Lost: Part 1

 I'm watching Lost for the fourth time (thanks, Netflix). Apparently so are thousands of other people around the world, making the series a global phenomenon for the second time. 

Warning: the final season and especially the last episode always reduce me to tears -- ugly, uncontrollable, cathartic tears -- and I plan to blog about it. And no, the tears are not because of the shitshow that is the final season. I can't quite explain it, but this show does things to me. So why would I put myself through that -- again? Because the series is that good. 

I've been reading articles that other people have been posting about rewatching the series, like me, and watching the series for the first time -- and, most interesting, watching people watch the series for the first time, including this hilarious one. Something that keeps coming up is that new viewers, unscarred by years of waiting for some sort of solution to the many mysteries of the island, don't hate the last season. In fact, they think it's pretty good. And they can't understand why we think it means what we think it means.

I'm trying so hard not to give spoilers here. If you haven't watched the series, stop here. Your viewing should be unmarred by any expectations.

I, like everyone else, thought that the last season, especially the last episode, meant that everyone had been dead all along. That everything the characters had gone through had been part of some kind of shared purgatory, lowering the stakes (because they could never have been rescued and all the trials they experienced were meaningless set-ups) and rendering its mysteries void.

Apparently, and this is a big apparently, we were wrong. It's one reading, but one that new viewers don't share. Which means that we're all obliged to rewatch the series and see why our cynicism led us to the worst possible conclusion. All hands on deck. Or bamboo. Or whatever.

But I started rewatching the series before I read these articles and the mystery deepened. Why? Some people, most of them uncultured heathens, don't like the series for the reason the rest of us love it: the mysteries. I once read that people formed viewing parties each week, after which they'd discuss their theories about where the island was, what the Dharma initiative was, what the numbers meant, who the others were, what happened to Walt and more. 

I'm a viewing party of one. And so far, I want to know two things: where the polar bears came from and what the smoke monster is.

The series may be the product of several writers' imaginations, but it became something more concrete over the years. It doesn't matter that we don't have any answers (or that we have several hundred instead) -- the island exists out there somewhere now because we willed it into being. The mysteries are the important thing, the soil on which the island is built, and the joy of the series is uncovering clues and piecing them together -- no matter whether or not they actually lead somewhere. It's a Schrodinger's box situation; they're both there and not there at the same time.

In Part 2, I plan to discuss the first thing that intrigued me about the series: the characters and what they represent. But I rarely plan my posts (no sarcasm needed, thanks) (this one was meant to be about how the first season primes us to read the final season as we did, so I guess that'll be forthcoming too), so who knows. See you in the next one.

Questioning my sanity

So I've finally done it. No, not started (re-re-restarted) Ulysses, because if I could get past the first 20 pages, I swear I would pay for one of those sky-writing messages. I think reading (never mind understanding) the 500+ pages of grammar no-nos that is Ulysses may be a bigger accomplishment than writing the darn thing. (Calm down. I'm kidding.)

I could keep anticipating your guesses, but it's Friday night and I'm tired, so I'm just going to get right to My Point (I'm as surprised as you).

I finally started Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand. 

This may be a Ulysses situation, where I read the first 20 pages 50 times and then give up, but this book has sentences with full stops so I'm fairly certain I'll get to page 50. (Again, I'm kidding. Although my Kindle says that it will take another 54 hours to read both Atlas Shrugged and The Fountainhead, which is a pretty daunting prediction.)

I've been avoiding it because it has been described as the 'Bible of capitalism' and I have some fundamental issues with capitalism as a social system. Although, can you really call it a social system if it's designed to benefit the few and ignore the needs of the rest of the population? (Relax, it's just a question.)

Then I read Anthem and I was (predictably) annoyed. A little more than annoyed, actually. The premise isn't that unusual: a communist fever dream where everyone is controlled by a central force and difference is anathema. My issue with these types of stories is the assumption that communism is the same thing as socialism (this is directed more at the reader than the author) and that it inevitably leads to a grim dystopia (this is wholly in the pen of the author).

I promised myself then that I wouldn't read Atlas Shrugged because I value my sanity. So what has changed? Nothing. Except that maybe my sanity is in a less precarious state. Or it's teetering on the edge of a rock on the edge of a precipice and a gust of wind will push me over into an abyss. I guess we'll have to see.