History YMMV / LOST

* NeverLiveItDown: Michael is mostly known for shouting about Walt's kidnapping and [[spoiler:his betrayal of the survivors at the end of the season, is what he's most known for, with his murder of Ana Lucia and Libby seen by many as his MoralEventHorizon]]. Despite getting a redemption arc in Season 4 he's still mostly disliked by the fandom.

* NeverLiveItDown: Michael is mostly known for shouting about Walt's kidnapping and [[spoiler:his betrayal of the survivors at the end of the season, is what he's most known for, with his murder of Ana Lucia and Libby seen by many as his MoralEventHorizon]]. Despite getting a redemption arc in Season 4 he's still mostly disliked by the fandom.

* CondemnedByHistory: As innovative as it was when it came out, ''Lost'' is also the face of everything wrong with the mid-to-late 00s TV series - the infamous "mystery box" model of unsustainable, WritingByTheSeatOfYourPants shows that just kept piling more and more nonsensical puzzles for the audience to follow without any actual goal in mind other than "keep ratings high". Not only is the series guilty of all the issues this style of writing and show-running entails, but it spawned ''[[FollowTheLeader dozens]]'' [[FollowTheLeader of sub-par copycats]] that absolutely flooded the market, coming up with more and more ridiculous starting points for their big "mysteries" that never meant anything at all, either burning out without any conclusion or starting to suffer from extreme cases of TheChrisCarterEffect - with ''Lost'' falling victim to that already by the end of season 3 out of 6. It is also guilty of introducing and popularising such hated things as: the marketing gimmick of "half-seasons" done for the sake of artificially extending the life of a single season, relying on CharacterDeath for shock value, absolutely massive casts that end up working against the show due to lack of focus and even souring flashbacks for generations to come, as they became a by-word for "padding" in the same way as EngagingChevrons. It's hard to comprehend how many despised practices hail back to this show as either origin or at least propagator and populariser.

* WhatDoYouMeanItsNotForKids: The show is about a bunch of people on an island, but that doesn't mean it's another ''Gilligan's Island'' or ''Survivor''. While it's tamer than many shows on nowadays and is TV-14, it still has lots of corpses and blood, multiple somewhat graphic surgeries, several murders including the gassing of an entire small town, multiple (albeit nudity-free) love-making scenes, some minor subplots relating to infidelity, several characters struggling with depression and self-loathing, and a main character with a severe heroin addiction, not to mention the many heavy philosophical themes that most kids wouldn't be able to appreciate. It's not an outright adult show, but should be kept in the 13 and up area.

* SeinfeldIsUnfunny:
** When ''Lost'' came out, it put everything about how TV series were made prior on its head - and this was part of its mass appeal in early seasons. By the time it was wrapping up, many of the new or ground-breaking things about it were already old news, with countless copycats further eroding their appeal or originality, such as things like "one of the main character got killed and not exactly in some big, dramatic moment", "there are constant flashbacks" or "not everything is explained and there is one mystery behind another to solve". It can be harder nowadays to appreciate the series without knowing precisely how it reshaped the landscape of TV series production and their plots, since it makes ''Lost'' look derivative of the formula it pioneered. The fact that some viewers were annoyed by the influence ''Lost'' had on TV in general didn't help.
** Perhaps the greatest innovation introduced by ''Lost'' was being the first mainstream show in Network television to completely abandon an episodic status quo formula and switch to serialized arcs from day one. While we had shows with serialized arcs at least since the 1990s like ''Series/BabylonFive'' and ''Series/BuffyTheVampireSlayer'', they tended to be niche genre shows. HBO also had already been doing serialized fiction with prestige series like ''Series/TheSopranos'', but ''Lost'' truly brought serialized shows to the masses. It was so successful that now it seems every mainstream show MUST have serialized arcs and ''Lost'' doesn't seem revolutionary in the least.
** ''Lost'' also seemed to be taking point in a movement of genre fiction becoming accepted by mainstream audiences at last, and demolishing or at least blurring the boundaries of the Main/SciFiGhetto, together with ''Series/BattlestarGalactica2003'', opening the way for highly-regarded and ever more openly science-fictional shows to be accepted by critics and mainstream audiences. Nowadays, SF and fantasy movies and shows are so mainstream that ''Lost'' doesn't look special anymore, and it's easier to see how the show was relatively timid and slow in introducing fantastic elements.
** Finally, there is the way ''Lost'' was seen as a game changer when it comes to the way TV shows were to be consumed in the Internet age. Fans sought online recaps to see if they'd missed any details from the episodes, fans came together to speculate about the show's many mysteries and predict future directions, etc. While none of this was new, ''Lost'' seemed to be one of the first mainstream TV shows to take full advantage of the Internet. Nowadays, all of this online activity is pretty much expected of any successful show.

