On tonight's episode, Kanye West won... oh crap. Wrong
channel. Hold on... Okay. Tonight's episode of Lost is called "The Long Con" and is a Sawyer-centric
episode focusing on flashbacks from his life. As always, this recap will be replete with spoilers, but I'm going to
save them all for after the jump. We start with Locke and Jack discussing the combination to the guns and drugs closet. Jack wants the combo, but John is concerned that his asking for the info isn't about trust, but about backup in case something should happen to Locke. Locke says that Jack should consider locking medicine in there too. Jack asks why and we cut to Sawyer walking out of the water to talk to Charlie, asking him how it feels to be the new most hated person on the Island. Charlie retorts that he'd be more concerned with Jack rummaging through Sawyer's tent. Sawyer runs over to find Jack taking pills back from Sawyer. Sawyer warns him not to do it and gives him a "This is your last chance" option to leave without taking his stuff but Jack walks off with it and Sawyer scowls at him as he walks away. First commercial break. More after the jump...
We return from commercial in a flashback with Sawyer in bed with a woman, reliving the same con we saw him in the middle of last season with the money in the suitcase. The girl notices the fake, calls him on conning her after grabbing for the money and finding out it is fake. She says she didn't take any money in her divorce and that he didn't do his homework. She says she wants him to show her what he does. She wants to learn to con. End flashback.
Back with Kate and Sawyer flirting near his tent and she agrees to read out loud to Sawyer since he lost his glasses on the raft. Sawyer starts joking about Locke shacking up with Claire. Then he mentions the army that Jack is building and discovers that Kate wasn't invited to participate either.
Cut to Hurley making a lime and the coconut joke with Sayid who is trying to open up a coconut. Hugo has a radio and asks Sayid to hack it and Sayid says it is a waste of time and that he doesn't need cheering up, but then after Hurley leaves we see Sayid staring at the radio that Hurley left behind. Cut to Ana and Jack walking around. Ana says these people aren't scared enough and then asks for the combination to the gun closet and quickly says she was just kidding when Jack looks at her suspiciously.
Cut to Sun gardening and a noise behind her in the brush with eerie music. It ends up just being Vincent and she says something to him in Korean just before he runs off and it starts pouring rain. Suddenly someone throws a black cloth over her head and starts dragging her off.
Kate and Sawyer hear the screams and run out in the jungle and find Sun hurt in the woods, passed out, Kate runs to get Jack and Sawyer runs back with her. Her hands were tied.
Ana says "they're back" but me and a lot of people in the chat room thought at this point that she did it to scare everyone. Second commercial break.
Cut back to Locke saying "They told us they would leave us alone." And Jack disagrees. Ana argues for guns, but Locke says no or they'll all end up shooting one another.
Cut to Sawyer and Kate in the jungle. Sawyer points out "How she'd get away"" mentioning that Kate couldn't get away when the Others grabbed her. Sawyer notices the difference in the details and that they are wrong. They find a hood that didn't match. Sawyer suggests it's a con by Ana to set up the army.
Cut to flashback with Sawyer showing his new apprentice about a jewelry con. Repeats the line "It's all in the details" as he writes price tags on the jewelry and puts a bandaid on his nose to make it look like he was in a fight. They run a scam on two marks, the girl buying the first necklace to set the others up.
Cut back to present with Sun, Jin, and Jack, and Sun with a HUGE knot on her forehead. Jin is concerned.
Cut to Kate and Jack chatting. Kate askes Jack how well he knows Ana Lucia. Implying that she's the one who clubbed Sun. Jack walks off without answering her. Commercial break.
Ana and Jack walking on the beech. Ana is talking about the army and says that after what happened people are finally willing to do something. Jack confronts her, and she catches his implication that he thinks she set the whole thing up and she acts indignant about his implied blame. Sun wakes up. Sun tells what she remembers, but she doesn't remember anything. Jin grows angry as they talk and starts repeating to Jack, "Gun." Jack is trying to calm him down.
Sawyer and Kate are talking and Ana looks at Kate and Kate says this is all Ana's plan to get to the guns and asks Sawyer to go tell Locke they are coming.
Cut to flashback with Sawyer and his girl in the bathroom, and she says she wants to do a long con. He says they need money and she reveals that she actually has 600K in the bank.
Cut back to present. Locke looking in Owl Creek Bridge book in the bunker when Sawyer walks up and asks him what he's doing. Locke says he is alphabetizing the books. John calls Sawyer James. Sawyer warns Locke about Jack coming for the guns, and when Locke asks why, he says "because it will piss off Jack". Locke asks Sawyer to help him move the guns. This is the point in the show where I started suspecting that this is all one elaborate long con on Sawyer's part to gain access to the guns and get back at Jack for taking things from his tent at the beginning. Commercial break.
