Ab Aeterno

Wow. What an episode. A number of things happened in Ab Aeterno, providing answers to some questions, perspectives on some characters, and ideas about what the nature of the Island really is. I think we can also put to rest the idea that Jacob might be God, or at least, the Judeo-Christian God.

Let's start first with what we learned about the candidates.

The Candidates

We return to the same scene between Ilana and Jacob that we saw in The Incident. Jacob never touched her, but we got more of the conversation. He needs her to protect 6 people - they are the remaining candidates. Flash forward to 2007, where, around the campfire, Sun announces that she, Jack, and Hurley are three of them. Ilana didn't correct her, but didn't she tell Sun earlier that she didn't know which Kwon was the candidate? Oh, well, nothing like confidence.

After Ilana brings them from the Temple, she's to ask Richard what to do next. And, at this point, we realize that Jack's intervention with Richard in The Black Rock did little other than prevent his suicide. He's still agitated, and announces, "You're dead. We're all dead....We're in hell." He then stalks off into the jungle, determine to find someone else to listen to.

It's at this point that Jack learns something rather vital - Richard wants to talk with Locke.

Jack: Locke is dead.
Ben: If it's any consolation, it's not exactly Locke.

One of Hurley's two best lines of the night comes when Jack demands to know to whom Hurley's speaking: Sorry Jack, but this has nothing to do with you.

Go Hurley!

The rest of our time focuses on Richard's story.

Ricardo

Ricardo's story is a sad but unfortunately not uncommon one. In 1867, the man comes home to find his tubercular wife coughing blood and burning with fever. He rides half a day away in the pouring rain for a doctor, to find the doctor is a venal man only interested in money. There's a shoving match, the doctor falls backward and dies, and Ricardo takes the medicine from the doctor's hands. But it's too late, Isabella, his wife is dead, and the police (or the Canary Island version of them) are banging on his door.

In prison, he's reading his English Bible when a priest brings him food and asks if Ricardo is prepared to make his confession. Which Ricardo promptly does. But when he asks to be absolved of his sins, the priest refuses. The only way Ricardo can earn the grace of absolution is through penance, which Ricardo won't have time for, seeing as he's scheduled to die the next day. "I'm afraid the devil awaits you in hell.'

I don't think much of this priest. I know enough about the sacrament of reconciliation to know that if you are truly sorry for your sins, you will be forgiven. And I'm convinced that Ricardo was truly sorry for killing the doctor. But this is just an aside.

As Ricardo is prepared for hanging, a Mr. Whitfield is given the opportunity to check Ricardo's hands and teeth. If Ricardo speaks English, he's good to go. Where? The New World. Whitfield announces, "This man is now the property of Magnus Hanso."

I'm pretty sure the New World to which Ricardo was headed is not America. I suspect it to be Australia or some other prisoner colony. I also want to point out that Hanso must be an ancestor of those who set up the Hanso Foundation. If you keep up with the activities of the producers at various Comic Cons, you then know that the Hanso Foundation funded the DHARMA Initiative. But this Magnus Hanso was killed in the shipwreck.

The trip to the New World looks completely miserable for prisoners, especially when there's a storm and shipwreck. The prisoners survive, but Whitfield decides he must kill the prisoners before they kill him. He's about to kill Ricardo when the Smoke Monster makes his appearance, killing all the officers, but, after pondering Ricardo, leaving him alive.

Ricardo, who really looks like he's wearing eyeliner in one of his close ups, tries to escape from his chains, but fails to. At one point, he awakens to find his now-dead fellow prisoners being eaten by a boar (yuck). But then, a miracle happens, as Isabella, his dead wife appears to him. Yes, we're dead, we're in hell. We must escape the devil. She runs from the ship, apparently to be killed by the Smoke Monster.

And so finds the Man in Black (not Jacob, as I had at first thought) nursing Ricardo back to health. He confirms that Ricardo is in hell and that the devil has Isabella. He agrees to help Ricardo, but only if Ricardo promises to do anything the Man in Black says. Ricardo is in no shape to refuse. He's shocked when he hears, "I'm afraid there's only one way to escape from hell. You're going to have to kill the devil."

So, if you eat a boar that has just recently eaten your friends, does that make you a cannibal?

The Man in Black gives Ricardo some instructions on how to kill the devil that we've heard before. The devil has to be stabbed in the stomach with a fancy knife before he says a word (apparently, the devil "can be very persuasive."). When Ricardo points out it is hard to stab black smoke, the Man in Black (I really wish we had a name) admits that he is the black smoke. Ricardo loses trust. He hears, "The devil betrayed me. He took my body. My humanity." And the Man in Black promises to reunite Ricardo with Isabella.

I still think it's not fair to get ticked with people when their alleged victim speaks before they really have a chance to stab. And let's face it, Sayid had been dead and Ricardo nearly so. What are people thinking?

