I Prove I Can Come Up With Better TV Shows Than Most Actual TV Writers - Part One

So. Lost is over. No more. Finished. The end.

It was a great show, with a great cast, but where do they go from here? I mean, some of them have proved themselves as some of the greatest actors of all time in this show (Michael Emerson) while others have... Not. (WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAALT!)

So I'm going to pitch some ideas for new shows for some of the actors here. You ready? I knew you were.



Michael Emerson

This guy is freaking brilliant. The way he can make anything sound creepy is both shocking, and awesome.



This is what he needs to play into in a new show I'd like to call...

"The Michael Emerson Power Hour"

Think of it as a Monty Python styled show filled with skits, only Michael Emerson PLAYS EVERY ROLL IN ALL OF THEM. They could range from parodies of children shows (Mr. Rogers, as played by Michael Emerson?) to SNL styled parody commercials where he could turn harmless objects into the creepiest thing you've ever seen? Creepy can be funny. All I'm saying.



Terry O'Quinn

The way Terry O'Quinn switched from being John Locke to the MiB so well in seasons 5 and 6, that was pretty darn good acting. That's why I'd like to pitch the new show...

"Where's That Doppelganger?"

The show would be a sitcom about a normal guy, let's call him Brad, who just so happens to live with his evil clone, let's call him Darb, created by his best friend, Zeke, a zany mad scientist. He can't let anyone know about his clone, or else Zeke will be arrested for illegal human cloning. So instead, he lets his doppelganger live with him, and his doppelganger gets a job working at a local coffee shop where ALL OF HIS FRIENDS like to hang out. As such, Brad never actually goes with them, telling them all he's moonlighting as a barista. There would be many episodes featuring zany misunderstandings! SO MUCH POTENTIAL!


Dominic Monaghan

Charlie was a great character. I liked Charlie a lot. What probably didn't occur to people is the Lost spin-off potential from the show, with a show I call *drumroll*

"Drive Shaft"

Imagine a "The Office" styled mockumentary show, following the band Drive Shaft and all about band life. Charlie could reprise his role, and the guest star, and tie in opportunities are endless. Not to mention the merchandising. Oh the merchandising.


Josh Holloway and Ken Leung


COP DRAMA STARRING SAWYER AND MILES. YES. Ok, ok, I can see where this could be problematic considering the fact that *spoiler* they were dead during the whole cop thing, but even if you didn't want to do a direct tie in with it, the idea still stands. A cop drama, starring Josh Holloway playing a cool cop who doesn't play by the rule (We'll call him Shmawyer.) and Ken Leung as his by-the-books partner who is his best friend, and incredibly loyal to him, but is frustrated by the way he... Well... Doesn't play by the rules.

WHO WOULDN'T WATCH THAT?


Jorge Garcia

Ok, this one is actually pretty difficult to me. I will always think of Jorge as Hurley. He will forever be ingrained in my mind as Hurley. I suppose if the Michael Emerson Power Hour doesn't pan out, the two of them could always do "Lost: The Ben and Hurley Years" set in the far flung future with the two of them controlling the island, as a new evil tries to destroy ZE WORLD...

Ok, that's a terrible idea. I don't know, but whatever he's in, I will probably watch it just because he's in it.


(Note: None of the above were in any way a joke. I don't care how rediculous the Michael Emerson Power Hour may be, I would watch it every week. And "Where's That Doppelganger" could be a really fun quirky sitcom.
Note 2: I titled this post Part One, because I may have more ideas in the future for incredibly awesome TV shows. Because I'm cool like that.)

The End

*Spoilers. Duh.*

What an ending. Lost, I gotta say, I'm impressed. You know, I've always loved lost. I've always though Lost has been brilliant. But the level of genius of this episode took it to the maximum.

This episode was beautiful, and gave the show a truly satisfying ending. Was every last minute detail explained? No. No it was not. Was the ending powerful and touching? Without a doubt.

This show has known how to do powerful, touching episodes. The Constant is an excellent example. Another is the moment I mentioned yesterday, the scene of Alex's execution. This episode followed up on that theme.

Overall, Lost has been a brilliant show, and I'd argue if you don't like it, you don't understand it. I know that's pretty much the ultimate cop out answer, but Lost has been an epic story of good and evil, love, betrayal, redemption, and ultimately this episode built upon all those themes and more. I love Lost. I will miss it. A lot.

From the first scene of Jack opening his eye, to the final scene mirroring that, Lost has been ingenious. From the idea of the flashbacks to build back story, while still progressing the plot, to the pacing which although slow, looking back was pretty much perfect. It's done things no other show has dreamed of. It's characters have grown on you to the point where, even though at the beginning of the season this wasn't true, at the end of the season I honestly can't say I disliked any of the characters. Even Kate.

