Quick Take: Lost, "Recon"
"I'm the smoke thing." – Not Locke
Review: Lost, "Recon"
(S0608) Each week during this final season of Lost I find myself excited by the focus of the episode during the "flash sideways" sequences: Sayid, Locke, Ben, Jack, Kate… and now our man Sawyer (Josh Holloway), the wise cracking, hard punching, ladies' eyeglasses wearing while reading, hard drinking reformed (of sorts) con man that we've come to know and love.
The Sawyer as con man character we've come to know from past seasons is used to delightfully surprise us in the early going flash sideways as we see him involved in an undercover sting operation with none other than Miles (Ken Leung), the other wisecracking, hearing dead people boatie (I believe the term is) that has grown into being an integral part of the show over recent seasons.
As with the others, Sawyer has a past which invades his current life, even off the island and apart from its pull. We learn that though he has escaped his con man past, there is a lot of mystery surrounding his present. "What were you doing in Australia?" Miles confronts with at one point. And we see him lose out on a potential love interest (archaeologist Charlotte, another boatie, played by Rebecca Mader) as she accidentally saw news clippings showing that Sawyer's father murdered his mother before killing himself.
The "main" storyline is losing me more now that not-Locke (Terry O'Quinn) is leading his band of Temple survivors out into the jungle. I'm starting to ask myself, "who is this guy again?" And, "why doesn't he just kill everyone if he's evil?" He claims that all he wants to do is to leave the island, but is that really it? I kind of feel like answers to these questions reveal the sort of entire rationale for the entire show so maybe I'm not suppose to know at this point. I hope there's good answers here, but when this is Lost, you just gotta believe sometimes.
Charles Widmore's (Alan Dale) return to the island with submarine and full entourage felt like a nearly overwhelming new plot element at first but was brought much closer to the story this week. It was fun to see Sawyer in full con man mode, playing off both Not Locke and Widmore (with both likely knowing it). Interesting to note that while Sawyer feels in some ways he has nothing to lose after the death (as far as we know) of Juliet (Elizabeth Mitchell), he is still loyal to friends.
There's also a good dose of Kate (Evangeline Lilly) and Claire (Emilie de Ravin) in this episode. Crazy Claire with relation to the importance of her son Aaron is brought up Not Locke, while meanwhile Claire forgives Kate for taking her son off the island. These sections were the slowest of the episode (though overall it was a terrific one) but was a lot of fun to see Kate's tie in to the flash sideways, detective Sawyer exclaiming "son of a bitch!" at seeing the attractive woman who had just smashed into his car and then fled on foot.
More thoughts on "Recon":
Video: Lost, "Recon
Catch 'er while she's hot on the Hulu:
Recap: Lost, "Recon"
John Locke assigns Sawyer a mission.
From Around the Web: Lost, "Recon"
