As compelling as Thursday night's Lost finale was, Harold Perrineau is dead on, in regards to his character and his annoyance about being brought back just to be a punching bag. "I thought it was disappointing and a waste to come back, only to get beat up a few times and then killed. I felt like it was sort of pandering to some fans who wanted to see Michael punished because he betrayed people." I don't agree with his assessment that his skin color has anything to do with his character arc, but his other thoughts in this refreshingly candid TV Guide interview aren't inaccurate, and its worth a read if you're even a casual fan of the show.Personally, I liked how Michael's murderous betrayal was going to seemingly go unpunished at the end of season two. He murdered two innocent bystanders in order to save his son, then left the island with Walt, seemingly never to be seen again. The idea that Michael must come back and redeem himself, with a cliche sacrifice to boot, is the sort of pandering to conventional morality that the show usually avoided. Sawyer never had to pay for his sins both on and off the island. Charlie got away clean with kidnapping Sun and died a saintly martyr. And Lock and Ben seem to keep their mystique of fascinated sympathy despite their increasingly villainous actions. Lost was great last week and it's shaping up to be one of the great myths of our generation, but Perrineau was right about the cop-out of Michael.
Scott Mendelson
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