QUOTE(southsider2k5 @ Mar 22, 2007 -> 02:27 PM)
One thing I have learned with this show is that you can't think of it as individual episodes. With a plot as complex as they have, they need time to build story line and details. A season is really a show, and sometimes it take a couple of weeks to get enough stuff out there to build a good climax. They have been setting up this weeks episode for 3 or 4 weeks now. I have found I like the show a lot better with that kind of perspective, instead of thinking that each week has to have something huge in it.
Also the flashbacks are key in lots of respects. Think of all of the Locke flashbacks for example. If we don't have those, the scene where Ben reveals John's Dad to him would have made zero sense.
you know what I think? I think there are a lot of fans that caught up with the show through dvds, and when you are flyin through a season a bad episode you don't notice as much cause you are caught up in the whole season. Then when we have to do the week to week stuff the individual episodes are so much more important. That hurley/van episode wouldn't have bothered me at all if i had 10 more episodes to just play whenever I wanted.