2/22/2010

Lost Update: Static (A Twilight Zone Special)


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Lost Update 02/22/2010

Greetings from another dimension of sight, sound, and imagination. Prepare yourselves for another Lost / Twilight Zone comparison. (The Twilight Zone was a classic science fiction television series created by Rod Serling that aired from 1959 to 1964. Each episode intertwined the supernatural with topical moral events in today’s society ending with a twist convoluting the outcome. I argue that the same can be said about ABC Lost. The castaways are more than just stranded on an island. There are mysterious forces at work of powers unknown. And just like the Twilight Zone, a twist is inserted in the story convoluting the outcome.)

The Twilight Zone had a standard format. Each episode began with a prologue, usually with the host, Rod Serling doing the voice over introducing the characters and setting. At the end of the show, Serling would offer up a final narration of what the viewer just witnessed.

Tonight’s offering is from season two, episode number 56, original air date, March 03, 1961, titled, Static.

As you read the opening monologue, plot synopsis, and epilogue, think about Lost and the season six premiere. As usual, I will explain the tie in below.

Monologue:

Retired old Ed Lindsay retrieves his ancient radio from the boarding house basement. He asks one of the boys intently watching him, "Don't you know what a radio is?". The boy says that of course he has, just not quite lick that. Rod Serling appears standing at the top of the basement steps:

"No one ever saw one quite like that, because that's a very special sort of radio. In its day, circa 1935, its type was one of the most elegant consoles on the market. Now, with its fabric-covered speakers, its peculiar yellow dial, its serrated knobs, it looks quaint and a little strange. Mr. Ed Lindsay is going to find out how strange very soon, when he tunes in to the Twilight Zone."

Plot Synopsis:

Ed Lindsay is an irritable bachelor in his late fifties. He lives in a dull boarding house where much of his time is consumed watching what he calls worthless and mindless programs. Not able to take it anymore, Ed retrieves his old radio from storage in the basement. When Ed was younger and happier, he enjoyed the radio and was one of his favorite forms of entertainment. Ed brought the radio to his room and plugged it in. He was amazed as to what he heard playing. It was programs from the 30's and 40's from big bands no longer alive. He tried to tell the others of his miraculous radio, but when he turned it on for them, all they heard was static. By making several phone calls, he found that the radio station he was listening to was off the air for over 13 years.

Later we learn that Ed intended to marry the love of his life twenty years ago but he kept letting other things get in the way until it was to late. Vinnie, a 50 something female boarder tells Ed that the past cannot be recovered and he should let it go. She leaves Ed's room and returns to her own. Ed turns on the radio once again and magically Ed transforms into a much younger man, twenty years younger. Vinnie runs into Ed's room young again as well. The radio offers Ed another chance to relive his life and finally get things right this time around.

Epilogue:

Around and around she goes, and where she stops nobody knows. All Ed Lindsay knows is that he desperately wanted a second chance and he finally got it, through a strange and wonderful time machine called a radio.... in the Twilight Zone.

Lost Tie In:

Remember way back in season one when Sayid and Hurley had the transmitter high atop the hill? Do you remember what they heard from the transmitter? That's right, they heard 1930's and 40's big band music. Sayid remarks, "What is that?" Hurley replies, "When is that?" Sayid looks at him strangely and then Hurley tells him, "Just kidding dude!"

Lost has always been about redemption, righting the wrongs from the past. The castaways have been given that opportunity in the form of traveling back in time, approximately 20-25 years, to fix what was broken. It doesn't mean that they will succeed, but they were given another chance at life.

just like Ed Lindsay from the Twilight Zone was given. What they do/did with that chance yet remains to be seen.



LURKING ON THE GRASSY KNOLL

10 comments:

  1. That is erie. the same music on the radio and the transmitter and after hearing it goes back in time to get anothert chance at their failed life.

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  2. The entire Twilight Zone similarities are uncanny. From the pilot episode, I felt i was watching a modern Twilight Zone. And when the invisible monster made it's appearance, i knew it wasn't a normal island, nor a normal drama program. I've kept a steady eye on the Zone ever since.

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  3. The more i think about it, the better this theory sounds. I read a while back that Cuse was influeneced by Serling si i'm sure there is a lot of twilight zone injected in the story and plot.

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  4. Star Studded2/23/2010 6:15 AM

    So if your theory is right how is the show going to end. The twilightzone was not a series, but a weekly stand on its own episode. Lost is a 6 year old series.

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  5. The Lost writers Cuse and Abrams have admitted that they are influenced by Rod Serling and the Twilight Zone. Abrams also directed Star Trek 11 and that ties in to your alien connection as well. With the series headed to an end in a few short months, the solution has to be un-natural, meaning not of this earth and your theory fits well. I am on your bandwagon sir that your VR theory is correct.

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  6. I figured it out. This is what's going on and it will be the most controversial series in television history. Lost is all about being lost in religion. The end of this series will upset the churches and the holy rollers. All theses things that take place on the island are things that we consider an act of god. The writers are about to show us how silly they think religion is. They are about to show us how silly we actually are.

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  7. The writers have admitted that they were influenced by Serling. All great writers are! :D Will the series finale proclaim a Twilight Zone remake, no, I doubt it, but no one can argue that the Zone isn't intertwined into Lost.

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  8. Perhaps the ending will go something like this....

    Perhaps in the series finale, we will see Cuse and Abrams walk from behind the temple as the screen fades to black and white. Both men will be dressed in dark gray suits, white shirts, and skinny black ties. Both will be smoking. They will pause and then recite, “The Castaways, lately returned from a place “back there,” a journey into time with highly questionable results, proving on one hand that the threads of history are woven tightly and the skein of events cannot be undone, but on the other hand, there are small fragments of tapestry that can be altered. Tonight’s thesis to be taken as you will, on the Lost island. And in the Twilight Zone.”

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  9. One can only hope that my VR theory is a candidate to be the correct theory. :D

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  10. That would certainly make a lot of people angry. Although, it may deflect some of the bad press Catholic priests have been getting recently.

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