How to Enjoy Watching "Lost"

Newsweek's Devin Gordon wrote up a funny little article, talking about how fans can enjoy watching Lost. And he, in part, eludes to elements of the First Season Curse that I talked about. He points out that the show was groundbreaking, but, it's kind of hard to keep being groundbreaking every. single. episode. So he offers these three helpful hints:

1. Stop clamoring for answers in every episode. You haven't gotten them, why would they start now? They come slowly, bit by bit. Enjoy what you get, but don't expect answers often. Especially not in a post-Twin Peaks world!
2. Stop trying to figure it all out. He points out that X-Files fans are still trying to figure out everything. Do you really want to be like an X-Files fan? Do you?
3. Just WATCH THE SHOW. Even if it's not revolutionary, it's still pretty good television.

I must say, it is kind of a testament to the show itself that fans are this obsessive over every single minut detail on the show. They raise some questions in the show itself, like, why don't the Others just fly off of the island and go to Rio or someplace? I, personally, would suggest sticking with over-arching questions like those and not questions that you have to piece together before you can ask it, like "What is Alvar Hanso's role in the assembly of all the passengers on Flight 815?". That's going waaaay too deep into the mythology and isn't going to help your blood pressure at all. But if the storytelling and writing were even a few levels lower, it probably wouldn't have this massive cult following.

My own personal advice is just to take any show, any episode, based on what it is, without setting it to any other standard. It's tough to do sometimes. I mean, I'm watching this current season of 24 and I'm sitting there thinking, 'This was cooler when the show was called Alias'. And it's tough to judge a show by itself sometimes if the episodes just downright suck and you don't want to admit that the show is having a bad season. It happens! But be careful: Sometimes, the storytelling is too good for television. When you "binge" on a full season on DVD, different over-arching story lines become apparent, some characters become less annoying and you can better pick up on how a character or plot is developing, because you don't have to wait a week or more between episodes.

That all said, Lost better explain why the Hatch seemed to explode, but actually imploded. Hhhmmm...