Guardians: Outlook 1x10 'Blind Faith'

by George Willson

On a planet where people will burn their eyes out for their god, Ruben looks for a chance to regain something of the life he lost.

With the show running a little behind schedule, it's time to get caught up with a review of episode ten, which looks set to provide a little background on Ruben, the stoic security chief who is in need of some more development after the teasing hints at some past family tragedy in 1x03.

We open on the crew watching some kind of ceremony on an alien world. Engel is busy running his translator while Ruben grumbles about the disadvantageous tactical position they're in (which is his job, when you think about it). The team are unaware that they're about to watch a ritual sacrifice, however, and they're horrified to see the man willingly burn his eyes right out of their sockets! Yick.

After the ceremony, Engel converses with the priest to learn more, as an anxious Aya gets her next shot from Ruben - seems she's still recovering from the events of 'AA' and is being weaned off the poisoned water she got hooked on. And yes, James, I get the Monty Python reference. With James a little concerned that any one of them could easily fall foul of the laws of this planet and suffer a similar fate, they find Ruben spaced out and staring at the temple - with a little audio flashback to boot. Later on, Engel is still learning about the ritual, but there a lot of gaps in the sampler's translation of what the priest tells him. And that'd be the Dramatic Irony alarm ringing in the background, then! James notices there's a lack of any blind people in the community, before the team split up to nose around. Ruben seems to be acting a little strangely, and we finally get a god's honest flashback, heading ten years back in time to Brazil. And, my word, he looks happy as he sits in a church service with his wife and kids. But what's this? A saucy Latino chick giving him the eye - and flashes to Ruben being a naughty boy indeed! Back on the alien world, and Ruben re-enters the main temple, offering himself up to be 'cleansed,' as the priest put it - could this be the end of the chief's 20/20 vision?

As Engel asks to get his apparently faulty sampler checked out, we get another Ruben flashback, this time six months ago in New York as Stansen comes to see him. Ruben looks pretty washed up - a parallel to the state James was in before he was brought into the program - with Stansen mentioning Ruben's dismissal from the UN's employ and an apparent blacklisting he's suffering from, offering him a second chance to redeem himself. Then, we get the juicy bit - remember that chick Ruben was seen canoodling with earlier? She just happened to be Carmen Diaz, Brazil's ambassador to the UN, and Ruben was her bodyguard. D'oh! He was kicked out as sexual misconduct charges were raised - and as his wife finds out, she tearfully tells Ruben she's leaving and taking the kids with her. We then see Ruben's official dismissal before jumping back a week (you keeping up with this?) to see Ruben first getting the job as Ms Diaz's bodyguard. He's surprised to see her, letting us know he was a cop and she a city official, so they've known each other for a while. We're finally back in the alien temple, with Ruben still struggling to get his head round what he did to himself - he still can't seem to get over it costing him his family. Ruben calls James and Aya back to the temple, where a newfound sense of peace seems to have come over him. He tells the shocked duo that he's going to stay here and take the test of faith - and if he loses his sight, then so be it!

On the Lander, Lak calls back down with the solution to the malfunctioning sampler - it just needs rebooting. Yes, it's more Microsoft jibes, but they work here with the technofriendly Lak baby-stepping the technofearful Engel through getting the unit working again. Outside, Aya is trying to spur James into action, but he's the kind of man who's always respectful of another's wishes, even if it means leaving a crewman to potentially burn his own eyes out! With Aya needing her medicine and growing increasingly agitated, James tasks Engel to talking to the priest again as they go in search of Ruben. Engel is led into a mine where blinded workers dig valuable, energy-providing stones from the wall - and it's only those who have been 'cleansed' that can do this. James confronts Ruben but he's not budging, showing an alarmingly clear head given what's in store for him. Ruben seems convinced that the cleansing ritual is the only way he can absolve himself for what he did, and as James tries to manhandle him back Ruben reminds us why he's the security James, knocking James on his arse in no uncertain terms. And just when the situation couldn't get worse - Aya collapses!

James gets Aya back to the Lander and shoots her up with some sedatives to keep her calm (although I'm not sure if Aya's snarkiness is an effect of her withdrawal or some slightly out-of-character writing here), before we rejoin Ruben as he prepares to undergo the cleansing. Another flashback shows us Ruben talking to Carmen, the relationship between the two of them deepening a little - Ruben admits sleeping with her was a mistake, and he's just doing his job now rather than spending time with her because he wants to. However, Carmen isn't the kind of woman you want to turn down, and despite sneaking a crafty snog off him Ruben still isn't playing her game, so she (rather melodramatically, it must be said) fakes an assault on herself and runs off to shop him for it. And I must knock some points off for the groan-worthy line of direction that reads: 'She stands so close her breasts are touching his chest.' Yuck! Anyway. Engel manages to arrive at the ceremony just in time, explaining to Ruben that the cleansing is for people who break the law - not a test of faith, as he's been led to believe! Ruben sheepishly steps down, realising his mistake at last, and hands James the medicine Aya needs. Back on the Lunar Base, Ruben is getting chewed out by Stansen, but he manages to leave the office with his job intact. This time. Outside, he apologises to Aya but still doesn't plan on telling her exactly what he wanted to take the ritual for. Ruben retires to his quarters, where there's a touching final shot of his wife back on Earth - holding one of Rubens' paycheques. He's been sending her his cash, to make amends and support his family even though he's not even on the same planet any more. And that's where we leave it.

Not a bad story this week, and an attempt to flesh out Ruben's character in the same way 'AA' gave us some depth on Aya, but unfortunately it doesn't quite click together the way it should have. The mass of flashbacks crammed into Act II really disrupt the flow of the story, and the fact that they jump back and forth through Ruben's past make them a little hard to follow. Lost's approach to character flashbacks may be a well-used device, but it works, and it's a method that should have been applied here. And while Ruben's quest to test his faith (and, you suspect, punish himself for breaking up his family) is a good, strong storyline, his sudden change of attitude is too big a switch, too soon, especially when he almost purposefully endangers Aya by refusing to hand over her medicine. Okay, she wasn't too sick at that point, but she got worse pretty quick so it's a pretty shitty thing for Ruben to have done. Overall, then, a good story that trips up a little through the jumbled flashbacks, despite the backstory we get being pretty intriguing, and Ruben seeming to go from stoic man mountain to brainwashed cult member in a matter of moments.