With Lost’s last season premiere just days away (Tuesday, Feb. 2 at 9 p.m. on ABC, to be precise), Entertainment Weekly’s own Jeff “Doc” Jensen met with Lost’s exec producers Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse — to get some key intel on what fans can expect in the sixth and final season. Given that there are so many lingering questions to be answered in just 16 episodes, Cuse and Lindelof say the plan is to do what they’ve always done: tell their story their way. “We’re writing the show for ourselves,” says Cuse. “It would be a terrible mistake to change the methodology that has sustained the show for this long.” Lindelof refers to Lost’s most despised duo to drive home the point: “Find the person who hates Nikki and Paulo the most, and I guarantee you that Carlton and I are still flagellating ourselves for that idea. The fact that we are 10 times harder on ourselves than anybody else makes us feel like the show is in the right hands.” That said, Lindelof is still feeling butterflies about the impending premiere: “I wish it was already here. The audience may hate it. The audience may not hate it. But at least they will finally see it, and when they do, it will be a relief.”
The duo also offered teasers about Lost’s most pressing questions — Is John Locke really dead? Who are Jacob and the Man in Black? Will Kate choose Jack or Sawyer? — though they’re coy when asked if fans will ever learn what the Island really is. As for Lost’s central hero and resident “fixer,” Jack Shephard, the question of whether he’ll achieve the redemption he so desperately seeks will be a core theme for season six. Explains Cuse, “This notion of predeterminism is something we’re very actively exploring this season. Is redemption possible? Is redemption possible for all of them? Is redemption possible for some of them? What does redemption look like?”
For more on Lost’s final season—including teasers about who survived the bomb, why Richard Alpert doesn’t age, and whether Jin and Sun will reunite—pick up the new issue of Entertainment Weekly, on stands January 29.
