LOST Rewatch: Two for the Road

The episode begins where the previous one left off, with Michael who had just emerged out of the jungle. It then quickly turns to Ana-Lucia and flashbacks about her. Her mother realizes that she executed the man who shot her, having previously refused to ID him. Ana prefers to quit the police force than accept her mother’s help or respect being a police officer.

Ana tells “Henry” that he is unlike other killers she has encountered, as they usually love talking. He grabs her and says, “You killed two of us – good people who were leaving you alone. You’re the killer, Ana-Lucia.” Locke wakes up and knocks “Henry” out.

In a flashback, Christian Shephard talks to Ana-Lucia about how one gets into “wanding.” She says one stops being a cop, and he laughs and says that’s funny since he just stopped being a doctor, and tells the story. Christian asks her to come to Sydney with him, to protect him since he is going to do something dangerous. He says they should not use real names, and so they pick “Tom” and “Sarah” for each other. He talks about fate, both in the airport, and then, after they reach Sydney and he has Ana drive him somewhere in the middle if the night. We hear Christian telling a woman that he wants to see his daughter, but she won’t let him in. Christian and Ana talk about having come to Sydney to run away. She decides not to have a drink with him. When he opens the car door, it hits Sawyer. She asks Christian to come back and leave Sydney. Christian says he can never go back.

Locke asks “Henry” why he attacked Ana-Lucia but did not try to kill him when he was trapped under the blast door and helpless. “Henry” says that it is because Locke is one of the good ones. “Henry” says the “man in charge” is a great man but not a forgiving man, and he will kill him because he failed in his mission. He says that he had been on his way to get Locke when he got caught in Rousseau’s trap.

When Michael wakes up back at the hatch, he tells his friends that he found the Others. He says that they are simple, no shoes, dirty clothes. He says they live in tents and tepees. He says they have a hatch, which they keep guarded all the time. He says that he only saw two guns and most of the Others are old and women. He says that “we can take them” and that he will lead a group back there to get Walt as soon as he gets his strength back.

Jack tells Locke that he was right to work with Sayid to interrogate “Henry.”

In this episode we see Sawyer reading Bad Twin. Jack, Locke, and Kate tell him to give them the guns. We then learn that Ana-Lucia took Sawyer’s gun. Ana wants to kill him. “Henry” says that Goodwin had told him about her, saying that she wasn’t beyond redemption. Ana says that Goodwin was going to kill her. “Henry” asks, “Was he?”

In a flashback, Ana calls her mom after hearing Jack talk to the person at the counter about needing to bury his father. She says she made a mistaken, and now she wants to come home.

Ana later tells Michael that she couldn’t kill the man they have locked up. Michael offers to do it for her, saying they are animals, and that’s what they would do. She gives him the combination. He says he is sorry, and then shoots her. When Libby walks in, he is startled and shoots her too. He opens the armory door and then shoots himself in the arm.

This episode is incredibly powerful. While we don’t trust “Henry” (whom we later come to know as Benjamin Linus) and so don’t accept his statement about the survivors of Flight 815 being the killers rather than the Others, Michael’s actions make it clear at the end of the episode. We’ve judged the Others before we’ve come to know them, and we understand Michael’s actions even as we despise them, because we know that we might do anything to save a child.

LOST brings a powerful spotlight to bear on the character of our morality and the ways we judge ourselves and others.

For me, the most interesting thing rewatching the episode was no longer treating every flashback as a story that might somehow help solve the mysteries on the island. Christian’s story isn’t somehow secretly connected with the Others. It is the story of a man failing to keep his life together, and secretly having a daughter in Australia – another detail about which we’ll learn more later.