Few shows are capable of competing with the President's State of the Union for a time slot and winning. But not every show is "Lost."
Hysteria for the show has started to build up after a leak of the first four minutes of the season premiere online. As people around the country prepare to (hopefully) have all of their questions answered, Ball State University students are beginning to discuss their theories as well as look back at a show that is beginning its sixth and final season tonight.
"Pretty much every episode ends in a cliffhanger and keeps you guessing. It makes you want to come back the next week to see what happened," said Tyler Pittman, a sophomore telecommunications major.
The show arguably has one of the most enthusiastic fan followings, with multiple Web sites set up purely for discussion and to explain the unique world the show has created, in which time travel is an essential tool for storytelling.
"The show does a great job of keeping you hooked and developing the characters in a way that gets you invested and then you want to see how it all ends," said Morgan Stehr, a sophomore telecommunications major.
Stehr and his friends will be getting together tonight to watch as the end begins for one of television's most unique shows.
As the show has grown over the past few years, so have the plot lines and the characters. The show still retains its core cast while those on the perimeter, such as the "Others" and the "Dharma Initiative," have replaced lesser characters from the first couple of seasons.
Along with the cast changes, the story itself has taken many different twists and turns, surprising viewers by pushing and expanding the show's boundaries into the impossible.
"As the show has gone on, I would have one theory for about a week, and then by the next episode, that theory would be gone because something would happen that would make me rethink the show entirely," said Daniel Parish, a sophomore telecommunications major who has watched the show from the beginning.
Parish is not the only one who has had multiple theories rise to the surface only to have them destroyed by the show's writers. Web sites such as lostpedia.wikia.com have ongoing threads where they keep tabs on some of the more prominent theories as the show has gone on. The Web site also has forums to discuss different aspects of the show, such as relationships between cast members as well as imagery on the island.
With so many theories up in the air, it can be hard to distinguish one from the next and not get confused.
The Lostpedia has separated the theories into a handful of categories, placing them based on a few key points. A few of the most popular ones are the ontological theory and the psychological theory. The ontological theory is one that says the show is a world that is much different from the one we live in - that an incident on the island caused a Pandora's box to open up and create problems for everyone. The psychological theory states that the island is an ongoing social experiment.
Whether these theories are right or not is still undecided, but that doesn't stop fans from coming up with theories of their own.
"I was one of the people that was convinced that they were all dead because the show had all these different clues that pointed to that, but then later on that theory was shot down," Parish said.
This theory was put to rest in season four, after it was revealed that several characters eventually made it off of the island.
"I feel like the fans came up with that theory and then it got back to the writers of the show, so they put in a bunch of clues to point towards that only to surprise people by having that not be the case," Stehr said.
As Lost enters its final season, the theories will start to slim down until one remains, and then the question will be how the show will actually come to an end.
"I don't think the show will answer every single question out there, but it will probably lead people in the right direction and let everyone interpret things in their own way since the show is based so much on theories," sophomore political science and communication studies major Dennis Sullivan said.
Fans and newcomers alike can tune in to ABC at 8 p.m. for a show recap followed by the two-hour season premiere.
Unanswered questions:
How is it that some of the characters never age?
What exactly is the "smoke monster?"
How is John Locke's body in two different places at the same time?
What role do Jacob and Richard Alpert play on the island?
Who built the giant statue that existed so long ago?
'Last Supper' promo:
People have been analyzing the above photo in comparison to da Vinci's "The Last Supper" painting and the biblical story behind it in search of hidden clues to the next season. Feel free to inspect this photo and make your own assumptions!
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