Get LOST!
Dr. Jack Shepherd sifts through the wreckage for survivors
If you haven't yet discovered ABC's new series Lost, on Wednesday nights, then you are depriving yourself of this season's most thrilling new show. Relentlessly suspensful, lavishly produced, and pitch-perfectly cast, Lost is guaranteed to be a winner with critics and fans alike.
Somewhere over the Pacific ocean, a transoceanic jetliner tears itself apart, spewing human and metallic flotsom over the vast ocean before burying itself on an uncharted island where 48 survivors pull themselves from the gnarled wreckage. Traumatized, injured, and frightened, the survivors must band together and find some way to surmount their situation, their distrust of each other, and their own dark, personal secrets. If they cannot, they will die--lost either to their circumstances or to something monstrous that hunts them from within the dark jungle that surrounds the twisted remains of their downed plane.
J.J. Abrams, the creator of Alias has delivered yet another superb, action-packed adventure story. Lost is filmed in Hawaii and boasts breathtaking scenery and cinematography; production values that have rarely been higher (the pilot was the most expensive ever produced for television); a musical score that is both majestic and haunting; and acting from a top-notch ensemble cast: Matthew Fox (of Party of Five fame, but here clean-cut and reminiscent of L.A. Confidential and Memento's Guy Pearce) leads the cast as a heroic doctor. Newcomer Evangeline Lilly is an unlikely leader with a hidden secret. Dominic Monaghan (Merry in The Lord of the Rings trilogy) is a washed out rock star. Jorge Garcia is a man with an unearthly sense of calm and warmth despite the desperate situation. Naveen Andrews (The English Patient) is a Middle Eastern man embroiled in suspicion and racial profiling. Harold Perrineau (Matrix II and III, William Shakespeare's Romeo + Juliet) is a father who has just gained custody of a son he barely knows. Terry O'Quinn (JAG, The X-Files) is a loner with a spooky symbiosis to the island. Daniel Dae Kim (Spiderman 2) and Yunjin Kim are a Korean couple whose way of life gets lost in translation. Josh Holloway is a brash and dangerous malcontent. And self-centered Maggie Grace and her estranged brother, Ian Somerhalder must put aside their bickering and learn to get along if they are to survive. It is a lesson they all must learn.
After only two episodes (the pilot was two hours long but was broken into two stand-alone episodes and will be reshown in its entirety this Saturday, October 2nd) I find myself unmercifully addicted to this intoxicating new show. I strongly recommend giving the electrifying Lost a chance and finding out what so many people already can't talk enough about.
posted by Brandon at 2:57 PM
1 Comments:
Sometimes, in order to emphasize a point, character trait, or theme, screenwriters must use hyperbole--exaggeration--to drive the idea home. This is especially true in a television program during which vast amounts of character information must be disseminated in so short an amount of time. The screenwriters feel that it is more important that Daniel Dae Kim's character take on shades of overstatement in order for you, the viewer, to have some sort of emotional reaction to his behavior. This amplified aspect of his behavior is a reference point for his character. Your disgust and intrigue at his absurd actions in the midst of this chaos is exactly what they wished to induce. “Why the hell is this man acting like this when he has just been through this massive trauma?” is exactly what they want you asking. Score one for LOST.
Moreover, the utter and absolute ludicrousness of Maggie Grace's character sunbathing in the middle of hell shows both A) her disproportionate self-centeredness, B) her false belief that this accident is temporary and will be remedied with rescue any time now, and C) the level of shock she has gone through so as to rearrange her basic human priorities and motivations. Her actions and your reactions are again totally to script. Why else would her brother have commented as he did in the second episode about her giving herself a pedicure while the rest of the survivors stack the dead bodies like cordwood? Your emotions are being played like so many susceptible instruments gentleman. Again, I must score one for LOST.
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