Season 6, Episode 6; "Dr. Linus"


This was my favorite episode of the season. Sure, Smokey death runs, slit throats, and axe wounds to the chest are thrilling and all, but in the end I'm a sucker for the slow cook variety of episodes that bring us new revelations about our beloved characters. Add the fact that Ben - the man we love to hate (and sometimes love to love) - was put back to the center of attention after a drought that lasted a little too long and you got yourself a perfect hour of television. There was a good amount of info to process from this particular hour, so let's get right down to it


"He might just as well have been Dead"

As Dr. Linus taught his European History students about the fall of the infamous Napoleon, you couldn't help realize that he was effectively describing his own history on the Island. In the lecture, Ben notes that Napoleon would likely choose death over a powerless life, and it would just so happen that he would have to make the same choice later on in the episode, but more on that later. What the line initially conjures up is a remembrance of Ben's own motivations throughout his life: his unrelenting lust for power.

Ben was never a candidate. I know his name ("Linus") was on the Lighthouse wheel, but I believe that the name represented his father Roger, and that Ben was brought along for the ride. Not only was he not a candidate, but I don't believe that he was ever "supposed" to be the leader of the Others. Instead, he used his keen sense of manipulation to rise through the ranks, as the allure to gain total power was too strong to pass up. Just like his buddy Napoleon, he wanted it all, and he got it.

As we know, little Ben was extremely unhappy with his original situation on the Island, and figured out a way to defect from Dharma and be "saved" by Richard and the Others. Once entrenched as a full time Other, he succeeded in the elimination of the Dharma contingent for good. Then, surely after a series of tried and true Ben manipulations, he exiled Widmore - the true leader at the time - siting various "rule" violations. With his quest to the top complete, he moved the Others to Dharmaville (now appropriately christened "Otherton"), and took over other various Dharma stations for his own use (the medical hatch, the Hydra, the Looking Glass, the Flame communication station to keep in touch with the "real" world, etc), a move that contradicted how the Others typically lived and operated on the Island. Furthermore, he undertook various projects - the doomed fertility experiment being one - seemingly without higher level direction and in the process put many of his people in danger. Ben does all of this to supposedly "protect the Island" and his people, but time and time again what we really see is him protecting himself and his position of power. Case in point, when he has a choice between saving his daughter or saving himself, he choose the latter and watched Alex be murdered right before his eyes.

All the while, Ben himself didn't seem to be protected by the Island at all. We've seen miraculous recoveries by those that are "chosen" - Locke has healed from a gunshot wound (inflicted by none other than Ben), Jack has survived rusty blade surgery, Rose is healed from terminal cancer, etc. Yet Ben, the supposed chosen leader and protector of the Island, develops an aggressive cancer on his neck and has to rely on Jack rather than the Island for salvation. And most revealing of all, Ben never even met Jacob when he was in power. Jacob never called for him, never spoke to him, relying instead on Richard to relay messages and direction. In the end, frustrated with the lack of attention he received from Jacob, Ben confronts him in the foot of the statue. And when responding to Ben's plea for recognition, Jacob's cold response of "what about you" acts as the final straw for Ben, and we all know what happened next.

According to Miles, Jacob's last thought before getting stabbed in the heart by Ben was "I hope I'm wrong about him." You see, Jacob always knew that Ben was not the true leader of the Others, nor the protector of the Island. However there was little he could really do about his rise to power. Choices were being made, free will being manipulated by Ben to fuel his own success. Jacob can set out a game plan, but he can't change the game once it has begun. Therefore, he knew that Ben could be trouble for him. He knew that since Ben was essentially a rogue leader, that all his carefully set out plans for the true candidates could go to hell. But being a believer in man's inherent goodness, Jacob hoped he was wrong about Ben's intentions. He hoped that he would choose the right path, that he would lead in the way that other candidates would have. After all, wouldn't that be the best story of all? A normal man, without the gift from Jacob, comes to the Island and proves that man is capable of good over evil. Jacob hoped that this could be true. But as we know, Ben's intentions remained rested on his own gain versus that of the Island, and as he plunged his knife into Jacob's chest, Jacob's fear was confirmed. He was right about Ben…for now.

