Episode Report Card LTG: A- | 10 USERS: A YOU GRADE IT Can't Keep A Dead Hobbit Down
By LTG | Season 4 | Episode 1 | Aired on 2008.01.31
Previously on Lost, Charlie died after warning Desmond that the boat approaching the island was not Penny's boat, Jack led Naomi and a group of Lostaways (including prisoner Ben) to the transmitter so they could get a signal through to that boat, and Sayid led a successful defense against an attack by the Others. Oh, and Locke went even more batshit crazy, throwing a knife into Naomi's back before she could signal the boat, but then he didn't have the stones to shoot Jack when he signaled the boat. And the flashback was actually a flash-forward, showing us a time after at least Jack and Kate have returned to L.A.
We open on a beautiful pile of papayas, beyond which we can see a cloud-flecked sky and a beautiful blue ocean. We hear gulls, and I suddenly develop an incredible craving for a Corona. And then the papayas explode, as a vintage sportscar plows through them. It turns out they were piled on a box in a parking lot, and the ocean and sky we saw were actually painted onto the side of a produce delivery truck. Needless to say, a bunch of cops are chasing down the sportscar -- Californians take their organic produce very seriously.
As the chase continues, a clean-shaven Jack watches it on his television and mixes himself a screwdriver. Jack hears the newscaster describe the sportscar as a vintage, early '70s Camaro, and he mutters, "Damn it."
Back on the streets of L.A., the police finally force the Camaro off the road, and it crashes into a car parked in a lot. The police surround the car with guns drawn, and Hurley slowly emerges from the driver's seat. They shoot it so it's supposed to be a mystery as to who was driving, but the fat hands that emerge from the window give a pretty strong clue as to who we're looking at. Hurley looks at the cops in a daze, and then makes a run for it. This chase does not last nearly as long as the car chase. As Hurley is led away in cuffs, he starts yelling, "Don't you know who I am? I'm one of the Oceanic Six!" Credits.
Hurley's in an interrogation room, where a hard-boiled cop is giving the exposition on how the police chase started. Except this exposition comes with visuals, as we see a convenience store videotape of Hurley purchasing some snacks, only to see something and freak out, running away and (presumably) taking off at high speed in his Camaro. The cop tells Hurley that he doesn't care that he's a celebrity, and then tells us that, by shocking coincidence, his former partner Ana-Lucia was a passenger on Hurley's plane. Sometimes I think that this entire show is just an extended remix of The Bald Soprano, and at the end we're going to discover that Jack and Kate were married all along. Hurley denies having ever known Ana-Lucia.