Before Episode 5 Recap: Noah's Collapse & 7 Other Reveals

Warning: This article contains MAJOR SPOILERS for Before episode 5!

Before episode 5 is one of the fastest-paced episodes yet, incorporating multiple reveals that will influence the story moving forward. In the first episode, the psychological thriller sets up the central mystery of how Eli is connected to Noah. Since then, each episode has continued to build on this question, introducing Lynn’s book drawing, shared hallucinations, and a strange farmhouse. At this point in the Apple TV+ original, there are more questions than there are answers, but it doesn’t make the story any less enjoyable.

However, Before episode 5 marks the halfway point in the series, and it serves as a turning point in the story. While the Billy Crystal show has been a slow-burn psychological thriller, this episode is the most shocking, action-packed entry so far. The connections between the two main characters in Before become more pronounced with each new reveal in episode 5, suggesting but not directly confirming that there might be something supernatural going on in the story.

8 Noah Says He And Eli Are In Lynn’s Drawing

There’s Ambiguity About Whether Noah Is Being Literal Or Not

When Eli comes to the psychiatric ward to perform therapy with Noah, he brings Lynn’s children’s book drawing with him. He asks Noah about the similarities between his drawing and Lynn’s, showing the young boy the drawing of two children walking through the snowy forest that he received from Jackson in Before episode 4. Strangely, Noah says he and Eli are the people in the drawing. When asked what they are doing, the young boy says that they are searching for their friend – a detail from the book that Eli never revealed to Noah.

The fact that Noah knows information about the book that isn’t disclosed brings up many questions, such as whether Lynn showed him the book at some point (if they have a secret relationship) or if he has some kind of undisclosed connection to the story. Before also doesn’t clarify through context clues whether Noah truly believes they are in the story or is using his imagination to connect with the drawing. Both are equally viable possibilities based on the central mystery and everything leading up to this point.

7 Eli Starts Hallucinating The Worm Under Noah’s Skin

The Hallucination Spreads Without Eli And Noah Ever Discussing What The Young Boy Is Seeing

From the very first episode, Before makes it clear that Eli and Noah both experience visual hallucinations, though Eli’s visions are exclusively him seeing his dead wife. However, this changes in Before episode 5 when Eli starts to see something that looks like a worm slithering under Noah’s skin. The young boy has been seeing this all the way back to episode 2, but he is never shown divulging that information to Eli until after he sees it early in Before episode 5.

This scene is a place where Before’s sparse soundtrack benefits the show. Without music, the sound of the worm wriggling through Noah’s forehead is more pronounced – one of the more disturbing, horror-esque elements of the show. In addition to making viewers’ skin crawl, the fact that Eli starts to see the worm without knowing that Noah is also experiencing it suggests there might be a less-than-normal explanation for what’s going on.

Noah and Eli are missing many components of the episode’s namesake illness, “Folie à deux,” the most notable of which in this situation is communication about the psychotic symptom (from StatPearls via NCBI). Plus, most of the time, Shared Delusional Disorder centers on delusions, not hallucinations. Unless they plan on misrepresenting the real disorder, this can’t be the explanation for both individuals having the worm hallucination.

6 Noah Becomes Paralyzed After He Collapses

Lynn’s Drawing Distresses Noah So Much That It Seemingly Causes Conversion Disorder

After Eli presents his client with the photo of the farmhouse, Noah looks at the back and becomes distressed at seeing the letters “B.W.” He continues to get more worked up as he’s shown his drawing and Lynn’s storybook illustration one after another. He mentions something behind his eye – indirectly referencing the worm – and then collapses in Eli’s arms. His skin is ice-cold after he loses consciousness, which could have a medical explanation or could connect to the ice hallucinations he’s been seeing since episode 3.

Unfortunately, despite regaining consciousness, he cannot move his body. The doctor explains this as possibly being locked-in syndrome, a neurological condition where a patient can’t move most or all of their body but can move their eyes, blink, and maintain cognitive functioning. However, Eli suggests an alternative explanation – conversion disorder. This occurs when high psychological stress causes abnormal physical symptoms that a different medical condition cannot explain. Both of these possibilities fit with the symptoms displayed by Noah, but the latter seems the more likely option based on the fact that Before is classified as a psychological thriller.

5 The Child Psychiatric Ward Experiences A Mass Psychogenic Illness

All The Children In Noah’s Ward Start Showing Symptoms After Collapsing

After Noah collapses, he’s placed on a gurney and rolled out of the room. As he passes every child in the ward, they, too, lose consciousness. By the time he leaves the room, every client in his ward is on the floor. The hospital locks down the ward and puts every child in the room in isolation, thinking that there is some sort of biological illness that caused everyone to lose consciousness collectively.

The hospital even insists on having Eli receive a medical checkup before he can leave the premises, with the implication that he would have to stay if he exhibited any symptoms. He’s only allowed to go home since he doesn’t show signs of an illness. Later, every person who visits Noah must do so in a quarantine suit to ensure they don’t get the biological organism that started the situation.

