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"Pilot, Part 2" is the second of the two-part pilot episode of Lost. It was originally broadcast on September 29, 2004, one week after "Pilot, Part 1". The two parts re-aired together on October 2, 2004. A group of survivors attempt to broadcast a distress signal for help, while Jack tries to save a man who has been impaled by a piece of shrapnel from the plane. Flashbacks show the events just prior to the crash from the points of view of Kate and Charlie.

Synopsis[]

Previously on Lost[]

  • Oceanic Flight 815 crashes on an island in the South Pacific. Jack, a doctor, runs among the post-crash chaos on the beach, helping a handful of survivors, including a pregnant woman. He asks Kate to stitch his wound as it is out of his reach and she reluctantly agrees, remarking that he "doesn't seem afraid at all." ("Pilot, Part 1")
  • 48 survivors make camp on the beach. Shannon expresses hope that they will be rescued; Sayid, however, believes rescue should have already come. ("Pilot, Part 1")
  • Hope turns to fear when the camp is interrupted by loud and terrifying noises from the jungle, accompanied by the crashing of trees. ("Pilot, Part 1")
  • Jack, Kate, and Charlie venture out into the jungle in search of the cockpit and its transceiver. There, they find the pilot, who reveals they were 1000 miles off course at the time of the crash, marring hopes of rescue. Charlie acts strange when Kate finds him in the bathroom. ("Pilot, Part 1")
  • The still-unseen monster rips the pilot from the cockpit and leaves his mangled remains suspended in the treetops. ("Pilot, Part 1")

Flashbacks[]

Charlie[]

1x02 Charlie Plane

Charlie notices Cindy and her fellow co-workers approaching him.

Charlie sits in his seat on Oceanic Flight 815, grimacing, sweating, and impatiently tapping his ring on his armrest. Cindy Chandler, a flight attendant, approaches him warily, asking him if he is okay. Trying to act calm, he politely tells her he's fine but becomes brusque when she presses him. She goes to the back of the plane and whispers to the other attendants about his behavior. Charlie becomes paranoid, glancing back repeatedly until he sees several flight attendants walking toward him. He flees his seat and rushes to the restroom, brushing past Jack and Rose and stepping over Boone and Shannon. The flight attendants pursue, but the captain turns on the "fasten seatbelts" sign, so Cindy stops her pursuit and alerts the passengers to fasten their seatbelts.

1x02 Mirrored high

Charlie gets high in the bathroom of the plane.

Charlie finds a vacant restroom after several unsuccessful attempts. Once inside, he locks the door and removes his shoe, from which he takes a small bag of heroin. As soon as he ingests the heroin, a flight attendant knocks on the door and demands he come out. Charlie attempts to stall the attendant and drops his bag of heroin into the toilet. As his finger rests on the handle, about to flush the toilet, the plane experiences severe turbulence, slamming him into the ceiling of the bathroom. After escaping the bathroom, he is nearly hit by a refreshment cart. Frightened, he rushes to a seat several rows back and straps himself in as the plane crashes.

Kate[]

1x02 KateInCustody

Mars taunts Kate about her captivity.

On Oceanic Flight 815, Kate sits next to Edward Mars. A flight attendant offers her more juice, but she declines while Mars asks the attendant for a black coffee. After the attendant leaves, Mars begins taunting Kate, sarcastically telling her to remain optimistic that someone might "believe her story." Kate sips on her juice, and it is revealed that she is wearing handcuffs.

The plane begins experiencing some slight turbulence, and Kate tells Mars that she has one favor to ask of him. Mars is interested to hear what her favor is, but before she can elaborate, the plane's turbulence worsens, causing several people to be flung into the plane's ceiling. Luggage falls and strikes Mars in the head, and he begins bleeding profusely and falls unconscious. Oxygen masks fall, and Kate attempts to grab hers, but she cannot reach it because of her handcuffs. She then reaches into Mars' pocket for the key to her handcuffs. She unlocks the handcuffs, straps a mask on herself, and after some deliberation straps a mask on Mars as well. She then sits back in panic as the plane's tail is ripped from the rest of the plane.

1x02 jack kate charlie

Jack, Kate, and Charlie trek back to the beach.

On the Island[]

Day 2 After the journey to the cockpit, Jack, Kate, and Charlie trek back across the Island to the beach. Jack is trying the transceiver while Charlie pesters him about whether it works. Kate asks Charlie what he was doing in the restroom of the plane while she and Jack found the pilot. Charlie replies that he was puking from the sight of the corpses, his "one tangible contribution to the trek." Charlie says that he is a coward, something that Kate reassures him he is not. Charlie's dark expression, however, indicates that he believes otherwise.

