There’s No Going Back, Jack: Lost and Binary Oppositions
There’s No Going Back, Jack: Lost and Binary Oppositions
After Lost finished its six-season run in May 2010, a backlash rose against the show in response to the show’s finale and lack of answers regarding the various questions raised in the show’s mythology. Some of those people argued the show’s finale made every episode they had seen prior to be rendered as waste. However wrong those people possibly may be, their response fails to notice just how well-crafted the show was, typically through its use of binary oppositions. Admittedly, binary oppositions were nothing new to the television landscape, but the use of them on Lost worked on multiple levels, characters and mythology, to create a show the likes of which had never been seen before and would change the television landscape forever.
Upon its debut in September 2004, Lost transported its viewers to a mysterious island where the survivors of a plane crash were forced to survive both each other and whatever laid beyond the supposed safety of their newfound beach homes. The character list was diverse, especially for its time, comprised of characters young, old, black, white, Asian, overweight, skinny, and much more. Perhaps simply by its nature, the diversity of the characters created a multitude of binary oppositions. Two of these characters, Jack Shephard and John Locke, were at the heart of one of the show’s most heated and often used binary oppositions: science versus religion.
During a dialogue exchange in the Season One finale, “Exodus: Part Three,” John tells Jack, “I think that’s why you and I don’t see eye to eye sometimes, Jack. Because you’re a man of science.” He later continues to say, “I’m a man of faith.” The two men have entirely different views on why they have been brought to the island, if there was ever a reason at all. For most of the show’s run, this specific binary opposition would drive much, and arguably all, of the conflict between John and Jack. On the surface, it might not seem as if this is anything special; however, what is special here — and helped to make Lost a cultural phenomenon — is how this binary opposition propelled the character relations and mythology.
The necessary nature of discovery on the show dictated that this binary be constantly brought to the surface. Part of this discovery was that of a smoke monster, one that was later revealed to be a man. Before that reveal, though, the monster was always a danger to any of the so-called castaways that ventured beyond the safety of the beach. Late in the first season, John Locke, a man who truly believed the plane crash was destined to occur, stared the monster down and survived, which is subsequently what led to the aforementioned dialogue exchange between Jack and John. John believed his time on the island simply wasn’t done; whereas Jack would not test those waters, and would run to hide.
The vast differences between the philosophies of Jack and John were similarly compared and contrasted through the use of binary: the past versus the present. One of the original conceits within the show was the use of flashbacks, which would often focus on one central character in order to reflect on who he or she was prior to arriving on the island. Considering that one of the core themes on the program was that of redemption, this binary opposition was key in order to properly understand just how someone was redeeming his/herself. It was shown to the audience that Jack’s need for rationality and fixing things had already caused his marriage to fall apart, just as it would cause trouble on the island. This can be compared to that of John, who, after being paralyzed from the waist down by his father, fought for more in life, believing he’s worth more than just being a paralyzed man. Yet the most remarkable thing about the use of these binary oppositions comes from one major complication: they would shift.
As the show progressed, it grew deeper in mythology. Because of this, the binary oppositions had to shift over time. Where the show was once largely centered on science versus faith, the show would eventually prove the feelings of John Locke to be correct. Consequently, the show, mostly in its final two seasons, became a show about an even more general binary opposition: good versus evil. The shift in binary opposition didn’t just allow the show to explore its central characters to a deeper level, it allowed the showrunners, Carlton Cuse and Damon Lindelof, to take the mythology of the show deeper and give more rhyme and reason to why things were happening at all.
However, this wasn’t the only shift in binary oppositions to occur, as what once was the past versus the present became the present versus the future. For the first three seasons, up until the finale, the show strictly stuck with flashbacks in order to explore its characters. With the addition of flashforwards, as introduced in “Through the Looking Glass,” the show was able to reflect and refract as it had before, but now it was able to tell a larger story in less time. The change also brought forth a faster pace to the narrative of the story, as Cuse and Lindelof were able to make bigger steps toward a finite ending. Even then, the binary opposition of time would change one final time in the show’s final season, from the present versus the future to the present versus an afterlife.
Through the use of binary oppositions, and more specifically shifts in those oppositions, the show created a complex array of television. As Jason Mittell discusses in his article “Narrative Complexity in Contemporary American Television,” one couldn’t simply watch Lost “as an unmeditated window to a realistic storyworld into which” one “might escape,” but rather the show demanded attention be paid to “the window frames” so that the audience could look at how “it provides partial access to the diegesis and how the panes of glass” then rearrange how the “vision of the unfolding action” is perceived (38). Of course, the use of flashbacks and binary oppositions in narratives was certainly not a new concept, but the well-crafted way they were implemented within Lost helped to usher in a new wave of television.
After the debut of Lost, many shows tried and failed to copy the formula set up by the show in its pilot episode. As Alan Sepinwall discusses in The Revolution was Televised, all of the shows like “FlashForward, The Event, Invasion, and Surface” failed because “none of them” came close “to capturing what made Lost work” (190). Where these shows failed is easy to notice. They took what seemed to be the gimmicks of Lost without taking note of the genius use of binary oppositions as filtered through the show’s characters and mythology. While many have come and failed, it is important to note the lasting effects of Lost, which managed to help usher in the age of serialized narratives. Gone were the days of binary oppositions with minimal effect. Welcome were the days of shifting, sprawling binary oppositions with maximum impact.
Works Cited
Lost: The Complete Collection. Writ. Carlton Cuse and Damon Lindelof. Dir. Adam Davidson. ABC Studios, 2010. DVD.
Mittell, Jason. “Narrative Complexity in Contemporary American Television.” The Velvet Light Trap.58 (2006): 29–40. Print.
Sepinwall, Alan. the Revolution was Televised., 2012. Print.
Originally published at http://www.tumblr.com on December 5, 2014.
