The climactic finale ended with a perplexing post-credits scene.
Boat Story has kept viewers hooked for weeks with its twisty crime saga – and sure enough, no one could have anticipated the strange direction of the series finale.
The concluding chapter sees Janet (Daisy Haggard) and Samuel (Paterson Joseph) in a desperate bid to escape the mess they’ve made, while keeping their loved ones safe in the process.
Adding to the tension is the shocking death count the series has seen thus far, which demonstrates that writers Harry and Jack Williams aren’t afraid to kill off characters in the name of story – but does that include the two main protagonists?
Read on for our spoiler-filled recap of the Boat Story ending, as well as that surprising post-credits scene.
Boat Story ending explained
The series finale of Boat Story picks up in the aftermath of the gutting preceding chapter, which saw plucky police officer Ben Tooh brutally murdered by henchman Guy.
That devastating detail is kept from his mother, Pat, as she has been rather busy playing muse to French crime boss The Tailor, who associates her with a character from a film titled Les Enfants.
In a dark flashback, we learn that he became obsessed with the motion picture from a young age, adopting its plot as his own life story in a desperate bid to escape the truth – that his father murdered his mother while he was watching it.
Nevertheless, the love that The Tailor feels for Pat appears to have softened him at first, as shown by his reaction when she is abducted by his bitter rivals Janet and Samuel.
They intend to trade Pat for the safe return of Janet’s son, Alan, who had himself been kidnapped by Guy – and in a change of pace, it goes rather well. Initially, at least.
Only after the hostage swap do things take a turn, as Samuel and Janet are blamed for the murder of Ben, leaving them both scrambling for a plan to go on the run.
Unfortunately, Samuel’s family want nothing to do with him after he gambled away their future (and locked them in a storage unit to boot). And he later learns that his cut of the cocaine sale has been swiped by Janet, who left Alan’s tuba as a calling card.
Shortly after, the police catch up to him. Talk about a bad day!
Janet proves herself to be the more moral of the duo, risking her freedom by mounting a daring rescue of Pat after realising what The Tailor really had planned for her.
Indeed, far from an innocent romance, the Frenchman sought closure for his childhood trauma by re-enacting the ending of Les Enfants in real-life – which sees the lead character poison his lover, before cutting her up and eating her.
“F***ing hell,” says Pat when Janet fills her in on the details. We concur.
Fortunately, it doesn’t come to that, as Janet stows away on The Tailor’s boat and interrupts his grand finale. In the end, Pat delivers the killing blow, before being informed of her son’s fate.
Boat Story wraps up rather hastily from there, with a quick epilogue rushing through major developments for each character that could very well end up dividing viewers.
We learn that the case against Samuel is thrown out of court, but he goes on to score a book deal via a contact in Gamblers Anonymous. Unfortunately, the film rights to his life remain with reformed crook Craig.
Pat returns to her pastry shop, grief-stricken by the loss of her son. Although the narration hints at a brighter chapter in her future, courtesy of a Spanish man called Carlos.
Disregarding his earlier aspirations for something more wholesome, Guy continues to work in the blood-soaked world of organised crime, until his misdeeds catch up to him and he is assassinated in his home.
The Tailor, whose name is revealed to be Jules-Baptiste Grimondelle (in a nod to Tchéky Karyo’s other character by the Williams brothers), is buried next to late actress Geneviève LaRue, who starred in Les Enfants.
Janet and Alan flee to Cuba using her fortune from the drug deal – a happy-ish ending, although there’s a sense that neither is entirely content with living as fugitives.
Boat Story post-credits scene explained
In a strange post-credits scene, the narrator is revealed to be a man named Elias (played by The Tourist‘s Ólafur Darri Ólafsson), who we meet in a sticky situation – waving a shotgun at a bound hostage as police sirens wail outside.
He says that he’s been telling the story of Samuel and Janet to his victim in the hopes of “learning from their mistakes”, before heading outside to face his destiny.
It’s left ambiguous whether Elias inhabits the same reality as Samuel and Janet, or if they are a work of fiction that he has invented – given the meta style of Boat Story’s presentation, we wouldn’t be surprised if it’s the latter.
That’s just one of numerous questions we’re left with. Alas, it’s unclear if this is intended to set up a second season – which could take the form of a quirky crime anthology similar to Fargo – or if this sting will remain unresolved.
As Samuel and Craig discuss in the concluding scene, we shouldn’t always be fixated on getting a perfectly tidy ending – and that may be what the Williams brothers are trying to teach us here.
Boat Story is available to stream on BBC iPlayer. Check out more of our Drama coverage or visit our TV Guide and Streaming Guide to find out what’s on.
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