1x02-BooneAndShannon

Shannon refuses to help the other survivors.

At the beach, Shannon sunbathes in her newly found bikini. Boone approaches, asking if Shannon wants to help the other survivors sort through the clothes. Shannon, confident that rescue will arrive soon, refuses to help. Boone walks away angrily. Claire, sitting a few feet away from Shannon, asks her if Boone is Shannon's boyfriend. Shannon tells Claire that he is her brother and refers to him sarcastically as "God's friggin' gift to humanity." Looking at Shannon's trim body, Claire says that she used to have a stomach, until her pregnancy, and reveals that she doesn't know the gender of her baby. She adds that she hasn't felt the baby move since the day of the crash.

JinSunButton1x02

Sun buttons the top button of her cardigan.

At the seashore, Sun silently watches Jin as he picks up shellfish from between some rocks. Their silent moment is soon interrupted by Michael, who is searching for his son, Walt. Sun speaks in Korean to Michael, presumably telling him that she and Jin do not speak English. Jin starts shouting at Sun, telling her to button her cardigan. She does so, and Michael apologizes for interrupting and continues searching for Walt.

Meanwhile, Walt, holding Vincent's leash, is calling for his dog quietly. He notices something on the ground and reaches down to pick it up; it is a pair of handcuffs.

Michael suddenly appears, berating Walt for wandering from the beach, though Walt thought that the small grove was close enough to the beach. Michael asserts his authority over Walt before noticing the pair of handcuffs in Walt's hand. Walt tells the anxious Michael that he found the handcuffs on the ground nearby. Michael, visibly nervous, leads Walt back to the beach while glancing around fearfully.

1x02 MichaelIsAToughDad

Michael scolds Walt for wandering off into the jungle.

A short while later, Sayid and Sawyer are brawling on the beach. Jack, arriving back from the jungle, rushes to separate the two, as does Michael. Sawyer, who had been informed by Michael about the handcuffs, immediately suspected that Sayid, a Middle Easterner, was responsible for crashing the plane. Sayid is livid at Sawyer's prejudice. Sawyer mentions that the guy sitting next to Sayid did not survive the crash, and also that Sayid was pulled out of line shortly before the plane was boarded. The fight is finally stopped by Kate, who changes the subject and asks if anyone can help repair the broken transceiver.

1x02 MakingFriends

Sayid and Hurley introduce themselves.

Sayid volunteers to help, much to Sawyer's chagrin. Hurley tells Sawyer to calm down, and Sawyer responds by calling him "Lardo." Jack tells Sawyer to take a break and Sawyer says "Whatever you say, Doc, you're the hero." Boone asks Jack if there were any survivors at the cockpit, and Jack, lying, says that there weren't.

A little after the confrontation, Hurley visits Sayid as he works to fix the transceiver. The two discuss Sawyer's intolerance, and Sayid simply states that "some people have problems." They trade names with a handshake. When asked by Hurley how he became so skilled at repairing things, Sayid replied that he was a military communications officer in the Gulf War. Hurley wrongly assumes that Sayid fought for the Americans, and Sayid quietly corrects him and tells him that he was part of the Republican Guard.

1x02 sun

Sun finds Kate bathing by the shore, and looks at her enviously.

Further down the shore, Kate is bathing in the sea when she notices Sun behind her, in awe of Kate's ability to show her skin. Sun speaks in Korean and points up the beach. Kate nods and with a half smile, Sun leaves. Kate has changed her clothes and approaches Sayid to check on the progress of the transceiver's repair. It seems fixed, but there is no reception, meaning it can't broadcast a message for rescue. Sayid explains that by heading up the mountains to higher ground, they might be able to acquire a signal. Kate visits Jack, who is struggling to save the life of Edward Mars from his shrapnel injuries. She tells him that she is going on a hike with Sayid, despite the fact that they both are aware of what lay waiting in the jungle. Kate is adamant, though, since the batteries on the transceiver won't last very long.

1x02 ComicBookReading

Michael attempts to raise Walt's spirits.

By the shore, Jin prepares the raw shellfish for the survivors, though not for his own wife. As he leaves her, Sun defiantly opens the top button on her blouse. Jin gives out the food, though Hurley laughingly declines. Further up the beach, Michael talks to Walt while he flips through a Spanish comic book. Michael's parenting skills are lacking, as he tactlessly says he'll buy Walt a new dog when they get home.

Charlie finds a private space and gets his heroin stash ready for a taste. The rest of the survivors are busy with different tasks. Jack enlists Hurley to search for antibiotics, and Boone sits with a crying Shannon after she sees the dead body of the crewman who refused to put her into first class, an action that saved her life. Boone gives her little sympathy, saying she has been useless, sitting around staring at the dead bodies.

