Lost/YMMV

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


  • Ass Pull: The Man in Black's nature and Freudian Excuse.
    • The reveal about the Flash-Sideways universe. So, an Island where supernatural events happen all the time really does exist in the Real-World, yet the frigging Afterlife contains nothing supernatural at all.
      • A lot of people think it would have been much better to have it be the other way 'round.
  • Alas, Poor Scrappy: Shannon, Nikki, and Paulo.
  • Alas, Poor Villain: Tom Friendly.
    • The Man In Black sometimes gets this too when you look over his backstory. The dude just wanted off the island but nooo his adopted mother (who killed his real mother for no particular reason) and Jacob won't let him. And they don't really even explain why this is a big deal.
  • Alternate Character Interpretation: The writers have had some fun with this in season 6, via the flash sideways.
    • Some fans actually point out that the Man in Black has a perfectly valid reason for everything he does. He wants to leave, whereas his jailor, Jacob, doesn't want to but can leave anytime he wants.
    • Is Jacob a weary God-like character full of love whose hand is forced by fate? Or a callous, sociopathic momma's boy whose manipulations have caused thousands of deaths?
  • Badass Decay: Played with in Locke's case. He goes back and forth from awesome to pathetic so many times that this duality has basically become one of his main character traits.
    • Even though his badassery was only memetic, Richard Alpert could be said to have suffered from this, having spent most of season 6 in a state of Heroic BSOD instead of actually doing anything badass. It's made worse because he BSOD'd after the first time he ever really ran into trouble. Before that, he got by on just standing around and looking badass without ever actually doing anything.
  • Bellisario's Maxim: Largely averted, due to the extreme amount of attention to detail and hidden clues. However, this often backfires, since fans attribute significance to every little detail, and minor things like getting the date of a real-world event wrong become central points of theories.
  • Better on DVD: For one thing, you don't have to wait an ungodly time between seasons.
  • Broken Base: ...Yes. And the finale too.
  • Canon Sue: Many think this of Jack and Kate.
  • The Chris Carter Effect: Oh, boy... It's already a major point of contention now that the series is over.
    • The worst part is that the writers swore that they had the answers. As a Cracked.com article put it - "In a 2005 interview, co-creator Damon Lindelof said: "Every mystery that we present on the show ... all of those are questions that we know the answers to." He also said that "nothing in the show is flat-out impossible" and that everything so far could be explained by science. Sure, he was talking in the present tense -- but the present tense included the Smoke Monster, who ended up being the ghost of a 2,000-year-old guy who can impersonate dead people, and Michael's 10-year-old son, Walt, displaying supernatural powers that turned out to be ... actually, we have no idea, because that was never explained."
  • Commitment Anxiety: Due to the show's Continuity Lock Out, it was difficult for some new viewers to jump in at later seasons without seeing any of the prior episodes.
  • Complaining About Shows You Don't Watch: Deserves a mention as this affected Lost like almost nothing else in the whole of popular culture.
  • Complete Monster: Keamy and Anthony Cooper
  • Creepy Awesome: Ben, Eloise Hawking.
  • Designated Protagonist Syndrome: When your two main characters (Jack and Kate) are the most divisive among the fandom, you have a bit of a problem.
  • Draco in Leather Pants: Sawyer, before he grew into a legitimately likable character.
  • Earn Your Happy Ending: To Don Bluth levels...
  • Ensemble Darkhorse: There is, of course, a stable full of them with this many characters. Rose and Bernard deserve special mention. Both Desmond and the Breakout Villain Ben started out this way with their popularity earning them major roles.
  • Epileptic Trees: One wild fan theory was the Trope Namer. Yeah, it's that kind of a show. We've a very active Wild Mass Guessing page if you've got a crazy fan theory to share.
  • Fan Community Nicknames: Lostaways. Or Losties. Confusingly, both refers to the Flight 815 islanders as well.
    • It's not so surprising that one nickname would refer to both the original castaways and the fans, given that for most of the first two seasons the fans also felt like they'd been wrecked on a mysterious island with absolutely no clue what was happening...
  • Fan-Preferred Couple: Some fans prefer Sawyer/Juliet just because they're so damn sick of the Jack/Kate/Sawyer love triangle.
    • Most of the fandom, given the question, will probably tell you that their favorite couple on the series is Desmond/Penny, Jin/Sun, or Rose/Bernard.
