Any time there's an episode written by Edward Kitsis and Adam Horowitz you can be sure you'll laugh out loud a few times. Yes, even in the Hydra arc of Season 3.
Let's start with the flashbacks, where Sawyer's in prison serving time for conning Cassidy Phillips. Predictably he works an angle between Warden Harris and new prisoner Munson in order to score a healthy "commission" plus commutation of his sentence.
What's NOT predictable is how Sawyer spends that commission. He puts it in a bank account under the name Clementine Phillips. That would be the daughter he found out about earlier in the episode. It's also one of the rare times you'll see Sawyer do something responsible and unselfish.
The flashback storyline isn't anything special but it's peppered with witty one-liners from Sawyer. He calls Munson "Costanza" without skipping a beat, making me wonder whether the script or the casting came first.
At the Hydra station, Sawyer is tricked into obedience when Ben convinces him his life's at stake. Together they walk to the island's edge, revealing that the Hydra is in fact on a smaller, separate island. Elsewhere, Jack operates on Colleen (unsuccessfuly) but more importantly sees an X-ray showing a spinal tumor. More on that next episode.
One aspect of this episode that resonates with me is when Ben quotes Of Mice and Men: "A guy goes nuts if he ain't got nobody. It don't make no difference who the guy is, long as he's with you. I tell you, I tell you a guy gets too lonely and he gets sick."
I personally don't think this was quoted just for giggles. There are numerous cases across the series when characters isolate themselves, intentionally or not, and they turn exceptionally cold. It could be argued that this is a precursor to the "infection," the idea that any time a character is suffering from great loneliness or despair they risk being overcome with darkness.
It's possible I'm giving the LOST writers too much credit here, but I think it actually works with the framework we were given.
Michael Emerson gets the acting prize this time around. It's hysterical when he places the caged rabbit on Sawyer's chest and shakes it vigorously, all the while commanding it with, "Come on, come on! Hippity hop, hippity hop!"
With each new scene Emerson seems to elevate himself even more, not just with dry humor but a certain aura that commands respect. It's hard to say whether the scripts were forming around him or vice-versa, but I'm inclined to think it was more the former.
Holloway knows how to take a fake beating, that's for sure. Ben whacks him repeatedly with a baton and Pickett beats him within an inch of his life. If Holloway decides he's done with dramas he's got a career waiting in pro wrestling — he knows how to sell pain. His highlight was the scene with Cassidy where he sees his daughter's photo. Subtle facial expressions made it known that Sawyer was taken aback but determined to keep his edge.
Lilly, Fox, Mitchell, Dickens, the Others, and the beach camp crew were all solid. Neither Ian Gomez (Munson) nor Bill Duke (Warden Harris) were particularly impressive.
One of the better visuals occurs in a storyline I hadn't even mentioned — Desmond continuing to show signs of his future-telling abilities. He fastens a golf club to a long branch and sits it upright, then lightning strikes the club with a very convincing visual effect.
It is my understanding that the Hydra view of the "home" island is all CGI, in which case that is very well done. If a green-screen was involved in any way then I'm even more impressed, for I didn't see any fuzzy edges around either character.
Bonus points for the frenetic scene in the Hydra operating room. There was just the right distribution of attention given to the patient, the two doctors, and the spectators in the booth up above.
Every Man for Himself is somewhat refreshing in terms of the Hydra arc, for now our characters are at least starting to move around a bit and getting a chance to do some interesting things. We're slowly... SLOWLY... getting back to the LOST we all know and love, so bonus points on the rewatchability factor.
The reveal of Clementine Phillips is pretty significant, as is Jack's discovery of X-rays in the OR. The "separate island" reveal is also fairly important but not so much that I'd consider this a critical episode by any stretch of the imagination.
But to be clear, we're still not back to LOST and our characters are still mostly frozen in place. It'd take another episode or two before things finally break free — literally and figuratively.
The flashback storyline certainly had little or no atmosphere. Too cold, too sterile, too bad. Not much atmosphere to speak of in the Hydra either, so we're left with the beach camp and that's about it.
I know I was supposed to be emotionally affected when Kate shouted "Yes, I love him!" to stop Sawyer's beating. The problem is I was overwhelmed with a desire to see Pickett and his thugs get destroyed. I'd just have to be patient.
I won't say the episode's greater than the sum of its parts but I do think it's got an interesting theme running throughout. Kate said to Sawyer at one point, "Live together, die alone" as a contrast to his philosophy of "every man for himself." All of this ties in nicely with Ben's "Of Mice and Men" quote, a line which clearly describes the implications of loneliness.
