Making up for Lost time: A quick catch-up

The cast of Lost. Photo / Supplied

Lost fans have dedicated a good part of the past six years watching and analysing the series - but for those who haven't been able to keep up, here's a quick primer of the last 120 or so shows for Saturday night's big finale ...

It's 2004, there's a plane, it crashes on an island where there are unseasonal polar bears and a smoke monster, and angry natives called The Others. Jack is a doctor, Locke is a paraplegic who can walk now, Sawyer's a con man, Kate's a fugitive. Kate likes Jack and also Sawyer, and then Jack again. Jin and Sun are a married Korean couple, Claire is pregnant, Charlie's a junkie. Sayid's a former Iraqi torturer. Hurley is a lottery winner with extremely bad luck.

The Losties find a hatch in the ground. Inside the hatch there is a dude named Desmond. Every 108 minutes he punches six numbers into a computer so the world won't end - he believes. The hatch was built by the Dharma Initiative. Dharma was a group of scientists and hippies who came to the island in the 70s and drove VW microbuses. The Losties capture Ben, the leader of The Others. The others capture several Losties. Locke decides they should stop entering numbers in the hatch. The hatch blows up, the sky turns purple, Desmond starts seeing the future. The captured Losties escape. Desmond tells Charlie he is going to die, he's right. A freighter shows up. Jack wants to be rescued, but Locke thinks the island needs them to stay. He's right.

The ship was sent by Desmond's girlfriend Penny's dad, who is kind of a jerk. It blows up.

Jack, Sun, Hurley, Sayid, Desmond and Kate escape in a helicopter. It crashes. They're okay. Locke, Sawyer and the rest are left on the island.

Ben goes underground and turns a frozen wheel which sends the island skipping about in time. The left-behinds end up in 1974 and join Dharma.

Locke leaves the island via the frozen wheel tunnel. He finds Jack. Jack does not want to return. Locke is murdered by Ben. Jack changes his mind. The evacuated Losties return to the island. But some end up in 1977 where they find their friends. They detonate a bomb to alter time and stop the original plane crash from happening. It is confusing.

The Losties are back in 2004, the plane does not crash but they are also in 2007 and still on the island in a parallel timeline. It is confusing. Locke comes back to life, except he is really the Man in Black who has lived on the island with a man called Jacob for a really, really long time. He is also the evil smoke monster. Locke, who is not Locke, tricks Ben into killing Jacob. Jacob, who may be a ghost, tells Jack that the castaways are candidates to replace him.

Desmond returns on a submarine with Penny's dad, who is still kind of a jerk. Penny's dad blasts Desmond with radiation. This makes alternate-reality Desmond aware of island Desmond. Alternate Desmond tries to make alternate everyone else aware of the parallel universe.

On the island, Locke persuades Jack and his friends to escape on a submarine which Locke has booby-trapped.

Sayid blows himself up to save the rest. Sun and Jin are reunited then they drown.

Evil Smoke Monster Locke is intent on finishing what he started ...

* Adapted from: watch.ctv.ca

LOWDOWN

What: The Lost Finale
Where and when: TV2, Saturday 9.30pm