Top Stories

1. Good for Conan.
2. Of course Jerry is supporting one of his good friends and the network that signs h is checks.
3. I have a feeling that if Conan stays, he will get bumped back another half hour when Jimmy’s contract is up and Leno will take his old spot back…
4. I reeeeeally hope that they don’t do a spin-off. Nothing good will come of it. Especially if Damon and Carlton aren’t on board. How about instead, ABC gives them a new development deal?

2. Wrong time…like 40 years too late.

I would guess that Conan has a non-compete clause in his contract. NBC would pay him to NOT have a talk show rather than let him go to FOX. If Conan “bolts” he’d probably have to wait on the sidelines for a year. That’s just my theory.

The reality: ABC agreed to ending LOST much too soon. There are wayyy too many good stories and answers we need, and why they all felt the urgency to rush thru them in 16 or 17 episodes is beyond me. Yes, this is an amazing franchise, and would make hundreds of millions on the big screen, etc. But it all comes down to not knowing how to handle a cult franchise (Heroes certainly proves that)…and an unwillingness to allow a cash-cow to end at some point. [What's next, Seinfeld: The Next Generation?]

Again, ABC blew it by calling it quits after six seasons….when this journey could easily have gone 10.

I don’t mind a spinoff as long as they don’t treat it like other spinoffs by using characters from the original to fuel the beginning of the new show to get people to watch.

Also Darlton would need to still be on board for it to even stand a HALFWAY decent chance. And it needs to be it’s own show, not Lost 2.0

Nick — I completely disagree. I think the best thing ABC ever did for LOST was give them an end date. That way the creators could decide exactly what they wanted to do and map out the rest of the show so we don’t get a lot of useless fluff episodes or the storelines don’t go crazy (see Heroes). I much rather have 6 amazing years than 4 or so great ones and then flailing for 5 more.

In fact, I think Dollhouse has benefited from having an end date too. The episodes they made after finding out they were canceled have been amazing.

I think the only thing lost can do after its run is comics. I think the story is just built for it. 5 or 6 issue story arcs at a time on characters. I just wish it could be handled by Vertigo/DC I have liked everything they have done. But as for spin off on tv. Hope it doesn’t happen, I’d rather Damon and Carlton move to a new show(though by that last interview posted they dont seem to want to do anything for a while.)

Darlton have already said that they would not be involved in anything LOST after it ends in May. They don’t own LOST. ABC/Disney does. And they can do as they like without any of the actors, writers, producers, directors, or prop guys.

Six seasons of LOST is still a cash cow for ABC because LOST is wayyyyy more than just the nightly ratings. DVD sales are very high, random paraphernalia is very high. If LOST had gone 10 seasons with a 1 year at a time renewal, it’s obvious the quality would have suffered and the possibility of an outright cancellation would have been possible – or more likely, a verdict by ABC that they wrap it all up in 6 hours. Instead, they were given roughly 65 hours to wrap it up. Incredible.

Guess we’ll all agree to disagree. But if According to Jim can last 8 seasons, then I still go with Lost for 10. Six just isn’t enough for the intricate layers of story, both current…and flashback and flashforward, that this unique show offers. Let’s be honest, there could be an entire series just on The Others, their origins and everything that happened on the Island from the Aztec Era until now. ABC would be so foolish not to sign Nestor Carbonel to star in such a spinoff. Ratings GOLD.

(How do I make the little ‘copyright’ symbol?)

But the point is that the story suffers on dramas if you stretch the story. Whereas with “Jim” every episode is interchangeable. 8 years? “Jim” could go on for 30-40 years and it wouldn’t matter. But for a mythology as deep as LOST’s, it needs to have a shorter life. That’s why there were a few crummy episodes (for LOST) in seasons 2 and 3. Once they set their end date, there was no more stalling with episodes about Jack’s tattoos. In the end, LOST will be 121 episodes encompassing about 84 hours of story. That’s enough to get the point across. The ONLY reason to keep going on forever is to make money – it would certainly not be to enhance the story. And then we’re just thinking like a television exec which makes me feel a little gross.

Nick — You must not have been around for The X-Files. As soon as I heard LOST had an end date I was elated. Nothing worse than dragging out mythology one more year, one more year, one more year because it is getting decent ratings while leaving the writers in disarray. Writers start to leave, actors start to get bored, the story starts to get watered down, the person who knew the mythology no longer works for the show…before you know it you have The X-Files. “According to Jim” is a crap show where the episodes stand alone, there is not continuity even in character development from one ep to the next, and there is no mythology. That show could go on for fifty years that way. A show with mythology and any amount of realism can’t. Besides, wouldn’t it be nice to see these actors and the talented people behind the scenes work on other stuff and create the NEXT Lost?

And talk of a series spinoff — anyone remember The Lone Gunmen? The spinoff from The X-Files? Good enough for hardcore fans to like (I did at the time), but no one else cared for it and it got killed. You don’t want to launch a show where 90% of the country already has no interest in it and half of the existing fanbase will lose interest because Sawyer or whoever they love the most isn’t in it. Those are things for graphic novels, book tie-ins, or audio adventures to appease the hardcore fans (and by appease I mean get more money out of them). And chances are the writers we like would have moved on and we’d be stuck with people hired to try to pull it off.

Hil — The X-Files is the perfect example of what can happen to a show like this if it is allowed to just go on and on. Once David left, the plot went south quickly and most of the viewers were gone before the series finale.