Matthew fox take rock to the face

On the journey to the cave kurt Russell places rocks for the cripple to follow. The old guy questions this and say that it should be his job to place the rocks not the sherif but Kurt says no he will do it.

Then at the end when they leave kurt he says to the old guy take the couple home but go the same way they came, which he does.

On the way back he picks up a strange white rock which to me symbolises the cave dwellers and its completely out of place anywhere else in the land eg not looking like normal rocks but it looks like the land it was taken from.

When they get back into normal land he drops it, you can see plainly it doesn't belong there and it stands out. Now the 3 gun shots you presume are kurt Russell killing the last 3 cave dwellers however how do we know that there arnt more?? And how do we know that one of those shots didn't miss?? Or were him ending his own life.

So I see the rock as the old guy finally leaving a trail of his own, a trail for the cave dwellers to find an easy way back to the town. Thus changing the ending from what we think is a good ending to a haunting bad ending.

Well that's my theory anyway.

I just saw it as he casually dropped the rock as he knew that Sheriff Hunt (Kurt Russell) wouldn't be returning, even if he finished off the remaining trogs. They both knew It was his last stand. As Chicory is escorting the O'Dwyers home, there was simply no one left to leave a trail for. If this wasn't already obvious, he previously questioned the Sheriff, believing that it was his duty as the back up deputy to leave the trail for O'Dwyer to follow. Throwing the rock away at the end shows that although he (as the NEW Sheriff) is carrying out his duty, he also realises there is no point. (IMO anyway)

I just saw it as he casually dropped the rock as he knew that Sheriff Hunt (Kurt Russell) wouldn't be returning, even if he finished off the remaining trogs. They both knew It was his last stand. As Chicory is escorting the O'Dwyers home, there was simply no one left to leave a trail for. If this wasn't already obvious, he previously questioned the Sheriff, believing that it was his duty as the back up deputy to leave the trail for O'Dwyer to follow. Throwing the rock away at the end shows that although he (as the NEW Sheriff) is thinking about carrying out his duty, he also realises there is no point. (IMO anyway)

Lots of symbolism theory here. My take was pretty simple on the rock at the end...

There were three troglodytes left as they set out. Old man picked up a rock to use in self defense if he had to. Three gunshots are heard. Old man believes his boss shot all three trogs. Drops his rock because he doesn't need it anymore.