For such a deliberately complex series, the ending of Outer Range Season 2 is simple enough. In fact, Episode 7 could be described – uncharitably, granted – as a bit plodding.
This is partly because it’s not really an ending. One of the problems with mystery-box sci-fi of this type is that it never really ends, since it’s always teeing up new questions that oftentimes the writers themselves haven’t figured out answers to. I suspect that might be the case here.
The future promised by the finale, one of yellow-outfitted time cultists and paradoxical family drama, seems bleak.
Wayne Throws Himself Into The Hole
Early on in the finale, Wayne discovers that Luke has killed Billy. “If I’d known your true colors,” he growls into Luke’s voicemail, “I’d have named you Cain.” Ouch.
Since he never made a secret of who the favorite was, I’m not sure how Wayne can be especially surprised by this development. Nevertheless, he takes the news very badly. And I mean he’s proper, Old Testament furious, so much so that he burns down the ranch while he’s sitting in it.
Naturally, he decides to leave at the last moment, but he only goes as far as the hole. Ever the spiritualist, he demands answers of the swirling abyss, and weirdly enough he seems to get them. The audience isn’t made privy to whatever kind of transmission he receives, though. But it’s compelling enough that he dives head-first into the pit and we don’t see him again.
Perry Regains His Family
Picking up where Perry left off with the younger version of his father in the penultimate episode, Royal takes the bold step of pushing Perry into the hole, believing his presence in the past is messing with the natural order (like all good ranchers, he justifies this with a fairly grim story. Cowboys love a monologue.)
Conveniently enough, Perry emerges on the night he killed Trevor Tillerson. Sensing an opportunity, he rushes to the bar to intervene, and sure enough finds himself fighting Trevor outside. Perry gets involved, and Trevor takes the opportunity to cheap-shot his younger counterpart, leading to his death.
Perry carries his dead self to the hole and, after stealing his wedding ring, rolls him inside. He returns home to the ranch as if nothing happened, and shacks back up with his family, who’re none the wiser.
Autumn Kidnaps Amy
Outer Range | Image via Prime Video
As if it was always meant to be, Autumn and Luke Tillerson team up to retrieve Amy from the weird commune. Autumn gets inside by pretending to be Amy’s sister. Getting the impression that she’d be willing to leave without her mother, Autumn confronts a meditating Rebecca and reveals who she really is.
Autumn threatens Rebecca into allowing Amy to leave with her, lest she tell her everything. Rebecca bids Amy farewell, and Imogen Poots’s look of disgust during this sequence is quite something. Autumn marches off like a football hooligan, but before she departs she smears some of the time dust across Rebecca’s mouth, giving her visions of future cult-leader Autumn.
By the time Royal and Cecelia arrive, Amy is long gone and the place is in disarray. Knowing they can’t catch up to Autumn before she gets to the hole, Cecelia calls her and tries to talk her down. However, she’s adamant about Amy being the missing piece of the puzzle, so Royal enlists the help of Joy to ensure Autumn is stopped.
Amy Goes Down The Hole
Joy does her best. When Luke speeds towards her in his truck, she blows out his tire with a shotgun and then knocks him out with the butt. But Autumn manages to hold Amy at gunpoint, walking her closer and closer to the hole. When Joy gets a shot she takes it, putting a bullet through Autumn’s chest, but as she collapses she shoves Amy into the hole.
More worrying still is that the hole closes up behind her.
Autumn survives the gunshot, just, and is taken to the hospital just as Royal is arriving, having suffered what seems like a minor stroke on the way. Autumn dies on the operating table, but as we see Amy wake up in the middle of nowhere, Autumn similarly springs back to life.
Amy is greeted by two worried backpackers, who ask her name. She can’t remember clearly, but she thinks it might be Autumn.
Royal also survives his medical crisis. At the end of Outer Range Season 2, he wakes up from a terrible dream in which various versions of his relatives, past and present, intone that time is a river and this is his destiny. As he hugs Cecelia, he sees Autumn in his mind’s eye, and her words close out the season: “This is just the beginning.”
At this point that sounds more like a threat than anything else.
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