  • Fanon Discontinuity: The only thing that isn't guaranteed to fall under here for someone somewhere is early-to-mid season 1. Beyond that, it varies massively.
  • Fan-Preferred Couple: Sawyer and Juliet.
  • Foe Yay: Tons between Ben and Locke.
  • Funny Moments: Have their own page.
  • Growing the Beard: A lot of fans were hooked right from the outset but the fourth episode of the series "Walkabout" where we find out Locke couldn't walk before the crash is the earliest episode to hint at deeper supernatural elements on the island and is remembered for having the series' first big plot twist.
  • Heartwarming Moments: Have their own page.
  • Hell Is That Noise: The clicking noise of the Monster when its travelling, just hearing it leads to so many an Oh Crap moment from the Losties when they realise its near.
  • Hilarious in Hindsight: Since almost the beginning of the show, viewers have theorized, over and over, that everyone died in the crash and the Island is Purgatory, even after repeated debunking. The final revelation of the series? The flash-sideways timeline is Purgatory, or the next best thing -- though the Island and all the events that happened on and/or off it in normal continuity was all real.
    • It makes it even funnier when you realize that after being told the Island wasn't purgatory over and over again, NO ONE theorized that that's what the FS really is.
    • The January 4, 2011 U.S. Mega Millions lottery (worth $355 million) had a very significant amount of overlap with The Numbers, with 4, 8, 15, 25, 47 and the bonus 42. Playing The Numbers would have netted a person $150, and apparently there were 9,078 people who did just that.
  • Ho Yay: By union set:
    • Jack and (Sawyer, Locke, Sayid, Hurley);
    • Sawyer and (Sayid, Hurley, Jin);
    • Charlie and (Hurley, Desmond)
    • Kate and Claire
    • There was definitely a good amount of Ho Yay between Charlie and Desmond. After all, in the flash-sideways it was Charlie who triggered the beginning of Desmond's memories of the island.
    • Also, Ben and Locke in the flash-sidways/alternate universe afterlife. Of course this can also be seen as No Yay
    • Plus, there's Richard/Jacob. And In "The End" there's some implied Miles/Richard. Miles' actor even said that Miles would be the one to take care of Richard after they left the island.
  • HSQ: Pretty much guaranteed to double during season premiers and finales.
    • Locke, Desmond, and Ben episodes also tend to be slathered in HSQ.
    • Listing all examples, it will need it's own page. However, the crowner has to be when Ben moves the entire fricking ISLAND!
  • I Knew It!: Speculation was that based off his nickname, "Mr. Friendly", Tom's full name was Tom Friendly. Eventually the producers confirmed this was true.
    • A number of fans also speculated that Tom was gay after he told Kate, "You're not my type," and the actor apparently changed his portrayal based on the fan reaction to that line. The episode "Meet Kevin Johnson" later confirmed that Tom was gay.
    • On a more plot-relevant level, a lot of fans, upon finding out that post-return to the Island, Locke is not really Locke anymore, speculated that he was actually the Smoke Monster in Locke's form. Sure enough, in the Season 6 premiere...
  • Internet Backdraft: Lots. Specially after the finale.
  • Iron Woobie: Sayid.
  • It Was His Sled: Even if you haven't finished Season 1 (or just haven't bothered watching the show), by now you should know that the monster on the island is made out of smoke.
  • Jerkass Woobie:
    • Sawyer.
    • Benjamin. Despite being so entertainingly evil, he suffers so much and so often its nigh-impossible to be completely unsympathetic towards him.
  • Karma Houdini: Ben for some. There's the idea that Alex's death more or less absolves him and moves him towards redemption. However, when you think hard about how many people the guy is responsible for killing, including ordering the death of Charlie, being indirectly responsible for Michael's death and almost Jin's and being directly responsible for Locke's murder amongst countless others, its feels like the writers just let him off the hook.
    • Not to mention that he was responsible for those last three after Alex was killed.
  • Launcher of a Thousand Ships: Claire. Paired in Fandom with just about anyone she shared a frame with.
  • Magnificent Bastard: Ben, Jacob and the Man in Black.
    • Also in a flash-sideways, Ben gets out-magnificent-bastarded (!) by the principal of the high school where he works.
  • Memetic Badass: Lapidus, Richard.
  • Memetic Mutation:
  • Memetic Sex God: Lapidus, Richard.
  • Moment of Awesome: Has its own page.
