Why everyone's talking about the ending of Netflix's 'Behind Her Eyes': The art of landing a satisfying TV show finale

The line between the sense and nonsense of an ending is a fine one. Just look at the Marmite reactions from those who have binged new Netflix hit Behind Her Eyes.

The thriller series, starring Simona Brown, Eve Hewson and Tom Bateman and based on Sarah Pinborough’s 2017 bestselling novel, has been stuck at No. 1 of Netflix’s Top 10 UK list since it dropped last week.

And it’s all because of its jaw-dropping finale, which we won’t spoil here.

Read more: The best reactions to that absolutely wild Behind Her Eyes ending

That’s largely down to the fact it’s a secret worth keeping, but also because the show’s denouement is so far out there it’s almost impossible to explain. You have to see it to believe it.

Just ask its author, who was equally as floored by the finale as everyone else.

“I finished watching it and then I had a shower and went to bed and I was still thinking, ‘That ending, man!’ – and I made it up!” Pinborough told The Guardian this week.

Readers of the novel knew what was coming, of course. This was a book that was promoted four years ago with the hashtag #WTFthatending.

The Netflix adaptation has been widely savaged by the critics, but that hasn’t stopped millions of viewers ticking it to the front of their watch lists.

The story of single mother Louise (played by Brown), who becomes embroiled with couple Adele and David (Hewson and Bateman), Behind Her Eyes is smart enough to race to its climax in only six episodes.

Watch: Behind Her Eyes

Read more: Will there be a second season of 'Behind Her Eyes' on Netflix?

But how does a show land a perfect ending when it’s been running for a number of series? Don’t ask that question of most Game Of Thrones fans, whose anger at its eighth season is still felt almost two years after it aired.

It could have been worse. Jon Snow could have broken the fourth wall (not the one keeping out the White Walkers and Free Folk) and told viewers the final season didn’t really happen.

Sounds ludicrous, doesn’t it? Because it is. But that’s exactly how Season 9 of hit US sitcom Roseanne ended in 1997.

The titular heroine, played by Roseanne Barr, wiped out the events of the entire final season when she revealed her husband Dan (John Goodman) hadn’t really survived his Season 8 heart attack and that her family hadn’t become lotto millionaires, as depicted earlier. Retconning Roseanne had just made it all up.

One of the myriad complaints laid at Game Of Thrones was that its ending was too happy (fans are rarely pleased when showrunners go out of their way to please them) - something that worked perfectly last year for lockdown favourite Schitt’s Creek, a show unabashedly created in a candy store and designed to put a smile on your face.

Read more: TV's most crazy endings

But sometimes a happy ending also works wonders because it subverts the rest of a show, as in recent Netflix chess success The Queen’s Gambit, an often dark and daring look at addiction and obsession, making its protagonist’s rather unexpectedly sunny outcome all the more enjoyable.

However, as the reaction to Behind Her Eyes proves, one viewer’s satisfying ending is another’s personal assault to the senses.

And yet the upshot of a divisive denouement is that it sticks in your mind. Or at least in your throat.

From The Sopranos (cut to black) to Lost (cut to a flash-sideways purgatory) to Mad Men (cut to an iconic early 70s ad for Coca-Cola), the end of a TV show should at least attempt to be memorable.

It’s something even the greatest shows find a struggle. It would be hard to argue that the last ever episode of Breaking Bad wasn’t satisfying, but very easy to argue that it didn’t — or simply couldn’t — match the hard-hitting punch of the predecessors from its previous seasons.

With that in mind, will the end of the upcoming and much anticipated Season 6 of BBC’s Line Of Duty be able to top the mind-melting “Urgent exit required” moment from the final episode of Season 3? It's going to have an extra episode, so we will wait and see.

In the meantime, Behind Her Eyes is the talk of streaming, and it’s all because of that ending.

Its Netflix success means we should expect a slew of future dramas attempting to beat its finale for sheer WTFery. But viewers may be ready next time. For now, the Eyes have it.

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