While we count down to tonight’s episode of LOST – and I, five hours ahead here in Ireland, try to stay awake for it! – let’s delve into the fanverse and put our 16 questions to the funny and talented Amanda Vare (AKA Manz) and Will Thame (AKA Wadrick) of GritFX.com, where you can buy some of the coolest and original LOST tees and other merchandise this side of the Island. (I want them ALL.) You can browse their LOST designs here and follow them on Twitter here. Read on to find out which one of them wants to be the time-traveling bunny, their fairly, um, aggressive elevator pitches and some very cool fun they had with Lego…

Q: How long have you been watching Lost? If you’ve been watching since the pilot, can you remember your initial reaction to it?

WADRICK: I’ve been watching LOST since the pilot. I can remember seeing the promo stuff on the tube before the show began, and I remember thinking it looked like a cross between Gilligan’s Island and The Twilight Zone. Which was enough to peak my interest. After watching the pilot (and seeing the pilot get eaten by the “whatever-the-hell-that-thing-in-the-jungle-is”, because we didn’t know it was a smoke monster back then), I recall thinking that this show was going to be something else.

MANZ: ‘Gilligan’s Island ‘ – really Wadrick!? You’re getting a coconut phone for Christmas this year! I too have tuned into LOST since the pilot. To me, the promo stuff was reminiscent of film trailers over the standard TV show promos – and that level of quality was one reason I decided to give the mysterious island my time. Watching “an extra” sucked into the turbine of the plane wreckage, as Jack advised to move away from it, certainly left an impression.

WADRICK: Yeah, death by turbine! Maybe Gilligan’s Island was the wrong example, but I sure do want that coconut phone! (continue reading…)

Today on the LOSTBlog.com’s Interview, we put the 16 questions we ask everyone to Michela Velasco of All of Us Are LOST, home to some of the web’s most concise LOST recaps, and LOST Sidesteps, on which Michela posts fantastic fan art, including awesome Twitter backgrounds. Visit All of Us Are LOST, LOST Sidesteps or follow Michela on Twitter here.

Q: How long have you been watching Lost? If you’ve been watching since the pilot, can you remember your initial reaction to it?

A: Not long. I started watching a few weeks before the premiere of the fourth season, and finished all the episodes in time for the season four finale.  So “There’s No Place Like Home” was the first episode I ever saw live. (continue reading…)

We’re getting the week off to a great start by putting our 16 questions to Paul Burrows of Room 23: animator, artists and avid LOST fan. Visit Paul’s Room 23 site here, shop his Room 23 store here or follow him on Twitter.

Q: How long have you been watching Lost? If you’ve been watching since the pilot, can you remember your initial reaction to it?

A: Back when Lost started I was watching Smallville and Star Trek Enterprise and Smallville was on the same night and time as Lost. I saw the trailer and thought man that’s awesome! But I didn’t want to add another show to my list. (That sounds funny now that I think of comparing Lost to those two shows.) But the next Summer I noticed that reruns of Season 1 were running at 10pm and so I decided to try it out and man was it awesome! They ran most of the episodes and I rented the DVDs to pick up episodes they skipped. (continue reading…)

Concluding Staff Week here on the LOSTBlog.com Interview, we’ve saved the best for last: Jon, famed Twitter re-watcher and our editor in chief.  From swilling LOST Flavor-Aide to tweeting with LOST royalty, he tells us all about his LOST life in our 16 Questions. Follow Jon on Twitter or read his LOSTBlog posts here.

Q: How long have you been watching Lost? If you’ve been watching since the pilot, can you remember your initial reaction to it?

A: Since the Sunday after the premiere.  I missed the first episode on Wednesday night, but caught it on Sunday re-air, and haven’t missed an episode yet.  I usually watch an episode at least twice the night it comes out, and then again in the morning to recap/theorize on my old blogs. My initial reaction was, this is good, but can it last?  I mean they’re on an Island, and Castaway was a great movie, but kinda slogged along there in the middle. (continue reading…)

Continuing with this week’s special interviews, today we’re putting our 16 Questions to the wonderful Erin, our ‘talent booker’ who works tirelessly to secure the cool and fascinating LOST fans we normally subject to our interrogations, compiles the always interesting Loster21’s Tweets O’ the Day and makes Twitter a better place to be for LOST fans the world over. Follow Erin on Twitter here or read all her LOSTBlog.com posts here.

Q: How long have you been watching Lost? If you’ve been watching since the pilot, can you remember your initial reaction to it?

A: I’m a watch-since-the-pilot-er.  If I ever did a tattoo, that would be a cool one – 09/22/04 . I remember really looking forward to seeing it after reading about it in TVGuide, and was completely glued to the tv from the first seconds.  I think “Wow” and “Wait – what?!” and “I am SO watching this show!” were my initial reactions. (continue reading…)

This week on the LOSTBlog.com interview, we’ve decided to do a little something different and put our 16 questions to ourselves. We hope this helps you get to know some of us a little better – and that you want to get to know us a little better! – and our first volunteer/victim is our very own – and very brave – Scott, the LOSTBlog.com’s “Spiritual Shaman.” You can read all of Scott’s LOSTBlog.com posts here, visit his personal site here, say hi to him on Facebook or follow him on Twitter. (continue reading…)

LOSTBlog is honored to have exchanged questions and answers with The Washington Post’s Jen Chaney and Liz Kelly of “Lost” Central!  They are the hosts of the weekly live Q&A session “Talk ‘Lost’ with Jen and Liz” and are the contributors of the weekly “Dueling Analysis” post, as well as other Lost-related posts at LOST Central.  You can follow them on Twitter here .

