Friday, May 7, 2010

Frequently Asked Questions


Last Updated: November 5, 2012

Here are some answers to questions I've been getting a lot from people regarding this project.  It will be updated as I get more questions.

What is Chronologically LOST?

Chronologically LOST is a project I have undertaken to present the show LOST in its entirety in chronological order.  That means taking every flashback, flash forward, and flash sideways, extracting them from the present day storyline, and creating one big timeline, that starts with the earliest flashbacks of the island, and goes through all the way to the end of the series in...well, I guess the end doesn't really have a specific date.  The plan is to release this timeline in 'episodes', just as the show is presented to us now.  These episodes will be posted on this site for viewing, and will be approximately the length of a regular LOST episode, 45 minutes, give or take depending on the logistics of a particular episode.

How long did it take you to do all of this?

I haven't really kept track, but it's taken a while.  Basically, the entire series is 120 episodes, or about 85 hours, and I've had to take all of that video, put it on my computer and in a format that's workable, go through every episode to split up all the clips, organize them chronologically (I worked on this on a season by season basis, because it's too big as a whole for my computer to handle), then start working on integrating the different seasons into one master timeline.  Then, finally, I had to go through each audio and video transition in between every clip to make sure everything looks and sounds okay.  This also included dealing with scenes that are looked at from multiple perspectives (ie. The Oceanic 815 plane crash or Locke, Jack, Kate & Desmond in the hatch, etc.), and figuring out where everything goes and setting up split screens if necessary.  It's been a fun yet arduous process, and it's really given me a good refresher course on the entire series since I've had to go through much of it a few times while working on all of this.

Is there any non-televised material that will be included in the project?

Basically, I wanted to only include things that were considered officially canon in the LOST universe.  So, other than the actual episodes, there are the "Missing Pieces" mobisodes that were originally released as part of a mobile phone promotion and ultimately ended up on the Season 4 DVD extras.  These are considered to be canon, and are meant to enhance the hardcore LOST fan's understanding of the show.  There are 14 of them, and each one is only a few minutes long, so it's not a lot of extra material, but there is some definite value in some of the mobisodes.  Other than that, though, I don't know of any other sources that would be considered 'canon', so for the most part it will just be video from the televised episodes.


Now, there are rumored to be some additional video clips on either the Season 6 DVD set or the Complete Series DVD set that may take place after the end of Jack's time on the island.  As of right now I believe those clips are going to be considered canon, so they will probably be integrated into the project as soon as possible.

What are you going to do with the flash sideways?

This is a popular question that I get a lot, and the short answer is:  I don't know, and I probably won't know until the show is actually over.  But I have some ideas.

There is some precedence for how to handle flash sideways, because we (unknown to us at the time) experienced one in Season 3 in "Flashes Before Your Eyes", after Desmond turned the key in the hatch.  Desmond flashed to 1996, only it wasn't 1996 in our world, but it was a similar world.  What happened in this place did not affect anything that happened in his actual life, his talking to Charlie, meeting Eloise, etc.  Now, since this flash sideways did not occur in our world, just because in the flash sideways world it was 1996, does not mean that's where it falls in our master timeline.  Instead, we would place this flash sideways at the moment Desmond starts to experience it.  As we saw in our world, Desmond started experiencing his flash sideways the moment he turned the key, and when he finished the experience, he woke up in the jungle.  And so in our timeline, that's where it will be placed.

Contrast that with Desmond in "The Constant".  In that episode, Desmond is leaving the island by helicopter, and starts to experience a temporal distortion, his mind flashing between 2004 and 1996.  Only this time, he's actually moving between two time periods in our world, so his actions in 1996 affect how things play out in the future (The whole point of the episode, his conversation with Penny, is evidence of this).  So this is not a flash sideways, this is just Desmond flashing in time, similar to Locke, Sawyer & Co. flashing through time on the island.  So in this instance, Desmond's flashes to 1996 would be placed on the timeline in 1996, and not in 2004 where he is supposed to reside.

But, back to our flash sideways in Season 6.  While with our previous flash sideways, we knew precisely when it was occurring from Desmond's perspective.  With our current flash sideways, we don't know who is experiencing it, or even when they are experiencing it.  Desmond was "awaken" from his flash sideways by a cricket bat to the side of the head.  I think that whoever is experiencing this flash sideways will have a similar waking up, and at that time we should have a better idea of when exactly these flash sideways were experienced in our world.  Now, this is all speculation on my part based on past experience, it could play out in any number of ways, which is why my short answer was I don't know.  But that's the long answer as to why I still don't know, and don't expect to find out how to handle it until May 23.




Hooray, we have an answer!  In case you were still wondering, the flash sideways world will be placed at the very end of the series, as a bit of an epilogue.


