The Tail Section

LOST: Further Instructions - Locke and Load

Lost Recaps — October 19, 2006 at 1:56 pm by docarzt
LOST - Further Instructions

I’ll admit it, I’m biased. I was excited to see LOST return in general, but what I really couldn’t wait for was the first John Locke episode. Like a lot of people, I was a little disappointed with Locke’s character treatment throughout season two; he just wasn’t the same guy. Locke of season one had gone face to face with the monster and walked away with a secret; Locke of season one somehow knew that a conflict was brewing on the island; Locke of season one was imbued with skills that almost seemed to be supernatural in nature; Locke of season one was cool, Locke of season two was, well, a different guy, occasionally approaching that level of cool but often times in an entirely different room. So, as LOST season three paid service to Jack, Kate, Sawyer, Sun, Jin, and Sayid, I waited patiently to learn the answer to one question: Would season one Locke be back? I’m pleased to report, he’s back… and better than ever.

Further Instructions is sort of the final status report on the cliff hangers of the finale, (save for that strange Penny business which folks are saying won’t be revisited until after the break), bringing us up to speed with what happened to Locke, Desmond, Mr. Eko, and Hurley.  In that sense it is a tricky episode from a writing perspective because it needs to service this matters and tell an interesting story in the process.  The continuity of it is a bit odd.  Keeping in mind this episode was switched with episode two at the last minute it is almost a back track.  Only one day has passed since the events of the finale.   This is going to seem a bit disorienting next week when we suddenly jump ahead a couple of days.  I suppose we could just count this as a catch up, but the fact is that in the timeline of the series, Further Instructions actually takes place before last week’s episode, The Glass Ballerina.   All that aside…

LOST - Further Instructions

Locke wakes up in the jungle with the typical close up on an opening eye.  He struggles to sit up,  blood streams from cuts on his head and face.  There is a sound, something moving about.  He scans the foliage and sees… Desmond.  Locke tries to call out to him, but he can’t speak and he is still too physically disoriented to stand.  Curiously, it looks like Desmond is naked.  He struggles to his feet and looks up towards a sound rushing towards him from the canopy above.  Eko’s scripture stick falls  and he snatches is up, considering it for a moment.

A lot of people are picking up on the quote from Genesis 13:14-18 that seems to be crying out to us in this scene: “Lift up your eyes and look north…”  The quote could have significance in where to look for Eko, but it should also be pointed out that this quote is from a passage where God is promising the land to Abraham to populate.  A hint to the larger mystery of LOST?  Redemption.  Daddy issues.  Populating the earth?  Worth noting in this context for future reference.

Locke arrives at the beach focused.  He begins tearing down his lean-to and takes the pieces to the church and begins to build.  Charlie tries to talk to him but finds that Locke is still mute.  Locke manages to relay to Charlie that he needs to talk to the island.  He is building a sweat-lodge and wants Charlie to watch over him.

The flashback is an interesting one.  It takes place after the Cooper incident of “Lockdown”  and catches up with Locke as he drives down a rainy stretch of back road.  He picks up a hitchhiker, wearing a Geronimo Jackson T-Shirt, and invites him to dinner at this hippy/granola commune.  Locke points out the sweat-lodge situated on the commune grounds and talks about how you can meditate there.  He tells the kid you can find out if you are a farmer or a hunter.  He doesn’t answer which he found himself to be.  It’s interesting that again we get a subtle taste of where Locke’s mystical sense may have been founded but there still seems to be a sharp edge between everything we know about Locke’s past and everything we know about John Locke of the island.  It is revealed earlier in this flashback that Locke is transporting a load of guns to the commune when they are pulled over by a cop, but his existence at the commune seems to be more about togetherness and earthy like stuff.  This is no survivalist training camp.  If Locke got his mad skills here, it’s not in the exposition of this script.

LOST - Further Instructions

Locke whips up some of that all-natural hallucinogen that he force fed Boone in season one, goes half lotus, and waits.  Sure enough, it isn’t long before the island starts talking to him, in the guise of Boone himself.  Locke is immediately expressing his grief and guilt to the vision who brushes off his overtures for forgiveness by telling him something more important is at stake.   From here is taken on a tour through a surreal Oceanic terminal.  He is in his wheel chair again, being pushed by Boone, and sees representations of the various characters scattered around the terminal.   Boone rolls him past them telling them they are not his concern, yet, and drops him at the bottom of an escalator.  He pulls himself and finds Eko’s scripture stick coated in blood.  Boone reappears,  this time looking much like the young lad who was crushed under an airplane, and tells Locke that he needs to clean up his mess.  There isn’t much time.  They have him.  The last thing he sees is a polar bear rushing towards him.

