Finding Lost - Season Four: The Unofficial Guide

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Overview

The third installment in the critically acclaimed, best selling Finding Lost series.

"The Finding Lost series is quite simply the best resource for fans. Not only is the information concise and complete, Nikki Stafford’s commentary is insightful, relevant, and entertaining. No matter how well you know the show, Stafford’s analysis of the themes and symbolism of Lost will renew your desire to go back and watch over and over again." —Jon ...

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More About This Book

Overview

The third installment in the critically acclaimed, best selling Finding Lost series.

"The Finding Lost series is quite simply the best resource for fans. Not only is the information concise and complete, Nikki Stafford’s commentary is insightful, relevant, and entertaining. No matter how well you know the show, Stafford’s analysis of the themes and symbolism of Lost will renew your desire to go back and watch over and over again." —Jon "DocArzt" Lachonis

Throughout the first three seasons of Lost, we saw the Lostaways trying to get rescued, adapting to the island, and then dealing with the "natives" of the island, the Others. But the jaw-dropping fourth season was the turning point in the series, giving fans a glimpse of the future through flashforwards of those who made it off the island. While this season provided answers to earlier mysteries, it also raised new questions and muddled viewers' brains with time-traveling bunnies. This book helps put those pieces back into a context that begins to make sense again. Finding Lost is the only Lost guide that analyzes the show episode by episode, and includes:

• An in-depth look at every episode of season 4, with highlights, little-known facts, and nitpicks

• Chapters on time travel, the popular time loop theory, philosopher Jeremy Bentham, the online game Find815, and the Lost mobisodes

• Sidebars chronicling fun trivia such as Sawyer's nicknames, the meaning of Abaddon's name, favorite online Lost parodies, and many more

• Bios of the new actors on the show

• Analyses of the show's literary references, including Slaughterhouse-Five, The Tempest, VALIS, The Invention of Morel, and the Mystery Tales comic

• Photos of the filming locations in Hawaii

With exclusive photos and enough background to put you leagues ahead of other viewers, this book will help you "find" Lost.

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Editorial Reviews

From the Publisher
"Nikki Stafford knows TV, and she knows TV fans . . . Stafford has succeeded in creating books for [Lost fans], a crowd that could arguably be called the most difficult to please."  —Jon Lachonis, BuddyTV.com

"Nikki Stafford has a gift for writing about television … this book is an interesting read and definitely a must for any Lost fan."  —The Medium Online

"The best part about Finding Lost: The Unofficial Guide is that Nikki Stafford brings the symbolism, themes, and mythology to the forefront, so that casual viewers and devoted fans have a better understanding of what is happening in each episode. When reading many of her points, I would think, 'Yes, of course, I knew that somewhere in my brain, but now Nikki has pointed it out so that I can think about it and come to my own conclusions.'"  —About.com

"If you're a fan of the popular TV show Lost, you can't be without this unofficial guide."  —California Bookwatch

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Product Details

  • ISBN-13: 9781550228786
  • Publisher: ECW Press
  • Publication date: 4/1/2009
  • Series: Finding Lost Series
  • Pages: 224
  • Sales rank: 761,668
  • Product dimensions: 6.75 (w) x 9.75 (h) x 0.50 (d)

Meet the Author

Nikki Stafford is the author of six books, including the first two volumes of Finding Lost, Bite Me! An Unofficial Guide to the World of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and is co-author of Uncovering Alias: An Unofficial Guide. She blogs at nikkistafford.blogspot.com

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Read an Excerpt

Season 1 of Lost was immensely popular. But by season 2 the ratings had begun to decline. This was either thanks to the inefficient scheduling of episodes (a couple of weeks of new episodes followed by a month of reruns, then three weeks back on and three more weeks of reruns) or thanks to the exposition of the story lines and the deepening of the mysteries (with no answers) that had fans scratching their heads. By season 3, when the network aired six episodes that were heavy on the Others, Kate, Jack, and Sawyer, and very light on everyone else, and when they ran the rest of the season a full three months later, those fans who were already frustrated by the show jumped ship, which left only the hardcore fans behind.

