He flew. We saw him. You're presenting
something that is sci-fi. There's no other ex-
planation for it." In this sense, he explains
that LOST is a long con, starting out with
small, debatable events and slowly building
to a show where a final season of time travel,
alternate universes and ancient gods and
monsters feel natural and necessary.
us right now, it's very sad to think we'll never
write Hurley again," Kitsis says a few days after
the finale finishes filming. "We'll never write
Jack again. We'll never write Sawyer again. It's
sad to us. It's hard to do all of it, but you try to
stay true to the vision you have." He pauses
for a moment and adds, "It's funny because
during season one, people would come up to
me and Adam and be like, `What's the smoke
monster? What's in the hatch?'" Kitsis stops to
laugh. "Now the only thing we constantly get
is, `I hope you don't screw it up. I hope the
ending doesn't suck.'"
is a regular part of everyday life and a com-
ponent of good storytelling. He points out
that George Lucas tried to define the nature
of the Force with midiclorians and in doing
so stripped that aspect of his story of all its
intrigue and power. "Mystery is good," Cuse
says. "I think that we, hopefully, will strike a
viding answers but also leaving that sense of
magic and mystery. We hope that the things
that remain unknown are unknown in that
good way that makes you kind of engaged by
this notion of the mystery that inhabits all
of our lives." He acknowledges that, at the
end, there will be satisfied audience members
and others who will still have questions, but
states some of the bigger questions will be
answered and that the show will have an
ending. "We're not intending to cut to black
or say this all took place in a snow globe," he
chuckles. "We know what the last image of
the show is and we feel that the conclusion
will be a satisfying one."
and digest the events and results, they'll ap-
preciate all the subtleties of the storytelling.
"There's hopefully a richness to the whole
thing that will keep coming to the surface as
people look back on it."
end things," and the planned ending for
LOST. "Our suspicion is that the majority of
people really care about how the characters
are going to end up," he says. "Who's going
to be with whom? Who survives? Who dies?
Where's Jack on the axis of faith when the
show ends? Those are the real answers that
we care about, and we feel that if those are
satisfying, then the legacy of the show will
live on."