Diksha Sundriyal
Netflix’s ‘Dead to Me’ wraps up its story in the third season with the stakes getting higher for Jen and Judy. All the trouble they’d stirred in the past two seasons comes back to haunt them all at the same time. With everything going against them, it looks like the law might finally catch up with them. As their friendship is tested, the women are forced to confront the worst things they have done. But owning up to their crimes might lead everything to come undone all over again. Here’s what that ending means for both of them. SPOILERS AHEAD
Dead to Me Season 3 Recap
Following the hit and run, Jen and Judy find themselves in the hospital, while Ben discovers that it was he who hit them. The news of Steve’s death breaks out, and the cops start digging into the mystery of his murder. While Perez tries to keep Jen and Judy’s involvement with the case a secret, it turns out that the duo left behind too many clues to not tie them to the murder. Things get more complicated when FBI agent Glenn Moranis comes back into the picture.
Judy is diagnosed with cancer, and a completely different battle of her life begins. Jen struggles with her feelings for Ben in the face of the fact that she was the one who killed his brother. Whatever intentions she had of keeping a distance from him are thrown out the window when she discovers that she is pregnant. Meanwhile, Nick figures out that Judy and Jen had something to do with Steve’s death, but he lacks the evidence to prove anything.
In the end, when everything has settled down, Jen struggles with the feeling of telling Ben the truth about Steve’s death and giving him closure. Besides, even with all the secrets that Jen has had over the three seasons, she couldn’t keep them for too long. Sooner or later, she would confess to someone, mostly Judy. She feels the same rush of emotions now and turns towards Ben saying that she has to tell him something. But before we can find out what that is, the screen cuts to black and credits start to roll. This leaves us wondering, did Jen finally find the courage to come clean to Ben?
Dead to Me Season 3 Ending: What Does Jen Tell Ben? Does She Confess?
The story of ‘Dead to Me’ began with a secret. Jen’s husband, Teddy, died after Judy hit him with her car and drove away. The guilt ate at Judy and that’s what led her to befriend Jen in the hopes of helping her. But this secret kept her on her toes, and no matter how much she tried, the truth eventually came out. Judy learned a hard lesson from all this. No matter what you do, the truth will always come out, so it’s better to come clean about it as soon as possible.
Jen’s harboring a secret from Ben. She killed his brother, Steve, and even though there’s a whole story behind it that Jen could probably use to justify her actions, it wouldn’t do anything to lessen Ben’s grief. It wouldn’t have been so hard to keep it a secret had Jen and Ben parted ways after a while. Instead, they fall in love with each other and end up having a child together. Now, even if Jen wants to get away from Ben, she can’t. And with Ben looking exactly like Steve, she has to live with the face of her victim night and day.
Judy advises Jen to tell Ben everything before they start their lives together. But the prospect terrifies Jen immensely. Confessing would mean that the life she has so desperately held together will unravel in one stroke. If she admits to the truth, it would also endanger Judy and Perez, both of whom helped her cover up the crime. By the end, however, this threat is removed.
After the Greeks are connected to Glenn’s murder, the FBI extrapolates the finding to deduce that Steve, too, would have been their victim, considering that he had been laundering their money and stealing from them for a long time. With no evidence to connect her to the murder, Jen cannot be arrested, even if she confesses. Even if she tells Ben, and he believes her, he’d have no way to prove it to the cops and send her behind bars. However, it would undoubtedly spoil their relationship.
No matter how bad Steve might have been, he was still Ben’s brother and he loved his twin very much. After Steve’s death, Ben struggles so much that he falls back on alcohol and has to go to rehab. He also admits that not knowing exactly what happened to his brother bothers him a lot. So, when he finally discovers that it was the woman he fell in love with that killed his brother, it would throw his life in shambles, and all the progress that he’d made in healing himself would go to waste. Further, because he wouldn’t be able to prove that Jen killed Steve, he would become resentful towards her, and this might further lead to another murder!
But then, there is a possibility that Ben might forgive Jen. He knows that Jen’s husband was killed when Judy hit him with her car and Steve told her not to stop. He might understand Jen’s feelings towards Steve, and that she couldn’t make him pay for what he did leading her to attack him. Moreover, he knows that despite Judy’s role in the hit-and-run, Jen not only forgave her over time but remained her best friend. In the same vein, when Ben comes clean about hitting her with his car, Jen forgives him. On top of that, Ben is in love with Jen and has a child with her. So, his feelings for her might cloud his love for Steve and encourage him to move on.
There is no way to tell how Ben would react to the news, which is why Jen refrains from telling him. In the end, as she turns to Ben, the look on her face suggests she has steeled herself to the outcome and is ready to tell him everything, no matter what. But there is no way to know for sure if she confessed or changed the subject. There’s no denying that the truth will come out eventually. If not at that very moment, then sometime later. With Judy gone, Jen has to carry the weight of that guilt alone, and it might get too heavy for her someday. But then, two can keep a secret if one of them is dead, and Jen might as well stick to that and carry on with her life. Suffering occasional bouts of guilt is the price she’ll have to pay to keep her life and family together.
Does Judy Die?
While the show leaves us on a cliffhanger about Jen’s confession, it promises a more concrete ending for Judy. We don’t know what the future holds for Jen, but for her best friend, things are a tad more imminent. At the start of Season 3, it is revealed that Judy has cancer. After a few rounds of chemotherapy, it is revealed that she is terminal. While Jen refuses to accept defeat and finds out more about clinical trials, Judy accepts her fate and decides to live the rest of her life in peace.
Judy confesses to killing Steve and even gives the evidence to prove so. But before Nick can tell anyone about it, Jen intervenes and begs him to allow her three weeks for the trial. However, instead of taking her to the clinic, Jen runs away with Judy to Mexico. For three weeks, they spend their days happily, without a care in the world. But when the time comes to go back, Jen offers to move to Mexico and spend the remaining days with her. However, Judy doesn’t want Jen to leave behind her life in Laguna. She advises Jen to go back to her children and Ben and live her life. Judy, on the other hand, stays back in Mexico.
In the first scene of the season, Jen sees a dream in which Judy’s on a boat sailing away. In the end, she sees her friend in a similar situation from a distance. Accepting that she will have to let Judy go her own way, Jen drives back home. Meanwhile, Judy stays in Mexico at Steve’s place. This is where she plans to spend her remaining days, away from the dangers of the law and living in peace. Now that the blame for Steve’s death has been put on the Greeks, no one will come knocking on Judy’s door asking questions. As promised, she might stay in touch with Jen, but her days are too limited to come back to Laguna and see her again. It is fair to assume that Judy dies of cancer in Mexico a few months after Jen leaves her.
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