Charles Widmore returns to the island in a submarine

Just off the island, we see a distant point-of-view shot of the beach camp reunion. Out of the water, a periscope appears. We then see to the point-of-view of the periscope which pans across the beach camp.

Inside the submarine, a man looking through the periscope says that there are people on the beach and asks if they should stop. We see none other than Charles Widmore tell him to proceed as planned.

So what exactly is Charles Widmore doing back at the island and which side in the coming war will he join?

Jack, Hurley & Richard join the beach camp + Miles gets diamonds

Ben rejoins the beach camp to the surprise of the others. He offers to help Sun fix her shelter as Frank keeps a fire going and Miles looks at a diamond (so I guess he dug up Nikki & Paulo). Ilana sits on her own, crying and holding the back of Jacob's ashes.

Then we see an old school beach reunion where Hurley, Jack and Richard come to beach camp. There's a cheerful reunion between Sun, Jack, Hurley, Miles and Frank. Richard is just there since he doesn't really know anyone there that well. Jack meets Ilana and then looks behind everyone to see a slouching, defeated Ben.

It's a great scene and a bit of a peaceful moment before the likely conflict and turmoil that's likely coming.

Ben chooses Alex's well being over job as principal

Back at the school, there's a misdirection where we initially are led to believe that Ben has taken Principal Reynolds job, but then Alex enters, coming to thank the principal for writing her a glowing recommendation. Ben denies having anything to do with the recommendation, even though he did.

When Principal Reynolds enters and questions what Ben is doing there, he says he's just dropping off the  detention sign-up sheet. They he makes a minor power play by telling Alex that the History Club is back on and pushes Reynolds to agree.

Outside, Ben is approached by Arzt who wants to know if he did it. Ben says no and when Arzt whines about not getting his parking space, Ben offers him his. Ben then sees Alex come out of the building with a wide smile. He seems pleased and content with her happiness and walks away.

In this timeline, we see Ben choose Alex over his power. Ben is in a way, redeemed in the flash sideways timeline for his poor decisions on the island, but will he have a chance to redeem himself on the island?

Ben explains why he killed Jacob, Ilana will 'have' him

As Ben runs from Ilana in the jungle, he finds the rifle that Locke told him would be leaning on a tree. In what could be Michael Emerson's best performance to date (though there are so many amazing ones), Ben tell's Ilana why he killed Jacob and about his choosing the island over Alex, leading to her death.

He asks her to let her go and join Locke and when she asks why, he says "Because he's the only one who'll have me." Ilana says "I'll have you," signaling some inkling forgiveness of Ben's murder of Jacob. He then follows her back towards the beach camp.

Ben must once again choose between power & Alex

Ben goes to Principal Reynolds office to make his play to become principal. He presents him with the emails describing Reynolds an the nurse's inappropriate actions. Ben tells him that he wants his job. More specifically, he wants Reynolds to resign and recommend to the school board that he take over as principal.

Then things get sticky. Principal Reynolds shows Ben an email from Alex asking him to write her a recommendation for Yale. He tells Ben that if he continues with his plan, he will "torch" Alex's future.

In this scene, Ben is once again presented with the option of choosing what is more important, Alex or his own ambition and power, just like when Keamy killed Alex in season 4. Reynolds even uses the word "torch," which is what Keamy was going to do to the island.

Richard wants to die, Jack lights dynamite at Black Rock

On their trek across the island, Hurley quizzes Richard asking if he's time traveling, a cyborg or a vampire, to each of which Richard answers no. They then approach the Black Rock instead of the temple and Richard tells them that everyone at the temple was dead, but their friends were not there. He then tells Hurley not to believe anything Jacob told him.

Richard approaches the Black Rock, telling them that he's going inside to die. Once inside, Richard examines some empty chains and tells Jack that he hasn't been back to the Black Rock since he was first there, implying what many have thought, that he was a slave on the ship. He opens a crate of dynamite ignoring Hurley's emphatic warnings and tells them that he can't kill himself because Jacob touched him which was supposed to be a gift, but was really a curse. Richard slams a stick of dynamite down and nothing happens.

Richard says that he devoted his life to Jacob who told him he had a plan which he would one day reveal and that he would be a part of. Now that Jacob's dead, Richard says that his entire life had no purpose and that if someone else lights the fuse, then he can die. Jack lights the fuse but then sticks around for a chat.

Richard tells Jack that he should go or he's going to die, but Jack tells him that he thinks that won't happen. Jack tells him about what he and Hurley experienced at the lighthouse and that Jacob has been watching him since he was a small child. Jack says that if Jacob went to all the trouble to watch him and bring him to the island, that he's not going to let him die there. Jack closes his eyes as the spark approaches the dynamite and then it goes out at the last moment. Jack smiles and asks Richard if he wants to try another stick.

Richard now seems convinced to follow Jack and asks what they should do next. Jack says they'll go back to where they started, which is the beach camp.

So there are a few lofty answers here. We now know what Jacob's touch means and essentially that Richard was a slave on the Black Rock. The touch explains why Michael couldn't kill himself in season 4, but when did Jacob touch him?