1x02 sawyer

Sawyer reads his letter.

After an argument, she defiantly proclaims that she is going on the hike with Kate and Sayid. Charlie also signs up upon hearing that Shannon is going, as does Boone, grudgingly. Further away, Sawyer reads a letter that's been tucked away in his pocket that seems to trouble him for a moment. He notices Kate and the team heading out in the distance and joins them on their difficult trek up the mountain. They scale the mountain.

Down at the camp, Michael talks to Jack about Walt's missing dog, and Jack tells him that he saw a yellow Labrador in the jungle after the crash. Elsewhere, Walt approaches Locke, who tells him about backgammon, explaining that the game is over 5,000 years old, referring to it as a Mesopotamian Royal Game of Ur. Walt explains that he never actually knew Michael and is only in his care because his mom got sick and died just a couple of weeks earlier. Locke then ominously asks if Walt wants to know a secret.

1x02 LockeTeachingAGame

Walt joins Locke, who plays backgammon by himself.

Jin continues to offer his fish samples to the survivors, this time to Claire, who says no at first but then reluctantly accepts. Immediately after eating the food, Claire jumps up in emotion, having felt her baby finally kick. She comments that "he kicked," and in analyzing her own words she says she believes that the baby is a boy.

1x02-DeadPolarbear

The group stand over a dead polar bear.

Kate's team argues about the right time to check the radio and risk completely wasting the battery. A roaring in the distance interrupts them. Kate realizes that it might be the same thing that killed the pilot. As the creature approaches, everyone runs, but Sawyer stands firm. In the last few moments, he pulls out a gun and fires almost a full clip of bullets. The group returns to discover that Sawyer has killed a polar bear. Kate questions where Sawyer got the gun, and he reveals that a US Marshal was on the plane, and he took the marshal's badge as well as his gun. Sayid then suggests that Sawyer was the prisoner all along. Kate manages to take the gun while Sawyer's back is turned. She asks how to use it, causing Sawyer to grin. Sayid instructs her on how to disassemble it. She then gives one part to each man, though Sawyer whispers to her that he "knows her type" as she passes him the ammunition.

On the beach, Hurley helps Jack tend to Mars, having found antibiotics from the plane. As Jack removes some shrapnel, Hurley faints at the sight of the blood. Then, as Jack stitches the wound, the pain causes Mars to regain consciousness. He grabs Jack's shirt, angrily asking, "Where is she?"

As Kate and the group head out, Sayid tries the radio and hears a conflicting transmission, meaning that there is another signal already broadcasting from nearby. He manages to tap into a French transmission, and Shannon, the only French speaker in the group, attempts to translate. She hears a distress message from a woman saying, "It killed them, it killed them all." Sayid also calculates, from the counter on the message loop, that the message has been playing for approximately 16 years. The group realizes that if the message is still playing, the call for help was probably never answered.

Distress signal

Shannon attempts to translate the French signal.

The situation is summed up by Charlie, who asks with a worried stare, "Guys...where are we?"

Trivia[]

Charlie'sShoeSize8

Charlie's size eight shoe.

  • This episode's "Previously on Lost" was not built into the episode.[1]
  • Throughout "Pilot, Part 1" and "Pilot, Part 2", it is only shown what Jack, Charlie, Kate, Rose, Locke, Boone, Shannon, and Edward Mars were doing on the plane.
  • If Sayid's estimation of the French transmission being on a loop for sixteen years and five months is correct, then the recording was most likely made in April 1988.
  • J.J. Abrams won an Emmy for the directing of this episode.
  • Abrams, Damon Lindelof, and Jeffrey Lieber received an Emmy nomination for the writing of the episode.
  • Sawyer can be heard using a non-Southern accent in some scenes. Josh Holloway masked his southern accent while filming the pilot. It wasn't until J.J. Abrams explained a couple of weeks into shooting he was hired for his southern accent that he stopped. Some of these scenes have been left in the episode. (Welcome to Oahu)
  • When Sayid and Sawyer are fighting, Sayid says "Ibn Al-Kalb" to him. This is Arabic for "son of a dog." Sawyer's favorite expletive is "son of a bitch", which is a female dog.
  • Charlie's shoe, a Vans classic checkerboard slip-on, is size eight and is made in China.
  • Bolivian television channel PAT was the victim of a hoax when shots from this episode, specifically Kate's flashback of the crash, were broadcast as "the final moments of Air France Flight 447", which crashed in 2009 over the Atlantic. [2]
  • This episode is rated TV-14-LV.

