I've written before that I'm a critic, not a historian, so I'm not sure what the first television season-ending cliffhanger was. The first one that I can clearly remember is one of TV's most famous -- Dallas' "Who shot J.R.?". This mystery had all of America buzzing over the summer, as we waited to get the answer. Since that time, cliffhangers have become very commonplace, and even in the most intriguing ones, we usually had a fairly good idea of what was going to happen.

Wow! What a cliffhanger! For once, I honestly had no idea what was going to happen. Did the bomb kill everyone? (Unlikely, but with this show, you never know.) Did Daniel's plan work and everyone is back safely in 2004? Did nothing happen at all? I couldn't wait for Season 6 to begin so that I could learn the outcome. Little did I know that Season 6 of Lost would be a monumental disappointment.

Again, it was difficult to predict what the effect of the bomb would be. Who could have guessed that there would be two results? First of all, all of those who had been stuck in the past where now back in the present. So Jack, Kate (Evangeline Lily), Sayid, Hurley (Jorge Garcia), Sawyer (Josh Holloway), Jin (Daniel Dae Kim) and Miles (Ken Leung) were able to resume their quest to get off of the island. Meanwhile, Ben (Michael Emerson) and Sun (Yunjin Kim) had been trying to find the others (and Ben had an ulterior motive, of course), but they now find themselves dealing with a resurrected John Locke (Terry O'Quinn) who is really an immortal known as the "Man in Black". This man has plans to wipe out everyone on the island and then move on to the rest of the world.

The bomb's second effect resulted in "flash sideways". The show began with flashbacks, and then moved onto flash-forwards, and now we have flash sideways. This introduces an alternate reality where Oceanic 815 didn't crash and everyone made it safely to Los Angeles. Some are doing exactly what they did before (Jack is still a surgeon), while others have new roles (Sawyer is a cop). Still, they all meet and find a way to get entangled in each others lives.

I can't help but feel that after five seasons of throwing mystery after mystery and twist after twist at the audience, while supplying very few answers, the powers-that-be at Lost had written themselves into a corner. The smart and polite thing to do would have been to spend the last season slowly offering the answers to one question after another. Instead, they decided to go in another direction and introduce more questions and mysteries. Such as, "That temple's been full of people all along?" Who's that Asian guy?" "Why the did the subplot about Sayid being evil suddenly get dropped?" Granted the show does offer some tidbits, such as how Richard (Nestor Carbonell) got to the island or the origin of Jacob (Mark Pellegrino). Unfortunately, the show set aside two entire episodes (out of only 16 for the entire season) to answer these questions.

Time-travel can often be confusing, so I'm sure that there were many who didn't understand Season 5. I'm sure that was a picnic compared to the "flash sideways". Frequent readers of science-fiction or comic books should be familiar with the idea of alternate realities, but I'm sure that the uninitiated were thrown for a loop by this concept. The problem with the flash sideways is that almost turn into their own show. Yes, the action is meant to mirror what is happening/has happened on the island, but it often doesn't. It got to the point where I dreaded the flash sideways, as they didn't really go anywhere.

And then we have the finale. This was a polarizing event and I came squarely down on the "Hate it" side. I felt that it was lazy and a copout. After years of deflecting ideas of what the island's true nature was, the writers took one of the most popular theories and wove it into the final episode. Oh, now you decide to give the viewers what they want? What about the Dharma shark? That's what I want! That guy has to have the worst agent in Hollywood! He turns up in the last episode of Season 1 and the first episode of Season 6 and that's it? What a rip-off!

You can't satisfy all of the people all of the time and Lost is certainly a prime example of this. For several years, the show was one of the best on TV, but as it become more and more inscrutable, it slowly wore out its welcome. Season 6 was the last straw, as action and adventure, with a dash of sci-fi, gave way to spiritualism and sappiness, leaving a very bitter taste in my mouth. In some ways, I wish that I had never discovered the island in the first place.

Lost: The Complete Sixth Season doesn't have nearly enough shark on Blu-ray Disc courtesy of ABC Studios. The five-disc set contains al 16 episodes of the show's final season. The show has been letterboxed at 1.78:1 and the Discs contains an AVC 1080p HD transfer which runs at an average of 20 Mbps. The image is very sharp and clear, showing very little grain and no defects from the source material. The daytime scenes have a nice crispness to them and the depth is very impressive. The nighttime scenes look good as well, and the image is never overly dark. The colors look very good, most notably the lush greens of the island. The Discs offers a DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 track which runs at 48 kHz and an average of 4.3 Mbps. The track provides clear dialogue and sound effects. We occasionally get some nice stereo effects, most notably in the jungle. The surround sound effects get a boost from the musical cues and that sound effect which accompanies a switch in time and place. There are a few explosions which provide nice subwoofer action.

The Lost: The Complete Sixth Season Blu-ray Disc set contains several extras. Disc 1 offers "Lost in 8:15", an overview of the series leading up to Season Six. The episodes "LA X" contains an AUDIO COMMENTARY from Co-Creator/Executive Producer Damon Lindelof and Executive Producer Carlton Cuse. The episode "Dr. Linus" on Disc 2 has an AUDIO COMMENTARY with Executive Producers and Writers Edward Kitsis & Adam Horowitz and Actor Michael Emerson. Disc 3 has AUDIO COMMENTARY with Writers Melinda Hsu Taylor & Greggory Nations and Actor Nestor Carbonell on the episode "Ab Aeterno". Lindelof and Cuse do an AUDIO COMMENTARY for the episode "Across the Sea" on Disc 4. The remainder of the extras are found on Disc 5. "The New Man in Charge" (12 minutes) is a short featuring Ben and Hurley which offers a glimpse into what happened after the show's finale. I liked this piece because it actually offered some answers. "Crafting a Final Season" (39 minutes) is a very detailed featurette which explores the production of Season Six. The piece offers many comments from the cast and crew and a lot of on-set footage. There are some surprisingly touching moments as we watch Jorge Garcia read the script for the final episode. "A Hero's Journey" (9 minutes) examines how Lost follows in a historic tradition of storytelling in which heroes must face epic challenges. (It also made me realize once again, that I may be the only member of my generation whose writing isn't inspired by Star Wars). "See You in Another Life, Brotha" (9 minutes) looks at the "flash sideways" from Season Six and how actors from past season returned to the show. "Lost on Location" (29 minutes) examines how various sets and locales in Hawaii were used to create the places seen in the show. The Disc contains nine DELETED SCENES which run about 10 minutes and which were taken from various episodes. Finally, "Lost Bloopers" is a 4-minute GAG REEL.