Thank goodness we stayed. We’ve loved Lost unbendingly from the beginning, but season 4 was mind–blowing.

In fact, the fourth season won back many viewers. Reduced to a mere 13 episodes due to the WGA Writers’ Strike, this season was short, but packed with intrigue, drama, mysteries, and answers. During an interview I did while the Writers’ Strike was on, a journalist asked me why I thought season 4 was getting great ratings and was so critically acclaimed. Was it because of the strike?, he asked. I said the answer was manifold. Yes, the Writers’ Strike (which lasted from November 2007 to February 2008) created a dearth of new programming in January and February, precisely the time Lost began rolling out brand new episodes. Or it could have been the timing of the DVDs. In previous seasons, new fans of the show would buy the DVDs when they came out — usually around September 7 or 8 — and try to make it through the episodes in two weeks before the new season started. But unless you’re a die–hard television viewer, such a schedule could be tough. When some viewers couldn’t finish the season, they wouldn’t dare begin the new one. So, they’d wait for the next season’s DVDs to come out a year later. These fans wouldn’t be counted in the ratings for that season. For season 4, however, the previous season’s DVDs were released on December 11, and the new season didn’t begin until January 31, giving new fans plenty of time to watch not only season 3, but the first two seasons as well.

But in my opinion, the main reason the new season was so good is because showrunners Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse have an end date. ABC has done the unthinkable and given them an end date of 2010, with three seasons of 16 episodes each. Knowing there are 48 more hours in which to tell the story, “Darlton” (as fans like to call the two men) have mapped out a plan. They know how to answer certain huge questions, when to drop the clues in there, and when they should start on the big reveal. This plan has allowed the storytelling to be smooth, it’s given us so many answers, and the new questions seem to be leading into more obvious territories than in previous seasons.

In other words, it’s starting to unveil itself like a beautifully told fairy tale, one where the writer already knows how it’s going to end and how many pages he has left in which to tell it.

If season 1 was about trying to be rescued, season 2 was about learning to live with each other on the island, and season 3 was about dealing with the native people on the island, then season 4 is about the invasion by the outside world into the microcosm of the island, and what that does to the people on it. Do the freighter people come in peace? Do they want to rescue the Losties? Or, as Ben famously says in “Through the Looking Glass,” is making contact with that ship “the beginning of the end”?

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Table of Contents

Acknowledgments v

How Not to Get Lost vii

"The Beginning of the End": Season 4 1

Season 4 January-May 2008

The Beginning of the End (Hurley) 7

Omgwtfpolarbear!! 13

Confirmed Dead (freighter folk) 18

The Freighter Folk Lance Reddick Jeff Fahey Jeremy Davies Rebecca Mader Ken Leung 26

Find815: The 2008 Lost ARG 31

The Economist (Sayid) 35

Funny Lost on the Web 41

Eggtown (Kate) 43

Valis 50

The Invention of Morel 55

The Constant (Desmond) 60

Wormholes and Time Lags and Course Bearings, Oh My! 63

Slaughterhouse-Five 69

The Other Woman (Juliet) 74

The Tempest 82

Ji Yeon (Sun, Jin) 86

Get Lost on YouTube 91

Meet Kevin Johnson (Michael) 94

The 2007-2008 Writers' Strike 103

The Shape of Things to Come (Ben) 107

"Let's Do the Time Warp Again!": The Time Loop Theory 117

Something Nice Back Home (Jack) 121

Missing Pieces: The Lost Mobisodes 131

Cabin Fever (Locke) 141

John Lock and Ben Linus: Cain and Abel? 150

Abaddon: The Destroyer? 153

Mystery Tales #40 155

There's No Place Like Home, Part 1 (Oceanic 6) 159

Sawyer's Nicknames 166

Mirror, Mirror, On the Wall 169

There's No Place Like Home, Parts 2 & 3 (Oceanic 6) 170

Checkmate 187

Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832) 195

Flashforward Timeline 199

Sources 203

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