Lost: The Economist Episode 4.3

I'd been putting off writing my thoughts about the episode because I really didn't like it that much. There were a couple of things that I thought was really really cool:

Daniel, the physicist, conducted an experiment. He had Regina on the freighter fire a rocket toward a contraption he'd set up. When the rocket failed to appear as expected, Daniel was very dismayed and alarmed. I wasn't too surprised because there have been tons and tons of hints that the island is in a totally different time zone if not even a totally different universe. Two examples jump into my head: Desmond's time travelling episode, in which he meets very spooky time traveller Mrs. Hawking who warns him he has to act out the same scenario as he did before or else we're all gonna die.

And the other was kind of charming. Hurley and Sayid are sitting on the beach and they've gotten a radio to work. All of a sudden it picks up the strains of Glenn Miller's "Moonlight Serenade". Sayid remarks something to the effect that they don't know how far away the signal is and Hurley says (in jest?) "Or from what time." And when Sayid gives him this "What!" look, Hurley says "Just kidding, dude."

Or maybe that was Glenn Miller, live, performing somewhere, sometime before his plane went down during World War II.

Why I didn't like the episode:

1. Locke is acting just like the nickname Sawyer gave him, Colonel Kurtz. If not the looney colonel, then he's acting like one of the savage boys from Lord of the Flies. He's losing it and as he's losing it, he's becoming meaner and trying to control everyone. He threatened Hurley, who objected to the idea of taking one of the freighties hostage. Since when do our guys take hostages? That's something The Others do, dude, just like at the end of the second season when Ben & his gang took Jack, Sawyer, Hurley and Kate.

2. Hurley conspired with Locke to trick Sayid and Kate! You don't do that to your friends, especially not when the group you're with are taking hostages and threatening to kill people (like Ben)! Hurley, Hurley, you were so sweet the first couple of seasons.

3. That whole flash forward sequence with Sayid. I love his character and I have enjoyed all his episodes up to now. I just didn't like seeing him living the high life, playing golf and assassinating people cold bloodedly. I really enjoyed the episode last season with the cat, which reminded him of a woman he tortured so brutally and yet she still forgave him. It was a powerful episode and so I was annoyed to see him just shooting people--whether he was forced to or not.

Other fans have written in-depth analyses of the episode and have come up with some very fascinating ideas. The one I love best is the one that says the flash forward occurred out of sequence. It started with Sayid on the golf course and some guy comes up and advises him to use a certain club to make the shot. The make a bet, Sayid loses, and as they talk, Sayid reveals his identity. It's very obvious the other man is totally unnerved, scared and tries to get away but Sayid kills him and nonchalantly strolls away.

Later on, he makes contact with a woman who works for his target, "The Economist". He's supposed to make contact and get close to her to weasel out the identity of "The Economist". Meanwhile, she's also trying to figure out who he is working for. Some of it started to remind me of The Sting. In it, Johnny Hooker is being pursued by a hitman and takes up with a waitress from some dive...well, it turns out in a twist that she is the assassin. I had a feeling about this lady friend of Sayid's and sure enough, she pulls out a gun and shoots Sayid when she realizes he's not going to tell who he works for. Sayid kills her, no surprise, but I found it depressing.

Here's the cool part of it that another fan wrote about: The rocket in Daniel's experiment finally arrived 31 minutes after it was shot off from the freighter. Where did it go for that amount of time? In the original script, "The Economist" placed a call to his female employee about a half hour early. And in the episode itself, apparently 31 minutes into it Sayid is telling the woman he's looking for/going to kill The Economist. Well, if you rewind 31 minutes you're at the golf course at the beginning. Whoa! Could it be?

I thought of one more thing I really really liked: the end of the episode. Sayid is actually working for Ben. Who saw that coming?

For some really great reviews, click here and look for the recaps.