Fans may forever be Lost for answers

If even Barack Obama promises not to preempt the premiere episode of Lost's final season with his State of the Nation address, just what might be in store for fans?

Lost is often lauded as one of the best fantasy dramas in television history, as well as one of the most cryptic and - occasionally - maddening. But confirmation of just how important it is came with an almost unbelievable communiqué from the White House last week. President Obama's office reassured Lost fans that the commander in chief wouldn't move his yearly state of the union address from late January to a date that would coincide with the premiere episode of the show's sixth and final season.

That's right. Obama might have had vital information to impart upon the American people about health care, the war in Afghanistan, the financial crisis - things that, you know, might affect real lives. But the most important thing was that his address didn't clash with a series in which a polar bear appears on a tropical island. After extensive lobbying by the ABC network, the White House surrendered. Obama's press secretary promised: "I don't foresee a scenario in which millions of people who hope to finally get some conclusion with Lost are pre-empted by the president."

It's incredible that Lost should have such an impact, but not wholly surprising. Right from the start, with that famous scene of the island's pristine beach punctured by a blazing aircraft (still the most expensive opening shot in television history), the story has become stranger and stranger. What began as a seemingly straightforward survivor-thriller has gone on to take in the strange properties of electromagnetic energy, time travel, a "love rhombus" rather than a triangle and an attempted hydrogen bomb explosion. It has not always been compulsive viewing - you wouldn't expect it of a story spun out into six seasons over six years. Many millions of viewers left the show in sheer exasperation over the lack of answers to the island's weird happenings.

But as a definite end point came closer, Lost got back on track. Seasons four and five might not have had the immense viewing figures of the early days, but they are widely regarded as being the show's best. So what to expect from the final series? Will it be wrapped up in a satisfactory manner? Unlikely, simply because there are too many nerds to please. Lost, with its huge online fan community (for evidence of this, visit the incredible Lostpedia website), is one of the key shows that created the online message-board geek. This wasn't a happy coincidence: Lost's makers revelled in leaving clues on tie-in websites and viral videos as well as in novels. There have been podcasts and an official magazine. But Lost's fans have a connection to the show that is unrivalled in television history. They've become like a Lost police - their obsessions help the makers keep track of a show that has become famously labyrinthine.

Still, the executive producer Damon Lindelof told The Hollywood Repoter recently that "all the crazy island mythology stuff, we love it, but it's like terrorists attacking Jack Bauer - it's stuff that happens in order to tell cool character stories". All of which seems to suggest that maybe there won't be one big reveal that explains everything. You would expect the season premiere to answer the cliffhanger from season five: does the hydrogen bomb that Juliet hit with a rock erase the past, change the future, and get the "Losties" (the people who were on Flight 815) back on to an intact plane? But there are bigger questions keeping Lost fans awake at night - why the Losties were brought to the island in the first place, who are the natives on the island ("the others") and where did they come from? What role will the mysterious, ageless Jacob, who seems to be the glue that connects most of the odd happenings in the show, play in the story? And then there's the question that perhaps even Obama is prepared to postpone the state of the union address for: what is the true nature of the island we were introduced to in such memorable fashion six years ago.

One thing is not in doubt: it's been an intriguing ride. It may also end up being unique. Lost is a major US show that instead of selling out or being cancelled in a whimper ended up being more complex and intelligent than any long-running fantasy drama on television and has still retained a sizeable following. Including, possibly, the president of the United States of America.