***Lost spoiler threat level: Yellow. I imply that certain characters are still on the show this season***

Someone, I think it was my brother Josh, had a point when he told me that it's pretty ridiculous that I'm having issues with Lost now, given all the craziness of the past two seasons — but that was consistent craziness.

I mean, I'm sure they can pull a story together at the last minute, even Chris "Just Forget About Those Previous Seasons" Carter could do that, but after the ending to last week's episode, which seemed to flatly contradict info elsewhere in the series, I no longer expect that this is all going to form some sort of artful tapestry.

(Speaking of loose ends: I finished The Dark Tower. You know, I really, really wish I hadn't read the coda. Stephen King himself warned me not to, but it's pretty hard to stop at the epilogue when you've read thousands of pages about Roland already and you're given the opportunity to follow him a bit farther. And I'd have wondered, anyways. Better to say that I wish the coda had never existed.)

It's not Lost's seemingly-irreconcilable logical inconsistencies that really bother me, however.

Almost since the beginning of the show, I've relished the annoying aspects of these characters — I hate, hate stubborn, blinkered Jack even more than holy white knight Jack, but the irritating flaws are what make these characters real, and what still might make this the Best Show on Television.

I think the big difference this season is that instead of being annoyed with the characters for being the occasionally-crappy people they are, I'm annoyed with them for not acting like we all know they should act.

The Politician suggests that they've been broken by some of what has happened since they came to the island, but we know these characters, we've spent two seasons with them, and now they're acting... Stupid. Unrealistically. Without giving much of anything away, I got the same impression last season with Sawyer, who used to be my favorite character... but that just seemed like one slip-up, some sloppy writing in the service of drama.

(Now my favorite character is probably Sun. Or fan-favorite Hurley, but I don't see that character developing much more. I keep telling Jenna to at least give this show a chance, and her response is invariably, "Yeah, I know, the Koreans rock." But she's right.)

Oh, I'll keep watching: there are still amazing moments, and this may still be the best drama on television. Still, since the ridiculousness is likely to get worse the longer Lost stays on the air, I'm probably not alone in praying that this season, or the next, will be the absolute last.

Just picture it: all those answers falling from the sky.