TORONTO (Reuters) –
The characters of sci-fi TV drama
"Lost" wrap up their adventures on Sunday in a highly anticipated
finale that may yield even more questions for fans after six seasons of plot twists on the
show's mysterious tropical
island.
To keep fans glued to television screens, the ABC network
is airing a two-hour retrospective, "Lost: The Final Journey" ahead of
the show's two and one-half hour marathon finale at 9 p.m. EDT, followed
by late-night talk show "Jimmy Kimmel Live: Aloha to Lost."
In 59 countries, the final episode will air simultaneously or within 48
hours of Sunday's U.S. and Canadian broadcasts.
Since it's debut in 2004, "Lost" has won 58 awards, including Golden Globes and Emmys, and while viewership has
fallen since its early heyday among TV's top-rated dramas, "Lost" still
averages around 11 million viewers weekly in the United States and has
devoted followers in some 220 countries.
Those fans will be looking for answers to key questions about the
series' numerous mysteries, but the "Lost" creators have already warned
that, despite the extended finale, many lingering questions will likely
go unanswered.
Producers Damon Lindelof
and Carlton Cuse
have said that the final episode's storyline will continue
on a season six DVD with upward of 20 minutes of additional material.
Part supernatural adventure, part character-driven drama, "Lost" has
evolved from the story of 48 survivors of Oceanic flight 815 who find
themselves stranded on a mysterious
island into a complicated, mythological tale with an expansive
cast.
The series-ending season No. 6 began in the post hydrogen-bomb haze of
the 1977 Swan construction site explosion, and it has progressed at a
break-neck pace, shifting through time periods and giving more back
story on strange characters like Richard Alpert, Jacob and The Man in Black.
Fans were taken into a "sideways" alternate universe, which may come to a
climatic end when Jack, Kate, Hurley, Sawyer and other key characters
meet at a concert they've been wrangled into attending by Scotsman Desmond Hume.
Last Tuesday's episode, entitled "What They Died For," saw Jack drink from Jacob's cup and
ascend from good doctor to the island's new protector. But it remains
unknown if Jack, and the surviving candidates, can defeat The Man in
Black, who is currently in a parasitic relationship with John Locke's
corpse and hell bent on destroying the island.
In Sunday's finale, the 114th episode and fittingly entitled "The End,"
fans will be looking for new light on key questions to relieve six
seasons of mystery fatigue. Yet, "Lost" has been exceptional precisely
because its plots have been bereft of answers.
So, viewers should prepare themselves: they may never know why polar
bears inhabited a tropical, seemingly-deserted island paradise.