Previously on Lost: Naomi died, Jack and Locke broke up, Sawyer ditched Kate and Jeremy Davies landed on the island.
Now it’s s04e02 recap time, and we’re looking at what appears to be the ocean floor, while some guys talk about what we’re looking at. Very weird, very cool. Hey, what’s that thing in the bottom right corner?
Beats me. This is quite the riveting intro. I thought things would calm down after last week, Sawyer would find a croquet set, challenge everyone for money; Hugo would beat him, take the croquet set away. You know, stuff like that. But not so. This one looks like a doozy from jump.
Unidentified voices communicate via radio:
“The Magnotometer is pickin up a hell of a lot of anomalies down here.”
“Chest full of doubloons?”
“Keep dreaming, Ron.”
They don’t find anything, so they go home and relax. Wait, no – they find Oceanic Flight 815!
Or do they? We cut to the ocean-floor 815 footage being shown on a fake-looking newscast, while the lower thirds identify our location – the first time that’s ever happened on Lost! – as Essex, Massachusetts. Then we pan to Jeremy “Dan” Davies, weeping. Oh, the pathos. His wife asks why he’s so upset.
“I don’t know.”
We cut a helicopter and see the leadup to Dan’s parachute ride onto Lost island. We also see the rest of his crew, including Ken Leung, another fine addition to the show. Still making up for Nikki and Paolo, I see! As you should, Lost creators. As you should.
Ken tosses Dan out of the chopper (Chopper 4?) and we ride along for a fun, first-person descent. Look! It’s Dan’s feet.
Jack and Kate run up on him and replay last week’s final exchange, which now ends with a line from Jeremy “Daniel Faraday” Davies: “I’m here to rescue you.” Nice! I guess this is the series finale? Oops, just the beginning of s04e02.
Dan doesn’t know what’s going on. Either that or he’s being disingenuous. The stuttering, stammering and fake-sounding name all suggest #2. He borrows Jack and Kate’s phone and calls George, who delivers one of my favorite Lost lines ever: “Dan, am I on speaker?”
Dan’s like, I gotta take this guys, pardon me. What’s real, what’s fake? Lost is like a shady Renaissance Faire this season, and I love it. Jack points out the gun Dan’s got on him to Kate. I hope he’s not a sore loser, or else the croquet game could get ugly. Dan comes back to relay some good news about rescue and GPS transponders and other such folderol. Keep an eye on him.
Meanwhile, Locke’s getting a taste of that sweet, sweet island rain.
Wet-haired Hugo rolls up on him to ask why they’re all standing around in a near-freakin’ monsoon.Locke says it’s about to pass, and it does. Mystical Locke returns! I like Locke a lot more when he’s not with Jack. So glad they broke up last week.
Locke explains to Sawyer that they have to make a detour and visit a cabin he needs to go to, which leads Hugo to point out that the cabin’s back that way. Whoopsie daisy! Locke asks what he means. “I, uh, thought you were talking about the airplane cabin.” Nice save, Hextall.
Locke either buys it or overlooks it, but not Ben. He’s making his Oops-I-Crapped-My-Pants face.
The cabin sure is important this season, but I’m not going to obsess about it. What’s the point? I mean, who knows what’s in it? Does anyone know? Do you know? Tell me! I have to know now!
Locke’s gang is already looking skeptical of his leadership, but he wins them back when he relays the reason he killed Naomi: Walt told him to. Walt! Wow, cool. I forgot about Walt, which is thoughtless of me, really, considering his role in making this show good in the first place.
Next up, the Juliet-Sayid scene that no one ever asked for, ever. She asks if he’s seen the extra botox, I mean if he’s seen Jack. She seems on top of the fact that things are about to go down. “How many guns do you have left?” More guns than roses. Baby bay-bay! From the expression on Sayid’s face, you know this is gonna be good.
Jack, Kate and Dan follow the phone signal around in their search for other crew members. “Ahhhh…yeah, yeah, yeah, blah blah blah, stammer stammer,” says Dan. Jack finds some gas masks and biohazard jumpoffs. What’s this stuff for, Danny boy? “Ahh, I’m not in charge of packing, doot dee dooooo, errrr, gabble gabble bo-babble,” states Daniel Faraday.
Finally, Jack puts him on the spot and asks why he’s got that thang on him. “Precaution.” For what? Dan appears to become sincere: “Rescuing you and your people? I can’t really say that’s our…primary objective.”
“Then what is?”
“Adding more talented actors to the cast.”
Actually, he doesn’t say that, because the phone starts a-blippin’, which Dan identifies as the location of his crew member Miles.
Meanwhile, Locke shares more of his stories about smoking dust, I mean about seeing Walt – well, taller Walt. “Like a giant?” asks Sawyer. Tired of being second-guessed by Sawyer, Locke pulls a classic Locke Grandstand to relay the message from Walt, which was to stop Naomi from bringing her people to the island. And because Taller Walt saved him after Ben shot him, Locke takes his word. Then, after showing off the nasty bullet wound, Locke ends strong with, “I’d probably be dead if I still had a kidney there. Anything else?” Ha! Nope, nothing else. Do you, Locke. So glad you and Jack broke up last week. He’s not right for you.
Now we’re with Jack, Kate and Dan, following a signal out to the rocks. Look! It’s Miles! He looks like roadkill, and Daniel looks concerned.
But surprise! He’s alive, he’s Ken Leung and he has a gun on Jack. “Back up, handsome.” Who wrote this ep? The dialogue is flawless.
Miles is calling the shots now.
“You’re Kate! You wanna tell me where Naomi is?”
“What?”
“Naomi! The woman you killed! Where is she!”
Then some very tense Lost music.
Then a commercial for Ghiradelli chocolate! I bet they didn’t buy this ad time with an understanding that their intense, slow-melting chocolate – enabler of “moments of timeless pleasure” – would get so much screaming and gunplay as a lead-in.
Now we’re back, in a flash-whatever with Miles. He goes into a house to perform some type of exorcism, or something. We pan to a picture of a kid on the wall, which begs the question: who’s the kid in the picture on the wall?
Miles asks the woman in the house for $200 cash up front, twice his usual rate because this one’s a murder. After counting $20s slower than anyone I’ve ever seen (not baller) he takes a bootleg-looking dustbuster contraption upstairs. Then he tells a spirit in the room – or pretends to tell him? – to leave his grandmother and stop causing her pain. He also wants the dead kid to tell him “where it is. So where is it?”
What’s going on? This is awesome. A clunking noise draws Miles’s eyes to the bookshelf, and he moves it to find a brown bag with a big ol’ wad of cash and some drugs in it.
He keeps the cash, but not the drugs. Then he tells Patrick Swayze, “You can go now.” And I officially have no idea what’s going on, making this an early candidate for one of the best episodes ever.
And that’s where Part 1 of the recap concludes, as I’m off to work. Stay tuned for Part 2 soon!
Seriously, what is up with the Ghostbusters routine and the retrofitted vacuum?
I bet the ‘vacuum’ was just that … literally just to make noise while he did his mind-meld thing