We return to a flashback with Sawyer meeting with some guy in a diner where Kate's mom is the waitress. We find out that the guy set up this long con to steal the 600K from Sawyer's girlfriend. Sawyer wants to not do the deal but the guy threatens both their lives.
Return to the bunker with Sawyer entering the code as Jack and Jin arrive. Jack opens the door to find the closet all empty. Sawyer takes a pill and throws the bottle to Jack and says, "I believe these are yours."
Cut to John on the beech. Jack runs up on Locke asking about the guns. Locke says he's hidden them and he's not willing to tell Jack where. They begin to argue vehemently when Sawyer shoots the guns and breaks up the yelling. Sawyer reveals that he took all the guns from the hiding place. He says, "Listen up. I'm only going to say this once... You took my stuff while I was trying to get us help." He says he's done taking orders. That he doesn't wants his stuff back. He says the only thing that matters now are guns and that if anyone on the island wants a gun that they'll have to come to him. He looks at Sayid and says "you want to torture me." Then: "New sherriff in town boys. Yall best get used to it." And he walks off with the gun on his shoulder as Kate looks angered and hurt. Commercial.
Flashback with Sawyer talking to his girlfriend telling her that the guy is out there and that she was the long con. He tells her to run and gives her all the money. He says, "I love you" and she says, "I love you too." And she leaves.
Back to island with Sawyer polishing his gun. Kate comes up and confronts him about using her to pull off his trick. She asks him if he were involved with Sun's attack. He retorts "WHat kind of guy do you think I am?" And she practically yells at him, "You want people to hate you." He says he's lucky she doesn't hate him, and then she asks him why he tricked her and used her. He says: "You run, I con. Tiger can't change her stripes."
Cut to comic relief scene with Sayid walking up to Hurley with the radio saying "I want to show you something," Hurley "you fixed it". They find a signal of a radio station playing some old waltz music. Sayid says, "Could be coming from anywhere." Hurley says "OR any time.... Just kidding, dude."
Cut to Charlie in the jungle. Charlie and Sawyer teamed up to pull off the gun theft. Sawyer tries to give Charlie one of the Virgin Mary statues. Charlie says he did it b/c he wanted Locke to look like a fool, not for the statues. Charlie says Sun can never find out what I did to her.
Charlie then asks Sawyer how he thought of the plan and we enter into another flashback with Sawyer getting into the car where the guy who threatened to kill him and his girlfriend was supposedly sitting. He turns to look at the drivers seat and we pan over to see no one there. He begins counting, One mIssissippi, two mississippi... Then we see him walk back into the house and take the bag full of money that he had switched with another identical bag amidst all the confusion when he told her that he loved her. He pauses to look at a picture of them both and then turns it face down as we leave the flashback.
Back to present: "I'm not a good person, Charlie. Never did a good thing in my life."End of episode.
While the episode was entertaining, I have to say, there are a few rather large holes in this story line. Mainly that this scam, although very possible, falls apart after it is complete. Locke should be able to track down where Charlie snatched the guns to. I mean, he's tracked Charlie all over the island in the past and seemed nigh omniscient about Charlie's actions. It seems like the scam may have worked, but Locke and Jack could have easily figured out a way get the guns back easily enough. I do like that the whole story line was put into action by Jack being a jerk to Sawyer though. I mean, right at the start, Sawyer warns him not to take his stuff and then he spent the rest of the episode proving that he could outsmart both Locke and Jack and place himself in the power-position of the island whenever he likes. It's also interesting the way there is now a grudge Sawyer vs. Jack and Charlie vs. Locke dynamic being set up that results in Locke and John on the same team again. What do you think?
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 4)
2-08-2006 @ 11:43PM
Radical Bender said...
"Waltz Music"?!?!
You young whippersnappers don't know anything about music. That was "Moonlight Serenade" by the Glenn Miller Orchestra. Big band jazz.
Also, if you listen carefully to the transmission, "Duke Ellington" was also mentioned. Hurley's crack about "anytime" I'm sure is foreshadowing about something.
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2-08-2006 @ 11:46PM
Anthony said...
During the flashback when Sawer and his partner meet in the diner, was that Kate's mom that served them?
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2-08-2006 @ 11:59PM
Doron said...
Yeah, according to the thefuselage.com, it was Kate's mom.
As for Charlie and tracking, Locke was too busy with the guns to notice Charlie. Perhaps next week they will try to figure out where the guns are now. Remember, the events are all in the same day, trying to find charlie's track in night won't work. Or perhaps just a slip on part of the writers :)
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2-09-2006 @ 12:32AM
Tom Biro said...
