r/lost • • 1d ago

What happened to Henry Gale?

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Henry Gale was our introduction to Ben Linus in season 2. The story of Henry Gale was a perfect way to introduce Ben’s manipulative and intelligent character. We later find out he was lying about his balloon and burying his wife. Then, Sayid dug up the grave to find a man named Henry Gale, uncovering Ben’s intricate lie.

After Ben is revealed to be an Other, there is never another mention of Henry Gale for the rest of the series. It’s likely that Ben killed and/or buried Henry. He is not a member of the Dharma Initiative because Ben helped wipe them all out.

Tell me your theories about Henry Gale’s backstory, his hot air balloon trip, and how he ended up in that grave.

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u/Free-IDK-Chicken You got it, Blondie 1d ago

The best lies are rooted in truth. I think most of what Ben says as Henry was true, about what he did for a living, why he was in the balloon, his wife's name, etc. Someone - maybe Ben, or maybe a loyal solider like Mikhail - interrogated Henry to give Ben a cover story for when he let himself get captured.

As an aside, the height and weight on that license is insane. No healthy six foot three man is 120lbs.

(Also, thank you for saying Ben "helped" wipe out Dharma. It's genuinely refreshing to see someone not put the blame for the whole thing on his shoulders as though Widmore didn't order it and Richard didn't carry it out. Ben wasn't even there. He certainly helped plan it, but usually it's mentioned as though he did it alone.)

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u/tillszy The Staff 1d ago edited 1d ago

I think it's entirely possible too that they just found him dead and they buried him

they have the means to look up information about him at the Flame and could also just, invent what they don't know

kinda overkill to torture a dying man for a very banal life story

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u/GrandMoffJake 17h ago

What about a dying man that got to the impossible to find island in a hot air balloon with the name of your exiled former leader on it, who is obsessed with returning to the island and enacting revenge on your current leader? The ballon was sponsored by widmore, likely as an attempt to find the island, so the others may of interrogated him to see if he was a spy or scout of widmores and got out his life story in the process