'Lost' recap: Working the Angles

When Lost fans speak of ''set-up'' episodes, they're usually trying to be kind about an hour wherein nothing really happened besides moving characters emotionally and placing them geographically so they are primed and positioned for more eventful episodes to come. This wasn't that kind of set-up episode, even though it often played the part. While Queen Ilana’s beach crew cooled their heels off screen, King Crock Locke shepherded his freaked-out flock of ex-Others across The Island, first to Crazy Claire’s cozy-creepy Little Yoda Hut on the Prairie, then to Banyan Tree Creek. At one point, we got a shot where ''The Smoke-Thing'' practically played traffic cop, motioning his herd along the path like a flight attendant directing passengers off a plane after an emergency landing. (In a deleted scene, Cindy noted his technique, tried to correct him, and then got slapped silly for being ''inappropriate.'') Along the way, Locke Ness Monster diverted Secret Agent Sawyer to Hydra Island to smoke out insurgents among the Ajira passengers. Instead, Dharma's former security chief and de facto sheriff made the acquaintance of the smaller island's new regent, exiled uber-Other Charles Widmore — a little Elba for the Island's deposed Napoleon. Sawyer returned to Smokey with intel (Widmore's got goons, guns, and sonic fences) and new mysteries. (What — or who — is locked up in the submarine? Who slaughtered the Ajira 316 redshirts?) He also came back with a plan to get himself, Kate, and presumably Jin and Sun off the Island. Kate wondered: But who's going to fly the airplane? Silly rabbit! Don't you know Sawyer is all about the Watership Down? In short, ''Recon'' told us where almost everyone in the saga currently stands (and sits) in advance of significant action.

And yet, like a certain red-headed archaeologist who found great booty while digging through James Ford's sock drawer, I found much to treasure and ogle within ''Recon.'' I was riveted by the return of Sawyer to the narrative mainstage and loved the trickster, long-con storytelling; every line seemed to be possessed with double meanings, every scene seemed to be pregnant with possibilities. Emphasis on possessed. And pregnant. (I'll explain as we go.) The first line of the episode came from Island Sawyer as he burned himself on a coffee pot: ''Son of a bitch!'' Of course, those were Juliet's final words before detonating Jughead. Juliet's name was never spoken in the episode, but she haunted the proceedings via association, as did several other dead friends, including hobbity dope fiend Charlie Pace and especially fate-screwed whiz kid Daniel Faraday. In fact, I was reminded of Eloise Hawking and her snake-eating-its-tail ouroboros broach when Sideways James issued the last line of his L.A. Confidential arc as he pinned fugitive Hoodie Kate against a fence: ''Son of a bitch!'' ''Recon'' spiraled through space and time and passed through metaphorical realms of limbo and worse to tell a story about Sawyer choosing to let go of the hell in his heart and replacing it with a dream of heaven.

This ''set-up'' episode was all about set-ups, from its opening sequence fake-out that seemed to present Sideways James Ford as every bit the slutty, soul-numbed vengeance-questing criminal as his Island iteration, but then revealed himself to be a… slutty, soul-numbed vengeance-questing cop. No doubt the happy sunflower glory days of his previous life as Dharma Initiative security chief had prepared him for the gig. But alas, there was no Juliet in this sad sunflower's life, and we were made to ponder if that made all the difference. His partner seemed to think so. Miles! Detective Miles Straume, who tried to fill Jim's lonely void by setting his buddy up with a blast from Lost's freighter-folk past, Sideways Charlotte Lewis. (Apparently, no matter the world, Miles will always end up wearing a badge with Sawyer.)

In the Island world, Fake Locke scrambled to manage the suspicious and impatient personalities within his Island escape club with what seemed to me to be an interconnecting series of short cons. Strategy? I think Smokey sent Sawyer to the Widmore Zooropa — in part — to get Kate's guardian angel out of his no-hair so he could isolate her for a Claire attack, then save her from it, so he could get a chance to spin her under this thumb. His preferred tactic seems to be the very thing that Sideways James struggled to embrace in his story: emotional intimacy. UnLocke tried to bond with Kate by unlocking a little bit of himself — cryptic tidbits about his background, like semi-redacted details from his dubious dossier of his life. Who's his bad mom? What were those ''growing pains''? Smoke-Thing, who the hell are you? Cain? Abel? Are you the evil demiurge Yaldabaoth or are you the Gnostic spirit Eve-Zoe? Are you the fulfillment of my Evil Aaron theory? My benevolent Swamp-Thing theory? Or are you Hamlet? Norman Bates? Or Stephen King's Carrie? Whoooooo are you, Smokey? Who-hoo? Who-hoo? Because I REALLYWANNAKNOW…

And you know what, kids? I think I do know. Because it seemed to me that Fake Locke was pulling another con, too, one that may have revealed his true character. The episode was called ''Recon,'' which itself was a con. We were clearly supposed to assume it was short for ''reconnaissance mission.'' But ''Recon'' was also a pun for ''Re-con'' — as in ''a previously executed con, done again.'' The story flicked at all of Sawyer's classic con man stories, from ''Confidence Man'' to ''LaFleur.'' I think FrankenLocke picked one of those scams to repeat anew — and I think I'm pretty creeped out by the implications.

NEXT: The cop with a secret plan