Also, was Sawyer calling his "girlfriend" something like "Temples," kind of like how he calls Kate "Freckles?"
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2-09-2006 @ 12:47AM
Dorv said...
Yeah, my first reaction to the blog post was, "Waltz Music?" Not that I'm a huge big band guy, but my brother was a big "All-State" jazz band kinda kid in high school, and my mom loves old movies, so I've seen the Glenn Miller story a time or two.
Tom: I think, and someone can correct me if I'm wrong, but it was "Dimples." I think.
As far as Locke tracking Charlie... Yeah, a bit weak, but if you're smart enough (and they should start learning by now), you should be able to hide your track easy enough if you take the time (Hell, just walking at the waterline for a long enough time would be an easy enough start).
While I hate that Sawyer is ostrosizing (is that spelled right? Who knows...) himself, I do like this Charlie/Sawyer pairing. I really expected it to be Ana Lucia coming out of the shadows, so Charlie caught me a bit off guard. I still think, however, that the main rift in the group will be between Locke and Jack, so this may be a little misdirection (Or I could be totally wrong again).
I'm curious as to what our clues tonight meant. Yeah, that was Kate's mom, but I don't know how much bearing that has in the long run (Only one of our "connections" has come to have any influence on the present IIRC, that of Sawyer meeting Jack's dad... PLEASE correct me if I'm remembering wrong). Also, Hurley's time comment is interesting... I'm impatient. I want the show to get there already :)
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2-09-2006 @ 12:55AM
brandon said...
haha I was going to post a comment about it being moonlight serenade and hearing duke ellington.....im starting to buy into this time travel thing...i read an interview with one of the writers or producers or something and they mentioned never mentioning what year it is...we all just assume its the year the plane took off in..we dont know what year it is on the island the others, rousou the drug plane...no indication of what year they think it is.....no time talk....rouseu's writings of "beyond the sea" also around the same time as moonlight serenade/duke ellington...time travel thing is starting to grow in my mind...and i agree hurleys time comment was very interesting
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2-09-2006 @ 1:06AM
James Kew said...
Hurley's "or any time" line was a reference to The Shining, no?
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2-09-2006 @ 1:15AM
Nikolai said...
i agree what was said earlier about Hurley's "anytime" comment foreshadowing something. also, have you noticed how the pasts of all of the survivors are dark? well it got me thinking about what if this is like purgatory or something and the people that died in the crash and on the island have gotten rid of their sins?! something that i want y'all to ponder on. please reply.
Thank you,
Nikolai
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2-09-2006 @ 1:37AM
mike said...
I heard on the Howard Stern show months ago that Lost is a big Nazi experiment. Obviously I don't have any evidence to back that up. BUT the luger (nazi pistol from WW2) and the whole Dharma experiment thing for "advancing" the human race thing kinda validates at least some of that theory (big band music was big in WW2 as well and the comment about "or any time" about the radio signal is kinda odd too). Maybe the clip with the building in the background from Charlie's past (when they're doing the photo shoot) is a building that was bombed during WW2 or something and isn't around anymore. Hell I don't know.
Stern mentioned he received the info from someone very reliable who refused to be identified. Bueller?...Bueller?...Bueller?
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2-09-2006 @ 1:46AM
Dorv said...
Nazis???
Right.
IIRC, the building from Charlie's episode was on the cover of a (Beatles?) album... (Sorry, showing my age).
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2-09-2006 @ 2:05AM
Tom said...
Wow, Nikolai, that is a VERY interesting theory, one that I haven't heard say...a hundred and fifty billion times already.
I totally dug the "or any time" comment because it can mean only one of a few things. Either the writers have heard all the theories about it being a different time (too many to go into) and wanted to put an inside joke in there, or maybe they are actually setting up a different time and space storyline--one that would have to be somewhere down the road.
I personally think that the flight left Australia sometime in the fall of 2004 and they have been on the island for two months--no breaks in between where they were cryogenically frozen, no virtual reality lab tests, etc. Hence, Hurley says, "Just kidding, Dude." Its the writers way of telling the fans to forget all the bizarre time theories.
As for this episode, I thought this was a fantastically good Lost episode, the kind we deserved after the crappy Charlie episode and then a week off where they showed us a Hurley episode (but not the one where he gets on the plane--which is the one we all wanted to see, right?) I can see where they used the Charlie episode to set up some of the conflict in this one, but was it really necessary to use a whole show wasted on Charlie to get us there? This felt like the episode we all deserved and were expecting following the previous episode.
I especially liked the way they tied up some things right off the bat that people have been kicking around. Why did Locke keep the statues? Explained. Satisfactorily. Did you notice Jack took the key off after putting the guns in the shelter?
