This is the type of Lost episode that has the globe-spanning ?ber-fan circle-jerk taking it up a notch. The mother of all Others, Richard, finally got the episode detailing his past, as Lost goes all Count of Monte Cristo.
One of Lost?s most outstanding abilities is how it can simultaneously provide a wealth of information in an episode without actually giving away anything. It's a contradiction, we know, but most of what was revealed in the current episode has been hinted at so much, it was pretty much already established.
Anyway, the episode started with Jack?s camp sitting around the campfire, singing Kumbaya and talking about their favourite Dharma Station. It wasn?t long before Richard ? or Ricardo, as we later find out ? gathers them all round for a good ol? tale, the likes of which has never been told – just been speculated to death by the over-zealous fan community.
Flashback into his past and we find out that, after some accidental murder and the loss of his wife, Ricky was a slave on the Black Rock (something we were led to believe a few episodes back). Someone was clearly pissed at the wheel and the ship went straight into the statue on the Island, breaking the darn thing and marooning the boat in the middle of the Island.
Things start to get a bit complicated from here. Ricky the slave was starving, marooned and couldn't quite reach water. He couldn't even reach the cutting device to get out of his chains, when he clearly could have just used his feet. Honestly, slaves ? you get what you pay for.
It wasn?t long before Smokey turned up in his ?end of season five? form (played by the awesomely named Titus Welliver), promising to reunite him with his extinct wife, just as long as he killed Jacob. If you're thinking that this scene had a striking resemblance to the conversation between Sayid and Dogan a few episodes back, then you're not wrong ? it even involved the same dagger. Interesting, as Smokey and Dogan are on different sides. And by interesting we mean it'll never amount to anything.
So the coolest Spaniard this side of Ricky Martin went over with his first class delivery of death to Jacob, except he was a bit bitter about the new sunroof that Rick?s boat had given his house. A baptism and some heavy petting later, Richard was not only working for Jacob but also had the gift of immortality.
In traditional fashion, we were then given the pre-school explanation to the events on the Island. It seems that both Jacob and the Man In Black are so condescending that they can't even explain what is happening without using visual metaphors with whatever happens to be lying around. We don't even know MIB?s name, which has become such a point that it is going to have to be someone significant; otherwise it has been another pointless exercise of Lost?s diversion techniques.
So Jacob, now knocking back the booze, explains that the Island is used to contain evil ? like a cork in a wine bottle – and if he was to be killed, then all hell would break loose ? literally. It seems MIB is the devil, Jacob is stopping him getting out and, by the end of the episodes, Hurley was so enamoured by Richard’s story that he was seemingly one step away from getting off with him. Poor fat guy, he's been on the Island for so long that he must be gagging for a shag.
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Tom J says
So the island is a hell-plug. Damn, I so saw that coming. Way back in season one I remember thinking “this is pretty weird but it does actually make perfect sense if the island turns out to be a big hell-plug”. Yeah, the old hell-plug play. So obvious.
stella says
It’s the other way round. The real hell is outside the island, although wherever people go they create hell. Jacob is as manipulative as Lucifer, that’s why he is usually in white.
gunter chang says
as it turned out, it was just a bottle of water.