Paradise Lost

Character is what you are in the dark – proverb

Thanks to the modern marvel of DVDs, my family and I are watching the first season of Lost four years after it aired. It’s a thrill ride of tension and mystery that fills the yawning gap of grief left behind when we devoured seven seasons of Buffy and five years of Angel only to realize we had no more Whedonverse to enjoy. Sadness. There is Firefly, but with its first and only season truncated by cancellation, the attempt to fully examine character is somewhat compromised by network executive narrow-mindedness. But I’m not bitter.

Lost eases the resentment. Aviatophobics take note: if you are on the fence about flying, this show might ground you indefinitely. Proceed with caution. The writers took the suggestion, “start with action”, to heart with astonishing abandon.

The premiere opens minutes after a plane crash in a gripping, gruesome tableau of scorched, smoking fuselage and bleeding, soot-covered survivors waking to the shrieks and moans of the dazed and dying. A giant, detached jet engine screams in wheezing ululations as one of the main characters, Jack Shepherd, stumbles forward. The visual horror stands in direct contrast to the swaying palms and dulcet tones of surf gently curling ashore. Despite disorientation, Jack immediately approaches the injured. His medical assessments mark him a physician. As a result, he becomes the unofficial leader of the group, a responsibility that proves both instinctive and burdensome.

Because of the large ensemble cast, each episode revisits brief yet relevant snapshots of history to reinforce theme, expose motivation, foster understanding, or generate empathy whenever current action requires explanation. At the heart of the season, the literary underbelly bubbles to the surface in pockets of literal and figurative significance. These folks are not just physically lost; they veered off course long before they boarded Oceanic flight 815 and plunged into paradise. One that harbors polar bears and a giant, invisible something that occasionally crashes through the jungle with bowel-loosening vigor and skin-shredding panache. Gilligan’s Island it ain’t.

The heavy reliance on backstory would not be recommended in novel form but it’s deftly handled here. These peeks into the past support each episode’s theme while peeling away a facade that hides the real deal. It embodies Robert McKee’s take on writing: story is the revelation of true character in contrast or contradiction to characterization.

We deduce characterization based on observable attributes – gender, age, profession, socio-economic level, personality type, etc. Jack, the accomplished, caring doctor, is a surgeon and son of an elitist chief of surgery at an LA-based hospital. Sawyer, the island’s bad boy, is an insufferable, selfish loner who oozes southern charm and cantankerousness in equal measure. You know from the get-go these two will collide. Need living, breathing proof? Enter Kate, the attractive, eager-to-help, capable question mark caught in the middle.

Characterization offers unique and specific individuals who conceal flaws they’d rather not expose to the general public. Until forced by conflict. As time goes by, the civilized masks slip via character choices substantiated by flashbacks.

Now we have character. Jack’s overactive sense of duty and responsibility hide self-esteem issues fed by a conflicted relationship with his domineering father. Sawyer, the scavenging opportunist, promotes ill will because he hates himself more than anyone else could. Why? He became the thing he spent most of his life hunting – a manipulative, reckless con man. His conscience is tearing him up. Kate, the executor of island law and order, is actually a fugitive from justice wanted for a crime that’s yet to be disclosed. Whatever she did warranted a handcuffed escort courtesy of a now-dead U.S. Marshal - one convinced she was danger personified.

True character beads the skin of characterization with the sweat of contradiction and choice. Who they appear to be (characterization) vs. who they are (character). Since character is story, I’m going in-depth with this concept for several castaways to observe how true character is slowly crafted. Fasten your seatbelts! Ha, ha.