Miles reveals Jacob hoped he was wrong about Ben, knows about Nikki & Paulo

At the beach camp graveyard, Miles comes to visit Ben who is digging very slowly and in small amounts. Miles offers him some food, but Ben offers him the $3.2 million he asked for in season 4. Ben says that he can get off of the island and has a large network of people who could get the money if he'll just free him. Miles says that he doesn't need the money because Nikki and Paulo are buried in the graveyard with $8 million worth of diamonds.

Ben then protests on a moral level, asking if he's going to stand by and let him be murdered for killing Jacob who didn't care if he was killed. Miles then reveals that Jacob did care. Miles says that up until the knife went through Jacob's heart, he hoped that he had ben wrong about Ben.

So it seems that Jacob expected Ben to kill him, but was holding onto a glimmer of hope that he wouldn't. Instead of trying to stop Ben, it seems that Jacob allowed him to make his own decision.

Alex studies with Ben at the library, reveals principal's secret

At the school library, Ben is quizzing alex on Lord Cornwallis and the East India Trading Company. Alex panics about the test and says that her mother has to work two jobs to pay their rent. This poses the question, how different was Danielle Rousseau's life if she was never on the island? Is Robert dead or alive?

Alex has aspirations of attending Yale and hopes that Principal Reynolds will write her a letter of recommendation since he attended the school. She inadvertently refers to him as a pervert, causing Ben to worry. Alex reveals that she hear the principal having sex with the school nurse during a visit to the nurse's office. Ben is repulsed and promises not to tell, but the wheels in his brain start spinning.

Ilana makes Ben dig his own grave, tells Sun she could be a candidate

Back at the beach camp, Ilana is gathering bits of wreckage to later tether Ben to a tree. While doing that, she reveals to Sun that either she or Jin or both of them are candidates to take over Jacob's job and it is Ilana's job to protect them.

We then see Ben, going through Sawyer's old stash. He picks up a copy of Booty Babes magazine and the book Justice In Truth In Action by Benjamin Disraeli. There is also the book The Chosen by Chaim Potok in the stash too (a little nod to the candidates being chosen).

Ben pulls out an Oceanic water bottle and says to Frank that he remembers the plane crash like it was yesterday. Frank then reveals to Ben that he was supposed to fly the plane and the reason he didn't was because he overslept. Ben notes that the island got Frank in the end anyway.

Ilana then points her gun at Ben and forces him to the graveyard. She tethers him to a tree with the items she'd been gathering and tells him to dig his own grave.

Ben takes care of aging Roger Linus, Alex stops by

In the flash sideways, Ben is making frozen dinners for himself and his elderly and ailing father Roger Linus. Ben tells him about having to watch detention as he switches out Roger's oxygen tank. Ben wonders if he's more of a loser than the burnouts in detention.

Roger then says that maybe if they stayed on the island with the Dharma Initiative, then maybe Ben could have become something greater and had a better life. He say the ironic line, "Who knows what you would have become?" As we know, on the island, Ben ends up killing his father.

Then, the doorbell rings and we get another surprise. It's Alex at the door, wondering what happened to history club. Ben agrees to meet her before school instead of after so she can study for her AP test. This is the first time (I believe) that Alex has seemed happy to be around Ben.

But back to the big question. So if Ben and Roger still went to the island, when did they leave and what were the circumstances of the departure? And what does this say about the effects of the hydrogen bomb? In theory, Ben was still on the island with the others when Juliet detonated it, so the depth of the changes seem to dig deeper and deeper into the past.

Miles hears Jacob's last thoughts, reveals Ben killed him

As Ilana, Miles, Frank, Sun and Ben are making their way to the beach camp, Ilana questions Ben's honesty about whether the smoke monster really killed Jacob. She knows about Miles' ability and asks him tell her what happened to Jacob using the pouch of ashes she took from the four-toed statue.

Miles rats Ben out, revealing that Ben actually killed Jacob and was standing over him holding a bloody dagger. Ben tries to deny he did it and Ilana reveals to them that Jacob was the closest thing she ever had to a father. The group then continues towards the beach.

So what exactly is Ilana's relationship with Jacob? How did they meet and how long ago was that?

Dr. Linus teaches about Elba, Locke encourages him to take on Principal Reynolds

In the flash sideways, Ben, or Dr. Linus, is teaching his students about Elba in his class, calling in an island where everything changed. That certainly sounds familiar. He also says that Napoleon may has well have been dead without his power, which mirrors Ben's island story in this episode.

As class ends, Principal Donald Reynolds tells Ben that he'll have to cover detention after school all week even though Ben protests because he'll have to cancel his history club meeting. Reynolds makes him feel small and powerless.

In the teacher's lounge, Ben gets his thoroughly marked lunch of cucumber sushi out of the fridge and sits next to Leslie Arzt, who shockingly, is complaining about formaldehyde stains on his shirt and the school's lack of decent educational tools. As Ben chimes in, complaining about Reynolds not caring about teaching the kids, Locke, who is sitting at the next table, says that maybe Ben should be the principle. In another ironic bit of dialogue, Locke says that he would be interested in supporting Ben. This exchange clearly gets the wheels in Ben's head spinning.