Production notes[]

BearLaunchFreeze

The fake stuffed polar bear originally used for visual effects in the pilot test screening looked ridiculous when freeze-framed.

  • The scene where Sawyer shoots a polar bear became very problematic. The original test screening preview of the episode showed a stuffed bear that looked unrealistic when frozen in screen capture (image at right); this was later replaced with a much more realistic CGI animation. (Welcome to Oahu)
  • The French transmission was dubbed in German for the French version of the series.
  • This episode was originally supposed to open with the scene involving Shannon and Claire on the beach. The producers changed this, feeling it should open with the jungle story where the first part of the pilot ended. (Lost: The Complete First Season (DVD))
  • An audio commentary by J.J. Abrams, Damon Lindelof and Bryan Burk is available for this episode on the Season 1 DVD.
  • Filming for this episode was wrapped on April 24, 2004, which was also Damon Lindelof's birthday. Six years later to the day, the series finale finished shooting. [3]


Cut material[]

Deleted scenes[]

  • During Michael and Walt's scenes, Michael would have jokingly spoken in Spanish and asked Walt about school.[4]
  • Michael would have later found Vincent and returned him to Walt within the episode itself. In the same scene, Ed Mars would have told Jack about Kate's secret with his dying breath.[5]

Bloopers and continuity errors[]

Blooper hands

Sayid's overgrown fingernails.

  • During the plane flashbacks, the audio of the voice of Cindy through the speakers say different words. In Jack's flashback, Cindy says, "Ladies and gentlemen, the Pilot has switched on the fasten seatbelt signs." In Charlie's flashback, Cindy says, "Ladies and gentlemen, the Captain has turned on the fasten seatbelt signs." In Kate's flashback, Cindy says, "Ladies and gentlemen, the Captain has switched on the fasten seatbelt signs."
  • When Cindy discusses the issue of Charlie with her co-workers, they are seen standing at the back of the plane, and the seating number on the luggage rack for the last row next to her is shown to be "22 HIJ". However, it should be "42 ABC" instead, as that side is for seats ABC, and the last row of the plane is row 42. On the other hand, row 22 is impossible to be the last row, since Jack is sitting in row 23, which is in the middle section.
  • When Charlie realizes Cindy is discussing him with her co-workers, a woman sitting in the first row of the tail section is seen wearing a bracelet on her wrist, but seconds later when Charlie gets up from his seat, her bracelet is no where to be seen.
    • The same woman is seen sitting in front of Rose at seat 22D in "Pilot, Part 1", while in this episode seat 22D is empty when Charlie walks past it.
  • Between Jack and Charlie's flashbacks, the order of Rose's "Guess he really had to go" line and Cindy's "Excuse me" doesn't match up.
  • Both Sawyer's hair and Sayid's facial hair are noticeably longer in the final scene of the episode than it had been in previous scenes despite only being set a few hours apart.
  • When Sayid shows Kate the receiver, the shot of his hand is shown to have overgrown fingernails. In the next shot, his nails are trimmed and cut. The person holding the receiver in the second shot was not Naveen, who kept his nails long at the time to play guitar.
  • During the argument after the fight with Sayid, Sawyer's shirt sleeves change from rolled up to unrolled between shots.

Music[]

Main article: Musical score
Main article: Musical themes

The most notable new theme from this episode is the march-like second traveling theme that appears on the soundtrack as "Hollywood and Vines". Though this doesn't show up again for a while, composer Michael Giacchino later uses it extensively, particularly in season finales.

A theme that plays briefly later reappears to characterize Nikki and Paulo as the track "Sweet Exposé". The episode also introduces an action motif and a motif that later appears in the season 3 track "Fool Me Twice".

Analysis[]

Recurring themes[]



Cultural references[]


Literary techniques[]


Storyline analysis[]

  • Sawyer and Sayid fight because Sawyer suspects Sayid of having crashed the plane. Later, they argue about checking the reception of the transceiver, and Sayid accuses Sawyer of being the prisoner on the plane. (Rivalries)
  • Shannon and Boone have an argument. (Rivalries)
  • Sawyer backs off his name-calling and acquiesces to Jack, calling him the "hero." (Leadership)
  • Kate, Sawyer, Sayid, Charlie, Shannon and Boone try to acquire a signal and send a transmission to the outside world. (A-missions)
  • Kate is shown to have been the one in the handcuffs. (Crimes)


Episode connections[]

Episode references[]

Episode allusions[]

  • It is revealed Kate was rubbing her wrists when she was first seen by Jack because she was wearing handcuffs on the plane. ("Pilot, Part 1")

External links[]

References[]

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