SPOILERS Need some help

I like to think that I'm pretty on top of things when I watch a show, and that it doesn't offer any need to be explained. Perhaps, as I age, that's less and less the case. My girlfriend and I just watched the (season?) finale last night, and I'm really not understanding some of the points, perhaps you guys could fill me in.

(I don't intend this thread to be about whether the show or episode was good or bad...just looking to fill in my understanding of the plot.)


OK, so...

Danny is taken to his parents, and they take the photo. Clearly the photo is meant to do something...what does he find inside the camera? I don't understand what happened.

Danny goes to visit Alex's mother. He asks his question (so far, so good), he learns how she had raised him to be a spy, and why (so far, so good)...and then he figures out that Charlotte Rampling isn't really Alex's mother. He seems to figure this out using the photo I referenced above, taken back out of the shredder. Was there some other flashpoint there? I accept that Danny has an intuitive feel for figuring this stuff out, as noted by Alex's "mother"...but I did expect there to be some telling moment where the lightbulb on this one turned on. Did I miss that?

Alex's real mother becomes upset, and lights the maze on fire. At what was she upset? Was it just the stress of keeping all these secrets that she finally snapped? Why burn the maze (destroy memories of Alex?)


Thanks for any help!


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For Nate.