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Note: If you haven’t seen tonight’s episode of Lost, this is obviously going to be filled with spoilers. You’ve been warned.

Intro: Tonight’s episode of Lost, “He’s Our You,” was the first specifically Sayid-centric episode since Season 4’s “The Economist.” Since the Losties have ended up back on the island, there have been many unanswered questions. For Sayid in particular, viewers were left wondering after “316” as to how Sayid ended up on the same flight. Granted, it appeared that he was the captive, much like Kate was on Oceanic Flight 815, of some sort of officer, as he had restraints on his hands. It was also unclear what transpired between his becoming captive and him leaving the rest of the Oceanic Six on the episode “This Place is Death” which aired a few weeks ago. “He’s Our You” answered a few of these questions, and gave us as viewers a more insightful look into how Sayid became the person that he is.

Recap:  The episode began with a flashback into Sayid’s childhood in Tikrit, Iraq. A young boy is shown near a chicken coop, and his father is demanding that he kill one, or he will not be allowed to come inside. The boy shows heavy amounts of trepidation, but another child comes up to him with seed in his hand. The second boy enters the pen and kills the chicken by breaking its neck. He then hands the chicken over to the first boy. The father comes back outside and congratulates his son for killing the chicken. His son denies having done so, and tells his father the other boy has killed the chicken. The father remarks that at least one of them will grow up to be a man, and congratulates a young Sayid (the other boy). 

The episode then flashes forward to the “present” AKA 1977. Sayid is still in his jail cell. Young Ben talks to Phil about how he is bringing Sayid a sandwich. He brings Sayid a chicken salad sandwich and a book, then questions Sayid as to whether Richard sent him. He tells Sayid the camera only offers visual feed, and that nothing they say can be heard. Ben tells Sayid about his wish to join the Hostiles and how Richard told him to be patient. He also intimates that he could help Sayid get away.

There is then a second flashback, this time to Moscow, Russia. A man runs into a building and locks the door. He then is seen accessing a safe while somebody breaks into the apartment. The man that breaks in ends up being Sayid. The man tries to bribe Sayid with money, but Sayid kills him. Sayid then meets up with Ben and asks “What’s next?” Ben informs Sayid that this is the last of Charles Widmore’s associates that Sayid had to kill, and that Sayid was now a free man.

The episode then flashes back to Sayid in his jail cell. Sayid is then questioned by Horace and Radzinsky. It is clear that Radzinsky is slightly unstable and wishes to execute Sayid, whereas Horace is willing to give him the chance to explain himself. Sayid, however, remains silent. The action then cuts to Sawyer and Juliet’s house, with Juliet staring out of a window, causing a pan of bacon to burn. Sawyer points this out and walks over to Juliet and looks out the window, and sees Kate walking outside. Juliet asks if everything they have is over. Sawyer disagrees as Horace comes in and tells Sawyer about the problem with Sayid. Sawyer says that he will talk to Sayid alone. He sends Phil, the Dharma worker that is monitoring the cameras away, and goes to the cell. Sawyer headbutts Sayid so that it looks convicing that Sawyer forced a confession out of Sayid. Sawyer further suggests that Sayid claim that he is defecting from the Hostiles, so that he may live with the rest of the Dharma Initiative and their cover is not blown. Sayid refuses. 

Meanwhile, Jack and Kate are shown in a cafeteria, and Hurley brings some food over to them. Hurley then blatantly says that Sawyer and Juliet are an item, which apparently was unknown to Kate. Jack warns Hurley to stop, so he leaves to prepare more waffles. 

Cut back to Sayid’s cell once more. A man is cleaning the floor and mocks Sayid for getting caught by a group of idiots. Sayid retorts that at least he isn’t the one cleaning up for said idiots. Ben then comes with a sandwich and immediately recoils when he sees the man. It turns out that this is his father, Roger Linus. His father abuses him for bringing food for a Hostile, and slams him against the bars of the cell. 

There is then another flashback to when Sayid is working for Habit for Humanity in the Dominican Republic. Ben shows up and tells Sayid that John Locke is dead, and that he suspects that he has been murdered. He also intimates that the killer might be keeping tabs on Hurley at the mental institution, as there has been a sedan parked outside the building for a week. Ben seems sure that Sayid will go to kill these men, as he thinks Sayid is a born killer.  Sayid claims that Ben is mistaken and that he has never enjoyed killing.Ben apologizes sarcastically and leaves.

In Dharma time, Horace, Radzinsky, Phil, and Sawyer are taking Sayid to a man called Oldham. Sayid whispers to Sawyer who this man is, and Sawyer responds “He’s our you.” They strap Sayid to a tree, and Oldham feeds him something that turns out to be a truth serum. 

The next flashback is from the episode “This Place is Death” where the characters are all gathered at the pier. Sayid leaves and goes to a bar and is drinking MacCutcheon scotch (which you may remember from the season 3 episode “Flashes Before Your Eyes”). A woman comes and flirts with Sayid, and it ends up being Ilana. They go back to a hotel room and are about to get intimate when Ilana kicks Sayid and pulls a gun on him. She tells him that she is a bounty hunter working for the family of one of the men Sayid kills (specifically the one he kills on a golf course in the Season 4 episode “The Economist“) and that she has orders to take him to Guam.

