Television Review: Everybody Loves Hugo (Lost, S6X12, 2010)

Everybody Loves Hugo (S6X12)

Airdate: 13 April 2010

Written by: Edward Kitsis & Adam Horowitz
Directed by: Dan Attias

Running Time: 42 minutes

Of all the many characters that populated the intricate tapestry of Lost, Hugo “Hurley” Reyes emerged as the most iconic, the most beloved, and arguably the most unequivocally positive. From his introduction as the lottery-winning everyman to his eventual ascension as the Island’s protector, Hurley maintained a rare consistency of heart and humour, making him the emotional anchor for the audience. It was, therefore, no great surprise that the penultimate episode to focus solely on a single character, the twelfth episode of the sixth season titled Everybody Loves Hugo, was dedicated to him. This instalment, however, carries a dual burden: the relentless forward march of the Island plot towards its apocalyptic conclusion, and the weight of fan expectation to deliver a satisfying emotional payoff for one of the series’ most cherished figures.

Season Six’s narrative engine is the juxtaposition of two timelines: the primary 2007 Island reality and the alternate 2004 reality where Oceanic Flight 815 never crashed. This ‘flash-sideways’ world had already established a pattern wherein the core characters led happier, often more fulfilled lives. Hurley is no exception. Here, he is not the traumatised, cursed survivor but ‘Hugo’, a phenomenally successful restaurant chain owner and renowned philanthropist. Surrounded by wealth and public adulation, he appears to have everything. Yet, as his mother keenly observes, he lacks romantic love, prompting a comically anxious blind date. This setup is brilliantly subverted when, at the restaurant, he is approached not by his date but by a beautiful blonde woman who introduces herself as Libby. Her cryptic remarks about people being “connected” and her subsequent, abrupt removal by a Dr. Brooks from the Santa Rosa Medical Institution injects the episode’s first note of poignant mystery.

Hugo’s initial intrigue turns to determined action following a visit from Desmond Hume, who has been systematically tracking down the Oceanic 815 passengers. Desmond’s cryptic encouragement propels Hugo to Santa Rosa, where he arranges a meeting with Libby, now revealed as a patient. In a deeply moving scene, she explains that while watching television, she saw Hugo and was suddenly inundated with flashes of another life—images of the Island, of the two of them together, of a love that was brutally cut short. Hugo, visibly shaken and undeniably attracted, orchestrates a genuine date on a Los Angeles beach. Their evening is idyllic, a tender moment of connection that the original timeline so cruelly denied them. The culmination—a kiss that triggers Hugo’s own flood of Island memories—is a masterful piece of fan service. It is a cathartic release, giving both the character and the audience a glimpse of the ‘what could have been’ that had been yearned for since Libby’s shocking murder in Two for the Road. Cynthia Watros’s return is handled with a delicate grace that makes Libby’s fragmented memories heartbreaking rather than contrived.

Meanwhile, on the Island in 2007, the plot moves with a destructive, house-cleaning urgency. Richard Alpert’s strategy to thwart the Man in Black (in Locke’s form) is characteristically blunt: destroy the Ajira Airways plane on the Hydra Island airstrip. Hurley, however, receives counsel from an unexpected source—the ghost of Michael Dawson. Michael’s warning that the plan is “a bad idea” is swiftly and gruesomely validated when Ilana, mishandling dynamite salvaged from the Black Rock, blows herself to pieces. This moment is a stark and arguably cynical piece of narrative disposal. Ilana, introduced as a formidable, Jacob-devoted guardian, is dispatched in a foolish accident that directly mirrors the buffoonish Dr. Arzt’s demise in Exodus, Part II. It feels less like a meaningful character conclusion and more like the writers efficiently removing a piece that no longer fits the endgame puzzle. Unfazed, Richard determines to fetch more explosives from the Black Rock itself. Hurley, now stepping into a decisive leadership role, takes drastic action and blows up the iconic ship pre-emptively. This spectacular destruction serves as a symbolic burning of bridges, both literally and figuratively. The Black Rock, a location central to so much of the Island’s mythos—from the source of the dynamite to the imprisonment of Richard—is obliterated, clearing the stage for the final act.

The explosion also creates the episode’s most significant fracture within the camp. Richard, clinging to his militaristic solution, departs for the Barracks with Ben and Miles in tow to procure grenades. The remaining group, now implicitly led by Hurley, chooses a radically different path: they will seek out the Man in Black to parley. This shift is monumental. Jack Shephard, the perennial leader, not only acquiesces but actively supports Hurley’s plan, marking a definitive transfer of moral authority. Jack finally accepts his limitations, recognising that Hurley’s empathy and connection to the Island’s spiritual side may be the more potent weapon than sheer force of will.

Amidst this, the episode delivers one of its few concrete answers. Through his conversation with Michael’s spirit, Hurley (and the audience) learns the nature of the haunting ‘whispers’ that have plagued the jungle since the first season: they are the trapped souls of those who died on the Island and cannot ‘move on’. While this explanation retroactively makes sense, its delivery here feels somewhat rushed, a box being ticked in the midst of higher-stakes manoeuvring.

The episode’s two concluding sequences, however, highlight its uneven pacing and occasional reliance on shock over substance. On the Island, the Man in Black, having taken Desmond prisoner, engages him in a cryptic dialogue before casually throwing him down a well. This act serves little narrative purpose other than to re-assert the villain’s callousness, manufacturing a cliffhanger that feels more obligatory than organic.

In the alternate 2004 timeline, the episode ends with a jarring, violent crescendo. Desmond, having stalked a junior high school, exchanges a few pointed words with Ben (now a sympathetic history teacher) before deliberately ramming his car into the wheelchair-bound John Locke. While this act aligns with Desmond’s growing mission to ‘awaken’ his fellow passengers through extreme trauma, its execution is so abrupt and brutal that it verges on being shock for shock’s sake, momentarily tipping the alt-timeline’s intriguing mystery into gratuitous melodrama.

Further contributing to a sense of over-egged mystery is the cameo by Dr. Pierre Chang as the master of ceremonies at Hugo’s charity event. The sight of a man who should have aged decades since the 1970s looking unchanged is a blatant, and rather clumsy, signpost screaming that this 2004 world is ‘wrong’. In an episode already rich with more subtle clues of dislocation, this hammer-blow approach feels unnecessary.

Written by Edward Kitsis and Adam Horowitz, Everybody Loves Hugo is an episode tasked with a difficult dual mandate. It must function as efficient narrative housekeeping, ruthlessly clearing away spent characters and locations to streamline the path to the finale. Simultaneously, it must serve as profound fan service, delivering the long-promised emotional reunion for Hurley and Libby. On the latter front, it succeeds magnificently; the alt-timeline romance is the episode’s beating heart, a beautifully acted and genuinely moving correction of a past narrative cruelty. On the former, it is more mechanically proficient than inspired, with character exits feeling occasionally perfunctory and symbolic gestures leaning towards the obvious. Despite these flaws—the occasional heavy-handed clue, the jarring violence of its cliffhangers—the episode remains a very good and crucial piece of television. It cleverly and deliberately sets the stage for the saga’s final hours, not just through plot mechanics, but by cementing the most important transition of all: the passing of the torch from the man of science to the man of faith, and ultimately, to the man of heart.

RATING: 7/10 (+++)

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