Television Review: Ab Aeterno (Lost, S6X09, 2010)

Ab Aeterno (S6X09)

Airdate: 23 March 2010

Written by: Melinda Hsu Taylor & Greggory Nations
Directed by: Tucker Gates

Running Time: 47 minutes

When the final season of Lost reached its midpoint, the creators had precious little time to put their affairs in order. With the end looming, the monumental task was to wrap up the sprawling plot into some semblance of a coherent whole and finally deliver answers viewers had craved for years. One of the more successful efforts in this fraught endeavour can be observed in Ab Aeterno, the ninth episode of the sixth season. Serving as the long-awaited origin story for one of the series’ most enigmatic figures, it transforms Richard Alpert from a peripheral, inscrutable presence into a fully realised tragic hero, anchoring the mythological chaos in human emotion.

The episode, written by Melinda Hsu Taylor and Greggory Nations, was originally titled ‘The Intermediary’. Damon Lindelof’s decision to rename it ‘Ab Aeterno’—a Latin phrase meaning “from the very beginning”—was not merely for its cool, portentous sound. It signalled a narrative plunge into the deep past, far beyond any flashback hitherto seen, promising to excavate the foundational bedrock of the Island’s conflict. This ambition is realised in an episode that is almost entirely one protracted flashback, but it is cleverly framed within the 2007 present-day narrative. There, the late Jacob’s faction, led by Ilana, is adrift. Ilana declares her mission to protect the candidates to replace Jacob as the Island’s protector—namely Jack, Jin, and Hurley—but there is a palpable lack of direction. This stems from the crisis of their supposed guide: Richard, the ageless advisor who was meant to have all the answers, has recently suffered a complete loss of faith and become suicidal. His despairing retreat into the jungle triggers the episode’s core journey, both physical and historical.

The flashback transports us to 1867 Tenerife in the Canary Islands, introducing us to Ricardo, a humble farmer. Nestor Carbonell, shedding the serene omniscience of the Richard we know, plays him as a man of raw, desperate love. His wife Isabella (Mirelly Taylor) is mortally ill. In a harrowing sequence, Ricardo’s attempt to secure medicine from a cynical, cruel doctor ends in a scuffle and the doctor’s accidental death. Returning home too late to save Isabella, he is arrested for murder, sentenced to death, and in a grim twist, sold into slavery by a corrupt priest and prison official. He becomes cargo aboard the British sailing ship Black Rock, under the command of the vicious officer Jonas Whitfield (Steven Elder). The ship’s fate is a spectacular piece of answered lore: caught in a ferocious storm and then a tsunami, it is hurled across the Island, smashing the four-toed statue of Taweret and coming to rest deep inland, explaining two of the series’ oldest visual mysteries.

Chained in the wreckage, Ricardo witnesses Whitfield, panicked over dwindling supplies, coldly executing the surviving prisoners. His own death seems imminent until the Smoke Monster attacks, slaughtering the crew but sparing him. Alone, dehydrated, and starving, he is visited by a vision of Isabella who tells him they are in Hell and escape requires “killing the devil.” This sets the stage for the original Man in Black (Titus Welliver, impeccably sinister) to appear. Freeing Ricardo, offering sustenance, and exploiting his grief, he identifies Jacob as the devil and promises a reunion with Isabella if Ricardo murders him. Welliver’s performance is a masterclass in predatory manipulation, his calm demeanour belying a timeless malevolence.

Ricardo’s confrontation with Jacob (Mark Pellegrino) is the episode’s philosophical centre. He fails in his assassination attempt, and Jacob—far from a devil—explains the truth. They are not in Hell; Ricardo was brought to the Island for a purpose. Jacob reveals the Man in Black as a “great evil” he must prevent from leaving, but he cannot compel people to help; they must come willingly. He offers Ricardo a role as his “intermediary,” an advisor to future candidates, and in exchange grants him agelessness. Ricardo, with nothing left to lose, accepts. The Man in Black, upon learning of this, coldly assures Ricardo the offer to kill Jacob remains open, planting a seed of doubt that will fester for centuries.

This history directly informs the 2007 storyline. A despairing Richard returns to the jungle where he last met the Man in Black and screams that he has changed his mind, ready to accept the dark offer. Hurley, utilising his psychic ability to communicate with the dead, arrives with a message from Isabella’s ghost. This scene is one of the series’ most moving late-stage moments—a tender, spiritual resolution that avoids sentimentality through its sheer emotional honesty. Isabella’s message, that Richard’s work is not yet done and that she has always been with him, restores his faith and convinces him to rejoin the fight on Jacob’s side.

Directed with assured clarity by Tucker Gates, ‘Ab Aeterno’ succeeds admirably in its primary world-building function. It satisfyingly explains the shattered statue and the Black Rock’s improbable location. More importantly, it demystifies Richard’s immortality, grounding it in a tragic bargain. Nestor Carbonell’s performance is revelatory; he traverses a staggering arc from loving husband to broken slave to desperate survivor, all while making us forget the immortal sage we know. His scenes of anguish in the ship’s hold are powerfully visceral, even though his ultimate survival is never in doubt.

The episode also enjoys a layer of wry meta-commentary. Jacob being accused of being “the devil” is amusingly reflexive, given that actor Mark Pellegrino concurrently played the literal Devil, Lucifer, on Supernatural. It is a playful nod that does not undermine the episode’s gravity.

However, Ab Aeterno is not without flaws. The most nagging is the rather unconvincing explanation for Ricardo’s fluency in English. The episode hand-waves this by he learned it while preparing to start better life in “New World”. Historically, emigration from the Canary Islands was far more likely to Spanish-speaking destinations like Argentina or Cuba, not anglophone territories. While a minor logistical quibble, it momentarily punctures the otherwise meticulously constructed historical verisimilitude.

Ab Aeterno is very good piece of Lost’s final season. By fusing grand mythology with intimate human drama, it provides the emotional and explanatory heft the series desperately needed at its midpoint. It transforms Richard from a plot device into a profoundly tragic figure, and in doing so, reminds us that Lost was always, at its best, about the people lost in the puzzle, not the puzzle itself.

RATING: 7/10 (+++)

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