"Lost" Recap: "The Economist" (2/14/08)

Oh Baby!  Things are starting to heat up in the world of the Losties.  It's a Sayid-centric episode and being a big Sayid fan, that makes me very happy.

We open on a shot of Sayid's beautiful face.  He's kneeling, his eyes are closed and it appears he's saying a prayer for Dead Naomi.  He goes over to close her eyes and checks out a silver bracelet she's wearing that's inscribed, "N. I'll always be with you, R.G."

In the background Jack and Miles are verbally sparring over what should be done about Locke and Charlotte when Sayid interrupts them.  Sayid proposes Frank fly them back to their mother ship.  Frank says because fuel is low, he can only take three people.  Miles doesn't want to go anywhere until they get Charlotte.  So Sayid promises to extract Charlotte from Locke in exchange for a flight to their mother ship.  Frank agrees.

Flash forward.

Now, I gotta tell you, at first I wasn't sure this scene was a flash forward, except Sayid looked more mature and prosperous than he did in any of his flashbacks.  And sure enough by the end of the scene, we know exactly where we are.  Kind of.

So Sayid is playing golf, early in the morning on a lush course overlooking the ocean.  We discover he's in the Seychelles when a friendly gentleman in a golf cart roles up and offers him a lift to the next hole.  Sayid politely declines. The Friendly Gentleman, who has what I think is a cross between an Italian and a Middle Eastern accent proposes a wager of 50 Euros if his ball goes further than Sayid's.  He thinks Sayid should be using a five iron and Sayid is using a seven.  Sayid counters a wager of 100 and they're off.

Friendly Gentleman is pleased, "Amazing huh?  How a wager, makes just about anything more fun."  I liked that line.  I'm not quite sure why.

Sayid takes a stroke and gets very close to the hole.  Friendly Gentleman, as he's about to take his stroke, asks Sayid what he does for a living.  Sayid says, he doesn't do anything because he was the recipient of a large sum of money because of a plane crash.  "I'm Sayid Jurrah.  One of the Oceanic Six." Okay, it's a flash forward and that's four accounted for.

Friendly Gentleman breaks out into a sweat and looks extremely nervous.  A smiling Sayid encourages him to take his shot.  When he does, Friendly Gentleman gets his ball closer than Sayid's, but instead of wanting his winnings, he wants to hightail  it out of there.  Sayid however insists on paying him, calling him Mr. Avillino right before he pulls out a gun and shoots him dead, dead, dead. 

Sayid then picks up his clubs and walks away.

Opening Credits.

Sayid dressed in a very sharp suit with an open necked shirt, enters a crowded upscale cafe and after looking around for an empty chair, asks a young German woman if he can use the empty seat at her table.  She says yes and then introduces herself as Elsa.  She's blonde, pretty and has a shy, unassuming way about her.  Sayid volunteers that he's a headhunter in Berlin on business.  Elsa works for---wait for it---an Economist.  Even though she doesn't know what her Economist does, she carries around a beeper 24/7 on the off chance he should summon her.  The Economist would then expect her to be at his side instantly.  By the way the beeper is one of the older kinds from about ten years ago.  She explains later that her boss uses it because he's "very old fashioned."

They make dinner plans and when Sayid is alone on the street, he makes a cell phone call and tells someone on the other end that he's made contact.  He hangs up and then drops the cell phone in a public garbage can.

Flashback to the island and Sayid finds the picture of Desmond and Penelope in Naomi's back pack.  Jack sends Juliet off to the beach to bring back Desmond.  Jack and Sayid have a pow wow and Sayid rightly points out that since the last time he saw Locke, Jack put a gun to his head and pulled the trigger, he's not the best one to negotiate Charlotte's release.  Sayid says he can get her without bloodshed.  Jack agrees.

Miles jumps in, "You think you're going after Charlotte without me?"

Sayid, "Of course not." 

Miles is taken off guard.  "Oh...well good."  I love it when you're dealing with an inherently angry person who's building up a head of steam and all of a sudden they have nothing to be angry at.  Heh.

