Episode 16 - Outlaws
30 March 2012
Present: Sawyer wakes up to find a boar in his tent. The boar later attacks him as well. He heads off for revenge and Kate joins him. The boar further antagonises him but when he finally catches him he doesn’t kill him. Charlie appears to be suffering mentally from murdering Ethan. Hurley asks Sayid to talk to him.
Flashback: We see Sawyer’s parents being killed. In the recent past a man called Hibbs comes to see Sawyer. He says he has found the man who killed his parents, he is living in Sydney. Sawyer tracks him down but can’t kill him. He goes to a bar and meets Christian Shepherd. Christian unknowingly convinces him to go kill the man which he duly does. But as he is dying he reveals that he isn’t Sawyer, but that he owed money to Hibbs.
The Good: The twist that Sawyer was fooled into killing the wrong man is a good one. His story builds nicely to that conclusion. Hibbs (Robert Patrick) is excellent in his role and sounds very convincing. The man who sells Sawyer the gun brings up the idea that maybe he isn’t really a killer which sets up his confrontation at the shrimp shack nicely. What follows is a pretty tense scene where Frank chats away amiably as Sawyer squeezes his gun tighter and tighter. It does a great job of conveying the emotions rushing through Sawyer.
Which leads Sawyer to an interesting conversation with Christian Shepherd. It’s a surprise to see him and it’s not clear at this stage how important it is that they have met. The fact that Christian talks Sawyer into murder isn’t meant to be the key point, I don’t think. But either way Sawyer ends up killing the wrong man and clearly that will stay with him for a long time. His inability to kill him initially painted Sawyer in a clear light. He is a con man and a “grifter” but he is no hardened criminal whose morality has long gone. His own foolishness leads him to murder and now the story with the boar adds another layer to that. Sawyer has to realise for himself that he can’t always blame others for his problems. Hibbs is no more responsible for his sins than the boar is.
Nicely shadowing Sawyer’s story is Charlie. It’s good to see direct follow up on his guilt and pain over killing Ethan. Both he and Sawyer will have to live with the consequences of their actions. Hurley and Sayid play their roles well here, drawing on their established traits to comfort Charlie. Similarly Kate and Locke play those roles for Sawyer.
There are a couple of nice jokes with Sayid showing us his dry sense of humour (“perhaps he (the boar) wanted to go camping”) and Sawyer discovering the boar had pulled his shirt out of his bag and peed on it. Sawyer also has a line which I like very much. Having discovered an uninhabited island, the survivors could safely assume that one day it will be inhabited. Presumably once they are rescued, some country will want to lay claim to this tropical paradise. So Sawyer very appropriately comments “I take comfort knowing someday, this is all gonna be a real nice shopping complex. Maybe even an auto mall.” You suspect it never will be.
The Bad: You can see why Kate is a difficult character to get your head around. This is the hardened criminal who once infiltrated a gang, convinced them to rob a bank and then shot them all. And yet here when Sawyer picks up a boar piglet she whines like any sweet middle class girl would “you’re gonna hurt it!”
Both Sayid and Locke having appropriate personal stories to relate smacks of unimaginative writing. It is an effective and interesting technique in television shows but it needs to be used sparingly.
The Unknown: Is there any significance in Christian Shepherd’s meeting with Sawyer, beyond the coincidental?
Best Moment: Sawyer teaches Kate to play “I Never.” There aren’t many scenes in Lost where we learn seemingly trivial details but here they are actually very revealing. Sawyer says “I never voted Democrat” to which Kate counters “I never voted” which are actually very interesting statements. Sawyer says he has never been in love and Kate reveals that she was married, though not for long. Sawyer finishes us by saying “I never killed a man.” To which they both drink. “Well, looks like we got something in common after all.” It’s a terrific scene: entertaining, funny, flirtatious and very revealing.
The Bottom Line: A much better effort from Lost. Charlie and Sawyer are given a good amount of attention and characterisation. Though Sawyer’s story struggles to live up to his first flashback (108). That is a harsh criticism but in the face of such a high quality story, this is bound to be a slight come down.
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