Take the character of Sawyer. When the show first started, I couldn't stand Sawyer. As we saw more of his past, and I understood his motivations, he grew on me, and finally in the fifth season, when he and Juliet fell in love, he became one of my favorite characters. Then when Kate returned, and Juliet was convinced Sawyer still loved her... Well, that was pretty tragic.

Or Jack. Watching Jack go from being a broken individual to becoming what he was in the end of this episode... It was pretty cool.

Desmond. Desmond is one of my favorite characters too. You didn't really know what to expect when he first appeared in season two, but by the end of the series, his character had progressed. You cared about if he found Penelope again.

Hurley. Charlie. Claire. Locke. Watching the island change all of them was an excellent thing. Lost may have had good mysteries surrounding it, but the show was always about the characters. The way they built the entire show around the battle between good (Jacob) and evil (MiB), but never even revealed that until this season? Ingenious.

So now the show is over. I'm going to miss it. Lost was certainly an epic tale. Lost was possibly the greatest show of all time. So farewell Lost, it's time to move on. What a beautiful show.

The Most "WHAT JUST HAPPENED?" Moments of Lost

Well this is it. Tomorrow is the final episode of one of the greatest TV series in history. Lost has been an epic story. I'm not saying epic in the slang term of "DUDE THAT WAS EPIC!", I'm saying it has been an epic. Lost has been a fantastic story, with fantastic actors, writers, and moments that have made you go "WHAT?"

In fact, it's had a lot of moments like that. A LOT. So I decided to point out the best moments like that from the show.

*Warning: Spoilers follow. If you have not seen Lost and ever plan to, don't read this.*

Pilot - Where Are We?



From the very first episode. Charlie asks the question all of us are wondering, where are they? This is when you begin to realize just what you're getting into with this show. This is one of the most iconic scenes from the entire series.

Man of Science, Man of Faith - Opening



This is one of the best openings to any episode the show had. At first you're wondering if it's a flashback or not, and the moment you realize this is actually the inside of the hatch? Pretty cool.

Live Together, Die Alone - The Four Toed Statue



The scene where they see the Four Toed statue (which never comes into play again until the fifth season) stands out as one of the strangest moments of Lost. Right when you think you know what's going on, BAM. Four toed statue. Where did it come from? Where's the rest of it? Why does it have four toes? These questions stuck around in your head for a long time.

The 23rd Psalm - Smokey



After years of wondering what the monster could be... Oh. Hi. There it is. Right there. Huh.

A Tale of Two Cities - Downtown



Great scene mirroring the opening to season two. The twist at the end is awesome.

The Man Behind the Curtain - Help Me!



Still not sure what happened here, but it was awesome.

Through the Looking Glass - Not Penny's Boat



This moment is as "WHAT JUST HAPPENED?" as it is sad. So, there's a boat off the island, that they're trying to contact, because it apparently belongs to Desmond's girlfriend Penelope. Turns out, that's not entirely truthful. "Not Penny's Boat" is one of those moments that sticks with you as well. Especially with what a great character Charlie was. I miss Charlie. Sigh.

Through the Looking Glass - We Have To Go Back!



So, after years of getting used to flashbacks, doing this as the end of season 3? Brilliant. Absolutely brilliant. For the whole episode, you assume it's a flashback. Revealing it's actually a flashforward of them off the island? Brilliant.

The Shape of Things to Come - The Execution of Alex


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This is the moment Ben went from being evil, to broken. This is the moment I went from hating Ben, to feeling sorry for him. This is a truly tragic, and shocking scene.

Cabin Fever - He Wants Us To Move The Island


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Oh. Ok.

There's No Place Like Home - He's Coming Too.



Not my favorite ending to a season, but the final shot was pretty good. The shot of Locke in the coffin is pretty crazy.

The Life and Death of Jeremy Bentham - Life

Oh. Maybe he's not so dead after all.

The Life and Death of Jeremy Bentham - Death



Or maybe he is.

The Incident - Do You Have Any Idea How Much I Want to Kill You?



After hearing about Jacob for so long, and finally seeing him and the man in black? Great scene. GREAT. SCENE.

The Incident - The Nuke



And that was it. For a year, that was all we saw. That was the last image, burned into our minds. I think this is the best season finale any show has ever done. Ever. It's one of them at least. Not to mention the fact that this was tragic, especially since Sawyer had become such a great character over this season, and Juliet was always awesome.

LAX - Underwater



I'm still not sure if this will have any kind of explanation, but it did make me go WHAT JUST HAPPENED? I'll give it that.

So there you have it. While those aren't all the moments like that, there's too many moments like that to list in one blog post, those are the big ones for sure. Well Lost, you certainly were a great series. I'll miss you.

