Recruiting Jack

I was most amused by The New Recruit because it further reminds me of something quite standard during the show’s long running tenure: rotating sides. Jack switches sides so many times I had whiplash during the episode. Kidding, but Kate is notorious for switching from one side to another with every whim. Cuse and Lindelof were the architects of this vast expanse, equipped with countless talents (behind and in front of the camera) to make the six seasons of Lost quite incredible, but they had their creative habits, one of which was characters going from one side to another depending upon whatever circumstances or developments on the island (or off, even) caused a split into factions of differing opinions or divisive reactions. Jack is at this crossroads on the island where Sawyer is dead set on getting off, working a con to steal a boat in The Man in Black’s possession so he can later take the submarine home. Jack is indecisive, no longer as comfortable being a leader and yet his restless unease at where the future lies for him places him in this cuckolded position, unable to truly uncover what it is meant for him. Sawyer has his con, needing Jack to get Hurley, Sun, and Lapidus (Claire following from a slight distance) to his position when possible while he and Kate eventually take the boat for all of them to escape to Hydra Island. Widmore has his people pull guns on them, though, dropping explosives on The Man in Black’s fixed position. So Jack is nearly blown to smithereens but MiB carries him off, on his shoulders, into the jungle, away from the falling doom. MiB is all smiles, too, totally sure that Jack is on his side. Well, Jack does leap from the boat into the water, communicating to a disgruntled Sawyer (“Get off my boat.”) that he’s sorry about Juliet but feels the island “needs them”, so when he washes ashore upon the beachfront MiB considers this is act of loyalty to him! I chuckled when MiB, in the form of an annoyed Locke looking down at Jack (who is on his knees and huffing/puffing from the swim back, planted deep in the wet sand), says, “Sawyer took my boat, didn’t he?” Sawyer’s resentment and dark stare at Jack speaks volumes about where they are at this point towards the end of the series. The way Sawyer orders him around and talks down to him, talks short to him on the boat and when giving him details about corralling their folks together for the boat trip to Hydra Island. That deteriorated relationship, souring especially with Juliet’s demise, meets its apex here, it appears. Jack found his turning point, not leaving the island, while Sawyer was done with him and the island…so the split, of course. Jack goes back to the island while Sawyer takes the boat on to Hydra Island. And on and on the carousel goes…

Claire chooses Team Sawyer reluctantly