'The Head' Season 3 Episode 3 Recap: Who Is Arthur's Secret Admirer?

Ghost of the past haunting the mainstay characters has become a recurrent theme in the survival thriller The Head since the very first season, as Olivia was presented as the reckoning of Arthur’s past sins. In the final season, it is time for Olivia to be at the receiving end of similar treatment as events from the first season make their impact felt. Previously, in order to conduct a secretive human trial of the miraculous algae, Lauren had put together a team with Rachel as leader. In order to ensure Arthur’s legacy remains stained, Olivia had coerced Lauren to let her join in the team as well. Along with the test subjects who volunteered themselves, the team settles in their secretive facility in Bir Tawil, Sahara, and a consecutive series of harrowing events results in the death of Lauren, two core team members, and a stranger whose arrival triggered the said events. As it becomes apparent that the killer is one among the crew/test subjects, who is trying to eliminate the rest of the team by any and every means necessary—sabotaging vehicles, draining supplies, and whatnot—both Rachel and Olivia find themselves tormented by the memories of troubling times.

Spoilers Ahead

The episode begins with a flashback scene which takes viewers to two years ago in Polaris VI, as the narrative focus shifts to the family life of Aki, the genius researcher from Japan who shared a relationship with Maggie (Olivia). On one occasion, during Aki’s absence in his room, his father, Takeshi Kobayashi, decides to chat with Maggie over video call, seeing her present in his room. Takeshi loves his son dearly, and it is evident how proud he is of Aki from the way he speaks of him. 

Back at present, the core team discovers that the water supply has been drained by the killer/saboteur, and once again another round of blame shifting ensues among members. Until the research contractors arrive at the facility, for which they have to wait a few more days, there is no other option than to make do with whatever they have. Taking water supply from the volunteers is not an option, as they need to remain healthy and safe for the trial to produce optimum results. Olivia suggests carefully rationing whatever little water is available, stopping showering for a few days, and asking volunteers to do the same. Desperate times, desperate measures. However, the volunteers, who are completely unaware of the incidents that are happening outside, are not too fond of these new rules. Which is why during the third and final trial, Keiko, Alba, and Ida refuse to take the algae-infused water if their demands of letting them use the shower are not met. Rachel and Olivia coerce the subjects to undergo the final trial by threatening that unnecessary protest will end up in the termination of their contract, and the money they were promised will not be given. One of the volunteers, Joe, is genuinely concerned about the completion of the trial, as he believes that as a volunteer, his contribution will be significant to use the algae for maintaining ecological balance. Joe informs Jamal about how Keiko sneaked out at night by using a keycard from researchers, and Jamal realizes that Liam’s missing keycard was obtained by her. 

Given the nature of the present situation, Jamal is quick to assume that  Keiko is not only a mole but also the killer who has been targeting the core team members one by one. It should be mentioned that Jamal had found the murder weapon—a knife, which was used to murder Lauren and Bashir—in Pierre’s cabin. Jamal completely trusted Pierre and was confident that someone had knowingly planted it in his cabin to make him look like the culprit. Now learning about Keiko’s misadventures, Jamal and Pierre consider her as the perp, and Jamal decides to pry information out of her through torture. Liam tries to talk sense to Jamal, who goes off with a rant about white colonizers and their conditional morality—which his ideals of a survivor cannot respect. Horst seizes Keiko’s laptop to extract any possible secretive information, while Olivia checks her phone for intel. 

Olivia finds Takeshi’s picture while scouring through Keiko’s chats and is quick to make a connection between all this. She assumes that as a consequence of losing his son during Arthur’s expedition in Polaris VI, Takeshi wants to take revenge by sabotaging the trial. Olivia  goes to Rachel to further prove her innocence by highlighting this damning connection. Rachel is still adamant that it is all Olivia’s doing.  Rachel’s bitterness towards Olivia is due to her belief that her father, Arthur, was in a relationship with Olivia’s mother, Sarah. A grief-stricken, anguished Olivia shares the horrid truth with Rachel — that her father tried to rape Sarah and ended up killing her and buried his dirty little secrets deep with Polaris V with the help of Annika and the research team members. Rachel is overwhelmed with shame and guilt after learning the truth, and Liam tries to comfort her, only to end up making a move on a grieving Rachel. An irritated Rachel rebuffs Liam, who takes his cue and leaves — but his strange behavior surely puts him on the list of possible suspects. 

In the meantime, the rest of the volunteers grow concerned about Keiko, assuming that she has met her end at the hands of the core team. The volunteers have already started speculating that something troublesome is happening in the facility, and Keiko’s abduction is a part of that larger conspiracy. Alba, Ida, Sean, and Joe decide to exchange the addresses of their families with each other so that if any one of them doesn’t make it to the end, the surviving ones will make sure to convey the news to their family. As an act of defiance to the rules imposed by the research team, Alba plans to reconnect the water supply so they get to shower again. 

In the meantime, Olivia approaches Keiko, revealing the fact that she was acquainted with Takeshi and his son Aki. Olivia demands answers from Keiko, who finally reveals that she was instructed by Takeshi to inject a trojan into the facility’s system, and in exchange she was promised aa huge amount. Olivia realizes it has been too late, as the malware corrupts the facility’s system, and a power distortion follows, which results in Ida getting electrocuted to death while taking a shower. The research data is most probably gone, which means that the only directive left for both the core team and the volunteers is survival. It should be mentioned that it is  Maggie/Olivia who is responsible for Aki’s demise, as she had stabbed him to death after he became aware of Olivia’s heinous actions. Olivia regretted her actions immensely, as she genuinely loved Aki and never would have harmed him had he not seen her true face. It remains to be seen whether, just like Arthur, Olivia too gets her due comeuppance after all. 

Following the plot thread of last episode, the present one too takes a look at the past, during Arthur’s time spent in prison. Rachel didn’t reply to the letters Arthur had sent her; instead, a secret deranged admirer of Arthur had tried to communicate with him, sympathizing with his plight and sharing her own troubles with father issues. Arthur managed to obtain a text-only phone from his tormentor, Patrick, to communicate with this mysterious admirer, and using page numbers and words, was able to send her his contact details. The unknown admirer had proven herself quite smart, and Arthur could feel a connection with her. Arthur’s admirer confessed that she felt herself burdened with taking care of her invalid father, and Arthur encouraged her to eliminate the ‘obstacle’ — but’ she couldn’t find the courage within her to do so. On one occasion, Arthur was commanded by Patrick to kill his own cellmate, Lennon, in exchange for Patrick’s favor, and betraying the trust of his cellmate, Arthur stabbed Lennon to death. Later on, Arthur used the example of his nefarious action to inspire his admirer to take matters into her own hands. 

As the episode ends, the question about the identity of Arthur’s secret admirer looms larger, which is surely linked with the killer in the research facility. Broken minds suffering without any support can cling to any form of encouragement and influence, no matter how vile and toxic it can be — which seems to be the scenario on this occasion.