The Man Behind the Curtain

"The Man Behind the Curtain"
Lost episode
Young Ben arrives on the island
Episode no.	Season 3 Episode 20
Written by	Elizabeth Sarnoff & Drew Goddard
Directed by	Bobby Roth
Production no.	320
Original airdate	May 9, 2007
Guest stars
Nestor Carbonell Andrew Divoff M.C. Gainey Jon Gries Doug Hutchison Samantha Mathis Carrie Preston Tania Raymonde Marsha Thomason Sterling Beaumon Madeline Carroll Jenn Boneza Gregory Suenaga Diamante Kielo
Episode chronology ← Previous Next → "The Brig" "Greatest Hits"
Lost (season 3) List of Lost episodes

"The Man Behind the Curtain" is the twentieth episode of the third season of Lost, and the sixty-ninth episode overall. It was first aired on May 9, 2007 on ABC. The episode was directed by Bobby Roth and written by Elizabeth Sarnoff and Drew Goddard.^[1]

Ben Linus (Michael Emerson) reluctantly leads John Locke (Terry O'Quinn) to Jacob, the mysterious leader of the Others. The episode was the first to feature flashbacks recounting Ben's back-story.

Plot

Flashbacks

In the flashback, the episode begins with Ben's birth, as his mother, Emily Linus (Carrie Preston) is in labor in the middle of the woods, 32 miles away from Portland. After the birth, Emily is in pain and bleeding heavily. Her husband, Roger (Jon Gries), carries her and the baby to the roadside, where a car carrying Horace Goodspeed (Doug Hutchison) and Olivia (Samantha Mathis) soon stops to help them. Emily tells Roger to name the baby Benjamin, and then dies on the side of the road.

The next flashback shows Ben, age 7 (Sterling Beaumon), arriving with his father at the Island, to work for the DHARMA Initiative. They are greeted by Horace. Ben attends school on the Island, developing a friendship with a young girl named Annie (Madeline Carroll). During a school lesson on volcanoes, being taught by the teacher Olivia (Samantha Mathis), the "hostiles," also known as "natives" of the Island, attack the barracks, where the DHARMA workers and their families reside.

Later in the flashback, Ben sees a vision of his dead mother on the island, which prompts him to sneak into the jungle in search of her. He encounters Richard Alpert (Nestor Carbonell), one of the supposed "hostiles". Richard tells Ben to not be afraid and asks him if he is lost. The young Ben says that he is looking for his mother, later explaining that she had died when he was a baby, and tells Richard that he does not like the DHARMA Initiative; he wants Richard to take him to their camp. Richard tells Ben that if he truly wants this, then he must be patient, and wait for his time to come. Ben listens to Richard, and returns to the DHARMA Initiative.

We see an older Ben, now a young man, at the barracks on his birthday. He helps his father Roger load a blue Volkswagen van, the same van Hugo "Hurley" Reyes (Jorge Garcia) found, years later, during the events of "Tricia Tanaka Is Dead". His father has forgotten his birthday yet again, but once Ben reminds him, he tells him that they will go do "father and son things" once they've finished their work for the day. They drive the van up to a hill, park, and begin to relax. Ben asks his father if he blames him for the death of his mother. Roger simply answers "What do I know", and promises to try and remember Ben's birthday the following year. But Ben, fed up after years of neglect and abuse, pulls out a gas mask and bids his father goodbye before filling the van with gas, killing his father. Ben returns to the barracks where all the DHARMA workers have died from the same gas. Ben pauses to close the eyes of Horace Goodspeed before Alpert and his men emerge wearing masks, having worked with Ben the whole time. Alpert offers to go and collect Roger's body, but Ben tells him to "leave him out there."

Locke and the Others

The Others, at their new camp, appear somewhat shocked as John Locke arrives carrying his father's (Kevin Tighe) body on his back. He meets with Ben, who tells him that the true leader of the Others is named Jacob. Locke demands that they go to Jacob, but Ben tells him that is impossible. Soon after, Mikhail Bakunin (Andrew Divoff) stumbles into the camp and tells Ben about the parachutist who landed on the Island, Naomi Doriit (Marsha Thomason) and explains that the sonic defense system's power was not set strong enough at the time to kill him when Locke pushed him through it. Locke says Ben can't take care of that problem right now, because they are on their way to meet Jacob. Ben is forced to take Locke with him, after Locke beats Mikhail unconscious while several of the onlooking Others do nothing to intervene.

