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<last time i'll ever make a thread>

so its over a year since the rubbish waterfall/amazing church reunion so just thinking about how it will be remembered/legacy

my view: first 3 series totally exceptional and more or less perfect, latter 3 still incredible but flawed - could have been of the same quality if they'd stuck to a 20+ episode format as certain ideas/themes/characters were definitely underdeveloped in series 4, 5 and 6

i think there's been a lot of revisionism going on about the final episode especially, feeling was very much divided from all fans/publications at the time but like with a lot of things, a conensus of a disappointing ending has emerged

and i agree but only to a small extent. there were a lot of flaws in the final series (mostly on-island, some backstory) which sadly overshadows loads of the great stuff 6 included (richard's episode, loads of the sideways stuff, the very final scene, the acting, giacchino's music).

legacy wise i dont think it will be very influential and be seen as very of it's time. i think it had a massive effect on the television landscape a few years ago - V, flashforward, heroes and fringe (only one that's somehow survived?) all failed massively in trying to recapture the same style of storytelling, and shows like mad men/boardwalk empire and the retrospective mass ejaculation for the wire are doing a lot more for tv in 2011.

i dont mean the above as a criticism though, but rather a strength as it demonstrates quite how difficult it is to pull off such ambitious storytelling and was the only success, both 'artistically' and viewing figures

essentially it's almost certainly the most i'll ever care about a work of fiction and the best experience i've ever had with tv, but i can see as a story it is flawed, albeit the strengths more than outweigh them to be something i genuinely think is 'objectively' great and unfairly overlooked when put against megasrs hbo stuff.