Locke and his Merry Band of Losties are trekking through the jungle.  Sawyer's questioning Ben about his spy on the boat, but Ben's not talking.  Sawyer suggests they shoot off some of Ben's toes to make him talk and Locke thinks that's a bad idea because then they'd have to carry him.  See, Locke might have gone off the deep end, but he's still thinking logically.

They arrive at a spot in the jungle and Locke looks around.  He sees a ring of gray granules on the ground and looks around as if he's expecting something.  He thinks the cabin should be in front of them and when Sawyer starts questioning what they're doing there, Ben says with an insulting sneer, that Locke is looking for someone to tell him what to do next. 

A flustered Locke says never mind, let's move on.  Hurley wants to know why they're taking Charlotte with them when all they thought they were doing was going off to hide.  When Locke says he wants to keep her as a hostage, Hurley's like, Dude, I didn't sign up for no hostage taking.  Locke's like, well too bad, Hugo, I'm in charge.  You got a problem with that?

Cut to Jack and Kate near the helicopter.  Kate ribs Jack about how it's hard to be told not to come along isn't it?  Jack laughs and then says Kate should go with Sayid and Miles.   Kate kind of unnecessarily asks what if Locke tries to put a knife in her back like he did to Naomi?  Jack says Sawyer won't let him.

When they finally trot off into the jungle Miles is all pissy because Sayid won't let him have a gun, Frank asks Jack if Sayid was some kind of diplomat in Iraq.  Jack says no, "a torturer."  Frank does a funny double take at that and watches them go.

In the jungle Miles wants to know how Locke was able to split up the Losties.  Sayid tells him.  When Miles wants to know if Sayid thinks the Fearless Foursome are dangerous as well, Sayid says, "I'll let you know when I decide."

Flash forward to Sayid picking up Elsa for a date to go to the opera.  It's several dates later and they're getting nice and chummy.  Elsa decides not to take her beeper for the night, but Sayid says he'll carry it for her.  He would hate to get fired. Elsa then shyly tells Sayid she's hoping one of the reasons he's still in Berlin is because of her.  As an answer, he gives her a kiss. 

Back at the helicopter, Daniel "Mr. Wizard" Faraday has decided he wants to conduct a little experiment.  He gets the phone from Frank, but not before Frank warns him to keep it to that "science stuff.  If Minkowski gets on there, you hang up right away."  Hmmm.  Very interesting.

Daniel sets up a tripod-like contraption with a whirligig thingy on top.  He switches on the whirligig thingy and tells Regina on the phone to "fire the payload."  It's kind of frightening as we wait for the payload, hearing Regina countdown over the phone.  When she gets to zero and nothing shows up, Daniel is stunned.

Meanwhile, Sayid, Kate and Miles have arrived at the barracks but they're deserted.  Suddenly they start hearing banging and when they burst into one of the houses they open up a closet to find a tied up Hurley.  "They left me."

After the commercial break a now untied Hurley says that, "Locke's gone off the reservation, man."  Heh.  "He took one chick hostage, he says Walt was the one who told him to kill this other chick..." 

When Miles tells Hurley to stop babbling and calls him tubby, Hurley says, "Oh awesome, the ship sent us another Sawyer."

Jack and Frank are packing up the helicopter and what's Jack's most important question?  "The Red Sox really win the series?"  Frank laughs and says not to get him started.  "My Dad's from the Bronx, I bleed Yankee blue."

All of a sudden, here comes the payload from the ship.  Mr. Wizard checks the clock on his beacon and the clock on the payload and they're exactly thirty one minutes off.  Mr. Wizard doesn't seem to think that's a good thing.  I'm thinking that means it took the payload thirty one minutes longer than it should have to reach that spot on the island.  Either that means there's a space/time continuum thing going on, or something about the island's atmosphere diverts things that are flying through it.  Either that or Mr. Wizard doesn't know what the heck he's doing.

Right then, Juliet returns with Desmond and he smiles broadly when he see the helicopter.