* BetterOnDVD: For one thing, you don't have to wait an ungodly time between seasons. For another, keeping up with every ContinuityNod and CallBack--and in general, the extensive lore--is much easier.

** What's known for sure is that Season 2 ''[[JustForPun lost]]'' many viewers because of an overly large KudzuPlot. The first six episodes of Season 3 (the "pod") were widely panned and turned off a lot of fans (who would then go on to miss episode 7, "Not in Portland," considered one of the show's finest, and the nearly unbroken line of incredible episodes that followed it). Fortunately, with the series' end scheduled to the sixth season years in advance, Seasons 4 and 5 started expanding the context of the story and tying together some of the various loose ends.

* AbandonShipping: Almost everyone who was still invested in the Jack/Kate/Sawyer triangle leapt off the Sawyer/Kate train in favor of Sawyer/Juliet after their RelationshipUpgrade in "[[{{Recap/LostS05E08LaFleur}} LaFleur]]".

** In Season 2, [[spoiler:Shannon to those who still considered her a Scrappy. Just when she starts becoming a compelling character and not the vapid RichBitch, as well as we get to learn how much her EvilMatriarch stepmother crashed her dreams and broke her spirits... boom, shot in the stomach.]]
** Also in Season 2, [[spoiler:Ana Lucia got quite a bit of hate for killing Shannon, but she becomes more likeable just in time for Michael, yet another disliked character, to kill her.]]
** In Season 3, [[spoiler:Nikki and Paulo. They are really hated, but to be buried alive (and by mistake because the Losties thought they were dead after being paralyzed by spider poison) is a terrifying fate.]]
* AlternativeCharacterInterpretation: This show is probably the poster child for this trope, and it can be applied to pretty much every character with explicit grounding in the show's {{subtext}}. Keep in mind, these are just some of the ''major'' ones:

** Perhaps the greastest inovation introduced by ''Lost'' was being the first mainstream show in Network television to completely abandon an episodic status quo formula and switching to serialized arcs from day one. While we had shows with serialized arcs at least since the 1990s like ''Series/BabylonFive'' and ''Series/BuffyTheVampireSlayer'', they tended to be niche genre shows. HBO also had already been doing serialized fiction with prestige series like ''Series/TheSopranos'', but ''Lost'' truly brought serialized shows to the masses. It was so successful that now it seems every mainstream show MUST have serialized arcs and ''Lost'' doesn't seem revolutionary in the least.

** Finally, there is the way ''Lost'' was seen as a game changer when it comes to the way TV shows were to be consumed in the Internet age. Fans sought online recaps to see if they'd missed any details from the episodes, fans came together to speculate about the show's many mysteries and predict future directions, etc. While none of this was new, ''Lost'' seemed to be one of first mainstream TV shows to take full advantage of the Internet. Nowadays, all of this online activity is pretty much expected of any successful show.

** This gets a CallBack in Season 6, when Miles rebuffs Ben's offer of a $3.2 million bribe originally from Season 4, pointing out that he's now aware of a grave containing "a couple of jabronies" named Nikki and Paulo who got buried alive with $8 million worth of diamonds. To add further insult to injury, he apparently unceremoniously dug them up shortly afterwards, since he's shown with the diamonds at the end of the episode.

* UnintentionallySympathetic: The Man in Black can invoke this response, especially after seeing "Across the Sea." When you consider that [[spoiler:he's been trapped on the island for thousands of years, with Jacob determined to keep him there, it's possible to see him as a WellIntentionedExtremist who has simply lost any empathy for those who stand in the way of that goal. Especially because the show never gets around to explaining ''why'' his leaving the island would supposedly cause the end of the world.]]
* UnintentionallyUnsympathetic: By the same coin, Jacob can come across as this. When discussing the episode as part of the web series "Totally Lost", [[WordOfGod Mark Pellegrino]] basically admits that Jacob knew [[spoiler:sending his brother into the cave would have dire ramifications for his brother's well-being. But he did not care, as he wanted revenge for the death of their mother and since he could not kill him (and had been given vague warning that going into the cave would have dire consequences from his mom), he chose the next best thing to harm his brother and permanently trap him on the island.]]

