Lost: The End Review

Whether you love the hell out of it (which is me) or you never caught on and never fully understand, you can't deny that Lost has made a giant smashing impact in pop culture and is considered one of television's most beloved phenomenons. Its fair that the mysteries of the show have become bigger and bigger and at time, lucrative and ridiculous, but we all accepted it as the show's narrative progress and it is a very clever techniques to draw us in and to explore the themes and mythologies it presented. The show gave us a wild and fantastical, yet an intellectual and analytical roller-coaster ride for 6 years and now like a novel, it comes to the final chapter. For a show that is very huge on its stories and mysteries, its understandable that not all questions will be answered and the ending won't make some of the audiences satisfied. What matters about the finale is that the important questions will be answered and resolved and it is for the fans who have stuck with the show, theorizing and analyzing for all these years. And I tell you that these fans won't be left insulted and bamboozled from this. The finale was handled and crafted very well, never used any cheap ploys or surprises and, in true Lost fashion, really does confuse you in the end and requires some re-watching before you fully understand. It is a very fitting, emotional and downright-worthy ending that is perfect for a kind of show like Lost.







*WARNING MAJOR SPOILER ALERT*

The finale is a 2 and half hour episode that wraps up most loose ends and resolve the matter of the Island while giving us emotional tie-in with these characters. It is until the final 15 minute of the episode that we find out what the entire show is REALLY about. And what it is really about is nothing that is convoluted, elaborate or set on a giant conspiracy scheme, but something much more simpler and somewhat general. It is about inevitability. It is about life. It is about love. It is about the journey any person take and the memories we take along with it. No, it is not a ploy where everyone on the plane dies and the Island is in fact purgatory. What established and happened on the Island is certainly real and certainly not wasted. The introduction of the "flash-sideways" able us to view the characters in their alternate lives, where they are able to live off much-more happier and content. We never got to know what was this alternate universe and assume that it is an epilogue to the show, until now. What this alternate universe really is makes more sense and natural when Jack finally finds the coffin that contains his father's body, only to find it empty. His father, looking alive and well stands behinds Jack and it all sums up from the few words exchange from both Jack and his presumed-dead father, Christian:

Jack: You died?
Christian: Yes, yes I did...
Jack: Then... how are you here right now?
Christian: How are YOU here?

At first, I was taken aback that the show would come up with this plotline, that everyone on the plane is dead. But Christian's further explanation reassures and everything makes sense. The Island is real and the flash-sideways is really a purgatory for every characters, a place "where they all made together, so they can find one another". They have been through the most important time of their lives and need one another to move on, to never do it alone. How these characters died are variable whether they died on the Island before Jack, or they died LONG after the Island. "Everyone dies sometime kiddo" as Christian puts it. Once they were able to remember one another, they are able to be with each other and move on to a far better place. Thus making the reunion of the core characters more natural and understandable and it makes it ever more bittersweet and emotional. It is about the people you spend your time with, whether it is with the people from Lost or from your own lives. How are we able to observe them growing from what they use to be to far someone better and spending our time with them through good and bad, even you spend it on crazy dangerous island. It is what the finale is about and it comes full circle at the end.

On the Island, we can't also forget that matter where Jack has to stop Smokey from destroying the Island and possibly the world. Its a simpler plot, but makes up with many great performances, lots of tension and many awesome moments especially the showdown between Jack and Smokey. But how I knew that this series was ended with great respect and craftsmanship was how the episode visually and finally end. It all comes back to full circles and inevitability. Jack, having to kill Smokey and stop the Island from destroying the world only to sport a fatal wound in the liver, walks himself into the bamboo forest where we first found him ever in the series while inter-cutting with the flash-sideways/purgatory reality where we see that emotional reunion between the cast inside a church before they move on. Jack lies on the ground while Vincent the dog comes in to keep him company and he sees the plane containing the last remaining survivors flying away safely, giving him a sigh of relief. A huge blanket of light envelopes all the lost souls. Then the final shot is, in the same manner of the first shot we ever see in Lost, Jack's eye closing. That is the end of the show. Full circle and perfect.



It is a series finale that not everyone will be happy about or will not understand. It will get fans to re-watch the episode again, contents will be interpreted differently by some people and audiences will be divided. However for the true fan of Lost who have been watching since season 1, it will be rewarding to obtain every pieces of the puzzle and to put them together to gain this golden knowledge. And as I said, this finale is for the fans and the fans will be satisfied in the end. And as a huge Lost fan, I came out of it VERY satisfied.