On Hurley's advice, Sayid, Miles and Kate go to Ben's house and do a search.  Sayid finds a secret room behind a bookcase with an assortment of street clothes, wads of cash in a drawer and a whole bunch of passports from different countries with Ben's picture in them.  Before he can investigate further, Kate calls him because Sawyer and Locke have shown up.  It seems Hurley's "abandonment" was all an act to trap Kate, Miles and Sayid at Ben's house. 

Rousseau and Hurley put Sayid in that same locked room that Ben put Jack in when they were holding him last season.  And Ben's in there too.  "Well, I guess they're running out of jail space," he says.

Sawyer's with Kate in one of the rooms in Ben's house.  He tries to convince her to stay with him on the island.  After all, there's nothing for either of them back home. On the island, in the barracks, they can be comfortable.  Kate asks how long he thinks they can play house.  Sawyer's like, why don't we find out.

Locke brings Ben and Sayid some iced tea.  He apologizes for the "theatrics" but he wanted to "cover his bases."  Sayid tells Locke he agrees the Fearless Foursome are liars and that they're not there to rescue them. That's why he wants to get to their mother ship so he can find out what's really going on.

Locke tells Sayid that Ben says he has a spy on the boat.  When Sayid wants to know who, Ben replies, "It's a secret."

Sayid then says to Locke, "Forgive me, but the day I start trusting him is the day I would have sold my soul."  Uh huh.

Locke asks why he should give Charlotte to Sayid for nothing.  Sayid's like, Dude, I never expected you to give her to me for nothing.  Hee.

Flash forward to Sayid and Elsa cuddling in bed.  She wants to know about his life and when she says it's because she loves him, he agrees to tell her whatever she wants to know.  Just then the infamous beeper goes off.  She starts dressing and says she has to meet her boss at a particular hotel.  Sayid all of a sudden looks very sad and implores Elsa to leave Berlin.  Something's going to happen to her employer and she can't be around to answer the questions when it does. 

Elsa, bright bulb that she is, figures out that everything about their meeting has been a set up from the beginning.  She wants to know if Sayid's going to kill the Economist.  When Sayid admits his name is on a list, Elsa turns her back and wants to know whose list, who is his boss?  Sayid doesn't answer but declares the man she's working for is not an economist.  Elsa pauses a second, turns to Sayid, and with a steely gaze, shoots him.

Sayid and I can barely believe it.  Man, she was good.

Elsa grabs the phone and tells someone in German that she didn't kill Sayid but he didn't give her the name of his employer.  The person on the phone convinces her to keep him alive and tells her to bring Sayid to him.  Or her.

When she gets off the phone a wounded Sayid throws something to distract her and then shoots her dead, dead, dead. 

He crawls over to her body and tenderly touches her face.  As we discovered when he told her to leave town, he was falling for her and tears roll down his cheeks as he closes her eyes.  His hand touches her wrist and we can see that she's wearing a bracelet identical to the one Sayid took off Naomi on the island.

Cut to Desmond trying to find out from Frank why Naomi had a picture of him and Penelope.  Frank says "she (Naomi) was senior management," so they didn't hang out and chat about strategy.  When Desmond mentions Penelope's full name, although Frank exchanges glances with Daniel, he denies knowing her name.  Desmond's like, okay, but I'm flying out of here with you guys.

Just then, Sayid returns with Charlotte.  Jack asks about Kate and Sayid says she decided to stay.  When Frank asks what happened to Miles, Sayid says he traded him for Charlotte.  Frank's like, if the guy wasn't such a pain in my butt I guess I'd be a bit more upset that you cheated.

Charlotte and Daniel decide to stay on the island, so Sayid, Desmond, and Dead Naomi are given the three seats on the helicopter.  Dead Naomi is Sayid's idea and it makes me wonder if she's not really dead, or if he has a plan to find out about who gave her the bracelet.  Before they lift off, Daniel warns Frank to fly out on exactly the same course they fly in on.

Exactly.  The.  Same.

The implication being that if he doesn't, something very bad will happen.

Jack wishes Sayid luck before the chopper takes off.