** Danielle Rousseau, probably the most tragic character of all. She was forced to kill her friends including the love of her life, had her infant daughter taken away, spent 16 years as TheAloner going nuts, and when she was finally reunited with her daughter [[ShootTheShaggyDog she got]] [[AnyoneCanDie killed off]].

** Lapidus is RatedMForManly and can land any plane or helicopter in any conditions. [[WebAnimation/HowItShouldHaveEnded He survives explosions because he's the only pilot!]]

** Perhaps the greastest inovation introduced by ''Lost'' was being the first mainstream show in Network television to completely abandon an episodic status quo formula and switching to serialized arcs from day one. While we had shows with serialized arcs at least since the 1990s like Series/BabylonFive and Series/BuffyTheVampireSlayer, they tended to be niche genre shows. HBO also had already been doing serialized fiction with prestige series like Series/TheSopranos, but ''Lost'' truly brought serialized shows to the masses. It was so successful that now it seems every mainstream show MUST have serialized arcs and ''Lost'' doesn't seem revolutionary in the least.
** ''Lost'' also seemed to be taking point in a movement of genre fiction becoming accepted by mainstream audiences at last, and demolishing or at least blurring the boundaries of the Main/SciFiGhetto, together with Series/BattlestarGalactica2003, opening the way for highly-regarded and ever more openly science-fictional shows to be accepted by critics and mainstream audiences. Nowadays, SF and fantasy movies and shows are so mainstream that ''Lost'' doesn't look special anymore, and it's easier to see how the show was relatively timid and slow in introducing fantastic elements.

** Finally, there is the way ''Lost'' was seen as a game changer when it comes to the way TV shows were to be consumed in the Internet age. Fans sought online recaps to see if they'd missed any details from the episodes, fans came together to speculate about the show's many mysteries and predict future directions, fans went online to bash the characters they disliked and gush about the ones they liked. While none of this was new, ''Lost'' seemed to be one of first mainstream TV shows to take full advantage of the Internet. Nowadays, all of this online activity is pretty much expected of any successful show.

** ''Lost'' also seemed to be taking point in a movement of genre fiction becoming accepted by mainstream audiences at last, and demolishing or at least blurring the boundaries of the Main/SciFiGhetto, together with Series/BattlestarGalactica2003, opening the way for highly-regarded and ever more openly science-fictional shows to be accepted by critics and mainstream audiences. Nowadays, SF and fantasy movies and shows are so mainstream that ''Lost'' doesn't look special, and it's easier to see how the show was relatively timid and slow in introducing fantastic elements.

** Perhaps the greastest inovation introduced by Lost was being the first mainstream show in Network television to completely abandon an episodic status quo formula and switching to serialized arcs from day one. While we had shows with serialized arcs at least since the 1990s like Series/BabylonFive and Series/BuffyTheVampireSlayer, they tended to be niche genre shows. HBO also had already been doing serialized fiction with prestige series like Series/TheSopranos, but Lost truly brought serialized shows to the masses. It was so successful that now it seems every mainstream show MUST have serialized arcs and Lost doesn't seem revolutionary in the least.
** Lost also seemed to be taking point in a movement of genre fiction becoming accepted by mainstream audiences, and demolishing or at least blurring the boundaries of the Main/SciFiGhetto, together with Series/BattlestarGalactica2003, opening the way for highly-regarded and ever more openly science-fictional shows to be accepted by critics and mainstream audiences. Nowadays, SF and fantasy movies and shows are so mainstream that it's easier to see how Lost was relatively timid and slow in introducing fantastic elements.