One of the few frames where "Jacob" is visible

Ben and Locke arrive at Jacob's cabin. They enter, but Locke cannot see anyone inside. Ben tells him that Jacob is sitting in the chair beside him. Locke, growing frustrated and angry, tells Ben that the chair is empty, and that he is crazy and pathetic. Just as Locke is about to exit the house, an odd and deep voice says "Help me." Locke pulls out a flashlight, which Ben had warned him not to do (saying that Jacob "dislikes technology"). Suddenly, objects in the room begin to violently fly about and windows shatter, and Ben is flung against a wall. Briefly, a strange man is seen sitting in the chair. Locke runs out of the house and Ben exits soon after. Locke still doesn't believe Jacob is real, thinking that Ben was only "putting on a show" for him. Disgruntled, Locke begins to head back to the camp with Ben.

Locke notices that Ben is leading him along a different path. Ben admits that he was not born on the island and that he wants to show him where he came from. They arrive at a pit full of skeletons clothed in DHARMA uniforms, and Ben tells him that he helped kill his own people when it became clear that the DHARMA workers and the natives couldn't cohabit. Ben shoots Locke, who falls into the pit, and then demands to know what Jacob said to Locke. Locke says, "Help me," briefly frustrating Ben before clarifying: "He said... Help me!" Ben replies that he certainly hopes he helps him. Ben departs, leaving Locke for dead.

At the Beach

At the survivors' camp, James "Sawyer" Ford (Josh Holloway) plays Juliet Burke's (Elizabeth Mitchell) tape for Sayid Jarrah (Naveen Andrews). They visit Juliet's tent only to find she and Jack Shephard (Matthew Fox) are both missing. Kate Austen (Evangeline Lilly) shows up and begins to defend Jack; Sayid tells Sawyer to play her the tape. Later that night, the survivors are introduced to Naomi and the tape is played for all to hear. Just then, Jack and Juliet return to the camp. Juliet tells Sawyer to play the other side of the tape, which is Ben's plan to kidnap Sun and, possibly, Kate. Sawyer seems especially disturbed by the idea that Kate would be taken by the Others. Jack reveals that he had learned of this earlier, and that he had kept it a secret because he did not know what to do about it yet.

Production

The part of Emily Linus, Ben's mother, was played by actress Carrie Preston, the real-life wife of the actor Michael Emerson. They had also worked together in other works, such as the 2004 film Straight-Jacket.^[1] Preston was cast as Ben's mother following Emerson telling people at parties that she was desperate for a part on the show.^[2] This episode is the first to deal with Richard Alpert's mysterious apparent agelessness, which would resurface in "Cabin Fever" and "Jughead." This is the first episode to list guest stars in alphabetical order, a practice that has been continued with minor exceptions for every episode since.

Damon Lindelof describes Richard Alpert's encounter with the young Ben, and Ben and Locke's approach to the cabin as analogous to that of the choosing of the Dalai Lama by the Panchen Lama: "Richard Alpert might be construed as some sort of a Panchen Lama, as he has a conversation with this boy who sees something that he wasn't supported to see, and now I think Ben finds himself in the role of Panchen Lama as he brings Locke into this cabin, in an attempt to sort of determine whether the island has chosen him to be its new surrogate.^[1]

The opening scene, which is of Ben's mother giving birth to Ben in a forest, was meant to trick the audience into thinking that the scene took place on the Island. The scene where Ben sees his mother in his window was supposed to scare the audience, and made Lindelof's wife scream. This was the first episode to be directed by Bobby Roth. Emerson also wrote Jacob's unspoken lines so that it would seem more like a normal conversation between Ben and Jacob.^[1]

Reception

12.1 million American viewers watched the premiere of the episode.^[3] Ben's father issues revealed in the episode are described as "not the most original Lost character trait by any means but it is the thrust behind Ben's development into the genocidal maniac he eventually becomes" by IGN's Chris Carabott. Carabott thought Richard featuring in Ben's flashback as a Hostile was "one of the more surprising revelations of the "The Man Behind the Curtain", because Alpert doesn't seem to have aged a day in thirty-plus years".^[4]

References