What follows is a momentous moment in the series.  One of the crash survivors, actually gets flown off the island and we can just imagine what Sayid must be thinking as he finally sees the island from the air in what hopefully will be the first stage of his flight back home.  The chopper pulls away, out over the ocean and we watch as Sayid takes it all in.  Great scene.

Flash forward to a veterinary hospital.  Sayid walks in and someone tells him to take his shirt off.  The voice is deeper, but I think I recognize it.  After Sayid does as he's told, the voice asks if Elsa's dead.  Sayid says yes and explains she wanted to know who he worked for.  The hands that belong to the voice start to take out Sayid's bullet.

"She wanted to know about you,"  Sayid says.

"Of course she did."

Cut to a closeup of Ben.  I knew I recognized that voice.  I'm also guessing he's not one of the Oceanic Six.

Uh, Sayid, you want a receipt for that soul?

At the sight of Sayid's tears Ben asks coldly, "Why are you crying because it hurts or because you were stupid enough to care for her?  These people don't deserve our sympathies.  Need I remind you what they did the last time you thought with your heart instead of your gun?"

Sayid says miserably, "You used that to recruit me into killing for you."

"You want to protect your friends or not, Sayid?"  Ben then says he has another name for him.

Sayid says, "They know I'm after them now. "

A long pause and then, "Good."

Blaring Horrrrrrrns.....LOST.

Oh, Baby.

Sayid dressed in a very sharp suit with an open necked shirt, enters a crowded upscale cafe and after looking around for an empty chair, asks a young German woman if he can use the empty seat at her table.  She says yes and then introduces herself as Elsa.  She's blonde, pretty and has a shy, unassuming way about her.  Sayid volunteers that he's a headhunter in Berlin on business.  Elsa works for---wait for it---an Economist.  Even though she doesn't know what her Economist does, she carries around a beeper 24/7 on the off chance he should summon her.  The Economist would then expect her to be at his side instantly.  By the way the beeper is one of the older kinds from about ten years ago.  She explains later that her boss uses it because he's "very old fashioned."

They make dinner plans and when Sayid is alone on the street, he makes a cell phone call and tells someone on the other end that he's made contact.  He hangs up and then drops the cell phone in a public garbage can.

Flashback to the island and Sayid finds the picture of Desmond and Penelope in Naomi's back pack.  Jack sends Juliet off to the beach to bring back Desmond.  Jack and Sayid have a pow wow and Sayid rightly points out that since the last time he saw Locke, Jack put a gun to his head and pulled the trigger, he's not the best one to negotiate Charlotte's release.  Sayid says he can get her without bloodshed.  Jack agrees.

Miles jumps in, "You think you're going after Charlotte without me?"

Sayid, "Of course not." 

Miles is taken off guard.  "Oh...well good."  I love it when you're dealing with an inherently angry person who's building up a head of steam and all of a sudden they have nothing to be angry at.  Heh.

Locke and his Merry Band of Losties are trekking through the jungle.  Sawyer's questioning Ben about his spy on the boat, but Ben's not talking.  Sawyer suggests they shoot off some of Ben's toes to make him talk and Locke thinks that's a bad idea because then they'd have to carry him.  See, Locke might have gone off the deep end, but he's still thinking logically.

They arrive at a spot in the jungle and Locke looks around.  He sees a ring of gray granules on the ground and looks around as if he's expecting something.  He thinks the cabin should be in front of them and when Sawyer starts questioning what they're doing there, Ben says with an insulting sneer, that Locke is looking for someone to tell him what to do next. 

A flustered Locke says never mind, let's move on.  Hurley wants to know why they're taking Charlotte with them when all they thought they were doing was going off to hide.  When Locke says he wants to keep her as a hostage, Hurley's like, Dude, I didn't sign up for no hostage taking.  Locke's like, well too bad, Hugo, I'm in charge.  You got a problem with that?

Cut to Jack and Kate near the helicopter.  Kate ribs Jack about how it's hard to be told not to come along isn't it?  Jack laughs and then says Kate should go with Sayid and Miles.   Kate kind of unnecessarily asks what if Locke tries to put a knife in her back like he did to Naomi?  Jack says Sawyer won't let him.

