Even if you don’t watch TV, it would have been hard to miss the fact that the much-anticipated finale to LOST, one of the decade’s biggest hits, was occurring this week. Since it aired Sunday night, fans and reviewers have been discussing it profusely online, and I assume at the office water cooler. It seems to have had a polarizing affect on fans: some loved it, many were profoundly disappointed.

I’m somewhere in the middle. There were some wonderful scenes and some beautifully portrayed emotional dramatic moments. The “awakening” of Sun and Jin, Sawyer and Juliet. The scene on the cliffs where Jack and Fake Locke face off and then come at each other. Some of my all-time favorite scenes were when Jack handed over his brief protectorship to a reluctant Hurley, and then Hurley appealed to Ben (of all people!) for advice and help. Almost every scene with Jack and Locke in the “sideways” time-line. The last scene when Jack’s eye closed was a fitting full circle from the series’ first scene of Jack’s eye opening.

I have to admit the whole light in the cave thing was a bit of a disappointment when it was revealed a couple of weeks ago that that was what needed protecting. And the strange explanation that it was somehow “the light within everyone” that some people wanted more of just didn’t make sense and seemed a little lame, but I went with it. If I could suspend belief for a smoke monster, I supposed I could accept this as well.

There were some “Lord of the Rings” moments, such as when Jack and Locke and Desmond first descended into the cave that looked very much like the fires of Mordor, though it was actually a waterfall with light behind it. The scene seemed like it was supposed to feel like the same kind of mythic quest, but the series up until the last few episodes didn’t have the same feel as LOTR, so it was a little hard to see it that way.

The biggest disappointment (to those who felt disappointed) was the fact that the series didn’t wrap up neatly and left so many questions unanswered. In fact, someone made a humorous video of a smattering of loose ends that were not tied up (just the first part — there is some weird unrelated song afterward that I didn’t watch.) Some people felt the writers “played” the viewers, strung us along, putting all these little clues and puzzles throughout the series and probably laughing at us as we tried to figure them out (there were several sites dedicated to all the puzzles and questions in LOST.) For instance, there were several books shown throughout the whole series, and some fans thought there had to be some meaning to them and sought to read them to try and figure it out. In the retrospective before the finale, the writers said they just tossed in books or philosophers that they and others in the cast and crew liked: there wasn’t necessarily a connection to the plot. Some felt the writers even lied to us and fell short of good story-telling by insisting it’s the characters who matter rather than the plot. And it is disturbing that some die-hard loyalist fans who loved everything about the finale condescendingly tell those who were miffed that they just don’t “get it.”

I have to admit I was disappointed in some aspects — not as much as some out there, but I think too much was left unexplained, and wondered if the writers just ran out of time, got lazy, or were really just playing us all along. On the other hand, I did expect that they wanted to leave some air of mystery, something for people to keep talking about. But the unresolved issues only affected the enjoyment of the plot a little for me.Well, maybe more than a little. But not enough to turn me against the show.

While there were Christian elements in LOST, I don’t think it was a Christian allegory as some do. In fact, I would be upset if it was meant to be a Christian allegory, because there were many things it did not get right if it was. The multicultural stained glass window at the church was a clue that there were elements of several religious philosophies thrown in. I never watch Jimmy Kimmel, but I did watch his “Aloha to LOST” airing the same night as the finale. On that show, Matthew Fox explained that in some religions, there are a few moments after one has died where he looks back on the events leading to his death and the people he met along the way — more of a retrospective than a purgatory. I had never heard that and I don’t believe there is such a moment, but the show makes more sense from this vantage point.

I wasn’t terribly interested in the show at first (“Another crash/castaway movie. Yawn.”) But I watched it because Dominic Monaghan had just finished LOTR and I wanted to see how he handled a different role. It didn’t take long to realize this was not just another airplane crash show! We were drawn in immediately. I didn’t like every point in every episode, and there were a few scenes we changed channels for.

Some will say, “It’s just a TV show.” True. But the best TV shows give you something to ponder, and pondering LOST has been an enjoyable activity for our family since the first episode.

(Several people have linked their discussions of LOST to Shannon’s discussion post, if you’d like to read more. This has not been a “review” per se — just a few of my many stray thoughts on the finale and the show in general.)