After the more character-driven stories in the past three episodes, The Hunting Party, written by Elizabeth Sarnoff and, making her Lost debut, Christina M. Kim, brings the mythology back to the fore with a tight, tense series of events involving a threat not seen since Exodus: the Others.
It all starts with Michael incapacitating Jack and Locke and leaving them locked up in the hatch while he goes into the jungle, armed with a shotgun, to look for Walt, but not before telling them the computer "isn't what it seems". Helped by Kate and Sawyer, the two men are freed and decide to go after Michael, accompanied by the still recovering James Ford (Sawyer's real name, used by Locke during a conversation between the two). During the search, they run into the Others and are confronted by the bearded man (M.C. Gainey) who abducted Walt.
The flashbacks are all about jack, and once again father issues are part of the matter, as the doctor and his old man discuss the chances of success in performing surgery on a man with spinal cancer. The patient's daughter chose Jack specifically because of his apparently miraculous operation on Sarah, and asks him to perform another miracle for her family's sake. Things get complicated when Christian begins to suspect the relationship between the two might get past professional bounds.
Considering that Sarnoff wrote the excellent What Kate Did, it's odd that this episode's flashbacks don't add much of substance, be it to Jack's actual back-story (although it's good to see John Terry and Julie Bowen again) or the present-day ramifications of his past actions. Where the episode does succeed, however, is in creating a suspenseful mood that never relents, and re-introducing a creepy villain like Gainey, who delivers one of the show's best lines: "This isn't your island. This is our island. And the only reason you're living on it, is because we allow you to live on it." In other words: there's an all-out war in the making, a prospect that effectively sets the tone for the remainder of the season.
8,5/10
It all starts with Michael incapacitating Jack and Locke and leaving them locked up in the hatch while he goes into the jungle, armed with a shotgun, to look for Walt, but not before telling them the computer "isn't what it seems". Helped by Kate and Sawyer, the two men are freed and decide to go after Michael, accompanied by the still recovering James Ford (Sawyer's real name, used by Locke during a conversation between the two). During the search, they run into the Others and are confronted by the bearded man (M.C. Gainey) who abducted Walt.
The flashbacks are all about jack, and once again father issues are part of the matter, as the doctor and his old man discuss the chances of success in performing surgery on a man with spinal cancer. The patient's daughter chose Jack specifically because of his apparently miraculous operation on Sarah, and asks him to perform another miracle for her family's sake. Things get complicated when Christian begins to suspect the relationship between the two might get past professional bounds.
Considering that Sarnoff wrote the excellent What Kate Did, it's odd that this episode's flashbacks don't add much of substance, be it to Jack's actual back-story (although it's good to see John Terry and Julie Bowen again) or the present-day ramifications of his past actions. Where the episode does succeed, however, is in creating a suspenseful mood that never relents, and re-introducing a creepy villain like Gainey, who delivers one of the show's best lines: "This isn't your island. This is our island. And the only reason you're living on it, is because we allow you to live on it." In other words: there's an all-out war in the making, a prospect that effectively sets the tone for the remainder of the season.
8,5/10