But what I really want to talk about now is an internal change that kind of caught me by surprised. For me, Lost has always been first and foremost about the characters. The mythology of the island has always come in second. Albeit a very close second. In previous seasons I would rush to the internets after watching an episode and spend hours scrolling through various recaps and message boards to gather little "bits and bobs" that would give me more insight into what the island was, or who the Dharma Initiative was, etc. I revelled in the mystery and loved to investigate the various theories and discover little easter eggs and peruse all the different screen shots to ensure that I didn't miss anything.
Now, I can't be bothered. It's not that my love for the show has diminished. It hasn't. At all. The first thing I do when I wake up on Wednesday morning is start the download of the the episode that just aired in the US a couple of hours before. I purposefully avoid many of my regular websites throughout the day to ensure that I don't catch any spoilers. I rush home from work and immediately watch the episode. So yeah, my passion has not declined. But when it comes to the mythology of the island, I don't really care anymore. I don't care what the island is. I don't care why it seems to have magical powers. I don't care what the smoke monster is. All I care about is the characters and their individual searches for redemption/happiness/meaning/love.
I think that is why I have enjoyed the last two episodes so much. I loved watching Locke in the sideways flash reality seemingly overcome many of the issues that have haunted him in the island reality. It was so enjoyable to watch Jack establish a meaningful bond with his son in his sideways flash reality and move beyond the troubled relationship he had with his own father. What I am saying is that for me personally, watching these characters succeed and evolve is providing enough satisfaction that the island and its mysteries are only important to me in the sense that they serve as the setting and backdrop where the stories of these characters play out.
Ultimately, I will be satisfied if many of the mysteries of the island go unexplained. This is blasphemy to many. I know. This is where I am at though. This is how much the characters have come to mean to me.
As a side note, there was an interesting explanation of the multiverse idea given by Marc Oronmaner at docarzt.com. If you disregard the portion about The Secret and focus on the video game analogy, it does a great job of shedding some light on the current season.
