Religion features prominently from early on in this episode. It is implicit when Jack and Kate talk about the possibility of rescue, Jack saying he wishes he shared Kate’s faith.
But it is explicit as Charlie goes to confession, indicating that he had yielded to sexual temptation, and deciding that he needs to quit the band. But his brother brings “glad tidings” that they have signed a recording contract, and that Charlie is going to be a “rock god.” In another scene, with churchbells ringing and nuns walking around, Charlie and his brother discuss their future and Liam makes a promise that they will walk away if it gets too crazy. But that same older brother is the one who starts taking drugs first, refusing to walk away, leading Charlie into trouble, and not helping him much even after he gets clean.
And in a bit of poignant symbolism, as Charlie claims to be a “rock god” in a conversation with Jack, his loud voice brings the rock roof of the cave crumbling down in a cave-in.
The title of the episode relates to something Locke tells Charlie, using the moth’s struggle to exit the cocoon as an illustration. Locke makes Charlie ask three times before he will give him his drugs back, emphasizing the importance of choice. Charlie goes in after Jack who is still trapped by the fallen rock, and the tunnel that had been dug collapses behind him. A moth then helps Charlie see that there is a way out from where they are trapped, but not before he says that the claustrophobic space reminds him of a confessional.
Charlie’s arc of heroism on the island starts here, as he chooses to toss his drugs in the fire and sees a moth flying. But it starts before that, when he chooses to risk himself for someone else’s sake, rather than boast of being a “rock god.”
Also on religious themes, we see Sayid mutter a quick prayer, Allahu Akbar, before setting off a flare to coordinate antennas and try to track the French distress call.
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