The Reason I Haven't Posted in a Month, and why Flash Forward Is Kind of Terrible

So, I haven't posted in a month, and even before that posts were erratic at best. So what's the reason, you might ask? Well, theoretical reader who doesn't actually exist, the reason isn't what you might expect. No, it's not that I've been busy, or some such nonsense, it's not that I have a life, and it's certainly not because I've been neglecting this blog and playing games instead. The reason is simple: Time travel.

You see, it's actually only been 5 minutes since I last posted, but because of my highly technical time traveling device, it's been a month for you guys. Simple, see?


IN OTHER NEWS:

I really want to like the show Flash Forward. I really do. It's a good premise... But the show is just disappointing. And do you know why? They're trying to be Lost. The problem with that is, quite simply, Lost does Lost a lot better than Flash Forward does lost.

Lost has great characters, and a great overall mystery.
Flash Forward had terrible characters, and a decent overall mystery.

The Lost characters are all very well developed. Take for example, Sawyer:
James Ford (AKA Sawyer) has shown many sides during Lost. When we first meet him, he seems very one-dimensional. He's the bully of the group, who steals, calls names, and is just an overall jerk.

Later on, you find out he's a Con Man. That fits, right? Well, you also find out that when he was younger, a man named Sawyer conned his father, who then went crazy, and killed his mother, and then himself. Thus, Sawyers beginnings.

Now, I never really liked Sawyer much until last season. That showed us a new side of Sawyer, when he settled down in Dharmatown with Juliet. This new side of him was very interesting, and showed that deep down there was more to him than that one-dimensional con man we saw in season one. And now, with Juliet dead, his character just gets more and more interesting.

In contrast, the more we see the character of Jack, the token "Good guy" character, the more we see him for what he is. He has a messiah complex. He wants to save everyone, no, needs to save everyone, not for their sake, but because he wants everyone to view him as a savior. That's why he wanted to go back to save the survivors. Not for their sake, but because he wants people to praise him as a savior.

Thus, since the first season, in my opinion at least, the way Jack and Sawyer are perceived has reversed, Sawyer wants to save people for their sake, and doesn't care what people think of him, while Jack just wants the praise for being a savior. That makes the whole thing a lot more interesting, not being sure how you're supposed to view them in the first place any more.

Meanwhile, Flash Forward has such memorable characters as:
Mark Benford, who is an FBI Agent with a history of drinking, and a fear he may return to it.
Olivia Benford, Mark's wife, who's afraid she may betray him.
Lloyd Simco, who's trying to be a good father, and is struggling with guilt from his belief that he caused the blackout.

I'd like to say that there was more to each character than that... But there really isn't.

There's more too.

Gay cop, FBI boss, guy who doesn't think he's going to live, I can describe most the Flash Forward characters in a sentence or less.

The worst example though, is the character of Charlie Pa- I'm sorry, Simon Campos, who's defining trait in my mind is, in case you couldn't tell, that his actor played Charlie on, you guessed it, Lost. Even worse than that though, his character feels to me like a poor attempt of what Lost did, of making deep characters, with the most recent episode being the defining example of this.
"He's a bad guy.. But he's doing it because he loves his family! He loves his family so much that he's killing his family! YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY!"
I'm sorry, but it's a big problem when I've been watching your show for months now, and I still call one of your characters the name of the character their actor played on another show.

So what's the fix? Simple: Stop trying to be Lost. Be yourself! You have a good idea for a mystery with the Flash Forwards! Just stop trying to make people care about your characters so much, and just focus on the Flash Forwards. Also, kill off Mark. Seriously, he's just annoying.

I said, months before the show started, that the show could go either way, on the one hand, if they made it just another cop show, it would be bad. On the other, if they made it a show that focused on the idea that EVERYONE had a Flash Forward, and what it would mean, and how it would change life to have to account for the future, not just the past, then it would be good. Now, Flash Forward keeps saying that they're doing that, ("Everyone makes choice based on what WILL happen now!") but they don't ACTUALLY do it.

You know what a show I'd rather be watching is? One that's not about Mark. Lloyd and Simon, while neither are interesting characters, make the show itself more interesting while they are onscreen, just because they focus less on the characters, and more on the mystery.

You know who my favorite character on Lost is? Hurley. He's fun, and he has a good, fleshed out character. At first he seemed like just comic relief, and it's true, for the most part he is still just comic relief. But there's MORE TO HIM than just that.

You know who my favorite character on Flash Forward is? I don't have one. I'm so indifferent about all of them, that I cannot pick one out as my favorite.

That's a problem, and it's on they really need to fix. Oh well, at least I still have V.