Diksha Sundriyal
The second half of Hulu’s ‘Saint X’ leads the main character Emily Thomas deeper into her obsession to uncover the mystery surrounding her sister’s death. About two decades ago, Alison Thomas was found dead on the island of Saint X, where she was supposed to be on a week-long vacation with her family. No one was ever caught, and no one ever found out what really happened to her.
When Alison’s younger sister, Emily, crosses paths with the man she believes holds the answers to all her questions, she gets so invested in him and his life that she forgets to pay attention to her own. In this episode, titled ‘Colonial Interference,’ we see Emily’s relationships unraveling, leaving her more alone and helpless than she’d felt in the beginning. Here’s what the ending spells for her. SPOILERS AHEAD
Saint X Episode 5 Recap
As the cops scour the island, looking for Alison, the people at the resort start distancing themselves from her. The man who had been eyeing the teenager the whole time doesn’t want to take part in her search. The boy who’d been contemplating a future with her once they were back in America lies to the cops to save himself. The boy who had been fooling around with her creates a web of lies to protect himself and his friend.
In the present day, Emily is spurred into action by the reminder of Alison’s birthday. She had been so consumed with Clive that she forgot her sister’s birth anniversary. It brings back many memories for Emily and her parents, who celebrate it in their own way. While her parents go out to watch the movie they thought their daughter might have liked, Emily dives deeper into the search for answers.
After the heart-to-heart with Clive in the previous episode, Emily starts to wonder if she’d been wrong about him. She believes that while Clive might have been involved, Edwin must have been the mastermind behind the crime committed against Alison. The problem is that she doesn’t know where Edwin is, and she can’t get to him through Clive because he has stopped talking to him.
In another flashback on the island, Alison breaks up with Edwin after her father makes her realize that their fooling around could lead Edwin to lose his job. This leaves her with Tyler, who tries to woo her with a romantic date. But things turn sour when he tries to be physical with her leading her to break up with him on the spot and run away.
Saint X Episode 5 Ending: Will Emily and Josh Break Up?
While ‘Saint X’ has a murder mystery at its core, the show’s central theme is the perils of obsession. It is less about what happened to Alison Thomas but more about the road that the quest for answers leads her sister. A chance encounter with Clive Richardson fuels Emily’s curiosity, and she decides to get some answers. It had already been a dangerous quest, considering that Clive was supposed to be one of the people involved in Alison’s murder. However, the more time Emily spends with him, the more she loses grip on reality.
At first, Sunita supported Emily, knowing how important it was for her to get answers to the mystery that had plagued her and her family for two decades. She decided to accompany Emily to her meetings with Clive, but she could see that her curiosity was turning into an obsession. The fact that Emily knew it wasn’t good for her is proved by the fact that she didn’t tell anything about Clive to her boyfriend, Josh.
Josh always tried to support everything Emily did, but she knew he would never let her go after her sister’s alleged murderer. At first, she confesses that she is looking into the murder, but she isn’t yet ready to tell Josh everything. This isn’t lying, and Josh, though bothered, understands because she is straightforward about it. Things get tricky when he sees Emily with Clive outside their home. When he asks her about it, she lies. She says that Clive was just helping her because it was raining. She doesn’t tell him anything about why they’d been meeting.
Emily’s casual dismissal of the incident leads Josh to believe her, but when he sees Clive at the diner, which Emily had been frequenting for the past few weeks, he gets suspicious. When Josh saw them together, he knew there was more to it than a friendly cab driver helping a girl. Seeing him again will lead Josh to question why Emily has been lying to him. A confrontation might ensue, and whether or not Emily tells the truth, we assume things won’t turn out as well for the couple.
Emily has already proved that she doesn’t care about anything else at the moment. Even after being repeatedly warned by Sunita to finish the project she’d been working on, Emily chooses to follow Clive. This leads her to get fired, and because of her, Sunita gets fired as well. If this isn’t an eye-opener for Emily, then we see her going down the same road when it comes to her relationship with Josh.
What was in the Letter?
In one of their meetings, Clive tells Emily that he is going to meet a friend. He doesn’t reveal which friend, which makes Emily think that he might be meeting Edwin. She follows him to an art show and discovers that Clive’s friend is Bery Wilson, who worked as a babysitter at Indigo Bay. She moved to New York ten years ago and has since found success as an artist. She’d been trying to get in touch with Clive, but he refused to meet her until he realized she was the only one he could talk to.
Bery reveals that she has been in touch with Edwin, and when she told him about meeting Clive, Edwin sent her an email. Bery gives its printout to Clive, urging him to read what his old friend has to say. We don’t get to see what was written in the letter, but it is enough to rattle Clive. What did it say? Considering that it was from Edwin, it could have been an apology and a confession about Edwin’s true feelings for Sarah. However, after reading the thing, Clive seemed more unnerved than angry, which means that Edwin might have scratched some old wounds. Possibly, it is about the night Alison’s died.
Another thing that Edwin could have written to Clive about could be his new life with Sarah and their kid. Edwin always wanted to move to New York, while Clive wanted to stay on the island with his family. They are living the life the other one wanted, which could lead to some jealousy on Edwin’s part. Perhaps, Edwin succeeded in coming to New York after all and wants to meet with Clive. Maybe, the fact that his family is so close to him stirred Clive’s emotions, leading him to run out of the art show.
Read More: Is Saint X a Real Island? Is Indigo Bay a Real Resort?
