That's a wrap

It feels like I say this every spring, but the season finale of “Lost” left me completely confused.

And flabbergasted.

Lost, even, if you will.

I’m not one of those “Lost” fanatics who comes up with all kinds of elaborate theories. I just consider myself lucky if I have any kind of grasp on what just happened at the end of a given episode.

Like, for instance, what’s the deal with Locke not really being Locke? That threw me for a loop.

It’s pretty clear that the creepy guy hanging with Jacob at the beginning of the episode had somehow taken on John Locke’s form.

I agree with those who believe he is actually the smoke monster come to life. We already know Smokey can morph into pretty much whomever he pleases, so it makes sense that he’s been the one manipulating the castaways all along.

The introduction of the much talked about Jacob was also great. What a fascinating character. I really liked the guy, so it sure was disappointing when Ben offed him.

As for the rest of our castaways, Jack annoyed me to no end with his stupid plan to reboot history by setting off the nuke. Yes that’s right, folks, Jack’s grand plan to save everyone was to set off a nuclear bomb.

Except nobody would be saved. Sure, the plane would, in theory, land safely in Los Angeles, and the castaways would have never crashed on the island. But then none of them would ever meet each other. Kate would go to jail. Sawyer would remain a loser con man and not the leader and, dare I say, good guy he turned into after visiting 1970s Dharmaville.

The island, for all the problems and deaths it’s caused, did do some good.

So I cheered when Sawyer, Kate and Juliet showed up to stop Jack, and I loved the knock-down, drag-out fight between Sawyer and Jack. Was that a long time coming, or what?

In the end, Jack still went through with his plan and tried to detonate the nuke. But, like so many things Jack has tried over the seasons, it didn’t work. At first.

All hell broke loose, and Juliet seemingly became one of the “incident’s” casualties. I never thought I’d care if she lived or died, but seeing Sawyer so devastated broke my heart.

I’m assuming she is a goner, though, because after waking up in the bottom of the mine, she pounded on the bomb with a rock until it went off.

So what happens next? Will history be rewritten?

I hope not. If the writers go in that direction, it will be like the past five seasons of stress were all for nothing.

Instead, I hope the bomb’s blast sends the castaways back to the present time, where Jin and Sun will finally be reunited, fake Locke will be exposed and Jacob will somehow be miraculously saved.

Maybe that’s what he meant when, right before his death, he said, “They’re coming.”

We can only hope.

“Lost” wasn’t the only series to go out with a bang. Here are some thoughts on a few more finales:

Chuck
After watching the season’s penultimate episode, I started to worry about the fate the NBC comedy.

It sure felt like a series finale to me, as the Intersect was finally removed from Chuck’s head, ending his service to the government and freeing him up to be with true love Sarah.

As the finale began, Chuck was ready to start leading a normal life. But not without first thanking Casey for “saving my life at least once a week.” Cute.

But his newfound freedom came to a halt when bad guy Ted Roark (a somewhat amusing Chevy Chase) showed up at sister Ellie’s wedding and threatened to kill her if Chuck didn’t hand over the new Intersect cube.

Complications abounded from there. Casey left town. Sarah told Chuck she was leaving in the morning for a new assignment. Bryce Larkin showed up again.

Jeff and Lester’s band, Jeffster, made a return appearance and elicited what was perhaps the episode’s funniest line: “Why are you letting Sam Kinison and an Indian lesbian wreck your wedding?”

In the end, Casey saved the day, but not before a shootout in the reception hall that destroyed the cake, flowers, centerpieces and even, gasp, the ice sculpture.

Ellie, of course, wasn’t privy to the real reason her nuptials were ruined. All she saw was a hideous performance from Jeffster, blaming them and, later, Chuck for the disaster.

Ever the good guy, Chuck schemed with Sarah and Casey to arrange a new, violence-free wedding, and I, in turn, loved seeing macho man Casey in wedding planner mode.

“No, no, no, no,” he said, “that clashes with the bunting.

I have no idea what bunting is, but kinda love that Agent Casey does.

The episode ended with what I think we all wanted: Chuck downloading the Intersect back into his brain.

But this time it was his choice — and it came with a few new perks.

“Guys,” he said after fighting off an entire team of armed men by himself, “I know Kung Fu.”

Fringe
Alternate realities. Déjà vu. Spock.

The “Fringe” season finale answered some questions and, taking a page from “Lost,” raised quite a few new ones.

Like, say, who is Peter, really?

As soon as Walter started talking about how he’d lost something in the early ’80s, “something precious,” I knew he meant his wisecracking son.

“I became convinced that if only I could cross over myself,” Walter explained, “then I could take from there what I had lost here.”

His talk about crossing over refers to the aforementioned alternate realities, of which there are apparently a lot in the “Fringe” universe.

We learned that crossing over isn’t impossible; you just have to find the right “soft spot,” where the barrier between the worlds has begun to decay (silly, I know, but just go with it).

Anyways, my fearless prediction was confirmed when Walter visited a gravestone at the end of the episode. The camera panned away and there it was, etched into the gravestone: Peter Bishop.

I can only assume this means Walter did, in fact, cross over, and snatched alternate reality Peter as his own.

That wasn’t the finale’s only shocker.

FBI agent Olivia actually got to cross over to another reality herself.

Once there, she finally came face-to-face with William Bell (Leonard Nimoy, or Spock to you Trekkies) and, as she glanced out the window, we saw that in this alternate reality, the Twin Towers are still standing in New York City.

Bones
Over the past month, the writers have been promising us that Booth and Brennan — one of TV’s best non-couples — would finally consummate their relationship by season’s end. Instead, the entire finale, including the long awaited Booth/Brennan dalliance, turned out to be a figment of Booth’s coma-induced imagination.

A lot of fans are crying foul about this, but I’ll disagree. I thought the episode was cute and funny, a nice reprieve from the craziness of so many other finales.

The episode imagined Booth and Brennan as a husband and wife who owned a nightclub called “The Lab,” where Angela was a flighty hostess, Hodgins a crime novelist and regular customer, and Sweets a bartender or, as he put it, “practically a psychologist.”

I, for one, really enjoyed seeing these Bizarro World versions of our favorite lab rats.

What I did not like was the ending, which had Booth waking up from his coma — good — but with what appeared to be amnesia — bad.

Random thoughts
I loved seeing my Kris Allen win American Idol, though I would’ve been equally as happy if Adam Lambert took home the title. Both seem like genuinely good guys and will no doubt go on to have great careers. ... Katherine’s desperation to marry Mike was embarrassing on Desperate Housewives, so I hope Mr. Delfino was remarrying Susan in that final scene. … I was surprised and pleased by Michael's completely out-of-character behavior on The Office. When Holly and her new boyfriend showed up at the company picnic, I thought there was no way Michael would be able to keep himself in check. But he did, later telling cameras that he and Holly were a couple that would have a "long story." Here's hoping! And, really, how great was Jim and Pam's baby news? ... Brothers & Sisters got some of its trademark wit back as the Walkers went to Mexico to save Tommy from what they believed was a cult. (Justin got most of the best lines, including “is he in a peaceful, blissed-out, panhandling cult, or is he in an angry, heavily-armed Kool-Aid cult?”) I’m glad Tommy is staying in Mexico. Couldn’t we move Ryan down there with him?