IanQuigley.com

Believe it or not, but I actually know a few people who have never seen the TV series Lost. Well maybe it’s not everyone’s thing, but personally I love the show. With the final season in the pipeline, the whole thing will soon come to an end before we know it. But I ask myself, will I ever go back and watch the whole thing over again from Season 1? Surely there are episodes I could skip over and sub-stories I could skip out. Then the idea struck me!

Books are often made into films, and the people who read the book will say “yes, but the book was better than the film because the film missed out large chunks of sub-plot”. If the film covered every detail of the book, it would be 10 hours long. The TV series of Lost, after Season 6, could be about 100 hours long from start to end.

I think it would be great if “someone” took all that footage, and tried to condense it down to say 3 hours? Six seasons in 3 hours would mean about 30 minutes per season. But not all seasons are equally important to the main story, so you might adjust those figures a little.

Season 1 – 40 minutes

Some character intro, including the others and maybe Ana Lucia and Eko from the tail section. Everyone from the tail section dies, so we can borrow some time from season 3 for this section. The plane crash, the monster, survival. Introduce Rousseau and the idea of the others. Polar bears, John Lockes connection with the island and the cable on the beach. Leave out the discovery of the hatch.

Season 2 – 30 minutes

Start weaving in Desmond’s back story and include some his day to day life in the hatch. This may appear to be an unconnected back story. Locke discovers the hatch then link the two together with Locke entering the hatch. The story could be retold with Locke first believing in the Hatch but quickly realising that he needs to shut it down.

Season 3 – 15 minutes

Forget about the tail section. Everything we need to know about the others and the tail section survivors influence should be kept to a minimum. Desmond foreseeing Charlies’ death and Desmonds flashes in “Flashes before your eyes” are the only parts of the story to maintain. Introduce Daniel Faraday and his Mother, and their connection to the island, and experiments.

Season 4 – 10~15 minutes

The invasion of the rescuers, Lockes’ struggles with Ben and the others. Cut out all the flash forwards. The Oceanic 6 do not escape the Island! When Jack and co’ see the island disappear, we are left not knowing what happens to them.

Season 5 – 20 minutes

Condense Locke, Sawyer and Daniels experience. The Oceanic 6 appear in 1977 without them saying “we came back” etc, they don’t know how they ended up in 1977. Assume they got dragged back in somehow.

Season 6 – who knows?

Cutting room floor.

What can be cut out of the series? Well some random pickings would include; Rose and Bernard, a lot of back stories such as Eko’s, Walt, Charlie etc. Sun and Jin’s story could be heavily cut since they don’t have much “purpose” to the overall story. Cut out the back stories which show how they are all inter-linked.

This is only a first stab and I’m sure I’m missing a lot of key things.