Payback spoilers follow.
ITV drama series Payback began by introducing us to mother-of-two Lexie (Morven Christie), who seemed to have a perfect life – cute kids, handsome accountant husband Jared and helpful au pair Doris, all living in a huge house in Edinburgh.
Of course, it wasn’t long before she – and we – discovered that her idyllic life was not all it appeared. After Jared was stabbed to death by four teenage boys in a seemingly random attack, it emerged that his life up to that point was just as shady as his murder.
Jared had been laundering money for organised crime gang leader Cal Morris (Peter Mullan) – which was bad enough – and to make things even worse for poor widow Lexie, he had also stolen around £27 million from Cal by funnelling it through fake companies and accounts.
Unsurprisingly, Cal was not exactly pleased by this turn of events – especially as it halted the purchase of a remote Scottish island he was determined to buy – so he forced Lexie (by threatening her children) into helping him uncover exactly what Jared had done with the money and where it was hidden.
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And if Lexie wasn’t already having a bad day, dogged cop DI Royce was lurking in the shadows, having made her the prime suspect in her own husband’s murder, while DCI Guthrie (Derek Riddell) also became involved in the case, seeing Lexie as an opportunity to bring Cal Morris down once and for all, even if it meant putting her life at risk.
As Lexie desperately worked to help Cal retrieve his money under the watchful eye of his nephew Aaron, it seemed that the only sane person in Scotland was financial investigative officer DC Khan (Prasanna Puwanarajah), who listened in on Lexie’s conversations via bugs he had placed in her home and sent her anonymous messages to warn her about DCI Guthrie’s intentions and to help her track down the missing cash.
However, by the end of the penultimate episode, Lexie was in deeper than ever, having discovered a missing shipment of Aaron’s was made up of puffer jackets with their stuffing filled with money. And when she returned home after this find, she walked in to discover Cal Morris sitting on the floor, playing with her kids – and wanting to know where she had been…
Payback ending explained: Who killed Jared, and where is the stolen money?
The final episode opens with Cal still in Lexie’s living room. She tells him about Beaumont, the antique dealer she thinks handled transactions for Jared, and DC Khan, listening in, realises that Lexie has just put the dealer in danger so rushes to contact him.
Lexie, meanwhile, is forced to travel with Aaron, his girlfriend Manda and Cal and his wife and daughter to the isle of Eris, the island that Cal wants to purchase. It turns out his plan is now to own a portion of it – enough to place 50 wind turbines there so he can make a fortune producing sustainable energy. (So he may be a murderer but at least he’s trying to help the environment, right?)
While on the island, Lexie realises that Manda is the mysterious woman Jared had been meeting in the weeks before his death, but the two women are interrupted by Aaron before Manda has a chance to explain what her relationship with Jared was, and why she is wearing a pair of sapphire earrings that Lexie knows her husband bought with some of the stolen money.
Back in Edinburgh, Manda finally reveals to Lexie that Jared had been protecting her from Aaron’s temper – he had bought the earrings to replace one Aaron had bought her that she’d lost, and also paid for her to stay in a hotel one night when she didn’t feel safe with Aaron.
While this clears up Manda’s relationship with Jared – and proves Jared wasn’t having an affair – Lexie also realises that it makes Aaron a prime suspect in Jared’s murder if he had discovered that Jared had been close to Manda.
Unfortunately, it’s not going to be easy to prove Aaron hired the young men who stabbed Jared in the street – one of them is already dead and another is on the run, while the other two are unknown to the police.
After coming to the conclusion that the police are, well, pretty useless, Lexie decides to take matters in her own hands, first by lying to Aaron about his missing shipment and then by letting the police know exactly where to find it so they can trap him.
She finally gets an agreement from Guthrie that the police will protect her and her kids – erm, let’s hope it also includes au pair Doris, as she has been remarkably stoic and understanding, even when Cal (briefly) kidnapped her and the kids in a previous episode – but Guthrie wants one more favour. He wants Lexie to get Cal to admit he knows what is in the shipping container (that valuable stuffing in the puffer coats) while the police are recording her.
With a magnetic bug literally up her sleeve, Lexie calls Cal for a meeting – the plan being she gets him on tape, then calls Aaron with the location of the container, and then lets the police know so they can swoop in on both of them.
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Yeah, that sounds like it is all going to go well, especially as Cal’s suggested meeting place is a creepy old building with thick walls that are blocking the bug’s signal.
Oh, and the building also boasts a room where Cal and his lackey are torturing Mr Beaumont, the antique dealer who bought valuable items of jewellery under Jared’s instructions. Apparently, Jared donated the jewellery worth – you guessed it, £27 million – to charity. Wait, what?
Lexie, being the super cool woman she is, gets Cal to admit the missing shipment is his, and then tells him where it is – while also making him believe that Aaron knew its location all along, implying Cal’s nephew was stealing it for himself. She lets Aaron know where the container is as well, but doesn’t yet text the code word 'delivered' she is supposed to, to let the police know that everything is in place.
For Cal, the evidence against Aaron is mounting, as he discovers that it was Aaron’s girlfriend Manda who was meeting Jared, and that Aaron also already knew one of the boys who stabbed Jared in the street. Just as Aaron finds the shipping container, Lexie sends the 'delivered' message, knowing the police won’t get there in time to arrest Aaron before Cal exacts his own revenge – then a shot rings out, with Aaron presumably shot by one of Cal’s minions.
As Lexie speaks at Jared’s funeral, the police move in on the container and find a dead Aaron, while Guthrie’s team arrest Cal and charge him with money-laundering offences that should see him sent to prison for a long while.
Lexie and her family are finally safe, but there is still one more surprise for her. Jared’s dad reveals that Jared had set up a number of charitable trusts for his children before he died (so that’s where the £27 million is!) and he also posted his dad a parcel – a sapphire necklace meant for Lexie, to celebrate the new life he thought they were going to have.
DC Khan, having obtained an address in Washington DC during his own investigation that he thinks may be a house Jared bought, goes to see Lexie, presumably to confront her about the money and everything that has happened.
Instead, he watches her get into a taxi with Doris and the children (Lexie’s daughter wearing that presumably pricey sapphire necklace), and throws the Post-It note with the US address down the drain, thus letting her and her children depart for the new home Jared had planned for them all in America, thousands of miles away from Cal Morris.
All episodes of Payback are available to stream now on ITVX.
Freelance film & TV writer, Digital Spy
Critic and writer Jo Berry has been writing about TV and movies since she began her career at Time Out aged 18. A regular on BBC Radio, Jo has written for titles including Empire, Maxim, Radio Times, OK!, The Guardian and Grazia, is the author of books including Chick Flicks and The Parents’ Guide to Kids’ Movies.
She is also the editor of website Movies4Kids. In her career, Jo has interviewed well-known names including Beyonce, Steven Spielberg, Tom Hanks, Kiefer Sutherland, Tom Cruise and all the Avengers, spent many an hour crushed in the press areas of award show red carpets. Jo is also a self-proclaimed expert on Outlander and Brassic, and completely agrees that Die Hard is a Christmas movie.