Locke emerges from the vision with his voice intact.  He sets out, with Charlie tagging along, to find Mr. Eko.  He picks up Eko’s blood trail and it becomes apparent that a polar bear has Mr. Eko.  Locke urges Charlie to go back to the beach.  When Charlie refuses,  Locke tells him that bad things happen to people who hang around him.


What is great about this, is that what we will learn about John from his flashback, and previous flashbacks, is that this is a false perception of his.   John feels responsible for the bad things that happen to people around him but is blind to the fact that these people are victims of their own choices.  The personality flaw that is revealed here about John is that he craves acceptance and in that end he is naïve in the choices he makes and how they will impact those around him.  He yearns for purpose and equilibrium, but the imbalance comes from those he places trust in to deliver him to that end.  Mike and Jan, seemingly open commune leaders, welcoming, nurturing, peach farmers, are nothing less than surrogate parents for Locke.  But in the end of the flashback, we find out that they, like every other LOST parent, have a dark side which puts Lock unwittingly in peril.  Despite this,  Locke continues to struggle with what he feels are his own failings to these people.

LOST - Further Instructions

Eventually, Locke and Charlie pass the remnants of the hatch which now resembles a ball of tinfoil in a crater.  Shortly after they run into Hurley who tells them about what happened to Kate, Saywer, and Jack.  They split up and Hurley later finds naked Desmond and gives him a t-shirt.


Locke finds the Polar Bear’s den and finds the remnants of some previous island inhabitants.  Toys, skeletons,  some Dharma clothing.  Locke eventually squares off with Mr. Polar Bear with a torch and a can of hair spray and retrieves a badly wounded Mr. Eko from the cave.

Desmond and Hurley have an interesting conversation where Desmond finally answers the conundrum that has haunted many LOST fans over why he never used the fail-safe key before.  He simply was afraid of what might happen.  Desmond also tells Hurley that Locke is going to get Jack, Kate, and Sawyer back just like he said in his speech,  even though this speech has not taken place yet.

The flashback reveals that Locke has no luck with parent figures.   Turns out the nice hippy couple, Mike and Jan, are pot farmers and the hitch-hiker Locke picked up was an undercover cop.  Mike and Jan are pretty cold to Locke all of sudden,  clearly they aren’t the earth-firsters they made themselves out to be.  Locke assures them he will “take care of “ the problem.  He leads Eddie out for a hunt and winds up training a rifle on him.  Eddie tells Locke he won’t shoot.  The police had targeted Locke as an entry into the commune because he was a good man, and easily coerced.   Faced with this existential fact, Locke allows Eddie to run free.


LOST - Further Instructions

The conundrum with this flashback is the theme seems to be about choices and being passive to a bad situation.  So when Locke was faced with the fact that he was “profiled” as being easy to coerce, he makes a choice to let Eddie go.  But parallel to this is Eddie’s proclamation to Locke that John is “good man, a farmer.”  Locke disagrees “I’m a hunter”  Before allowing Eddie to escape.  This could be the time that the choice was made which would define the John Locke we know.  Interesting that both themes, farmer and hunter, are nurturing in different ways.  Farmer nurtures through growth, hunter through killing.  One creates life, both destroy it, all for the same reasons.

Before heading back to the beach, Eko awakens delirious and says that Locke will find Jack, Kate, and Sawyer.  He also says “you are a hunter John.”  Before passing out again.  At the beach, we get our first glimpse at Paulo and Nikki.  Nikki is clearly going to be a vocal influence,  Paulo is just sort of ‘concerned’.  If I can digress for a second,  the buzz on Paulo seems a bit overblown.  I’m a guy, so maybe I just don’t get it, but I didn’t feel the heat.  Maybe when they called this guy a Brazilian Tom Cruise they meant that he jumped on couches and was generally all washed-up.  Don’t get me wrong, the character may indeed be pivotal and well performed,  but I don’t see this guy as a threat to the LOST leading men.  Forgive me my Vanity Fair moment…

LOST - Further Instructions

At the beach,  Locke gives the very speech that Desmond foreshadowed earlier,  revealing that Desmond has come out of the incident with clairvoyance, and so far Hurley is the only one who knows.

Further Instructions is not a significant download in the sense of the over-arching LOST serial, it is, however, a satisfying bit of escapist action adventure that brings John Locke to a mindset somewhere between Locke of season one and Locke of season two.  Here we have a Locke who is ready to make the choose that seemed so tenuously made in his flashback;  Locke is, again, a hunter.

Enjoy this recap? Don’t forget to digg it!

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