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However, it’s eventually revealed that the more likely explanation is that Noah experienced conversion disorder triggered by the drawing, and every other child in the ward experienced a psychogenic illness. The clients in the ward are all in a psychologically vulnerable state, making them susceptible to influence. This would also explain why all the children exhibit drastically different symptoms.

4 Eli Finds Lynn’s Other Children’s Book Drawings

Lynn’s Other Drawings Could Provide Context On What’s Happening With Noah

When Eli goes to see Jackson in Before episode 4, he receives one of Lynn’s drawings for her children’s book. However, that’s the only drawing that the friend has. The husband presumes that Lynn didn’t draw anything more than that single illustration. However, Cleo suggests in Before episode 5 that there might be more drawings. After all, Lynn was known for creating sketches while coming up with ideas for a new project. It turns out Cleo was right.

Eli and Cleo start searching for the drawings, and he realizes that she might have put them in her box of medical things that Lynn said he “wouldn’t like.” Considering he finds them under a false bottom of the box, it’s clear that she was trying to hide the drawings from her husband. This begs the question of whether the discussion of death and mortality wasn’t the real reason she wanted to keep the drawings secret. Ultimately, these drawings could provide further answers in future episodes about what’s really happening with Noah in Before.

3 Eli Figures Out The Meaning Of “B.W.” On The Back Of Lynn’s Farmhouse Photo

“B.W.” Are The Initials Of Lynn’s Ex-Boyfriend

After Eli finds the other pages of Lynn’s children’s book, Cleo points out that one of the drawings has notes about “Benjamin’s nightmare.” Eli connects that Lynn used to have an ex-boyfriend named Benjamin Walker, and the next moment, he realizes that Benjamin’s initials match the ones written on the back of the farmhouse photo. Since almost nothing is known about this man, fans have used this detail and Noah’s reaction to speculate about a supernatural element that could be going on.

Since Noah draws the farmhouse, has some kind of connection to Lynn, and reacts in fear of the initials “B.W.,” some fans think Noah might be Benjamin Walker. If true, the question then comes as to how he went from being a fully grown adult dating a woman to being a child in the foster care system. There could be some kind of reincarnation element to the story that hasn’t yet been disclosed.

An alternate theory is that Noah knows that he is the child of Benjamin Walker and Lynn. This might explain why he says that Eli hurt him. He could blame the child psychologist for breaking up the relationship of his parents. However, both of these ideas are simply speculation and might be proven wrong with future episodes of the Billy Crystal Apple TV+ show.

2 Eli Learns Lynn’s Ex Was Also Hallucinating Worms Under His Skin

Before Doesn’t Explain Why So Many People Are Hallucinating Worms

After making the “B.W.” connection, Eli decides to retrieve the cassette tapes Lynn made with her boyfriend from her mother’s house. He thinks there might be answers on the tapes about the nightmare she wrote about on one of her drawings. Most of the scenes where he goes to retrieve the recordings do very little other than show him to be hallucinating more than just Lynn, which was hinted at by the worm earlier in Before episode 5. However, the end of the scene provides a chilling and meaningful reveal.

Eli gets a glimpse at Benjamin’s nightmare when he hears Benjamin scream in panic on the tape about worms wriggling under his skin, which connects him, Eli, and Noah. There are no answers about why all three of them would be seeing the same thing. The lack of explanation leaves the door open for them to be experiencing a paranormal phenomenon, something that past episodes have hinted at. Nothing in the episodes fits into a simple psychological explanation.

1 Eli Cuts Into Noah’s Forehead With A Scalpel

Eli Hurts His Client But Thinks He’s Helping

The final moments of Before episode 5 are tense and horrifying to watch. Without permission or the proper preparation, Eli goes into Noah’s room, and takes a scalpel to his client’s forehead. His mother watches the whole thing through the wall with the window, banging on it and screaming for him to stop. However, Eli can’t be deterred. He remembers Noah saying something was behind his eye. Since Eli doesn’t explain what he’s doing, it can only be speculated that he thinks the worm behind Noah’s eye is causing his paralysis.

The doctors run in to stop him, but the damage is already done. He has used forceps to remove the worm he saw underneath Noah’s skin. Unfortunately, at the last second, he realizes that the worm isn’t really there, and then he collapses. It seems inevitable, based on this incident in Before episode 5, that he will be removed from Noah’s case, probably fired, and potentially even admitted into a psychological ward. This could create a barrier to him solving the mystery in the second half of the miniseries.

Cast

Billy Crystal , Judith Light , Rosie Perez , Jacobi Jupe , Maria Dizzia , Ava Lalezarzadeh

Character(s)

Dr. Eli Adler , Lynn , Denise , Noah , Barbara , Cleo

Release Date

October 24, 2024

Seasons

1

Creator(s)

Sarah Thorp

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