Ending
Does anyone have any thoughts on what the ending could mean??
shareYou mean when she notices Sidney at the end of her speech & smiles?
shareYeah exactly!!
shareI believe it was to depict the total control she had achieved in all the lives she had messed with. Whilst her anti-bullying speech is being delivered, the ramifications of her actions are being shown with Sam & Allison's fate. The whole speech turned out to be a proper metaphor (of sorts) of Jean being the bully. She manipulated & pushed her way into her patient's lives, drew them in and established dominance over them. You could literally see them being so dependent on her. Sam had almost made it out, but then got pulled back in.
Though we didn't get a full background on Melissa Saugraves, I'm certain that it was a similar scenario and that Jean had some part in the arson incident (hint: her conversation with Claire). She would have probably driven Melissa to commit the whole act & pushed the blame on her. Melissa wanted to break free from her, but reconciles in the end, despite how awfully she was treated.
Essentially, Jean created a whole new persona for herself (Diane Heart) who leads a different life and is a complete opposite from her usual character; a good wife, friend & mother. This new persona overlaps her regular life and that's where things begin to fall apart. The ending was, in my estimation, to reflect on how her consequences as having this alternate side affected everyone around her and eventually, Jean to finally take ownership by apologizing and trying to make amends. The smile at the end would be her realization of the level of control she had achieved & that, in some way, was satisfying.
Really good post! I thought the same too. I really hope we get a season 2, though I guess we could Accept this as a ending.
shareAgreed. They should be able to pull off another season, but I don't see this show going anywhere beyond it. The concept and the content it can offer is very restrictive, in terms of it's longevity. I feel one short season (says 8 episodes) should be sufficient for a full closure.
But going by the ratings, it doesn't seem to have made a major impact on Netflix, even with Naomi Watt's presence. So would be interesting to see how it works out, especially amidst this new cancellation spree that Netflix is on.
I agree with all that you said. There were some unanswered questions, like why Jean took Sidney to Sams engaement party, and tried to put Sidney back together with him. Why did she do that? Also, how did Sidney put the written article by Alexis together in Michaels office? How did Sidney figure out anything?
shareI thought the article thing was the least mysterious part - Alexis likely posted it somewhere online where Sydney could Google it.
As for why she took Sydney to Sam's engagement party, same reason she does anything in this series - to mess with both their heads. We spend the series thinking she's falling under Sydney's spell, but it turns out she's the one manipulating and messing with everyone else.
It's kind of satisfying, ending the series on a note of maximum messed-up-ness. Not that we have a choice. Guess Jean wound up messing with the audience as well.