Flash Back and Forward to See the Lost Cast Then and Now

Not to cause you a jolt akin to waking up on an island surrounded by the debris of the plane crash you just survived, but Lost premiered 20 years ago.

Destined to launch a zillion fan theories and polarize audiences with its increasingly head-scratching plot twists (watch together, debate alone, right?), the ABC series was a fairly instant sensation upon arrival Sept. 22, 2004, going on to win six Emmys—including Outstanding Drama Series—for its gripping first season. 

And the plot twists and time-jumps only got more flow chart-worthy from there.

In fact, the show about the survivors (or were they?!) of the crash of Oceanic Airlines Flight 815, starring Matthew Fox, Evangeline Lilly, Josh Holloway, Terry O'Quinn, Naveen Andrews, Jorge Garcia, Daniel Dae Kim and Ian Somerhalder—among many others—was ultimately so chock-full of lore that even showrunners Carlton Cuse and Damon Lindelof may have not known exactly how to land the plane.

Or at least some of baggage that was loaded on at the beginning of the journey didn't make it to the final destination.

But the series' mind-boggling ways were what made it such a phenomenon, according to Fox, whose spinal surgeon Jack Shepard becomes the de facto leader of the group on day one (like shepherd, get it?) but bows to the pressure of expectations in myriad ways.

"The answer to any question can be found on Google," the actor told the Guardian in 2013. "But just as all the internet was catching on, you had Lost, which fed on the exact opposite part of human nature: the side that wants desperately for there to be an incredible, unknowable mystery in our lives and our souls. Everyone gravitated toward this show where no one knew what the f--k was going on. You couldn't Google the answer."

Well, at least it wasn't just us.

But never in dispute was that Lost had a vast array of complicated characters to get to know and root for (or against), and it should come as no surprise that one of those first-season Emmy wins was for casting.

Though the number 20 is meaningless when it comes to untangling the secrets of the Lost universe, we didn't want to wait until 23 years had gone by to reveal what the show's stars are up to these days.

See the cast of Lost then and now:

Party of Five alum Matthew Fox was a natural fit to play Dr. Jack Shepard, the head of a proverbial household of plane crash survivors.

But while his leading-man presence led to big-screen opportunities in the likes of We Are Marshall, Speed Racer, Alex Cross and World War Z, Fox didn't feel the need to go back after making Bone Tomahawk in 2014.

"I wanted to do a Western," he told TV Line in 2022, explaining his long hiatus from acting. "It's a very odd Western, but it's a Western. And so that sort of completed the bucket list."

More importantly, he added, around that time his daughter Kyle and son Byron with wife Margherita Ronchi "were at an age where I felt like I needed to really reengage. I had been focused on work for some time, and Margherita had been running the family so beautifully, but I felt like it was time to be home, and I really felt like I was retiring from the business, and working on other creative elements that are really personal to me—some music and writing."

Fox returned to action as a star and producer of the Peacock series Last Light in 2022, and he has booked roles in the upcoming Yellowstone spin-off The Madison and the Max series The Assassin.

After her Golden Globe-nominated run as convicted killer (it was self-defense!) with a heart of gold Kate Austen, Evangeline Lilly fled to the land of blockbuster franchises, playing Tauriel in two Hobbit movies and Hope/The Wasp in the MCU's Ant-Man films and Avengers: Endgame.

Following 2023's Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania, however, Lilly—who's also the author of the children's book series The Squickerwonkers—announced she might be done with acting for good.

"I am so filled with joy and contentment today as I live out my vision," she wrote on Instagram June 3, 2024. "I feel so grateful for my blessings. Stepping away from what seems like the obvious choice (wealth and fame) can feel scary at times, but stepping into your dharma replaces the fear with fulfillment."

Way to take the initiative. Off-screen, Lilly shares two sons, born in 2011 and 2015, with Norman Kali.

Though pregnant Claire Littleton took a bit of a detour while traveling from Sydney to Los Angeles on Oceanic Airlines Flight 815, surviving not just the crash but getting kidnapped, having her baby get kidnapped, amnesia and other assorted trauma, Emilie de Ravin emerged from the experience with great memories.

In the upcoming indie documentary Getting Lost, the Australian actress marveled over being part of such a "freaking kickass show" that she still loves and feels "so lucky" to have been a part of, "and I don't ever take that for granted."

De Ravin has continued to act, most notably playing Belle Gold on Once Upon a Time, yet her biggest role is mom to two daughters and a son with husband Eric Bilitch.

Talk about your big reveals (and we're not talking only about Daniel Dae Kim's shirtless scenes)!

As it turned out, Jin-Su Kwon wasn't the domineering husband he appeared to be at first sight, instead joining Yunjin Kim's Sun-Hwa Kwon in becoming one of the most beloved TV couples of the 21st century.

Since Lost, the Korean-born actor has kept busy doing tons of TV and video game voice work, was a regular on Hawaii 5-0 and, after lending his voice to the animated version, became a star of the live-action Avatar: The Last Airbender on Netflix, which in 2024 was renewed for second and third seasons.

"He's deliciously a villain, and that's what I sank my teeth into," the actor told Entertainment Weekly of playing big bad Fire Lord Ozai. After playing so many upstanding characters, "that's one of the things that I was really looking forward to doing."

