But it really is a Sawyer episode, and it opens up in a most heartbreaking fashion: we watch the young Sawyer hide under his bed while his father shoots his mother and then turns the gun on himself as he sits on the bed above the boy. It's quite tragic, but it provides us a narrow window into James Ford's psyche.
On the island Sawyer is reliving this memory as a nightmare, and when he wakes up in his tent on the beach, he's surprised to find someone (something, rather) rustling around at the opposite end of his tent. It turns out to be a boar, and it makes off into the jungle with some of Sawyer's things. He gives chase and ends up in the jungle, surrounded by ominous whispers. It's those damned whispers again! I have trouble understanding exactly what they say, but the entry for this episode on Lostpedia asserts they're saying, "it'll come back around." I suppose that makes sense seeing as how Duckett (the man Sawyer shot in Australia) says it as he's dying.
So Sawyer spends most of episode tracking the boar that did him wrong. It attacks him on two more occasions. The first time it chases him, and the second time it ransacks more of his stuff. All of this leaves our tough guy thoroughly pissed. Kate's also trying to help him, but doing it for reasons of her own. Earlier, Jack told Kate that Sawyer still had a gun, which he claimed he was okay with. But Kate is confident that she can get it back from Sawyer. She subsequently offers her tracking skills to help him find the boar in return for "carte blanche," which she'll obviously use to get the pistol back. It's all quite complicated and yet another time in the series where this lust triangle creates all sorts of problems. As I've said before, I couldn't care less about their three-way melodrama. Just give me the science-fiction, thank you very much.
Somewhat related to the lust triangle is the game of "I Never" played between Sawyer and Kate. I'd be remiss if I didn't at least mention that they played it. It provided them the opportunity to trade barbs with each other, and at the end of it all you can tell that there are some bruised egos and hurt feelings. The scene actually takes quite a chunk out of the episode, which I didn't recall it doing. Oh, well. Outlawzzz bein' outlawzzz, I guess!
All right. The majority of what I like to think of as the episode's "filler" has been covered. What's really cool about this episode is the flashbacks. We've already mentioned the scene that changed young little Sawyer permanently. What of the others? The past few chapters have concentrated on character development, and there's nothing wrong with that. But in "Outlaws" we're witness to the chance meeting that Sawyer and Christian Shephard had in a bar down under. The two knock back liquor like it's water and Sawyer gets to learn a little bit about the good doctor before he even meets him. It's a great instance of the interconnectivity between the survivors of Flight 815. It's great because it's one of the first times we see how these strangers are inexorably tied together. And, judging from the fifth season finale that showed Jacob selecting these people off of the island, we certainly must ponder why destiny brought these disparate personalities together (do I sound like Locke here?).
We can also further observe how Sawyer wrestles with his demons via the other major flashback. We learn that Sawyer was in Australia because he had information about the man who had ruined his parents' lives. The guy now runs a shrimp stand in the Outback, and Sawyer pays him two visits. The first one allows Sawyer to meet the man he's been hunting all of his life face-to-face. The two engage in some strained yet mundane conversation, and then Sawyer vanishes. The next time he comes, he puts a bullet in the man (lo and behold, two consecutive episodes with shootings!). Of course, we don't learn until the third season that Sawyer has killed an innocent man. Well, he may not have been innocent, but he wasn't the "Sawyer" that James was actually seeking. That S.O.B. actually fathered another one of the 815 survivors (the interconnectivity again!), and the two become a strange pair of allies as they team up to kill him. If you don't know of whom I speak, then I'll just let you remain in the dark for now. But seasoned Lost fans should remember this.
And so, those are the main highlights of this excellent episode. One of my favorite parts of the flashbacks is having my opinions of the characters altered, and I feel that takes place for me here with Sawyer. Sawyer's a changed man after he kills that man in Australia. After that, brother can't even shoot a boar that wronged him.
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