Reflections on Watching Three Seasons of LOST in Three Weeks

In the last few weeks I spent the equivalent of TWO FULL DAYS watching Lost. And that’s even stripping out the “previously on Lost” bits.

I enjoyed it a lot, though I would not say I enjoyed it thoroughly and completely. My only dings at all are that it got a little bit too weird towards the end of season three (though I may change my mind on that when season four rolls around). Also, I feel cheated out of the back story on Libby, because before killing her off, they made it clear that she was in the psych ward with Hugo for a while, but they never pursued that story line.

I understand the appeal of the show, which I distill down into three areas.

It’s a story about people. People who are multi dimensional and have their own issues but, regardless of their issues are still “basically good.” This appeals to the Anne Frank in us all. Plus, this is somewhat like an Internet chat room or Craig’s List (except for the characters being FAR more interesting) in that you’re left feeling like, “I might have my issues, but I am not as f***ed up as these people!”

Secondly, like another favorite of mine, Heroes, the underlying premise to the whole thing is that there is meaning in life. Humans love, love, love looking for meaning and this show is based on the premise and entirely crafted from the point of view that everything means something.

Finally, as an offshoot of the first two, there’s this underlying premise that God and/or the Universe is somehow screwing with you. One of the reasons I tend to numb myself with TV at times is because I experience plenty of this in my everyday life and have had a few Lost-esque experiences in the last couple of years alone.

But at the end of the day, I still prefer Boston Legal to Heroes or Lost. While BL is sometimes a little out there, it’s a story about people who struggle to find meaning where it’s in no way obvious that there actually is any. This mirrors the true human struggle, the thing most people turn to TV to get away from. But the beauty of BL is it sucks you in and makes you laugh anyway. Two words: Denny Crane!

Nonetheless, I look forward to Season 4 of Lost in ’08.

The Trend is not Les Moonves' Friend

Per Bill Gorman:

But neither is it his competitor's friend either.


Lot's of hub bub about the Katie Couric move, but the reality is that the long term trend in broadcast nightly news viewing is down and nothing is going to change that.

Amen.

But will Mark Cuban be able to capitalize on this?

Die Paulie, Die!!!

Regardless of my personal feelings that not only was the Sopranos series finale lacking and the last few years weren't really very interesting to me either, I give David Chase the tip of the cap for being a creative genius. According to the Internet people are split down the middle. Me and my friend Bill G. are on opposite sides -- even Tony Kornheiser and Michael Wilbon disagreed on Pardon the Interruption. Interesting to me is how much smarter ABC is here than Time Warner itself -- the actual distributor of the show. ABC was all over capitalizing on the Sopranos sensation wherever it could. Even ESPN. PTI, a show about what's up in the sports world spent 10% of its air-time discussing (or arguing about) the Sopranos finale.

Time Warner, coroporate home of HBO on the other hand, had no mention of the finale AT ALL in its own Time Magazine. Perhaps they will capitalize with the next issue. The episode did seem to leave people wanting more, and sticking Tony's mug on the cover of Time should sell a few more copies. Maybe they were smarter than I was all along and wanted to rake it in on the aftermath instead of the "pre-finale hoopla". We'll know soon enough.

For me personally, only one change would've made a huge difference. I needed Paulie "Walnuts" Gualtieri offed to be fulfilled. It didn't work out that way so I wasn't.

DVRs Save Thursday Nights

According to this story from the Hollywood Reporter, ABC had success with Thursday nights for the first time since the Barney Miller days (well over 20 years) by switching Grey's Anatomy to Thursday nights. Because I'm long winded and have not yet refined my writing skills yet let me tell you the most important thing right now: CBS says that HALF of its viewership for the CSI that runs Thurdays vs. Grey's Anantomy is people watching on DVRs. HALF. HALF. That seems...shocking and outrageous...but cool as hell if it's true.

While I did sort of taste the Grey's kool-aide, I did so primarily because it became socially impossible to have a decent conversation with any woman over the age of 33 because there were simply too many Grey's references that I wasn't aware of.

To me, this show has roughly about the same appeal as an Internet chat room or Craig's List. Right in front of you, characters who are way more screwed up and depressing than anything you have going on in your own life. But Grey's notches this up because unlike most flakes in an Internet chat room the people actually have good jobs and are beautiful and ARE STILL MISERABLE AS HELL. This is a show about a bunch of people who have great lives but are chronically miserable as hell.

Anyway, the interesting thing about this story to me was the quote from CBS Research Chief, David Poltrack. Because although CSI on CBS did feel the pain of Grey's moving to Thursdays, it wasn't problematic according to Poltrack.

"In a non-DVR world, this would have been a tough situation for the viewer and for CBS in particular because 'Grey's' comes in there and people have to make a decision whether they're going to watch 'CSI' or 'Grey's,"' Poltrack said. "But with DVRs, people were able to watch both." Half the "CSI" viewership comes in playback mode, according to the CBS data.