That makes a lot of sense, but it’s hard to reconcile because all of the mythical concepts seemed to carry so much weight. When it all gets broken down, none of it was important except the characters themselves and their relationships. It’s hard not to wonder about what exactly the two men fighting over the island were or why it was so important to either of them. I think the man in black himself says, in Season 6, that the whole thing is a big joke; the island is meaningless and saving it does nothing. It has no effect on the outside world at all. It just is. Basically these people have given their lives to this place and it has no bearing at all on anything else.
Viewing it as a character play set against an exotic and bizarre background makes sense and is more in line with what Lindelof says in the video and I think in another medium it would have been more well-received television audiences have certain expectations and this series defied most of them. Is that a bad thing? Of course not! It’s just not a big surprise that many viewers – myself included – were expecting something bigger, like that if the man in black got control over the island that he could then have influence over the world and that he planned to take it over entirely. I was also expecting Dharma to be something bigger than what it was. In the end I think you’re supposed to walk away with the idea that everything is trivial.