When they finally trot off into the jungle Miles is all pissy because Sayid won't let him have a gun, Frank asks Jack if Sayid was some kind of diplomat in Iraq.  Jack says no, "a torturer."  Frank does a funny double take at that and watches them go.

In the jungle Miles wants to know how Locke was able to split up the Losties.  Sayid tells him.  When Miles wants to know if Sayid thinks the Fearless Foursome are dangerous as well, Sayid says, "I'll let you know when I decide."

Flash forward to Sayid picking up Elsa for a date to go to the opera.  It's several dates later and they're getting nice and chummy.  Elsa decides not to take her beeper for the night, but Sayid says he'll carry it for her.  He would hate to get fired. Elsa then shyly tells Sayid she's hoping one of the reasons he's still in Berlin is because of her.  As an answer, he gives her a kiss. 

Back at the helicopter, Daniel "Mr. Wizard" Faraday has decided he wants to conduct a little experiment.  He gets the phone from Frank, but not before Frank warns him to keep it to that "science stuff.  If Minkowski gets on there, you hang up right away."  Hmmm.  Very interesting.

Daniel sets up a tripod-like contraption with a whirligig thingy on top.  He switches on the whirligig thingy and tells Regina on the phone to "fire the payload."  It's kind of frightening as we wait for the payload, hearing Regina countdown over the phone.  When she gets to zero and nothing shows up, Daniel is stunned.

Meanwhile, Sayid, Kate and Miles have arrived at the barracks but they're deserted.  Suddenly they start hearing banging and when they burst into one of the houses they open up a closet to find a tied up Hurley.  "They left me."

After the commercial break a now untied Hurley says that, "Locke's gone off the reservation, man."  Heh.  "He took one chick hostage, he says Walt was the one who told him to kill this other chick..." 

When Miles tells Hurley to stop babbling and calls him tubby, Hurley says, "Oh awesome, the ship sent us another Sawyer."

Jack and Frank are packing up the helicopter and what's Jack's most important question?  "The Red Sox really win the series?"  Frank laughs and says not to get him started.  "My Dad's from the Bronx, I bleed Yankee blue."

All of a sudden, here comes the payload from the ship.  Mr. Wizard checks the clock on his beacon and the clock on the payload and they're exactly thirty one minutes off.  Mr. Wizard doesn't seem to think that's a good thing.  I'm thinking that means it took the payload thirty one minutes longer than it should have to reach that spot on the island.  Either that means there's a space/time continuum thing going on, or something about the island's atmosphere diverts things that are flying through it.  Either that or Mr. Wizard doesn't know what the heck he's doing.

Right then, Juliet returns with Desmond and he smiles broadly when he see the helicopter.

On Hurley's advice, Sayid, Miles and Kate go to Ben's house and do a search.  Sayid finds a secret room behind a bookcase with an assortment of street clothes, wads of cash in a drawer and a whole bunch of passports from different countries with Ben's picture in them.  Before he can investigate further, Kate calls him because Sawyer and Locke have shown up.  It seems Hurley's "abandonment" was all an act to trap Kate, Miles and Sayid at Ben's house. 

Rousseau and Hurley put Sayid in that same locked room that Ben put Jack in when they were holding him last season.  And Ben's in there too.  "Well, I guess they're running out of jail space," he says.

Sawyer's with Kate in one of the rooms in Ben's house.  He tries to convince her to stay with him on the island.  After all, there's nothing for either of them back home. On the island, in the barracks, they can be comfortable.  Kate asks how long he thinks they can play house.  Sawyer's like, why don't we find out.

Locke brings Ben and Sayid some iced tea.  He apologizes for the "theatrics" but he wanted to "cover his bases."  Sayid tells Locke he agrees the Fearless Foursome are liars and that they're not there to rescue them. That's why he wants to get to their mother ship so he can find out what's really going on.

Locke tells Sayid that Ben says he has a spy on the boat.  When Sayid wants to know who, Ben replies, "It's a secret."

Sayid then says to Locke, "Forgive me, but the day I start trusting him is the day I would have sold my soul."  Uh huh.