  • Moral Event Horizon: The Man in Black tricking the main characters into activating his timebomb, resulting in the deaths of Jin, Sun and Sayid.
  • Narm Charm: One would argue that, Michael's repeated shoutings of "WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAALT!", given their justification, come off less narmful than anybody else in the same situation.
  • Nightmare Fuel: Has its own page.
  • The Producer Thinks of Everything: Despite a lot of the show's criticism claiming the contrary, anyone who actually watched the show through all 6 seasons knows that way too many things do add up for it to all be "made up as they go along".
    • Even in the first couple of episodes there was Foreshadowing of the events of the last couple of seasons, including the sounds of the Monster playing on the soundtrack during the final close-up of Locke at the end of "Tabula Rasa", and Locke's dialogue about backgammon in the very pilot ("a game played between two sides, one light, the other dark").
  • Rescued from the Scrappy Heap: Jack's popularity within the fanbase significantly increased during seasons 5-6 and season 4's flashforwards.
    • Kate had enough awesome moments in the Grand Finale to put her in this category.
    • After the pilot aired, Sawyer was said to be the characters audiences hated the most, and he spent the rest of the season as a unsympathetic, antagonistic Jerkass. But thanks to character development, he's become popular for reasons other than how hot he is with his shirt off.
  • Romantic Plot Tumor: The Jack/Kate/Sawyer love triangle took up significant story time.
  • Ruined FOREVER: Quite a few people have complained that "Across the Sea" did this to the series.
  • The Scrappy: Jack, Kate, (though see Rescued from the Scrappy Heap above) Nikki & Paolo, Michael in season 2, Ana Lucia and in season 6, Zoe.
  • Seasonal Rot: Some say Season 2, some say Season 5, most say the first half Season 3 (especially the six episode "pod" at the beginning), but 2 and 3 got back on track as they approached the finale.
  • Shocking Swerve: "We have to move the island." Of course, that plot line was tied up quite well and it did prove to be invaluable to the Myth Arc, but at the time it was pretty weird.
  • Special Effect Failure: Not common, but glaring when it happens.
  • Stoic Woobie: Juliet was a brilliant fertility expert with an ex-husband who controlled her every move, and had a cancerous sister who she was helping. She came to the island because she was mislead into thinking she was going to conduct experiments for a scientific company in Oregon. She found out her duty on the island was to try to prevent pregnant women and their children from dying, and she failed countless times. She then slowly became Ben's slave while her chances of leaving and seeing her sister became slimmer each year. Despite all these hardships she maintains a stoic demeanor, but when she slips you just want to give the girl a big fat hug.
  • Tear Jerker: Has its own page.
  • Unfortunate Implications: The fact that Walt has become a stereotypical urban black kid growing up without a dad is apparently the reason Harold Perrineau was not pleased with his character's fate.
    • "The Candidate" killed off three members of the cast in order to show how evil and serious the threat from MIB was. This has many people believing that the producers considered the non-white, foreign members of the cast to be "expendable". Even Jimmy Kimmel had to joke about it.
  • Villain Decay: As of the end of Season 5, Ben has been reduced to just another pawn in The Man in Black's extended chess match against Jacob. He knows it too, and isn't the least bit happy about it. It should be noted that only a few episodes after we learned Ben led the Others we found out Jacob gave the orders (the list for instance), so we should have seen this one coming.
    • Though it's implied that Ben's mere existence and free will is the "loophole" that Jacob's nemesis needed to kill Jacob, making him the most important character in the show...
    • Let's just say this: Ben in early seasons: Leader of the Others and Magnificent Bastard. Ben at the end of the series: Hurley's sidekick
    • To quote How It Should Have Ended;

"Widmore used to be important..."

  • Wangst: Jack, though he gets significantly better in Seasons 5 and 6.
  • What Do You Mean It's Not Didactic?: See below. Some people think that there seems to be a little too much religious symbolism for it not to have some sort of message. Not only are there mentions of yin and yang, the I Ching, dharma, karma...
  • The Woobie: Every. Single. Main. Cast. Member. Even the Big Bad during his Day in The Limelight.
    • Danielle Rousseau, arguably the most tragic character seen. She was forced to kill her friends including the love of her life, had her baby taken away, spent 16 years as The Aloner going nuts, and when she was finally reunited with her daughter she got killed off.
    • Benjamin as a child.
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