* SeinfeldIsUnfunny: When ''Lost'' came out, it put everything about how TV series were made prior on its head - and this was part of its mass appeal in early seasons. By the time it was wrapping up, many of the new or ground-breaking things about it were already old news, with countless copycats further eroding their appeal or originality, such as things like "one of the main character got killed and not exactly in some big, dramatic moment", "there are constant flashbacks" or "not everything is explained and there is one mystery behind another to solve". It can be harder nowadays to appreciate the series without knowing precisely how it reshaped the landscape of TV series production and their plots, since it makes ''Lost'' look derivative of the formula it pioneered. The fact that some viewers were annoyed by the influence ''Lost'' had on TV in general didn't help.

** [[LesYay Kate and Claire.]] It starts with Kate being the one to deliver Aaron. Later, they develop a very close friendship, with Claire easily being one of [[OneOfTheBoys Kate's]] best female friends on the Island along with Sun and Claire choosing Kate to accompany her on her mission to find the Staff in "[[{{Recap/LostS02E15MaternityLeave}} Maternity Leave]]". Kate is fiercely protective of Claire, leaping to defend her from Charlie during his creepy phase in "[[{{Recap/LostS02E12FireWater}} Fire + Water]]" and Rousseau when she returns to camp after her failed attempt to kidnap Aaron. Kate also raises Aaron off the Island after Claire disappears, and returns specifically to rescue her. In the finale, [[spoiler:Kate convinces Claire to leave the Island by proposing that they [[HasTwoMommies raise Aaron together]], and the last shot of the two on the Island is them holding hands on the Ajira plane as it takes off. Also, in the Flash-Sideways, Claire, not Jack, is the person who causes Kate to regain her memories of her life, a role that almost every other character reserves for their LoveInterest.]]

* SpoiledByTheFormat: In syndication, the series finale suffers by being cut into two parts and removing beautiful scenes to make room for more ads. This is really glaring on subscription services like Hulu, which, for reasons unknown, stream the edited two part finale, followed immediately by the uncut version. But you wouldn't know this if you're just watching all the episodes in order, so by the time you get to the uncut finale you've already seen it once.

** Jack, the show's main character, was intensely disliked by many fans throughout the early seasons for his righteous and condescending attitude. It doesn't help that [[VanillaProtagonist practically every other character on the show is more interesting than him.]] He finally [[RescuedFromTheScrappyHeap gets]] [[CharacterDevelopment better]] towards the second half of the series.
** Kate could also qualify. Her constant swapping between Jack and Sawyer did her no favors whatsoever. Not to mention [[DamselInDistress she got captured so often]] and was rather useless in any situation, that she made [[Franchise/SuperMarioBros Princess Peach]] look competent.

** Kate could also qualify. Her constant swapping between Jack and Sawyer did her no favors whatsoever. Not to mention [[DistressedDamsel she got captured so often]] and was rather useless in any situation, that she made [[Franchise/SuperMarioBros Princess Peach]] look competent.

** The sheer amount of characters who have horrible fathers. It was a regular joke among the fans that someone in the production team must have really ''despised'' their father as they seem to be literally unable to comprehend the possibility that anyone can have a healthy relationship with theirs.

** Another background survivor, an attractive woman who wears a [[BareYourMidriff revealing]] blue striped shirt, affectionately known to the audience as [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin Sexy Blue Striped Shirt Girl]], became popular enough for her actress to get a Lostpedia interview despite having no lines or memorable scenes whatsoever.

** WordOfGod is that Paulo and Nikki's [[BuriedAlive manner of death]] was a direct response to their Scrappy status. In season 3:

** Giving an amusing CallBack in Series 6, when Miles rebuffs Ben's offer of a $3.2 million bribe from the previous season, pointing out that he's now aware of a grave containing "a couple of jabronies" named Nikki and Paulo who got buried alive with $8 million worth of diamonds. To add further insult to injury, he apparently unceremoniously dug them up shortly afterwards, since he's shown with the diamonds at the end of the episode.

** Widmore's henchman, Zoe, in season 6, is widely hated for being a pointless, annoying character, eating up valuable screen time... and also for the actress claiming that she's the key to all the show's themes and is on "every page" of the series finale [[note]]Apparently the "every page" referred to [[http://nymag.com/daily/entertainment/2010/03/losts_zoe_explains_herself.html the watermark on her script]].[[/note]]. [[spoiler: In the penultimate episode, The Man in Black violently slits her throat, killing her and pleasing everyone who hated her.]]