Episode #1 (S1E01): Pilot Part 1

What a great start to the series. Pilot Part 1 blew away all expectations I had for Lost. The episode did an excellent job of building suspense and establishing many main characters while beginning to create the mystery of the island.

With fast-paced action and explosions, the opening scene feels like a high-budget action film. Due largely to high production value, the atmosphere on the beach feels realistic. In addition to providing great suspense, the scene also succeeds in establishing Jack as a strong character capable of helping his fellow survivors as he rushes from person to person on the beach.

After the frantic scene on the beach, the pace of the show settles down and a number of characters are introduced in only a few minutes. With just a few images, the audience is able to grasp a basic idea of the personality of each character and their potential role in the show. This is critical, as a number of these important characters have little screen time in this part of the pilot.

Sawyer is only present briefly in this episode, but it is clear he is a loner from the images in this scene.

Locke is immediately shown to be separate from the rest of the survivors. Among all the turmoil on the beach, Locke is shown quietly looking out on the ocean.

After getting directions from Jack to take care of the pregnant Claire during the frantic beach scene, Hurley is shown gathering food from the plane wreckage for dinner. Immediately, Hurley is established as a good caretaker and a loyal follower to Jack.

The show also establishes Sayid as a strong leader. Immediately, he is focused on mobilizing the survivors and organizing on the beach.

After these brief introductions, the episode slows and the focus of the show turns to establishing the mystery of the island.

Jack, Kate, and Charlie go on an expedition to find the cockpit and the transceiver. After finding the cockpit, they discover that one of the pilots has survived. He informs the group that the plane radio went out midway through the trip. The plane went far off course before crashing on the island. Rescue is not imminent, as the rescue mission would be looking in the wrong part of the ocean.

Suddenly, the group hears sounds from a mysterious creature again, after hearing them the previous night on the beach. The pilot is ripped from the cockpit. Jack, Kate, and Charlie run from the creature. The group gets separated when Charlie stumbles in some brush, but eventually the creature disappears and the group reunites. Above them, the pilot is dead and left up in the trees.

Even after just 40 minutes, a number of mysteries about the island. While we know little about the island and the creature, we do get some insight into a number of the characters on the island.

Jack is the main focus of the pilot. By the end of the episode, it is clear that Jack's main purpose is to help the other survivors. Much of the conflict in the first scene comes from the fact that Jack can't seem to act fast enough to save everybody. He helps a man from underneath a piece of wreckage, assigns Hurley to help Claire get to safety, and revives Rose before saving Hurley and Claire from a falling plane wing, all in the span of just a few minutes. Jack seems to save everyone except this guy:

Later, during the first flashback to the crash, Jack instantly comforts Rose when her husband is in the bathroom. When the group is running away from the creature, Jack goes back to help Charlie when he gets caught in the brush. This episode clearly establishes Jack as a strong caretaker and as a potential leader on the island.

As mentioned above, Locke is clearly shown as separate from the group. He is shown a number of times in the episode sitting by himself on the beach. Locke only makes one attempt to communicate with the other survivors, and it was an epic fail:

At the time, Kate was taking shoes off a dead man and appeared to be unamused and creeped out from Locke's apparent joke.

When it starts to rain, everyone but Locke scrambles to find cover, either under plane wreckage or in the forest. But Locke embraces the rain, imitating Andy Dufresne in the Shawshank Redemption:

In this moment, Locke seems to be more contemplative than the other survivors. While others seem to be wrapped up in early life on the island, Locke seems to appreciate the miracle of surviving the plane crash. By embracing the rain, he seems to be giving thanks for the second chance at life the survivors have been given.

Charlie is also a prominent figure in this episode, but it is tough to know what to make of him. There is clearly something skittish about Charlie. On the plane, he mysteriously goes in the bathroom of the plane and doesn't answer Kate when she asks what he was doing. At the end of the episode, he gets separated from Jack and doesn't have a clear explanation as to what happened.

Charlie also provided a not so subtle reminder of one of the show's main themes: fate. As I wrote in the intro, I find the idea of fate very interesting. It is exciting to see that it will be a prevalent theme on the show from the very start.

Before I began watching the episode, I wasn't sure how I would respond to the show. I thought that there was a chance I would be bored by the show and would fail to make it through 120 episodes. Those doubts are much weaker now. After watching the first 40 minutes of the show, I am very enthusiastic about continuing to watch.