Now I'll pick out five favorite moments of the Lost series finale:





Every Memory Sparks From Each Of The Characters


Seems cliched that the element of love will prevail upon these characters, but if you have been sticking around with these characters for many years, it is hard not to get gooey once they have been reunited and discover true love for each other. Couples like Charlie and Claire and James and Juliet will have your hearts beating once their memory sparks starts to fly.

Jack and Smokey's Showdown On The Cliffs



Though the fight was kinda brief, the setting is just perfect. Jack, the newly-appointed Jacob duking out against the evil Smoke Monster using the body of Locke on top of a rocky cliffs in a middle of a stormy weather...Oh F*ck Yeah! Classic good-vs.-evil battle and it is one we have been waiting for. Ironically Jack is saving Locke through spinal surgery in the flash-sideways while Jack is beating the crap out of Locke on the Island.

Hurley Becomes New Leader Of The Island With Ben As His Assistant


Everybody LOVES Hurley and if you don't, you have no soul. That's why when Jack appointed Hurley as the new leader, it felt so right. Feeling that the job may be too big, he sought help to the one person who has immense amount of experience, Ben. Seeing Ben light up so bright when he felt so needed is just a joyful thing to see. Plus that would make an odd couple to actually take over the Island. I smell a spinoff!

Ben's Conclusion


Ben has been, throughout the entire series, a complex manipulative side-switching villain of a bastard... and that's why we love him. In purgatory world where most of the characters are inside ready to move on, Ben decides to stay a bit longer as he has alot of repenting to do. Even though he has done the one good thing in the end, he has done many bad things in his lifetime and will not get over them until he's ready.

The Ending



From the huge revelation to the emotional silent reunion to the final shot of the series, these sequence of events prove to be a beautiful and poetic send-off of the series. Inter-cutting with the joyful reunion of the characters with Jack struggling through the bamboo forest before he dies accompanied with the music scored by the ever-talented Michael Giacchino, it is one joyful, teary-eyed perfect way to say goodbye to the characters we journeyed together on that crazy Island. The fact it ends on the same place we found Jack in the very beginning of the series and closes with the series with Jack's eye closing just comes full circle and makes the series... whats the word.. complete.

All I can say now is that I want to thank the creators, the cast, the people behind the show and the people supporting the show for bringing such an extraordinary series to the TV screen. I tell you it'll be a very very long time before we come across as unique and brilliant as Lost.

Mini Reviews - Persepolis

Persepolis

Marjane is precocious and outspoken young Iranian girl who was nine years old during the Islamic Revolution when the fundamentalists first take power--forcing the veil on women and imprisoning thousands. She cleverly outsmarts the "social guardians" and discovers punk, ABBA and Iron Maiden, while living with the terror of government persecution and the Iran/Iraq war. Then Marjane's journey moves on to Austria where, as a teenager, her parents send her to school in fear for her safety and, she has to combat being equated with the religious fundamentalism and extremism she fled her country to escape.

An intriguing and wistfully coming-of-age autobiographical tale of a girl growing up in war-torn social-provocative Iran, told with simple, yet beautiful animation. The film plays so innocently as Marjane, the girl finds her identity and views in Iran and outside of Iran. Marjane is a very interesting and layered character as being a girl raised in Iran where she is independent and clever and thinks beyond the religious aspects and standards. It may look dull on the outside, but it never is and the film is consistent in having a good flow of the story. Its a real witty and charming film and a must-see for animation lovers.

4 out of 5 stars

Rare And Buried: The Toxic Avenger

The Toxic Avenger

This is the story of Melvin, the Tromaville Health Club mop boy, who inadvertently and naively trusts the hedonistic, contemptuous and vain health club members, to the point of accidentally ending up in a vat of toxic waste. The devastating results then have a transmogrification effect, his alter ego is released, and the Toxic Avenger is born, to deadly and comical results. The local mop boy is now the local Superhero, the saviour of corruption, thuggish bullies and indifference.

The legendary flagship series of the Troma Films and it took me a long time before I actually sat down and watch this. I'll say this... I could have really love it. The first half of this film was awesome at its best with its great kills, ridiculous characters and a simple superhero mythology. However by the last act, the craziness and violence kind of died down and becomes less of what the film establish itself to be. I still like it and two of the kills were some of the best I have seen, especially the use of its effects. If you're not familiar this series and you want gory fun goodness, go find this!