How did you arrange the flashbacks?


I used Lostpedia's fantastic timeline for a lot of the initial groundwork.  While it doesn't list out everything, it gave me enough to work on to where I could use my best guess to figure out where everything else goes.  Since most of the flashbacks don't have any set dates as to when they occurred, it was more like putting together puzzle pieces than anything, making sure everything fit together.  It's an inexact science, but I believe I was able to put things into a logical order.


How can I watch the episodes?


Episodes are available to be downloaded via torrent.

28 comments:

  1. Just watched the third episode, w/ my wife. You're doing a great job. We really enjoyed it, and can't wait to continue watching.

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  2. Unfortunately, I need to point out that you are wrong with your thoughts on the Flashes Before Your Eyes episode... The events occured in OUR WORLD just as The Constant did... His actions did change reality, but unfortunately for him, "Time has a way of course correcting" so he ended up deciding to break up with Penny anyway, throwing away the ring and such.

    The biggest evidence of this ACTUALLY occurring in our world is Hawking's reaction to Desmond years later in the Lamp Post station...when he says "this woman cost me 3 years of my life because she said it was my bloody purpose to go to the island"... to which Hawking does not react as though this is untrue.

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  3. I made a post about "Flashes Before Your Eyes" that I used to expand upon my thoughts on the episode, I encourage you to check it out there certainly isn't enough evidence one way or the other for you to be able to outright say I'm wrong, however.

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  4. I just finished the 4th episode. Great job! I have always wanted to watch the series chronologically. I'm curious, have you thought about arranging the scenes in order when they occured for the characters? For instance, placing the time traveling scenes in the later part of the series because that is when it happened for the (main) characters? Do you know what I mean? It's great the way you arranged everything technically by time, I love it, but I'd like to see it as how it happened for the main characters because it would be more coherent. Anyway, just curious if this is something you have thought about. Thanks for your work so far, I appreciate it!

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  5. I suppose it's certainly something I could do, however I think it would be quite a bit of work to re-organize things, and if I can be honest for a second here, I'm not sure I'd have the interest in working on it. I've spent the last nine months or so working on this project, and I'm already pretty burned out on the whole thing, I can't imagine spending however much time trying to re-order a chunk of the series.

    But you're right, it would certainly be a different way of watching things.

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  6. Mike, you've done such a fantastic job with this! I'm starting to re-watch the series now, since yesterday was the anniversary of the plane crash. What I'm doing is first, watching the episode as it aired (starting with the Pilot), and then watching the chronological version of it from your blog. I'm not going to watch most of the flashbacks again in chronological order, however. I just want to see all the stuff that's going on from the day of the plane crash onward and then to when the losties got fixed in time in 1974 after all the flashes. Anyway, this is truly a work of art, my friend. Just one question/request: in your soon-to-come HD re-uploads, could you stick all the deleted scenes in there, pretty please? :D I know the producers haven't technically said that they're cannon, but come on, we know they fit pretty well as cannon. So whatdya say? :D

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  7. If not the deleted scenes, then at least the "LOST Flashbacks."

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  8. @Charlie Apologies for my delay in responding. I will not include the deleted scenes, because you indicated, they are not canon. However, all of the LOST Mobisodes are included in the series.

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  9. This is fantasmic!!!

    Since the deleted scenes and "Lost Flashbacks" aren't cannon, per se... maybe if you ever get bored, you could make a "Lost Bits" episode or two (depending on how much there is) and put all that stuff in chronological order?? THAT would be a fun little "...and here's the leftover bits" episode.

    I for one always felt some of those should be cannon, considering most of them were all cut for time, such as Sawyer stating "That's the best we could do without a shovel" when burrying the Dharma chick's husband... Obviously cut for time, and it's funny how many forum threads started because of that simple omission. (ie "How did they bury him with no shovel!! FOUL!!")

    It would be neat to at least throw all of those in as an addendum.

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  10. @The Unabeefer - Well, if I ever get bored enough I will certainly entertain the idea! Glad you're enjoying the series!

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  11. oi por favor up de novo em novos servidores pois saiu do ar

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    1. Por favor, utilize os torrents que você pode baixar aqui: http://www.chronologicallylost.com/2011/02/series.html

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  12. "The Constant" shows that the events of Desmonds flash to 1996 really did happen, because A. Daniel wrote in his notebook that Desmond would be his constant. If that wasnt real, then Danie wouldnt have met Desmond until he was on the Island, and it couldnt have been in the notes. And B. It's a popular theory that Desmond was sent to jail and kicked out of the Scottish Army because he deserted to go see Daniel.

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    1. Yep, I agree that the events that happened in "The Constant" were real and actually happened.

