Lost: The Pilot

I recently saw the first 2 episodes of Lost, the acclaimed television series that seems to have launched J.J. Abrams into his movie career, and I must say . . . I was not impressed. Original? Hardly. The first hour of the show was very reminiscent of another "castaway" television show that aired a few decades ago. That show was called Gilligan's Island, and it also began with passengers emerging from a wrecked mode of transportation (this time a sailboat), attempting to get their bearings and trying to discover what they could of the new island. (Incidentally, the passengers spent the rest of the series having a lot of strange adventures on the island, just as I presume the passengers of the doomed airliner had throughout the rest of their series.) The second hour reminded me of another show that aired several decades ago--The Prisoner.

I'll give the show kudos for narrative pacing and for its special effects (which were, in the first hour, reminiscent of the movie Castaway and its plane wreck scene). The characters' fear and bewilderment at being trapped in a seemingly deserted island comes across as real and forms a kind of underlying "heartbeat" for the show. Also, I get the impression that perhaps those 48 people who made it onto the beach alive probably didn't make it through the rest of the series unscathed, which (if true) is a nice change of pace from most television series, in which the creators make clear who the "disposable" characters are and who they are not from the very first episode.

However, even though there is a lot to admire technically in this show, the plot strikes me as derivative of social Darwinism: Who will survive on this island? Who DESERVES to survive on this island? What tools of ingenuity will these human beings discover within themselves as they attempt to remain alive without technology long enough for someone to rescue them? All of these questions spring from the same motto which has become the hallmark of what we know as Darwinism today: survival of the fittest. Oh yeah, and we're invited to join in the "selection" process through our suspicion of the characters and their motives, too.

Natural selection (or "survival of the fittest") is a concept that also undergirds much of reality television these days, and I find it ironic that Lost aired shortly after a famous reality series--Survivor--had begun its legendary run. I saw enough bare backs, bare bellies, and small (but strategically placed) bikinis to remind me of that series, and the mutual suspicion among the characters also reminded me of the mutual suspicion engendered among Survivor's contestants. Ultimately, this show teaches by example, rather than by precept (see my posts on Stargate SG-1 and Star Trek), what any good believer in evolutionary theory should know about not only the world but how to live his or her own life.

Atheism is a major driving force within our culture, and it makes sense that atheism is going to drive every article of mass media entertainment our culture produces. That is why, even though shows like Lost appear innocent on the surface (no fornication, bloodletting, or denunciations of God/religion within the pilot episode), they still bear the stamp of the culture which is producing them. To be unaware of this is to be unaware of the fundamental philosophy that, unfortunately, all too many of us are allowing our television sets to teach our children. If you want your children to have the same heart for the God of the Bible (and the God of Christianity) that you do--if not better--you need to be aware, at every step of the way, what you may be allowing others--without your knowledge--to teach your children, and as always, the teacher that most undermines your influence with your children may not be someone you hire or pay with your tax dollars. It could easily be what you have, with comparatively little expense, brought into your living room.