Defending the “Lost” finale on series' 20th anniversary

Step aside, haters.

Look, I’m not saying it’s The Shield. Or Newhart. Or Six Feet Under. The Lost finale may not be the most stupendous of all time, but it’s certainly not deserving of some of the scorn that was heaped upon it when the last installment of one of network television’s most ambitious series ever dropped on May 23, 2010.

As we hit the 20th anniversary of Lost’s Sept. 22, 2004, debut, it’s worth looking back at the infamous bookend finale (appropriately titled “The End”), and assessing why so many people felt let down by the show’s final installment — an installment that pulsates with big-picture themes, nods to the series’ most impactful moments of the past, and tear-jerking emotional reunions.

Maybe we, as a collective viewing public, were simply a bit let down that we had already correctly guessed the big mystery of where the passengers of Oceanic Airlines flight 815 that crashed on a tropical island filled with smoke monsters, polar beers, and dudes with eye patches actually were in the season 6 Sideways-world — a purgatory-like afterlife holding station.

Related: Lost: How binging the series with my son brought us closer

That’s on us for insisting on a big, shocking final twist and not simply enjoying the journey for what it was and appreciating the fact that executive producers Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse did not feel the need to stray from their vision and come up with some ridiculous out-of-left-field explanation that nobody had already guessed. (The finale even slyly nods to fans’ incessant guessing games when The Man in Black, as Locke, comments to Jack about being chosen to take over the island: “You’re sort of the obvious choice, don’t you think?”)

Or perhaps we were simply too distracted by the fact that the “Heart of the Island” set looked a little bit like one of those amusement park queues you go back and forth through as you wait two hours to take a spin on Lost: The Ride. And yes, it must be acknowledged that the entire fate of the island did indeed come down to a giant cork. That was a little odd… not to mention phallic. Meanwhile, the less said about Claire’s season 6 wig, the better.

Related: How Sun and Jin's relationship went from problematic to transcendent on Lost

But in the name of Danielle Rousseau, let’s stop the nitpicking, because there are so many first-class moments throughout the 104-minute ender that you’d have to be a Tailie to not appreciate them. The revelations when characters who went through life and death together touch one another and “remember” while we see flashes of their six-seasons worth of story are like nostalgic shots of emotional adrenaline that fit perfectly into the context of the denouement.

If you don’t tear up watching Jin and Sun’s entire tragic arc play out in mere seconds, culminating with their fresh-faced recognition of a life long forgotten, then… well, you are made of stronger stuff than I. If you do not lose both your mind and your heart watching Sawyer and Juliet passionately reconnect (“Kiss me, James”) over a broken vending machine, then you clearly hate candy bars… and love.

Sign up for Entertainment Weekly's free daily newsletter to get breaking news, exclusive first looks, recaps, reviews, interviews with your favorite stars, and more.

Hurley being the eventual keeper of the Island — and his initial reluctance to assume the position — is a chef’s kiss; the redemption (yet not total absolution) of Benjamin Linus is a fitting conclusion for the show’s arguably most complex character; and Miles telling us “I don’t believe in a lot of things, but I do believe in duct tape” reminds us why Miles is such an underrated force.

And then there is that ending. Many shows have used finales as callbacks to their very first episodes. (Seinfeld, anyone?) But rarely, if ever, have they been executed so perfectly. Watching Jack Shephard stumble and collapse in the bamboo grove, only to have Vincent the dog come find him in the place where they first met all those years ago was poetic enough. However, what was truly inspired was the final frame of the series being Jack’s eye closing — an inverse of the original premiere’s eye-opening shot.

For all its action, and its sci-fi intrigue, and its mysteries wrapped inside enigmas folded into question marks, Lost was ultimately a show about relationships. Claire and Charlie. Desmond and Penny. Jin and Sun. Shannon and Sayid. Hurley and Libby. Whatever was going on with Kate and Jack and Sawyer and Juliet. Rose and Bernard, for crissakes! The finale put those relationships front and center, and it was an eye-opening, eye-watering, and eye-closing experience.

Read the original article on Entertainment Weekly.