Locke asks why he should give Charlotte to Sayid for nothing.  Sayid's like, Dude, I never expected you to give her to me for nothing.  Hee.

Flash forward to Sayid and Elsa cuddling in bed.  She wants to know about his life and when she says it's because she loves him, he agrees to tell her whatever she wants to know.  Just then the infamous beeper goes off.  She starts dressing and says she has to meet her boss at a particular hotel.  Sayid all of a sudden looks very sad and implores Elsa to leave Berlin.  Something's going to happen to her employer and she can't be around to answer the questions when it does. 

Elsa, bright bulb that she is, figures out that everything about their meeting has been a set up from the beginning.  She wants to know if Sayid's going to kill the Economist.  When Sayid admits his name is on a list, Elsa turns her back and wants to know whose list, who is his boss?  Sayid doesn't answer but declares the man she's working for is not an economist.  Elsa pauses a second, turns to Sayid, and with a steely gaze, shoots him.

Sayid and I can barely believe it.  Man, she was good.

Elsa grabs the phone and tells someone in German that she didn't kill Sayid but he didn't give her the name of his employer.  The person on the phone convinces her to keep him alive and tells her to bring Sayid to him.  Or her.

When she gets off the phone a wounded Sayid throws something to distract her and then shoots her dead, dead, dead. 

He crawls over to her body and tenderly touches her face.  As we discovered when he told her to leave town, he was falling for her and tears roll down his cheeks as he closes her eyes.  His hand touches her wrist and we can see that she's wearing a bracelet identical to the one Sayid took off Naomi on the island.

Cut to Desmond trying to find out from Frank why Naomi had a picture of him and Penelope.  Frank says "she (Naomi) was senior management," so they didn't hang out and chat about strategy.  When Desmond mentions Penelope's full name, although Frank exchanges glances with Daniel, he denies knowing her name.  Desmond's like, okay, but I'm flying out of here with you guys.

Just then, Sayid returns with Charlotte.  Jack asks about Kate and Sayid says she decided to stay.  When Frank asks what happened to Miles, Sayid says he traded him for Charlotte.  Frank's like, if the guy wasn't such a pain in my butt I guess I'd be a bit more upset that you cheated.

Charlotte and Daniel decide to stay on the island, so Sayid, Desmond, and Dead Naomi are given the three seats on the helicopter.  Dead Naomi is Sayid's idea and it makes me wonder if she's not really dead, or if he has a plan to find out about who gave her the bracelet.  Before they lift off, Daniel warns Frank to fly out on exactly the same course they fly in on.

Exactly.  The.  Same.

The implication being that if he doesn't, something very bad will happen.

Jack wishes Sayid luck before the chopper takes off.

What follows is a momentous moment in the series.  One of the crash survivors, actually gets flown off the island and we can just imagine what Sayid must be thinking as he finally sees the island from the air in what hopefully will be the first stage of his flight back home.  The chopper pulls away, out over the ocean and we watch as Sayid takes it all in.  Great scene.

Flash forward to a veterinary hospital.  Sayid walks in and someone tells him to take his shirt off.  The voice is deeper, but I think I recognize it.  After Sayid does as he's told, the voice asks if Elsa's dead.  Sayid says yes and explains she wanted to know who he worked for.  The hands that belong to the voice start to take out Sayid's bullet.

"She wanted to know about you,"  Sayid says.

"Of course she did."

Cut to a closeup of Ben.  I knew I recognized that voice.  I'm also guessing he's not one of the Oceanic Six.

Uh, Sayid, you want a receipt for that soul?

At the sight of Sayid's tears Ben asks coldly, "Why are you crying because it hurts or because you were stupid enough to care for her?  These people don't deserve our sympathies.  Need I remind you what they did the last time you thought with your heart instead of your gun?"

Sayid says miserably, "You used that to recruit me into killing for you."

"You want to protect your friends or not, Sayid?"  Ben then says he has another name for him.

Sayid says, "They know I'm after them now. "

A long pause and then, "Good."

Blaring Horrrrrrrns.....LOST.

Oh, Baby.