Second by second, the digital clock counts backward on the Web site ABC created for its popular Hawai'i-based mystery, "Lost." The fourth season of the popular series draws closer with each tick, but it's more like a drumbeat of anticipation for the "Lost" faithful.

They know this feeling, this itch they can't scratch. They've endured three seasons of cliffhanger endings, characters that disappear (and come back as spirits), numbers with bad karma and those press-them-or-else-the-world-ends buttons that needed to be pressed — or else.

Zero hour for the fourth season is 8 p.m. Thursday. That's when it's time to press the one button millions of those "Lost" fans have been eagerly waiting to press since the Season 3 finale last May:

The button on their TV remote.

The new season marks the beginning of the end, the first episode from producers who promised to unravel all the mysteries in the series in 48 episodes.

The new season may arrive just in time for Kara Baker, a 26-year-old 'Ewa Beach resident who is feeling so much excitement about the fourth season that she just might explode.

"I just love that show so much," she said. "On a scale of one to 10, I am an 11."

Baker has her own countdown to the premiere ticking away on her computer and a wall calendar emblazoned with the show date — as if she needed reminding. She's thinking of inviting a few dozen friends to watch the premiere and promises "it will be better than a Super Bowl party."

Baker became a fan just prior to the start of the third season, catching up on what had happened before by watching a DVD collection of episodes.

"I watched it from start to finish," she said. "I didn't sleep for a week. It is so intricate and interesting and so in-depth. You never know what to expect."

THE STORY SO FAR

ABC debuted "Lost" in the fall of 2004 by crashing Oceanic Air Flight 815 on an uncharted Pacific island.

But this was no "Gilligan's Island": The island began sprouting mysteries that included a tree-shaking smoke monster, polar bears, ghosts, and an underground chamber with plumbing, a stereo sound system and a computer that needed attention every time a clock reached zero after counting down from 108 minutes — or else.

About that point, "Lost" really got weird.

Through regular flashbacks that became a recognized feature of "Lost," fans discovered a complex series of relationships among the survivors of Flight 815.

When it seemed the show could not get any stranger, the focus shifted to the survivors' growing war with a surly bunch of bad guys called The Others. The plot took on a byzantine nature, and at the end of last season, the survivors were upbeat after having managed to make a satellite phone call for help.

Careful what you wish for: The would-be rescuers may bring even more trouble to the island.

And everything turned upside down in the last minutes of the season finale: Turned out that wasn't a flashback with stars Matthew Fox and Evangeline Lilly arguing in Los Angeles; it was a flash-forward.

EMBRACING CONFUSION

"They left us with our jaws on the floor," said Crissy Terawaki Kawamoto, a 29-year-old Palolo resident. "I didn't see it coming at all. It was really cool, though."

Kawamoto isn't sure what to expect from the fourth season. She does her best to keep up with blogs that specialize in the show's many plot twists.

"One of the coolest things I have heard is that we won't be able to tell now what is a flash-forward and what is a flashback," she said. "In the season finale, we couldn't tell it was a flash-forward until the end."

Believe it or not, Kawamoto doesn't find any of this confusing.

"There are so many different plots and so many different characters, yet they are all linked together," she said. "Not just by the crash, but their background stories are all linked. And we still don't know why. There are so many things we don't know."

But knowing that at least two of the characters escape the island in the finale hasn't spoiled the storyline for Kawamoto.

"It still leaves a lot of mystery," she said. "And there is still a lot that we don't know. They talk about a funeral in the Season 3 finale, but we don't know who died. And even if they just said so, it wouldn't make sense for us to know because we wouldn't know the how."

ANOTHER DILEMMA

One of the biggest mysteries for the new season doesn't come from the super-secret North Shore set of "Lost." It's out of Hollywood, where the Writers Guild of America remains in a contract dispute with studios.

Only eight episodes of "Lost" were filmed and edited before the strike began last November, which is half of what was originally planned.

That could leave fans with a mini-cliffhanger after the eighth episode on March 20.

Always tightlipped about the series, ABC has behaved no differently since the strike. Producers were unavailable to talk about potential plot twists but the network, in announcing the new season, promised a "shocking Season 4 premiere that will change everything."

At the same time, ABC withheld advance review copies of the premiere, because the network thought too many plot spoilers would be revealed.

Megan Terawaki, a 20-year-old University of Hawai'i student from Mililani, is confident that the show's producers have a plan to keep viewers happy.

"I think we will be getting a lot of answers up until the end," she said. "They will be creating more questions along the way but at least we will have some satisfaction along the way."

That jolting flash-forward was the perfect hook for viewers, said Terawaki, a steady fan of the show since its first episode.

"I think they are just as curious as ever," she said.

That's certainly the case for Joe Philipson, who calls "Lost" one of his favorite TV shows. He jumped out of his chair when he saw the finale.

"I freaked out," said Philipson, a 23-year-old elementary school science teacher from 'Ewa Beach.

Philipson had grown slightly bored with "Lost" after its second season — he thought that ABC was stretching it out simply to make money. But he was drawn back into it last season. "They gave us more meat," he said.

Until that flash-forward cliffhanger, Philipson was beginning to think that no one would ever get off the island.

Maybe it was some kind of cosmic, alternate dimension that no one could reach — and that maybe he would be reaching for his remote.

"I think they gave people a reason to want to come back," he said. "If they didn't do that I wouldn't be as excited to watch it. It gave people hope ... that they are going to get off the island."

MORE WAYS TO WATCH THIS SEASON

Clear your prime-time schedule or set your recording device of choice because ABC is about to start the fourth season of "Lost." The show moves its weekly day and time to 8 p.m. Thursdays on local affiliate KITV, but the first two weeks will have some special scheduling. Also, episodes will be available online at www.abc.com beginning the day after their original air date.