If you're expecting new ABC show Flash Forward to be full of Lost-esque unfulfilled teases, you'll be disappointed. Producer Marc Guggenheim says that the show won't be filler, and it also won't be a rehash of Robert Sawyer's original novel.
Talking to SciFi Wire, Guggenheim laid out the concept behind the new oracular series, and explained why it's not going to be another Lost:
What the show is about is really simple. Everyone in the world blacks out at the same time on the same day, and during their blackout they have a vision of their future for 2 minutes and 17 seconds, six months into the future. They all wake up and deal with the consequences. They deal with the consequences of the blackout. They deal with the consequences of the things that they learned during their flash-forwards... We say in the pilot that the characters are going to see a vision of their future [on] April 29, 2010. Which means we've got six months [worth of story]. There ain't no vamping to be done. We plant a very specific flag, so even if we wanted to vamp, we no longer have the option.
If you've read Sawyer's original novel, you'll know that the six month vision is a change for the TV series (The novel gives its characters a 21 year bump), but that's not all that's different, according to Guggenheim:
Basically the book provided the concept... the notion of a worldwide blackout, people flash-forward into their future... Pretty much everything else is different. The characters are different. The circumstances are different, the nature of the stories that we're telling are different... The novel is essentially a jumping-off point for us.
Flash Forward premieres September 24th at 8pm on ABC.
Producer: Why Flash Forward won't drive you crazy like Lost [SciFi Wire]