Missing You spoilers follow.
Fool Me Once star Richard Armitage promised an exciting conclusion to the latest Harlan Coben mystery thriller to hit Netflix.
The actor told Digital Spy that building Missing You's story "through loss – the love that's been lost from Kat's father, the loss of her fiancé and her quest to find it and reconnect with it – that's the thing that's going to stab you in the heart at the end".
Well, there were certainly some emotive moments along the way. What started out as a daughter's simple desire to uncover the truth surrounding her father's death 11 years ago, quickly descended into chaos when Rosalind Eleazar's Kat Donovan unexpectedly and indirectly reconnected with ex-fiancé Josh (Ashley Walters) through a dating app.
His reappearance in her life dragged many questions to the surface, especially when she learned that he happened to be linked to a string of missing people.
The penultimate episode saw a determined Kat finally come face-to-face with her ex-lover, but does the finale live up to that 'heart-stabbing' moment Armitage teased? Will the rug truly be yanked out from underneath us?
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Here's what happened in the finale of Netflix's Missing You.
Missing You ending explained
Kat's inevitable reunion with Josh was, as expected, anti-climatic for the detective, who had hoped his answers would finally heal the emotional wound she'd been saddled with for 11 years following his abandonment of her.
While she did clarify that his identity had been stolen for the dating app and that he was not connected to the missing-persons case she'd been investigating, the rest of his revelations fell short.
His disappearance 11 years ago following the death of her dad Clint (Sir Lenny Henry) broke her, and the best he could give her in a way of explanation was that he "had to [leave]".
Dissatisfied with this, Kat filled in the blanks for them both, claiming that he left after visiting the man convicted of murdering her dad, Monte Leburne (Marc Warren), in prison and discovering Clint was a corrupt cop whose secrets got him killed.
As imagined, Josh's "the truth would have broken you" excuse for not confiding in her wasn't the response she was looking for, and so after some face-nuzzles, almost-kisses and declarations of love on his part, she bolted, unable to trust him.
Meanwhile, kidnapper Titus (Steve Pemberton) and his goons were doing their very best to re-capture their victim Dana (Lisa Faulkner), who had managed to escape, by using her son Brendan (Oscar Kennedy) as bait. They kidnapped Brendan, who had been working with Kat to find his mother, and used him as leverage to lure Dana back.
Luckily for him, Kat witnessed his kidnapping, which took place in front of her home where he was hoping to meet her.
Kat went back to the police station to regroup and gather up resources that would help her to find Brendan.
There, she confronted her boss Stagger (Richard Armitage) about Monte Leburne's conviction. Stagger admitted to paying Leburne to take the fall for Clint's death.
He told Kat that he did it to bury the truth about Clint's corrupt connections with the criminal Calligan (James Nesbitt) and conceal the affair he was having.
Kat later discovered that the affair was with a man named Parker (Cyril Nri) and that not only was Clint hiding his queerness, he was also living a double life with Parker, whom he also loved.
Kat walked out on Stagger, turning her attention back to the case. With a possible location in hand, she headed down to the farm where they believed Brendan to be.
Back at the farm where the hostages were indeed being held, Titus learned just how much of a mess he was in when he discovered Dana had been in his office, killed one of his men and possibly called the police.
He ordered his other subordinate to burn the place down – including the hostages he'd been exploiting for financial gain by getting them to transfer large sums of money into his off-shore account.
Dana, who had stuck around for the sake of her son (having been on the phone to him when he was taken), began liberating all the victims. After taking their revenge on Titus' henchman, she urged her fellow hostages to flee but halted when Titus yelled that he had Brendan.
Dana arrived before Kat, at which point Titus ordered her to give up the other victims while threatening her and Brendan. Kat's eventual arrival distracted Titus, and the pair had a shoot-out. Ultimately, Titus found himself on the losing end of that duel and died, having been shot by Kat.
All the loose ends appeared to tighten up in Kat's life. Her case was wrapped up, she learnt why Josh left, and that her father's dodgy lifestyle was what led to his death.
She even discovered from Parker that Clint had gotten mixed up with Calligan because he threatened to expose his life with Parker to Clint's wife Odette (Brigid Zengeni) and Kat. He'd wanted to protect them. This should have put Kat's mind at ease, but it was only when Josh arrived at her doorstep that she really felt settled.
Despite his abrupt disappearance and lukewarm reason for leaving, the pair agreed to give their relationship another shot.
"I just spent the morning with someone who waited a very long time to be with someone," she told him, referring to Parker. "I don't want to wait."
Cue the happy, happy montage of their reunion, an abundance of laughter as their respective families welcomed each other into their lives. Their happiness seemed never-ending and probably would have been if not for the phone call Kat received pertaining to results of the fingerprints on her dad's murder weapon.
Who killed Kat's dad in Missing You?
In the final moments of the season, we learned that Josh killed Kat's dad Clint, but it wasn't as black-and-white as that. While the prints on the murder weapon belonged to Josh, Clint's death was not intentional.
Josh explained that 11 years ago, Aqua (Mary Malone) had spotted Clint and Parker in the streets together clearly having a lover's tiff. Realising that his double life was in jeopardy, Clint went to the flat Aqua shared with Josh to confront her.
Aqua tried to reassure Clint that she wouldn't be the one to expose his secret to Kat, but encouraged him to come out and live his life openly. However, Clint became skittish when a call came through from Kat.
He was convinced that Aqua had told Kat everything and was deceiving him now and in a fit of rage attacked Aqua, demanding that she tell him exactly what she'd shared with Kat. Terrified, Aqua pulled out a knife from the kitchen but Clint quickly disarmed her.
Josh arrived home at this point to witness Clint's attack on Aqua; there was a tussle as he tried to wrestle the knife away from Clint, and in the madness Clint was fatally wounded. Stagger, who Clint had called earlier, arrived on the scene as Clint was dying.
In his final moments, Clint instructed them all to keep the truth from Kat and Odette and not to involve any police. From there, the cover-up took a life on its own, plaguing Kat for 11 years.
Learning the truth devastated Kat, but at the same time released her from her anguish. At least she understood the real reason Josh had to leave and knew the whole truth about the complex man her father was, how he lived but also how he died.
This may have seemed like the end for the pair's newly reignited relationship, but Missing You offered a grain of hope when at the end, sat on the bed with a gulf of distance between them, Kat reached out, touching her little finger to Josh's. It was tentative and barely grazed, but it's probably all the pair could handle.
All episodes of Missing You are available to watch now on Netflix.
TV writer, Digital Spy Janet completed her Masters degree in Magazine Journalism in 2013 and has continued to grow professionally within the industry ever since. For six years she honed her analytical reviewing skills at the Good Housekeeping institute eventually becoming Acting Head of Food testing. She also freelanced in the field of film and TV journalism from 2013-2020, when she interviewed A-List stars such as Samuel L Jackson, Colin Firth and Scarlett Johansson. In 2021 she joined Digital Spy as TV writer where she gets to delve into more of what she loves, watching copious amounts of telly all in the name of work. Since taking on the role she has conducted red carpet interviews with the cast of Bridgerton, covered the BAFTAs and been interviewed by BBC Radio and London Live. In her spare time she also moonlights as a published author, the book Gothic Angel.
