1.16 Outlaws

Sawyer awakens in his tent, sweating, from a dream of his mother and father’s death – a dream he must have had many times. A growling noise brings him back to reality. When a huge boar enters his tent, he bashes it once with a pipe, making it run. He pursues it unsuccessfully into the jungle fringe, and it is there he hears the whispered voices that Sayid heard.

When Sayid comes by to tease Sawyer about the boar who stole his tarp, Sawyer asks Sayid for more info on what he heard, without revealing explicitly that he heard anything himself.

Jack and Kate return 4 of the 5 guns to the case. Sawyer still has the other one. Kate offers to ask for it back, but Jack says she should leave it – he doesn’t want her to owe Sawyer anything.

Claire had some pleasant dreams about Charlie. While he messes with some piece of equipment, she asks him if he wants to go for a walk, but he says he has to do something.

Deep in the jungle, Sawyer finds his tarp. Soon after, he again hears the whispers, and then the boar reappears, chasing him until he knocks him down in a mud puddle. He tells the story to Kate, then heads off with his loaded gun to get revenge.

Charlie had been fashioning a digging tool so he could bury Ethan. Hurley volunteers to help him. Hurley becomes concerned about Charlie’s state of mind, believing he has Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, so he asks Sayid, a veteran of war, to talk to him.

Kate has been following Sawyer’s four hour hunt for the boar, during which time she tells him he has been following tracks made by Boone, a rockslide, and himself. She offers to help him track the boar in exchange for ‘carte blanche’ – any item in his stash, at any time, no questions asked. He agrees. In the evening, they share a campfire together. For a mini bottle of liquor, Sawyer insists they play ‘I never’.

Sawyer dreams the dream, but this time his father is replaced by the boar. In the morning, a boar has invaded their campsite, scattering Sawyer’s clothes and eating his food, but, strangely, leaving Kate’s things intact. When the bushes rustle, Sawyer draws his gun, but it is only Locke. Locke tells a story about an animal that took the place of a dead sibling.

Sayid pays a little visit to Charlie to assure him he is not alone with the trauma oif what he did.

Kate discovers the boar wallow. Sawyer finds and waves around the baby boar. Kate finds this disgusting and stalks off, leaving Sawyer alone. He ends up face to face with the boar, but spares him as a way of alleviating the fatal mistake he once made.

Charlie is finally ready to take that walk with Claire.

When Sawyer gives the gun back to Jack, some innocent words make Sawyer piece together that it was Jack’s father whom Sawyer was talking to in that bar in Sydney.

Sawyer’s backstory flashback: A mother tells her young son to hide under the bed and not come out no matter what, as a madman, his father, bangs at the door of the house. Soon after the boy hides, the man breaks in, shoots the mother, and then enters the young boy’s room. We see it from the boy’s perspective as the man sits on the boy’s bed. Only his legs and boots are showing as he pulls the trigger and kills himself.

As an adult, Sawyer carries a laughing woman onto a bed as they flirt together. They are interrupted by an intruder in Sawyer’s apartment, a man who once double-crossed Sawyer but has now returned to make things right. He does this by providing the whereabouts of the real Frank Sawyer – the man who seduced Sawyer’s wife and caused the downfall of his family.

Sawyer is in Sydney (the location of the real Frank Sawyer). There, he buys a gun expressly made for killing. He visits the shrimp truck where Frank works alone. Sawyer gets the gun out but, shaking, cannot make the kill. He retreats to the bar, where he drinks with Jack’s dad. Jack’s dad says he is proud that Jack turned him in. Jack’s dad says he is too weak to phone Jack and set things right by telling him how he feels. His story, and the alcohol, spur Sawyer to return to the shrimp truck, where he kills the man – but it is the wrong man.

Comments

Though he is haunted by a few ghosts from his own past, Sawyer seems to be the quintessential pragmatist. So it will be interesting to see what he thinks about – and who he tells about – the whispering jungle voices.

Now it is Sawyer who knows that Jack’s father forgave him and praised him for his strength of character in turning him in.

Amazingly, Sawyer's character arc has seen him change from someone who is unappealing and has no moral values, to someone who has many strengths, and whose morality could be saved.

Nits

In Australia, ‘prawn’ is used to describe those edible crustaceans that Frank Sawyer is serving in his ‘Shrimp’ truck.

Quotable Quotes

Hurley: Did you ever get that ‘Gulf War Syndrome’?
Sayid: That was the other side.
Hurley: Oh, right.

"Over the last few hours, you have managed to follow the tracks of humans, birds, a rockslide, yourself – basically everything except boar. You have no idea what you’re doing."
- Kate to Sawyer

Kate: Got any more of those [liquor bottles]?
Sawyer: I got a lot more of everything, but you ain’t got carte blanche yet.

Sawyer: I never killed a man.
[Kate and Sawyer both drink, meaning they each killed a man]
Sawyer: Well, looks like we got something in common after all.