Department Q’s Chloe Pirrie explains *that* confusing ending and its hidden meaning

Netflix’s new crime thriller Department Q is currently sitting at number one on the chart, and while the reception has been great, some people are a little confused about the show’s cryptic ending.

Starring Matthew Goode, Chloe Pirrie, Jamie Sives, and many other notable names, Department Q is a gritty thriller that follows Matthew’s Detective Carl Morck. Following a brutal shooting, he’s put in charge of a new cold case unit at the Edinburgh police department that is essentially a PR opportunity for the force. Soon enough, Carl and his band of misfit officers are cracking cold cases that run deep in the city.

Things got a little confusing at the end of episode one, when we, as the viewers, learn that Merritt Lingard’s storyline was happening four years before the rest of the show. In reality, she was being held hostage in a hyperbaric chamber, tortured by people later revealed to be Lyle and Ailsa Jennings. The mother and son duo blamed Merritt for the death of their son/sibling, but by the end, Carl and his team are able to secure Merritt and save her life.

In the final few scenes, Carl’s unit is finally given proper funding after some not-so-legal blackmail. Season two of Department Q was hinted at with “new cases” being teased, but still, the ending scene between Carl and Merritt was just outright strange.

The meaning behind Department Q’s ending and why Carl and Merritt didn’t speak

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After a three-month time jump in the final episode, Merritt is seen at the police station thanking people for saving her life. Carl, the man responsible for saving her life, is not present, with his colleagues revealing that he’d taken some time off. Merritt does, however, bump into Carl on the way out of the building, but they don’t speak, which is kind of confusing given the nature of their relationship. He spent like eight episodes hunting her down and saving her life, just for them to seemingly ignore one another in Department Q’s ending scene.

Speaking to Cosmopolitan, Merritt actress Chloe Pirrie noted how it was never meant to be some “sentimental” moment where Carl and Merritt bond over their shared trauma. Instead, Department Q’s creator, Scott Frank, wanted to illustrate how the craziness of life often prevents us from having these deeply intimate personal moments.

“Scott describes himself as allergic to sentimentality,” she explained. “And I think there is something really powerful about not quite giving us what we [the audience] want in that moment. And they kind of miss each other, which is quite human and quite like real in life. It does something slightly unexpected. And I find that quite beautiful in a way.”

Maybe not the satisfying ending we were all hoping for, but it does make sense.

Department Q is available on Netflix now. For all the latest Netflix news, quizzes, drops and memes like The Holy Church of Netflix on Facebook. 

Featured image credit: Netflix