3 out of 5 stars

Iron Man 2 Full Review

As I said about the comic-book character, Iron Man, I was never entirely a huge fan of the character as I was more into Batman, Spider-man, Superman, etc. Iron Man seems like Marvel's version of Batman (which he kinda is) and the fact that alter ego, Tony Stark fully relies on the "robo" suit to fight, was some way off-putting for me. Which is why I didn't go into the first Iron Man movie with great interest. However it ended up being one of the great and fresh movies of that year, only to be shadowed by a little movie called "The Dark Knight". This year, no giant competitions stand in its way (except for maybe Kick-Ass) and it has that chance to be the legendary monster hit The Dark Knight was. And this time, I went into the theater with excitement. How it turned out....

.... It turned
out ok...

Wasn't great, wasn't horrible... it was good. I
wouldn't say (in my opinion) not quite better than the first one.

I black out after a few Tequilas and somehow I got into this...

Let's get into what this is about. After Tony reveals to the world
he's Iron Man, everybody loves him as he does service to provide peace. All except for the government who wants his Iron Man suit for military purposes, rival weapons manufacturer Justin Hammer who wants to beat him, a Russian named Ivan Vanko who wants him dead and himself who wants to live life with dares and parties because he finds out he's dying from overuse of his power arc. Meanwhile (in what actually took major grounds of this film), Tony and Nick Fury sets up this kind of Avenger-like team. Oh and James Rhodes becomes War Machine, played by Don Cheadle, who STILL does not look like James Rhodes. God you had the perfect guy for that and his name was Terrance Howard. Its simple and popcorn-ish, yet doesn't really add much.

Did I expect too much?
Did I hype it alot before I went in? I don't know, but I expect much from Kick-Ass and I ended up loving it. I still like it and pretty much enjoyed it. It probably that the second film ran into the same problems that first one had and it had every chance to improve on it. What I love about the first one is its fresh and interesting character arc of Tony Stark, played brilliantly by Robert Downey Jr. and his journey of one traumatic experience that gives him that realization in improving his legacy while still being able to screw and party. In this film, this goes through that same arc again except replacing the problem with another that is not far from the first. What I'm trying to say is that I felt it was missing the freshness the first movie possessed and that nothing entirely new rises from Iron Man's previous journey. Robert is still as charming and dare-say damn cool as ever as Tony Stark, but (for me) it wasn't enough.

You better be worth replacing Terrance Howard, you know...

Another problem that still exist are the villains. When it comes to
Iron Man, he doesn't have a good roster of recognizable and interesting villains to the casual audience and I know its hard to find one (Try bringing The Mandarin to the big screen!). This comes to the inclusion of Whiplash (a combination of Blacklash and Crimson Dynamo) played by Mickey Rourke and Justin Hammer played by Sam Rockwell. Whiplash was (sorry to say this) pretty much underused in this movie and is placed way in the background to the whole Tony Stark's problem and Nick Fury's antics that is kinda pointless to have him in. Mickey Rourke actually performed well, but he was so underused. Justin Hammer was Spider-Man 3's Eddie Brock of this film. He's an annoying unpopular copy of the main character who is threatened by his competition and would become even more lame by stooping low in order to get rid of him or kill him. He, including Eddie, are not villains, but lame annoying rivals and doesn't make any of them interesting.

The supporting actors such
as Gwyneth Paltrow, Scarlett Johansson and even director Jon Favreau did a well done performance, though none of them stood out. There are alot of expectation hinted on Don Cheadle as he replaced Terrance Howard to take up the mantle of War Machine, yet he still doesn't look like the part and was kind of mis-casted. He looks not built enough to wear the iron suit, nor he looks tough enough. The writing is typical-Favreau as the characters are competing of who can over each other the most with snappy remarks, which even though works in the first film, doesn't mean it can entirely work again in this. As the action pieces are kind of amped up in this, the amount is still not enough and it only has the big final battle as the movie's payoff, which is very cool to look at. Though the references of the upcoming Avengers movie can bring up the anticipation and excitement (the appearance of a certain iconic item and how it was used in this film was hilarious), it does keep banging your head and you have to remind yourself that you're watching an Iron Man movie, not an Avengers movie.

I'm sorry, am I too slimy enough for you...

We all hyped up for it to be one of the greatest comic book films
of all time, next to The Dark Knight and I wanted it to be after watching the first Iron Man movie. Unfortunately, unlike The Dark Knight where it stood as a major progression of the series journey and built the anticipation for the next chapter, this seems like fluff as a standard, even forgettable comic book sequel and built the anticipation for another franchise, not Iron Man itself. Which is not a bad thing anyway. This is still an enjoyable and fun movie and you will end up liking it. Its just that it wasn't bigger. Fun, but not bigger.

3 and a half out of 5 stars