11 years later, 'La Brea' may be the new 'Lost' we've been waiting for

Looking for a new TV show to obsess over? We don’t blame you. Sure, there’s tons of great TV out there, but ever since Lost went off the air in 2010 we’ve been looking for that one show that keeps us up at night, you know?

From unexplained polar bears to mysterious initiatives, to smoke monsters, to healing powers, the island featured on Lost was full of things to keep us dissecting and analyzing. Of course, the fact that the show also had a cool cast of characters with backgrounds to flashback to was also pretty compelling. You can’t blame a TV lover for missing it.

Well, since La Brea (Tuesdays at 9ET/PT on CTV) premiered, we've been thinking we may have finally found our next Lost -- it's no wonder everybody's already obsessed. While the two shows definitely have lots of differences, they also have some big things in common. So, if you’re anything like us and you loved Lost but still have a Sawyer-sized hole in your heart, here are a few reasons you may totally be on board with La Brea. (Oh, and you can catch up on what you've already missed on CTV.ca and the CTV app.)

1. It’s a show about a giant disaster

Lost featured a giant, expensive premiere episode about a plane crash. The La Brea pilot opens with a giant freaking sinkhole that opens up in the middle of (you guessed it!) La Brea, Los Angeles, right near those infamous dinosaur-demolishing tar pits now known as Hancock Park.

The real action kicks off with a character named Eve (Natalie Zea, Justified), who is driving her kids, Izzy (Zyra Gorecki) and Josh (Jack Martin), to school when the sinkhole happens. The kids’ father, Gavin (Eoin Macken), isn’t there, having supposedly become mentally unstable after crashing an Air Force jet in the desert a while back.

Before they know it, the family is split in two, with half of the fam-jam above the sinkhole and the other half of the clan in a mysterious new place…

2. It’s got some big storylines for you to believe in

And here’s where things get super interesting. In the sinkhole, dinosaurs still exist. We’re talking Jurassic Park style here. So not only do the family members who fell have to figure out how to get home, but they need to try and not become road kill or an accidental lunch in the process.

It’s a huge suspension of disbelief and it totally reminds us of some of those Lost storylines that we followed so faithfully. (Even if we did think it was a bit weird that a smoke monster could take someone out, or that we never really did get an answer to that four-toed statue…)

3. There’s that same survivor mentality

Part of the fun on La Brea is seeing these characters get all down and dirty while using what they have on them to survive. There are no fancy outfit changes or hot showers here, just sheer survival of the fittest. At the same time, when we’re back on the surface, we get to follow characters that do get those things, which is really the best of both TV worlds.

And that also gives us those Lost vibes. After all, even though we saw the leads in the same wardrobe every single week, we had those nicely showered flashback scenes to look forward to, when we learned about what their lives were like prior to the plane crash.

4. The cliffhangers won’t all be explained…

Or at least not right away. Like on Lost, many of the stories will be told at the writers’ own pace. And these days that’s kind of fun and unique for a show that doesn’t air on a streaming service.

“Really, the genesis of the idea was just an image of a sinkhole opening in the middle of Los Angeles, and it was just an image that I couldn't shake,” says showrunner David Applebaum. “I had never seen a show open that way, with something so dramatic. And I knew I wanted that to start the story but didn't know anything else.”

According to the creative, it was the fact that he didn’t know anything else that made him start asking a bunch of questions, and that, in turn, ended up becoming part of the premise of the show. “I started asking so many questions about why does the sinkhole open? Where does it go? Who are the people that fall in?” he continues.

“And then, once you’re starting with those questions, you start to create a world of characters in situations. And then from there a thousand other things happen, but it really just started with an image.”

5. The fans that love it are really going to love it

There’s no doubt about it, the way that La Brea was written makes it an investment. One in which each hour won’t be perfectly resolved, so of course that will make fans want to chat about it and discuss it even more.

If that doesn’t remind you of Lost, well, at least it reminds the characters of the legendary show. “Maybe we're just in an episode of Lost!” One of the characters says in the pilot. Maybe we are, and if so that’s a very, very good thing. At least as far as La Brea is concerned.

Watch La Brea Tuesdays on CTV at 9 ET/PT.