While it may have been a little too late for Jacob, Ben does eventually prove him wrong. What we saw in "Dr. Linus" was Ben's final path to true redemption. While digging his own grave - an extremely apt metaphor for what Ben has essentially been doing throughout his selfish life - Flocke visits him and gives him a choice: come with me, and have it all back. The power, the glory, the control, the manipulation, everything. Come with me and have it all….or stay here and die. It's Napoleon's quote all over again. At first Ben reacts instinctively and runs. He retrieves the gun that Flocke left for him and turns to face a chasing Ilana. But instead of killing her in cold blood - something that he would have done with no problems at all in the past - he hesitates. He doesn't want anymore blood on his hands. He knows what he's done is wrong and accepts that no one in their right mind would want him in their company. But he so desperately wants to choose correctly this time. On verge of tears and willing to accept his fate as the newest Flocke recruit, he laments that "he's the only one that'll have me." And in a line that truly saves Ben's life Ilana responds, "I'll have you."


Illana, ever the student of Jacob, realizes that Ben's road to redemption is nearly complete. Given the chance, he will work with them and turn what was evil within him to good. He will eschew power and be a part of the team. And as he approaches Sun back at the beach, he offers a lending hand with a tarp; to help not only rebuild shelter but to rebuild his trust with those that might give him one more chance, after all.



Ben's choices to overcome temptation and evil on the Island leads to him make correct choices in the Sideways as well. Instead of sacrificing Alex for his own personal gain to become principal, he instead gives up that hope so that she can succeed. For once, he sacrifices himself for someone else's gain. Have we EVER seen him do that? This is a new life for Ben, and I think that the change is for good, both here and on the Island. In the beginning of the episode our old friend Locke the Substitute respects Ben's devotion to improve his kids' educational environment, saying "it sounds like you really care about this place." While the old Ben used this notion of "caring" as a rationalization for his crude actions on the Island (claiming that everything he did was for his people and the Island), now he truly does care for this place and for these people. There are some out there that think that Ben will fall to the dark side again, and that all of this is just one more long con to gain back the power that he lost, but I tend to disagree. Sure, I may eat these words (as I think I fall for Ben's tricks every time), but I think that he is truly changed man. It's Season 6 my friends, and there are bigger fish to fry. (Good thing I can edit these posts whenever I need to when the time comes though ;)


"Wanna try another stick?"

Let's move on to the awesomeness that was the Richard and Jack storyline. Jack and Hurley encounter an increasingly disheveled Richard in the jungle and he leads them to Black Rock, the place of Richard's embarkation to the Island hundreds of years ago. And simply put, Richard is looking for a way out. Much like MIB, he's questioning his purpose on the Island. He sees the chains that once trapped him on the Black Rock and thinks that while he thought he gained freedom on the Island through Jacob, he instead entered into another form of slavery for all these years. He's completely lost faith in all that he once believed in, and figures that offing himself is the best way to just end it all. But there's just one thing. We learn that since Jacob has touched him, he is incapable of suicide. Interesting.



As a side note (and props to Bri Guy for pointing this out), this little tid bit of info explains a few unresolved mysteries from past episodes. In "Meet Kevin Johnson" back in Season 4, our old frenemy Michael was wracked with guilt over the betrayal of his Lostie friends, and for the breakdown of his relationship with Walt. In the beginning of that episode, we see him write a note to Walt, and proceed to drive his car into a dumpster at roughly 70 miles per hour. But he lived. Later in the episode, he acquires a gun, loads it, points it to his head, and…nothing. Jammed. Again. Jammed. Coincidence? Hardly. Like most of the our other characters that were brought to the Island, Michael was a candidate and therefore susceptible to the rules that Jacob imposed upon them. And as we learned this week, one of those rules is that you can't kill yourself. Be killed by others? Sure. But no dice if you want to do the deed yourself.


Another example of this rule in action is when a disheveled and bearded Jack starts to step off that bridge in Season 4, but is interrupted just in time by an accident occurring behind him. They couldn't die not only because Jacob had touched them, but because both characters still had work to do for the Island. Michael's job was to get on that Freighter and redeem himself for his awful actions in the past. And Jack? Well Jack's starting to figure out what he needs to do as well.

Jack has seemingly gone full circle from Man of Science to Man of Faith. No longer does he ignore the powers of the Island and chalk everything up to coincidence or chance. He's realizing that this Island, and this dude Jacob; they represent more than just a rock in the ocean and some loony-toon mythical leader. So when he casually lights the stick of dynamite in front of Richard and just sits there - calm as can be - he knows that he hasn't come all this way just to die in some freak explosion. Sure, the bit of info that Richard just laid down probably helped him pull such a radical move, but the fact that he even believed him is a huge step for Jack. Two seasons ago he'd think such an act was insane and would have been a mile down the road with Hurley. This change in Jack is significant, and be sure to keep an eye on it as we move along this season.