I also dug how the long con in the flashback played out to the long con on the island, which I freely and happily admit, I didn't see coming (the island con, not the flashback con). They've really been portraying Jack as a little off-his-rocker lately, along with Locke as leaning slightly to the dark side. Now I see that as all but setting up tension to distract us from Sawyer's con game. And it worked.
I still think Locke is a good guy (a man of faith), the yin to Eko's yang. And Jack is a good guy too (the man of science). And I think Sawyer is going to play out as a good guy too, especially with his comment that he's not a good person. I'm just really interested in his motivation.
The person I'm worried about is Charlie, who really seems to be traveling further down a dark road. One can only hope that at the end of that road is a steep drop off to the rocks below, and Charlie will go over it head first--the sooner the better. Seriously, Charlie needs a headstone in the island graveyard.
I really loved this episode, a 9.9 out of 10. I place it only behind Eko's great show from last month.
I think those of you who think the plot had some holes are getting ahead of yourselves, and the timeline in the show. Those guns are going to continue to be important, but the statement that was made by Sawyer in grabbing them was perfectly written and executed. If you want a show that's turning into swiss cheese faster than you can say Ana Lucia, check out the last few weeks of Battlestar Galactica.
And next week holds the potential for them to let the countdown run out? Is it sweeps? Bring it on.
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2-09-2006 @ 2:09AM
cheesetoe said...
My 2 cents on Kate's mom at the diner: In the episode where we meet Kate's mom they refer to Cedar Rapids, a city in Iowa. In this episode Sawyer tells "Dimples" to go to a motel in Sioux City, another city in Iowa, about 5 hours from Cedar Rapids (and also my home town). Nothing real interesting about this since the above comments pretty much confirm that it is, in fact, Kate's mom. But I think the writers attention to detail, is what makes this show so great. Only someone who has lived in Iowa would have caught these miniscule details, but it makes me wonder what other little things I miss in each episode.
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2-09-2006 @ 2:19AM
Dorv said...
(Tom's bashing Galactica on the Lost post now)...
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2-09-2006 @ 3:04AM
Tom said...
James, could you explain your Shining reference? Without watching that movie, I didn't get the reference.
Like, I think Jack is stressed and needs to take some time off. You know what they say, "All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy." Now that would be a Shining reference I would have gotten.
Reminds me though--wasn't there a rumor of a Richard Bachman cameo in an upcoming episode?
And Dorv, I don't mean to cross-blog, but when I see a logical way to express a thought or comment I want to get across, I take it. I wish the writer's of...you know what...would take the same approach. Oh, and its Pink Floyd, not the Beatles.
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2-09-2006 @ 4:38AM
Bill said...
There's an interesting article about Lost at subversiveminds.com this week, pretty funny and worth some thought :-)
http://www.subversiveminds.com/rant/2006/02/04/socialism-survivor-and-lost/
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2-09-2006 @ 8:07AM
tamara said...
FYI:
In 1944, Glenn Miller's plane to Paris disappered without reaching its destination. If I am right, a live recording of "Moonlight Serenade" features the sounds of WWII bombers flying overhead as the band played on in England. There's a point where the music is low as Miller instructs the band to take cover.
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2-09-2006 @ 8:46AM
LC said...
I don't think it really is a plot hole on why Locke hasn't tracked the guns or Charlie. They only just lost the weapons. Now that they know who has them I am sure that Locke will go into full tracking mode.
Jack and Locke, by now have to realize that Sawyer had something to do with Sun's abduction, since it would seem too much of a coincidence that it happened so soon after the drugs were taken from him and his little speech about how they rummaged through his things.
I'm looking forward to see what happens next week after the clock hits zero, unless it does so at shows end.
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2-09-2006 @ 8:53AM
Nicole said...
There was some talking through the static before the Glenn Miller music started.
Any overly-techie person isolate the words being said from the static yet?
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2-09-2006 @ 9:00AM
SKA said...
Any thoughts on what radio station Sayid and Hurley picked up? I heard the DJ (or whatever it's called) saying WXR (or did I miss a letter?). A search on Google shows that there isn't any radio stations called that, but WXR is an acronym for "weather radio". But don't put anything into that! ;-)
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2-09-2006 @ 9:22AM
Scottidog said...
I agree that Locke will be in "full tracking mode",looking for the guns. He seems to have a sense of people(especially Charlie)so don't be surprised if he figures out Charlies' involvement in the faux kidnapping.I agree with Charlie, in that it was nice to see Locke humiliated. If I were on the island, I would've had enough of Locke and Jack running the place too! Charlie made reference last season to being stuck at "the kids' table",while the power group made all the decisions. Sawyer has obviously had enough as well. Welcome back evil Sawyer. Soft gooey "Gosh I like Freckles" haircut boy can stay gone!
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