Back on the island, Sayid is now answering the questions the DI members are asking him. He tells them about how he came on Ajira flight 316 and that he had previously been on the island for 100 days after landing on Oceanic Flight 815. He mentions Sawyer but Radzinsky interrupts with questions about the stations. Sayid mentions the various stations and their function, which freaks out Radzinsky, since the Swan hasn’t been created yet. 

Back at the barracks, the Dharma members are in a house deciding what to do with Sayid. Radzinsky wants to execute him, and threatens that he will call Ann Arbor if they don’t agree with him.  Sawyer, of course, is adamantly opposed, and Horace seems inclined to agree with him. However, Amy chimes in that she can’t sleep with one eye opened, and that she agrees with Radzinsky. After this, Horace agrees to put it to a vote, and every member except Sawyer raises his or her hand. Horace tells Sawyer that he wants the vote to be unanimous, and Sawyer reluctantly raises his hand.

Sawyer makes his way to the cell and tells Sayid to hit him and take his keys and escape. Sayid says that he does not want to escape. When he woke up on the island after the Ajira flight, he figured that there was no purpose, however, he now knows what his purpose is. Sawyer goes to Kate’s house to ask why they came back to the island. Kate claims that she can’t speak for the others, but she knows why she came back. Before they can talk further, a flaming van crashes into a building, and the DI and the Oceanic survivors work to put out the fire. The scene cuts to Phil leaving the area where Sayid is held captive, and young Ben is seen going to the cell. He is shown with broken glasses, and Sayid asks him if it was from his father. Sayid then tells Ben that he is there to take him to the Hostiles. 

The final flashback has Sayid at the airport as the captive of Ilana. He sees the various members of the Oceanic Six and asks if they can take another flight. Ilana insists that it is going to be that flight. It then cuts to Sayid’s viewpoint of when Ben makes it onto the plane and they make eye contact. Sayid questions Ilana as to whether she works for Ben, and calls him a genocidal monster who let his own daughter die to save himself. Ilana asks why she would ever work for somebody like that, and Sayid calmly responds “I did.”

In Dharma time, Sayid and Ben are running in the jungle when a van passes by them. Sayid warns Ben to stay down as the van stops and a person gets out of it. It turns out it is Jin. Sayid grabs Jin’s attention and tells him that Sawyer freed him from the prison. Jin seems relieved, and calls Sawyer to confirm. Before he can say anything, Sayid knocks him out and takes Jin’s gun. Ben seems impressed and asked where he learned that. Sayid then tells Ben that he was right about him, that he was a killer. He then shoots Ben, and runs off into the jungle.

Opinion: As Sayid is one of my favorite characters on Lost, I was fairly excited for this episode. The first flashback showed that Sayid had been a killer to some extent at an early age.  It was also somewhat exciting to see his cool, collected manner in which he assassinated the man in Russia. I was surprised that Ilana was, in fact, a bounty hunter as opposed to a cop or some related field. It was a smart way they showed the scene in the airport in “316” as it caused us to assume incorrectly. They definitely caught me on that one.

Obviously the most important part of this episode, however, was the fact that he shoots Ben at the end of the episode. When you’re aware of this fact, and you watch the rest of the episode, perhaps it lends for a different interpretation. When Ben suggests that Sayid is a born killer, is it something he is assuming because Sayid has been killing for him, or rather that Sayid shot him when he was a child? This also creates a somewhat complicated relationship between the two. Sayid went from saving Ben from Rousseau, to torturing him, to killing for him, to trying to kill him. For Ben, Sayid has gone from trying to kill him, to saving him, to torturing him, to killing for him. It is also interesting that Sayid is now the one that is captive whereas Ben is free, which is a heavy contrast from the Henry Gale days. This contrast was also developed through the flashback where Ben tells Sayid he is a free man and to live his life, which is immediately followed by a scene where Sayid is in the jail cell. The irony is sickening. It also makes the previous scenes between the two much more interesting. Does the smirk Ben has on his face after Sayid beats him up in Season 2 due to the fact that Ben already knows so much about Sayid and the fact that their roles will be reversed? Perhaps the title “He’s Our You” refers to how Ben and Sayid are actually somewhat similar in that sense?

The scene where Sayid was put on the truth serum was pretty poor in my opinion. It is just too convenient that they don’t bother asking the questions that might reveal Sawyer’s true identity. Granted, this is necessary for the story to progress, but it is still slightly too convenient to swallow acceptingly.  It was also fairly obvious (at least to me) that Sayid was going to shoot Ben. The episode tried to make it seem as though Sayid was repentent for the people he killed, and that he was willingly going to die to atone, but it did not really trick me. 

Overall, it was an entertaining episode. It was not really one of the top episodes of the series, or season, even, but it did what it was supposed to do: provide more information on Sayid. It also does a good job of setting up future episodes, as clearly something is going to have to be done about Ben (as we can safely assume he does not die…or does he? *dramatic music*) before he dies. It does provide more insight into Sayid as a character as well, emotionally speaking. We see from the bar scene that he is perhaps more human than he appears when he works for Ben. For me, at least, the regret was tangible, and I think Naveen Andrews did a good job conveying those emotions. We also got to see the humorous side of Sayid when he laid that zinger on Ben’s dad. You could tell that there was nothing Roger could have said after that. I’d love to see more quips from Sayid in the future.Some of the aspects of the episode could have been better, as nothing was really too surprising (although I will admit that I’m sure plenty of people were surprised by the ending). That could just be my own fault, however. I’ll try to be less omniscient in the future.

 Rating: “He’s Our You” gets a 7 out of 10.

Until next time.

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