What early story ideas did Lost drop from its original plan around the time of the pilot episode? Lost has been off screens for almost a decade now, and while rumors of a reboot or sequel series rumble on, all that currently remains is the show’s legacy as one of the most ambitious and groundbreaking ventures in modern television that, love it or hate it, changed the game for what could be achieved on network TV.
One of the most frequent criticisms of Lost over the years has been that the writers were making up the story as they went along, and while Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse have admitted to a certain amount of narrative flexibility, they insist that the overall direction of Lost played out as originally intended. When addressing this criticism, it’s important to acknowledge that Lost’s progression was disrupted by both an ill-timed writers’ strike and not knowing how many seasons the show would run for.
Helpfully, the Lost bible gives a close idea of exactly what elements were altered during the show’s run. This document was produced by Lindelof and J. J. Abrams following the filming of Lost’s pilot episode and is now widely available online. Here’s everything that changed from Lost’s original plan.
An Episodic Format
Lost is perhaps one of the foremost examples of serialized TV storytelling, with each episode contributing to a long-term arc and each arc building towards the overall story of why these characters landed on the island in the first place. Although this quality becomes more prominent in later seasons, it’s interesting that Lost was never intended to be serialized at all, and the original plan was to have a “mystery of the week” format with standalone episodes.
Although it might seem odd now, Lost’s bible describes the series as a story viewers can dip into without knowing anything about the characters or catching up with previous episodes. This remit seems faintly ridiculous now. Around Lost’s third season, the show began to lose viewers due to accusations of being too hard to follow, and dropped viewers quickly began making jokes with nauseating regularity that they were “lost” with Lost.
Logical Explanations
Another promise Lost made in its early designs was to always provide logical, real-world explanations for the show’s mysteries. Obviously, this rule was cast aside in no uncertain terms as Lost progressed. Later seasons introduced water that could make people ageless, a cork that could destroy the world and, most famously, time-travel. It’s also worth noting that the smoke monster was first envisioned as some kind of man-made security system, rather than a figure with god-like abilities turned into smoke by a mysterious electromagnetic energy. While some questions certainly did have logical answers (the Others, for example), Lost ended up being far more fantastical than it envisioned.
Furthermore, the Lost bible references an easy-to-follow mythology for the show. Given that Lost encompasses a formula that predicts the end of the world, unexplained psychic abilities and so many unresolved stories an epilogue was added to explain them, this aim also appears to have been altered somewhere along the way. The document asserts that Lost has no “ultimate mystery,” but the focus on the island’s purpose in later seasons suggests otherwise.
Disappearing Survivors
In a series like Lost, it’s inevitable that only a handful of survivors can be given the spotlight, with most of Oceanic 815’s passengers merely background characters that help paint a more realistic scene. Lost partly deals with this by separating the plane into two sections and then gradually whittling down background figures through a series of conflicts and dangerous events. By later seasons, the extras have largely been forgotten, but Lost originally had a more dramatic way of dealing with this issue - making them disappear. Apparently, Lost’s non-speaking contingent were slated to mysteriously disappear by episode 4, leaving only the central cast.
Boone’s Schizophrenia
Ian Somerhalder’s Boone was the heartthrob of Lost’s first season, and after finding himself lacking direction, the character fell under the tutelage of Locke - a partnership that would ultimately seal his early demise. Although Boone certainly experiences his fair share of trauma, self-doubt and inexplicable happenings, the character was originally written as suffering with Schizophrenia, which would obviously worsen during his time stranded on the island. Perhaps fearing such a storyline could be deemed insensitive, Boone’s mental health condition was dropped, although there are potential hints towards this ditched plot point in the pilot episode.
Shannon & Sawyer
Boone’s sister Shannon was also penned for a very different arc during Lost’s early drafts. Although Maggie Grace’s character was always bratty, immature and spoiled, she was lined up for a romance with the island’s bad boy, Sawyer. This relationship would have allowed both characters to mature and get over their respective personal problems, but Shannon was eventually paired up with Sayid instead, while Sawyer become one third of Lost’s main love triangle. Although Sayid and Shannon might not have gained much from their tryst, the decision to shift Sawyer’s affections onto Kate (and later Juliet) provided some of Lost’s best moments.
The Fog, A Hurricane, An Eclipse & Cocoons
The Lost bible mentions a variety of natural threats that were never utilized in the finished show. A thick fog was supposed to descend on the survivors during a trek through the jungle, separating them and leading to all manner of problems and dangers. The island was also going to be battered by a huge hurricane in season 1, testing the fortitude of the castaways and their will to carry on living. On the more supernatural side of storytelling, a two-day eclipse was meant to cover the island for several episodes, deepening the mystery around the location of the crash. This might’ve been dropped due to reservations about having entire episodes with minimal lighting. By far the weirdest dropped story, however, was that the aforementioned fog would leave behind cocoons that would eventually hatch, revealing some unknown threat.
Vincent’s Bite
One particularly strange planned storyline would’ve resulted in a very different fate for Walt’s dog, the ever-lovable Vincent. Aside from being viewed as one extra, unnecessary mouth to feed by some of the cat lovers among the islanders, Vincent also would’ve gone missing in Lost’s earliest plans, only to return with a human-shaped bite mark out of his ear. Perhaps this story came as a result of the Others being conceived as more primal island natives rather than the contemporary, regular settlement they ended up being. In reality, Vincent was put to better use, book-ending the series by joining Jack Shephard for the final scene.
Wild Animal Attacks
Lost’s island was full of odd beasts, from talking birds to tropical polar bears. Other animal storylines involved hunting down hogs and killer spiders that were later revealed to have been a manifestation of the Man in Black. However, a few unused zoological threats were planned for Lost’s first season, including killer ants and wild cats that kept stealing the camp’s food. The ants might’ve been an early, disused replacement for the spiders that would kill Nikki and Paulo in one of Lost’s most derided episodes, and the cats perhaps deemed surplus to requirements with the hogs around camp fulfilling much the same function. Arguably, keeping the local wildlife to a minimum made the appearance of Lost’s animals oddities (such as the polar bear and Hurley bird) all the more shocking.
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