      Contrast that with my thoughts on "Flashes Through Your Eyes" (Which you can read about here: http://www.chronologicallylost.com/2010/06/flashes-before-your-eyes.html ) where I suggest that those events were more of a flash sideways.

      So yes, I agree with everything you said, Daniel writing about Desmond in his notebook and Penny waiting for Desmond's call prove that Desmond's flashes through time in "The Constant" were real and did happen.

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  13. Hi Mike,

    I must say watching the show in Chronological order is really making me see the show in a different light. In some senses it makes me question the meaning behind some things and makes me think there may have been a grand plan all along (I'm one of those people who hated the last couple of episodes and the final ending itself)

    I'm at episode 35 which is the episode where Claire returns. I might be wrong but didn't we see flashbacks of her in the maternity place getting treatment? According to the LOSTpedia timeline, that happens day 16-24 but I'm already on day 27-31, Claire's back and we've not seen what happened. It could be me or you've maybe included it later as she is remembering what happened but it's the first thing that I've noticed that I thought was maybe missing.

    Thanks again for your fantastic work and awesome job you've done on this - looks so professional! Well impressed!!

    Regards,

    Chris

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  14. Hi Mike,

    just saw your post saying you included this in as a memory rather than a flashback...makes perfect sense!

    Chris

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    1. Ha, glad you figured it out! It was something I struggled with, and really could have gone either way.

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  15. Hey! I am having trouble viewing the episodes either on here or downloading them (the download site just takes me to a petition site). I don't know if this is just my problem or something else. Thanks! I'm real excited to watch!

    Erin

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    1. Hi Erin-

      I will have to update my FAQ, as currently the only way to download the series is via torrent (You can download the torrents here: http://www.chronologicallylost.com/2011/02/series.html)

      The original download links I had put up were done over two years ago and have since expired, which is why you can't download them any more.

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  16. This project is awesome, I'm enjoying it tremendously. I can't believe how much work this must have been.
    However, am I correct that some parts are missing (maybe ones that can't be placed in time)? For example, while I did encounter Charlie's first swimming lesson, I think I missed him getting a piano for Christmas, and I'm now at a point where he's an adult already.

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    1. Glad you're enjoying the project zeptimus. You are not the first person to ask about Charlie playing the piano, however the piano sequence is in fact part of a dream Charlie is having, during the episode when Charlie ends up sleep walking and taking Aaron away from Claire in the middle of the night. So, since it is a dream and not necessarily a 100% accurate memory/flashback of that Christmas, it does not get placed during the time when he is a child.

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    2. I thought it was one of his 'Greatest Hits'. Damn, here I thought you were being sloppy when you're more accurate than I thought.

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  17. Mike, not sure if you're still monitoring comments, but I recently found your site and d/l'd all the episodes and after watching them at every waking moment I can find the time, I am about 6 away from the end. I had previously started watching my Lost DVDs but never made it past season 3 or 4. It was just too hard to understand and follow along. Now that I've watched your interpretation of the series, I am anxious to go back and watch the DVDs as aired on TV with a much better understanding. Having undertaken a similar, but MUCH smaller project myself, I just cannot imagine the hours/time you took to put this together. I can imagine you're still burned out on Lost at this point. I just wanted to give my thanks to you for all your work. You've made a series that I had chalked up to "I just can't finish it" to something I can now enjoy. Thank you, thank you, thank you.

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    1. Thanks, I appreciate the kind words. I must say, you're the first person that's ever wanted to use Chronologically LOST as a guide of sorts to help them understand LOST itself. But I find it fascinating that it's helpful for you in this way.

      I definitely had some LOST burnout for a while, although lately I've been finding myself thinking about actually going through and watching all of CL, so maybe it's coming to an end!

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  18. Hello! I heard about this at DragonCon in Atlanta this past weekend. I was going to go ahead and download the torrent until I saw the size. Do you have it in smaller chunks?

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    1. You should be able to just select certain files to download, you shouldn't have to download the ENTIRE torrent if you don't want to. At least I know in torrent clients like uTorrent you can select which files you actually want to download from the torrent. This way you can download a handful of episodes at a time if you'd prefer.

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  19. This edit is spectacular. Thanks for doing it.

    Currently on my second watch and podcasting thru it this time. Had a thought about the 80's. There are some "mysteries of the universe" videos on youtube that speculate from an outside world perspective on the existence of the Dharma Initiative. Might be cool to put those in there in the 80's to show how the world is reacting to the existence of Dharma. Seems relevant and gives a bit more backstory on Alvar Hanso and Dharma. Idk if the Rachael Blake videos are "canon" but it would be cool if it was part of C-Lost. Just a thought. Again, thanks for this.

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  20. I watched the entire netflix version in March and then found this. This is really cool and I appreciate you making this available!

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