52emu.lua

local track={}
setmetatable(track,{__mode="v"})
function setmetatable52(t,mt)
	if mt.__gc then
    local p = newproxy(true)
		track[p] = t
		getmetatable(p).__gc = function(p)
      local mt = debug.getmetatable(t)
      if mt and rawget(mt, "__gc") then
  			rawget(mt, "__gc")(t)
      end
		end
	end
	setmetatable(t,mt)
end

t={}
print(t)
m={__gc=function(tt)
	print('got call, now resurrecting',tt)
	t=tt
	setmetatable52(tt,m)
end}
setmetatable52(t,m)
t=nil
for i=1,10 do collectgarbage("collect") end

If I remove t=nil and add print(t) after the loop I get this:

(note the second call to print(t) happens before the calls to __gc)

Program starting as '"/home/soniex2/zbs/bin/linux/x64/luajit" -e "io.stdout:setvbuf('no')" "/home/soniex2/git/github/lua/LJPlus/test.lua"'.
Program 'luajit' started in '/home/soniex2/git/github/lua/LJPlus' (pid: 8930).
table: 0x406142a8
table: 0x406142a8
got call, now resurrecting  table: 0x406142a8
got call, now resurrecting  table: 0x406142a8
got call, now resurrecting  table: 0x406142a8
got call, now resurrecting  table: 0x406142a8
got call, now resurrecting  table: 0x406142a8
got call, now resurrecting  table: 0x406142a8
got call, now resurrecting  table: 0x406142a8
got call, now resurrecting  table: 0x406142a8
got call, now resurrecting  table: 0x406142a8
got call, now resurrecting  table: 0x406142a8
ERROR: ld.so: object '/home/soniex2/.local/share/Steam/ubuntu12_32/gameoverlayrenderer.so' from LD_PRELOAD cannot be preloaded (wrong ELF class: ELFCLASS32): ignored.
Program completed in 0.02 seconds (pid: 8930).