This is a classic episode, that it ends with Mr. Eko quoting the 23rd Psalm while fire engulfs the plane wreckage that became his brother’s tomb, isn’t the game changer… It’s just the capper of a very revealing episode, that twists in things from the first season, swirls it around with what we know of the second season, and sets up a chess piece for upcoming seasons.
The backstory of Mr. Eko is telling, he’s not afraid to do what is right to protect the people he loves, but he’s also all about getting the business done, the right way, even if it means bending the laws, rules, killing people. The way the story tell of Eko’s Nigerian gangster past is somewhat surprising that we know he was wearing a priest’s collar, and has a habit for etching bible verses in tree branches. How that story is told, while winding around the Heroin infused statues of Mary, then loading them on the yellow plane that Locke found, that had lead to Boone’s death just is classic twisty LOST story telling.
The game changer was the approach of the smoke monster, to Charlie’s sound of alarm to the face to face meeting of Smokie and Eko. The slow plan through the smoke as it takes it’s measure of Mr. Eko, with flashes of faces and times that we’d never encountered, made it another screen capture/pause/wedbetterwatchthatagain moment.
Think Eko was able to stand down the smoke monster because Smokie thought he might be able to turn him to do his bidding. He is able to kill him later because Eko has a truly repentent heart. He is of no use to Smokie because he can no longer be manipulated. I definitely need to rewatch the episode to pick up the links between seasons.
Yeah, I think you’re right. Eko is like the anti-Locke, he’s not as susceptible to coersion, and hence not a good game piece for Smokey. The between seasons arc, is the location of where the plane crashed became so important, then the plane crashing was also a part of S5 and the time flashes.
Mr. Eko was so awesome.