Quotes from Damon Lindelof

Michael Arndt, that guy - you're just supposed to say nice things about other writers, but I worship Michael Arndt.

I believe that this idea of story or myth or this thing that Joseph Campbell writes about is sort of an inter-connective spiritual force - like The Force in 'Star Wars' - where it doesn't matter where you were raised, or what your background is, there are certain elements of story that totally appeal to you.

My father - until the day that my dad died - didn't know how many points you scored in a touchdown. He could say there were nine innings in baseball, but no intricacies of the sport.

The year that 'Lost' started and premiered was, without a doubt, the most miserable year of my life. The level of despair and anguish that I was feeling; I was clinically depressed, and anyone that you talked to who knew me at the time will tell you that.

From my own internal fanboy perspective, there's nothing that I hate more than seeing a three minute trailer for a movie where I feel like it's shown me the entire movie.

I love collaborating with different people.

I love finding new creative partnerships but then continuing the partnerships I'm already in.

I think 'The Lord of the Rings' trilogy has a very satisfying ending, and there's not really that deep of a mythological construct.

I'm a huge Star Trek fan. I've seen all the shows, I've seen all the movies, but ultimately I just want a 2-hour movie that takes me to another time and place - something that entertains me.

I don't think anybody wants to see a dour Star Trek movie.

When you're a writer and you're a producer, traditionally the junkets are really focused on the beautiful people and nobody wants to talk to you.

I'm not sitting around thinking of ideas for TV shows.

As cliched as it sounds, if you have an original voice and an original idea, then no matter what anybody says, you have to find a way to tell that story.

We all look at ourselves in the mirror and think, 'Am I good?'

I've always believed that a good twist is one that, when it is presented to the audience, half of them say, 'I saw that coming.' And half of them are completely and totally shocked. Because if you don't have the half that saw it coming, then it wasn't fair: You never gave the audience a chance to guess it.

Good twists are enormously hard to come by, and I think the best ones are earned ones. The idea that a story can take a left turn on you, it's easy to do, but it has to be done very, very carefully, or else you risk losing the audience's trust.

When someone says something in an interview, the beauty of Twitter is that it's a platform for instantaneous response.

When I saw 'Blade Runner,' my understanding was that 'Blade Runner' and 'Alien' were sequels to each other - or they were related. They were set in the same world.

I love the 'Lost' ending. I stand by it, but there are a lot of people out there who hate it.

I would say that my fatal flaw, as a human being, is that I need people to like me, and if they don't like me, I will obsess over it - and try to change my personality until they like me - even if they don't like me for reasons that have nothing to do with me, and even if they're strangers.

I'll never be immune to criticism, and that's okay, and I'm very comfortable with that.

If your friend is critical [of your work], you have to have a very thick skin and a thick skin is something that only builds up after it's callused for awhile.

The fun thing about doing origin stories is you are introducing the audience to characters.

I've always felt that really good prequels should be original movies.