When asked if he'd consider doing a Lost reboot, Kim told Screen Rant in February, "If they come calling, I'll pick up the phone."

Off-screen Kim shares two sons, born in 1996 and 2002, with wife Mia Rhee.

After harboring a painful secret on the mainland, Sun has a chance to start fresh with Jin after the crash. Their marriage is renewed and, though it all ends terribly, theirs was a TV love for the ages.

Kim has since starred on ABC's Mistresses, the coming of age comedy XO, Kitty and the Korean mysteries series Ms. Ma Nemesis. And in 2024, American fans were psyched for her two-episode arc on Station 19.

On the personal side, she's been married to her former manager Park Jeong-hyeok since 2010.

Before he was undead on The Vampire Diaries, Ian Somerhalder was alive for awhile on Lost playing Boone, who had been in Australia rescuing the stepsister he's in love with from her latest bad choice before their fateful flight.

After becoming the first main character to be voted off the island—"I guess this is TV history, huh?" he quipped to EW about Boone's demise in season one—Somerhalder went on to play vampire Damon for eight seasons on TVD and found Brother's Bond Bourbon with co-star Paul Wesley.

Since the 2019 Netflix series V-Wars, Somerhalder has put acting on a cold burner in favor of farm life with wife Nikki Reed and their two children outside L.A. The couple launched the supplement line The Absorption Company in 2024.

Josh Holloway joined the ranks of TV heartthrobs as the roguish Sawyer, who along with Jack and Kate made for a most intriguing love triangle until he fell for an Other, Elizabeth Mitchell's Juliet.

After Lost ended, it was on to accepting a role in 2011's Mission: Impossible—Ghost Protocol, after which he starred on the series Intelligence and Colony before showing up on Yellowstone's third season as a land developer who couldn't help but be a bit of a rogue. He's due to re-team with Lost co-creator J.J. Abrams on his period crime thriller Duster coming to Max.

In real life Holloway shares two children with wife Yessica Kumala.

Malcolm David Kelley was 12 when he started playing Walt Lloyd on Lost, whose kidnapping at the hands of the Others sets off a lot of action.

And while he's acted steadily since, most recently having an arc on Insecure, Kelley is also known as one half of the pop duo MKTO, which he formed with Tony Oller in 2010.

Maggie Grace's Shannon ultimatey didn't fare much better on the island than her, er, over-protective stepbrother Boone, but she did find love and was missed when she was mistaken for an Other and unceremoniously shot.

Her TV toughness came in handy, however, for playing Liam Neeson's oft-abducted daughter in the Taken franchise, vengeful vampire Irina in the last two Twilight films and intrepid journalist Althea on Fear the Walking Dead.

Grace and husband Brent Bushnell welcomed a son in 2020.

Naveen Andrews' Sayid Hassan Jarrah was a lover and a fighter, the Iraqi special forces veteran having the opportunity to showcase his various combat and intelligence-gathering skills in the hunt for his lost love Nadia, which took a turn when he ended up on Flight 815.

Among his post-Lost projects, he played Dr. Hasnat Khan in 2013's Diana, starred in the series Sense8 and Instinct, and played Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes' partner in corporate malfeasance Sunny Balwani in Hulu's The Dropout.

What a year 2004 was for Dominic Monaghan: The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King won the Oscar for Best Picture (plus 10 others) and he debuted as heroin-addicted rocker Charlie Pace on Lost.

After getting clean, falling in love with Claire and going out a hero, he hosted the BBC America adventure series Wild Things With Dominic Monaghan and appeared in a number of indie films (as well as a non-indie film called Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker).

He also hosted the podcast The Friendship Onion with Billy Boyd, who played Pippin to his Merry in the LOTR trilogy.

Played by Jorge Garcia, Hurley was another guy who was having a rough go in the real world and had a chance to be useful on the island.

The character ended up getting a Weezer album named after him (Garcia is on the cover of 2010's Hurley), while the actor moved on to Californication, Once Upon a Time, Hawaii 5-0, feature comedies like The Wedding Ringer and The Ridiculous Six, and the Max comedy Bookie, which in 2024 was renewed for a second season.

Garcia has been married to Rebecca Birdsall since 2019.

Speaking of people who preferred the island, Terry O'Quinn's John Locke not only survived the crash, he no longer needed a wheelchair. So let's say, he felt a certain purpose on that not-quite-earthly plane.

A veteran actor who was previously best known for playing the titular nut in The Stepfather, O'Quinn has been in demand since Lost with credits including Hawaii 5-0, 666 Park, Castle Rock, FBI: Most Wanted, Pieces of Her and The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live.

Off-screen, he shares two children with ex-wife Lori O'Quinn.

Since playing Walt's increasingly distraught dad Michael Dawson, Harold Perrinau has never been far from a screen, whether it was reprising the role of Julian in two The Best Man sequels or recurring on Sons of Anarchy, Criminal Minds, Goliath, The Rookie and more.

He currently stars on the MGM+ sci-fi series From, which is back for a third season Sept. 22.

Perrineau's been married to Brittany Robinson since 2002 and they have three daughters together, including West World actress Aurora Perrineau.