Lost, a review

Okay, I'm thoroughly hooked. Not that surprising, really. This, like JJ Abrams' Alias, has that delicious combination of interpersonal hyper-drama and B-movie intrigue. In the case of Alias, it's Bondian spy stuff, here the show is Stranded! On a Desert Island! combined with Something's Out There! Horror movie fare, but so much more interestingly wrought.

Actually, the series feels like a cross between Survivor, (only with better writers because it is, after all, written) and a pilot Dan cut a few years ago that sadly never went to series. The premise of that one was post-Apocalyptic: What if you were the only group of people left on the planet? How would you survive, how would it feel? Lost has that same spooky feeling, a group of people banding together in the face of the unknown, mixed in with the spicy flavor of a group of people forced into contact and not entirely trusting each other a la Survivor, only without the dumb competitions and weekly who-gets-voted-off-the-island tribal council.

I love this show. I love the flashbacks to everyone's lives before now, love the way they all seem to be remaking themselves in this lush but creepy new place, gradually coming to terms with their own tabula rasa existence. Past is prologue in this show and yet it isn't because you get to – no, you have to – begin again. Fascinating stuff. Fascinating show.