelof: Look, it would be nice to look back and say, "We love every
episode of 'Lost,' and every episode turned out the way we wanted it
to." There are shitty episodes of "Lost" that we wish we had never
written. But had we not written them we would be in a different
situation now, because we ran out of ideas, we stalled, then the
network realized what we had been saying from early on -- that "Lost"
needed an end date. And now here we are six years later on broadcast
with a show that is -- not what it once was [in the ratings] -- but
still performing, and we're ending it on our own terms because we had
shitty episodes.
THR: Can you say definitively, after this final episode, there will
never be another produced hour of "Lost" on film, TV, Web, any medium
-- this is it?
Cuse: The Walt Disney Co. owns "Lost." It's a franchise that's
conservatively worth billions of dollars. It's hard to imagine "Lost"
will rest on the shelves and nothing will ever be made with "Lost."
Eventually somebody will make something under the moniker of "Lost" --
whether we do it or not. We just made a commitment to this group of
characters whose stories are coming to a conclusion this May.
Lindelof: Somebody made a sequel to "Gone With the Wind." Sometimes
the franchise transcends the storyteller. The definitive edition of
"Lost" ends this May on ABC, and that is the story that we have to
tell. It has a beginning, middle and end. That ending will not have
cliffhangers, or be set up in such a way that people will be saying,
"Clearly they're going to make more of these." We don't have any
connection to another TV series or movie, but there's a new "A-Team"
movie coming out, for god's sake. This is a business that thrives on
known commodities. "Tron" is the most buzzed-about Disney movie for
next year, and it has been gathering dust for 20 years. I cannot
imagine there will not be something with "Lost" on it involving smoke
monsters and polar bears and time travel.
THR: I started the interview asking how you think fans will feel about
the show ending. How will you feel?
Cuse: It's like Christmas. We have a great present we bought a long
time ago, and we're excited to have a recipient -- in this case, the
fans -- open it. There will also be some certain nostalgia and
sadness, like when you put away your holiday decorations.
Lindelof: There will never be Christmas again. It's impossible to tell
how we will feel the day after. It feels like my senior year in high
school. You've made these great friendships and relationships, but
you're going off to college and a new phase of your life is beginning.
Dimensional Traveler
> http://www.thrfeed.com/2010/01/lost-final-season-interview-.html
>
> Q&A: 'Lost' producers discuss emotional final season
> by James Hibberd
>
>
> THR: Have you boiled "Lost" down to a central question that the finale
> needs to resolve?
>
> Lindelof: The only question that's ever mattered to us is what is
> going to happen to these people. What is the character resolution?
> That the audience feels like the characters had an arc -- a beginning,
> middle and end. And I'm satisfied with that. All the crazy island
> mythology stuff, we love it, but it's like terrorists attacking Jack
> Bauer -- it's stuff that happens in order to tell cool character
> stories.
>
about the Island.
--
"The Internet lied again!"
AC
"Dimensional Traveler" <dtr...@sonic.net> wrote in message
news:4b44691a$0$1610$742e...@news.sonic.net...
This "its all about the characters" stuff is one of the worst cope outs
available to writers. Funny how they never say that at the beginning. "Hey
folks, we have this great sci-fi premise, but we have no intention of
explaining it because we are just writing for the characters." Yeah well,
while its fine and essential to get the characters right and interesting,
but you can't just piss over the sci-fi device(s) used to tell the
characters story.
When you boil it down, this is the question that's been being asked since
Lost began. Can the sci-fi elements be explained. Do the writers even want
to?
To be honest, I think I would rather leave the island mysterious than have
the writers come up with some thing crappy. I'm gonna hate that, but much
less than a load of nonsense explaining it.
AC
Ubiquitous
> THR: Have you boiled "Lost" down to a central question that the finale
> needs to resolve?
>
> Lindelof: The only question that's ever mattered to us is what is
> going to happen to these people. What is the character resolution?
> That the audience feels like the characters had an arc -- a beginning,
> middle and end. And I'm satisfied with that. All the crazy island
> mythology stuff, we love it, but it's like terrorists attacking Jack
> Bauer -- it's stuff that happens in order to tell cool character
> stories.
In other words, they have no clue how to tie together the crap they've
pulled out of their collective arses all these years.
--
It's now time for healing, and for fixing the damage the Democrats did
to America.
frater mus
> In other words, no intention of actually answer any of the questions
> about the Island.
Or at least no perceived compulsion to do so.
--
brother mouse
composed offline and synced later.
http://www.mousetrap.net/mouse/offline.html
THULL+
> --
> It's now time for healing, and for fixing the damage the Democrats did to America.
Thanks. I needed that. ROTFLMFAO....