Tuning in to the two-hour season premiere of ABC's Lost, I did something I haven't done with a commercial broadcast TV drama all year. I stopped everything else I was doing, leaned forward excitedly, and watched.
If broadcast television has a future, the future is Lost. And shows like it...
Programs to care about, to savor, to ponder afterward. This is what broadcast TV has to give us, if it is going to continue to matter. News, sports, live events, sure -- but unless it presents and nurtures some of the best television out there, why should people watch?
With Lost, the show itself has been vanishing and reappearing like the island itself. Here one day, gone the next -- for eight months. But when it came back, it was with such assurance, pace and imagination, it was not only a treat, and a joy. It was a relief.
The two-hour season premiere is being repeated by ABC Saturday night, preceded by a repeat of the one-hour clip show that explains and repeats some, but not all, of the series' complex story lines. Together, the two programs gobble up all of Saturday's prime time, just as they did Wednesday's.
That's two nights out of seven in which Hurley and Kate and Locke and Jack and the rest represent ABC. You can't ask for anything more, or for anything better, from ABC. Kate, three years after escaping from the island, looks less rugged. Locke, three years later, looks dead -- but not in flashbacks.
And for Hurley to pull a last-second about-face that derails the best-laid plans of mice and Ben, that's so Hurley... and yet so surprising. Who's doing the right thing here? That's one of the key questions regarding this series. But for ABC, doing the right thing means doing just what it's doing: supporting Lost to the very end, with an end we all know is coming.
You can give ABC credit for developing Pushing Daisies, but also have to blame ABC for jettisoning it. With Lost, there's no blame to go around, just praise, and thanks.
TV Worth Watching -- Lost may as well be our broadcast TV poster boy. Can't wait for next week...