"There's only 6 left"

Finally, I wanted to discuss Illana's comment about the number of "remaining" candidates she made to Lapidus. She claimed that "only 6 are left." To our collective knowledge, the candidates that remain are Kate, Sawyer, Jack, Hurly, and one of the Kwons (I think Jin…I do not think it's both, but I could be wrong). So with only five left, who is the sixth? Call me crazy, but I have a hunch that it's Lapidus. Think about it, Illana has been quasi-protecting him ever since they crashed, while also letting him in on all these little secrets along the way….she showed him Locke's dead body in the coffin before anyone else, and dropped this candidate info on him this week. Furthermore, we know that Lapidus was supposed to be the pilot of flight 815, and even though he slept through that gig, he obviously still made it back to the Island not once but TWICE (freighter crew and then Ajira 316). Ben certainly hit the nail on the head when hearing this, noting the "the Island really had it out for you, huh?"

Another possibility could be Widmore. As I noted above, Widmore - while we've been conditioned to think of him as a bad guy - was the true leader of the Island before Ben kicked him out under false pretenses. Could it be that his intentions to come back and protect the Island were true all along? I'm not sure, but it's worth considering. There just seem to be a few holes in his story…don't forget that when Bram (who was a part of Ilana's team) picked up Miles (before he left to go on Widmore's Freighter), he specifically said that Miles was "playing for the wrong team." So I guess we'll just have to wait and see what Widmore is up to when he docks that sub.

A third possibility is Desmond. Many believe that Des is on the sub with Widmore. I like this theory too…I mean, Des has to return to the show at some point, and he is special after all, right? But maybe he's too special. As Faraday claimed last year, "the rules don't apply" to Desmond. I'm thinking that he instead is more of a facilitator in all of this rather than a candidate for leadership.

And what the heck, why not one more guess: Walt. Let's not ever forget about Walt.



Tid bits.

So Miles doesn't seem to be up for redemption anytime soon. In one last shout out to the widely hated Season 3 couple Nikki and Paulo, Miles got the last laugh by "hearing" their grave and learning that 7 million dollars worth of diamonds were buried with in there with them (he even knew that they were buried alive…classic). At the end of the episode we see that Miles succeeded in digging those diamonds up, showing us that he's as greedy and selfish as ever. But if he keeps up with the hilarious one liners, I don't mind.


The last scene this week (pre Widmore sub scene, that is), where Jack and Hurley return to the beach was interesting in the sense that it was a carbon copy of the last scene of Season 3's "One of Us." If you recall, the happy reunion that went down in "One of Us" showed Jack, Sayid, & Kate returning to the beach after escaping from the Others. The cheery reunion was quelled though, by Juliet's appearance behind them. In this week's episode, the same exact scenario went down with Jack and Hurley returning, with a suspect looking Richard following. There's no real significance here, but I just thought the similarity was cool. And I love that homecoming music.

One major thing I didn't touch on this week was that in the Sideways, Ben and his father Roger discussed the fact that they had been on the Island and a part of the Dharma initiative. This is the first time that the Island has been specifically discussed by our characters in the Sideways. It's important, but I'm not sure if we have enough info at this point to know how so. Remember, the Island is at the bottom of the Ocean in the Sideways, and how that happened is also still a mystery, but the fact that Ben and Roger were there at some point is something to remember.


Upon seeing the happy reunion on the Island beach, the sub captain asks Widmore if he wants to stop there. Widmore says no, saying that instead they should keep going. Where are they going? Will they dock at the former pier where he was exiled? Or instead, will they make their way to the Hydra station, the same place where Flocke said he was heading? Could this be Flocke's way out? Or are he and Widmore working together? After all, Widmore agreed that Locke would need to "sacrifice" himself for the cause when Locke attempted to get the O6 back to the Island. Is it possible that he's been on MIB's side the whole time (and yes, I'm aware that this completely contradicts my "Widmore is the 6th candidate argument"...but that's why Lost is great, you just never know).


Alright, I think this is way long enough…thanks for reading if you got this far. As always chime in below, this episode can be viewed a variety of different ways so I'd love to hear what you guys have to say as well. Till next week!