The last thing that I expected Jacob to do was to beat Ricardo up. This is not the kind, gentle Jacob of The Incident. Indeed, this guy is all edge and irritation. He even dunks (or baptizes) Ricardo in the ocean after Ricardo protests once too often that he's dead.

And finally, we learn something about Jacob after he admits to bringing Ricardo's ship to the Island.

That man who sent you to kill me believes that everyone is corruptible because it's in their very nature to sin. I bring people here to prove him wrong. And when they get here, their past doesn't matter.

Ricardo is confused when he learns that everyone Jacob has brought to the Island has died and that Jacob never helped them.

I wanted them to help themselves. To know the difference between right and wrong without me having to tell them. It's all meaningless if I have to force them to do anything. Why should I have to step in?

Ricardo then says the thing that apparently Jacob has been needing to hear for years, "If you don't, he will." To which I say, duh!

Jacob realizes the truth of what Ricardo says, and offers Ricardo a job to act as his intermediary between him and the people he brings to the Island.

What's in it for Ricardo? Well, Jacob can't bring Isabella back, and he can't absolve Ricardo of his sins, but he can make Ricardo live forever. And Jacob puts his hand on Ricardo's shoulder, and Ricardo's fate is sealed.

Ricardo brings a white rock to the Man in Black (subtle), who seems unsurprised that his plan has failed. He then gives Ricardo the necklace with a cross that Isabella had given Ricardo to pay the doctor for her medication. I'm as confused as Isabella as to why he buries it.

Fast forward over 140 years, and now Richard is wearing black (I just noticed that - has he always?) and digs up his cross. He then yells to the Man in Black that he's changed his mind, and ready to follow him. He hears a noise, and is angered that it's not the Man in Black, but Hurley.

One things the producers do well is heartbreaking romantic scenes. Perhaps some viewers found the conversation between Richard, Isabella, and Hurley to be treacly, but I did not. I loved it, and wanted to cry. In the conversation, Isabella reminds Richard that they are always together, and that there was nothing he could do to save her. She also tells him that he needs to stop the Man in Black from leaving the Island, "If you don't, we all go to hell." Okay, so Hurley said the latter in Spanish, but whatever.

The episode ends back in 1867, with Jacob asking the Man in Black why he wanted to kill him. Really? You don't know why? I guess that was his first attempt. The Man in Black promises that he will kill Jacob and whomever takes Jacob's place.

And so much falls into place.

Thoughts

There's been a lot of discussion as to what is the nature of Jacob and the Man in Black. Good, evil, God, devil. I do believe that the Man in Black is evil, somehow, even if at most selfish, but I suspect he's more than that. But I'm not as convinced that Jacob is all good, and I'm sure he's not God. First of all, God kicked Lucifer out of heaven. He never dedicated himself to keeping Lucifer in one place. Perhaps Jacob is an angel of sorts, sent by God to keep this evil within bounds, but I'm not so sure.

Jacob himself seems to have a lot of rough edges in 1867. He brings The Black Rock onto the Island, but does nothing to prevent the Man in Black from killing the passengers and crew. How can they prove they can choose good if they're killed immediately? And why would he start punching Richard before talking with him? What's that comment about not letting anyone in his foot (okay, the foot of the statue, but it sounds better my way) unless they're invited? He sounded really irritated.

Richard may have thought that his 140 years as Jacob's intermediary was pointless, but I disagree. I think that Richard must have humanized Jacob to a large degree. Perhaps Richard was the first real human Jacob interacted with. But what a difference between Jacob in 1867 and Jacob over a hundred years later. In 1867, he petulantly demanded to know why he should intervene with the people he brought to the Island. But we saw him pay for Kate's lunch box, give James Ford a pen, congratulate Sun and Jin on their wedding, give Jack a candy bar, ask Sayid for directions, and perhaps revive John Locke after a fall from eight stories. And who can forget his conversations with Hurley? He didn't know Richard's name, but he certainly knew these eight intimately.

When Jacob talked with Ilana, he knew that only six candidates remained. We know that one named Kwon, Hurley, and Jack are candidates. It's doubtful that Ben, Miles or Lapidus are. There were eight people Jacob touched in The Incident: Kate, Sawyer, Sun, Jin, Jack, Sayid, John Locke, and Hurley. I personally think it's fair to say that John Locke and Sayid are no longer candidates. Locke was killed by Ben, and Sayid has apparently gone to the dark side (Darth Vader would be proud). That leaves six. A lot of hay has been made that Kate is not a candidate since we didn't see her name on the ceiling or on the lighthouse thingie. But just because we didn't see it doesn't mean that it wasn't there.

It's getting late, and I have a feeling that rambling could occur if I stay on, so I'll sign off. I'll be curious to hear what you have to say about this episode. It's definitely a hard one to not think about.