This article contains major spoilers for the show 'Sugar'. Episode 6
Last time on the Apple TV+ series “Sugar,” John Sugar (Colin Farrell) told Melanie (Amy Ryan), “I have a secret,” and in Episode 6, we finally learn what it is.
As perceptive viewers may have guessed, the incredibly skilled detective, who can speak any language easily and even seems to be able to silently communicate with animals, is not human.
Villain Stallings (Eric Lange) has no idea how accurate he is when he tells the detective that he is “convincingly strange,” right before the outnumbered and unarmed Sugar fulfills his threat to kill Stallings and his two associates.
Apart from his remarkably extensive language and combat skills, we were previously given clues that Sugar is not from this place. In times of stress, his hand begins to shake and he grimly tells himself, “Not yet.” And in this episode, he quietly calms down the villain’s Dobermans, who go from attack mode to playful nuzzles in his presence.
In the very last scene, we see a badly injured Sugar inject himself with a mysterious substance: He watches his reflection in the mirror as his skin turns blue and textured and his hair disappears. He is, we can safely assume, an alien, one who is able to pass himself off as a regular human most of the time.
The syringes come courtesy of Sugar’s friend Henry (Jason Butler Harner), who arrives at the hotel where Sugar is laying low with Melanie. After sending her to the store for more medical supplies, Henry administers the unknown drug to Sugar.
In Episode 5, the mysterious Miller (Paul Schulze) ordered Ruby (Kirby) to warn Sugar off the case and this week we learn that it was Ruby who gave Stallings a heads up that Sugar was on his way.
She once again tells Sugar to forget the missing Olivia, because it’s “for the greater good” and that he will jeopardize “the mission” if he doesn’t drop his quest. We previously saw her host meetings for other “polyglots,” the term used by Sugar’s fellow travelers.
While Apple teased the show from Mark Protosevich as a genre hybrid, before it debuted, Farrell could only hint at Sugar’s true nature: “He keeps his cards close to his chest, he doesn’t really divulge much about his background or about his history,” he told TheWrap.
“He’s deeply intuitive… very attuned to his environment, very attuned to anything living in creation; truly trees, birds, humans, dogs,” said Farrell in an interview conducted before the show debuted. “That was one of the lovely things about him. He had a tenderness to him as well, and a concern for all things [in] creation.”
Two more episodes remain of the eight-episode Season 1. New episodes premiere Fridays on Apple TV+.