Along with the standard 16 questions prepared by our Cath Howard, LOSTblog Editor Jon Stueve added in 7 more to make it 23 questions. 

1. How long have you been watching Lost? If you’ve been watching since the pilot, can you remember your initial reaction to it?

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Wrapping up this week of 16 Questions, we have the very eloquent Djuna of Lostrithim. Read on to find out why she compares watching the pilot to a first date, how Exposé gave her second-hand embarrassment and how LOST, having left an imprint on her soul, will ‘add another 10 shades of annoyance’ to her life when it – sob! – ends. You can follow Djuna on Twitter here.

In light of recent Island events, we also have replaced one of our 16 Questions. Can you spot which one? (continue reading…)

Another zombified Wednesday for me; stayed up to watch LOST until 3 a.m. this morning despite swearing I wouldn’t. But how could I resist? However I chugged back just enough coffee to put our LOSTBlog interview to Anthony Zuaro of Motivators TV. Scroll to the end for a sample of their fabulous LOST parody work, follow Anthony on Twitter here and read on to discover his answers to our burning 16 questions…

Q: How long have you been watching Lost?

A: Since January 2008. I don’t know how it didn’t show up on my radar until then, but my best friend from high school (let’s call him my constant) gave me Season 1 for my birthday and I became addicted immediately and caught up as soon as I possibly could. (continue reading…)

Lyly Ford is 25, from France and in her words ‘a crazy LOST fan’ who gets up in the middle of the night so she can watch LOST at the same time as her friends across the Pond. Her LOST blog (http://lylyford.blogspot.com) is packed full of news, videos and exclusive pics and you can follow Lyly on Twitter here.

Q: How long have you been watching Lost?

A: I started watching LOST in 2004 in France. I didn’t watch the pilot; I started with the middle of The Moth. When I first saw the preview of LOST in TF1 it was the Season 1 poster and it seemed to me like another reality show with people in a jungle, so I continued to watch Smallville. Even when my friend told me it was a new series, Dominic Monaghan was in it, it was a JJ Abrams show and she told me about the first episode I was like, nah – this show seems to suck! But then after the season finale of Smallville I was bored and I thought, what can I watch? I changed the channel and Sawyer, The Moth and I hooked up. I watched the pilot and the 6 episodes I’d missed at the beginning of Season 1. I was amazed at the pilot. The first part is great but my favourite is the second – I loved the revelation about Rousseau and Charlie’s line, ‘Guys, where are we?’

Q: How did Lost get its polar bear claws into you? What about it got you hooked?

A: Sawyer and Locke! Seriously it’s them who made me watch week after week, one for a emotional level, the other for the mystery on the island.

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Mac Slocum is the founder/senior editor of Filmfodder’s Lost Blog In addition to pouring over each episode of LOST, he also finds the time to keeps things running at Filmfodder.com, TVFodder.com, TechFodder.com and MacSlocum.com. You can follow Mac on Twitter here.

Q: How long have you been watching Lost?

A: Since the very beginning. I watched the pilot and then started Filmfodder’s Lost Blog with “Tabula Rasa”. I was undecided initially, but the big reveal in “Walkabout” convinced me this was a special show.

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Today we’re putting our 16 questions to Karen Mauro of Karen’s LOST Notebook, a great source of detailed episode recaps, theories and clues. Having been hooked since that ‘life changing day’ in September 2004, Karen uses her site to encourage fans to think outside the box and fears she might end up heavily medicated in Santa Rosa Medical Institute once LOST ends… (continue reading…)

Well LOST fans, how are we all feeling today? I, for one, am feeling a tad sleep deprived, having stayed up to watch LOST live as it aired on the East Coast; due to my unfortunate GMT time zone and post-premiere-watching hyperactivity, I didn’t get to bed until 5.30am. (Oh, but it was SO worth it!)

So while we recover from our LOST hangover and try to get to grips with last night’s revelations, let’s put our 16 questions to Anil of The ODI, your “No. 1 source for exclusive TV and movie spoilers and news.” (continue reading…)

As Erin said this morning on Twitter, Happy Lostmas everybody!

As an Irish LOST fan, I can’t – unfortunately – join in the viewing party tonight as it won’t air here until Thursday (Friday in the UK and as late as next month in some European countries). If the temptation to wait gets too much for me, I might turn to the magical interweb but if not, you won’t catch sight nor sound of me until Friday morning. I’ll quietly log into the LOSTBlog – blinkered! – post my interviews and sneak out again without talking, reading, watching or communicating with anybody who has already seen the premiere. I have zero willpower when it comes to LOST – my excuse for breaking down and watching those leaked first four minutes was ‘The Island made me do it!’ – and so my resistance to spoilers would be futile at best.

And so, a plea: please be careful what you tweet. (continue reading…)

Well Lost fans, the excitement is building. We can practically taste the anticipation. In just mere hours the last ever Lost season premiere will be upon us. While we plan our viewing parties, struggle to resist spoiler temptation and wonder how it’s all going to end, let’s take a look back over some of our LOSTBlog Interviews: The 16 Questions We Asked Everyone in a special Lost Premiere Week Retrospective. (continue reading…)