Poker Face season 1 ending explained: What happened in the jaw-dropping finale?
As the long awaited second season of Rian Johnson's Poker Face finally arrives, let's take a look back at the thrilling season one finale
Warning - this article contains major spoilers for Poker Face season 1.
After a long break of over two years, the much-anticipated second season of Poker Face is set to premiere this week.
The popular series, crafted by Knives Out director Rian Johnson, features Natasha Lyonne in the role of Charlie Cale, a casino employee with an extraordinary knack for detecting lies instantly.
After blowing the whistle on her boss, Sterling Frost Jr's (portrayed by Adrien Brody) corrupt activities, she's forced to go on the run. Her unique sixth sense proves useful as she encounters a new murder and cover-up in each episode during her journey.
With Cliff LeGrand (played by Benjamin Bratt), the head of security at the casino, hot on her heels, Charlie can't stay in one place for too long. So, where will the eagerly awaited second season of Poker Face lead her?, reports the Mirror US.
Let's recap the series by revisiting how Charlie escaped her most recent predicament....
What happened at the end of Poker Face season 1?
While most episodes in the inaugural season saw Charlie unraveling a different gruesome death, the finale, The Hook, circles back to the initial incident that forced our unlikely detective to flee.
In the pilot episode of Poker Face, Dead Man's Hand, Sterling Frost Jr ends his own life after Charlie irreparably tarnishes his casino's reputation by revealing a fixed poker game.
This leaves Frost Jr's father, Sterling Frost Sr (Ron Perlman), seeking revenge, sending Cliff to eliminate her.
A year on, we find Cliff in the finale, weary of chasing her across the country. He makes a desperate pact with Frost Sr's adversary Beatrix Hasp (Rhea Perlman) to remove him from the equation.
Upon hearing that Charlie's body is in a Colorado morgue, he goes to investigate but instead finds Morty Bernstein's (Stephanie Hsu) body due to a case of mistaken identity from the previous episode, Escape From S*** Mountain.
He then visits the nearby hospital to check on the Jane Doe from the scene and discovers Charlie there. Frost Sr instructs him to let her recuperate.
Two months later, Cliff welcomes her in the car park after she's been discharged.
They return to the Atlantic City casino where Charlie has a meeting with Frost Sr, who drops a bombshell; he no longer holds her responsible for her son's death and offers her a job. It appears he's aware of Cliff's deal with Hasp and is prepared to give Charlie $500,000 and absolve her if she informs him of any lies during a meeting with her and the other crime families.
However, the situation takes a dramatic turn when Frost Sr presents Charlie with a gift box containing a gun; the lights go out, revealing Sr's glow-in-the-dark poker chip, two shots are fired and Sr is killed. Cliff calls for security, accusing Charlie of shooting his boss, and we see a shot of a gun left on the floor with a smoking barrel.
A flashback reveals the sinister deal Cliff made with Beatrix, ensuring Frost Sr's death appeared accidental and framing Charlie for it. He had cunningly slipped a decoy gun into a gift box, manipulated the power to cut out, and gave Sr a glowing chip to make it easier to eliminate him in the darkness.
In a stroke of luck, Charlie manages to escape the scene and contacts Agent Clark (Simon Helberg), who advises her to find a safe place. She hitches a ride on a bachelorette party bus, amusingly picking up a penis ring along the way, before reuniting with her sister, Emily (Clea DuVall), who gives her a frosty reception.
To her dismay, Charlie also finds her escape boat has been sabotaged.
Feeling desperate, she reaches out to Cliff, who agrees to meet her but sneakily alerts the police to her location. Once together, they discuss Sr's death, with Cliff choosing his words carefully to avoid revealing his plot.
Cliff tries to lure Charlie into believing they can flee together, attempting to trap her below deck as the police arrive. However, Charlie uncovers his scheme when she finds the blacklight poker chips.
Using the penis ring to deliver a powerful punch, she stuns Cliff and dives into the water to escape. But her quick exit was unnecessary, as the police were actually there to arrest Cliff for the murders from the first episode, having found incriminating evidence on Sr's tape recorder.
Charlie finally gets her beloved Barracuda back from Agent Clark, thinking she's in the clear—only to receive a chilling call from Beatrix. The crime boss informs her of an ongoing war with other criminal families and vows that her "fully modernized crime syndicate" will hunt Charlie down if she refuses to become Beatrix's personal human lie detector.
During a tense exchange, when Beatrix questions Charlie about how long she can keep running, Charlie retorts cheekily: "I don't know, B. Let's all of us find out together."
As the season wraps up, we see Charlie ditching her phone and casually sipping a beer, ready for whatever comes next on the road. But the burning question remains: Will Beatrix catch up with her in the upcoming second season?
Keep watching to uncover what fate has in store for Charlie.
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