Exclusive Interviews

Breaking Down the ‘Tell Me Lies’ Series Finale: Cast Talks Lucy’s Last Scene & More (VIDEO)

[Warning: The below contains MAJOR spoilers for the Tell Me Lies series finale.]

Tell Me Lies went out with a bang — and a lot of wedding cake. The final episode of Season 3, which is now the series finale, ended with Stephen (Jackson White) giving one hell of a final toast, Bree (Cat Missal) and Wrigley (Spencer House) finally confronting their feelings, and a devastating turn of events for Lucy (Grace Van Patten).

Let’s start with Lucy, who thought she was safe after Stephen gave her the tape of her confession. Well, after Bree discovered Lucy and Evan (Branden Cook) hooked up freshman year, she released the tape in an act of revenge. Everyone, including Lucy, was convinced that Stephen had released it, but he was actually innocent this time around. (Surprised? Same.)

Since Lucy had made a false accusation and admitted the lie, she was expelled from Baird University. It wasn’t until Bree and Evan’s wedding reception that she found out about Bree’s betrayal — through Stephen. Once Stephen put all the pieces together about what Bree knew, and when she knew it, he got up in front of the remaining crowd to just unleash all his intel. From Lucy and Evan’s hookup to Bree and Wrigley’s affair to Bree releasing the tape to admitting his earlier morning tryst with Lucy, Stephen didn’t hold back. Diana (Alicia Crowder) and Pippa (Sonia Mena) quickly left to get away from this drama once and for all because they were done with this mess.

Disney / Ian Watson

In the midst of the chaos, which featured Evan trying to tackle Stephen, only to tackle the wedding cake instead, Stephen urged Lucy to leave with him. Bree begged Lucy not to listen to Stephen, but Stephen continued to twist the knife and act like he had no part in Lucy’s college downfall. Lucy did leave with Stephen, only to get abandoned by him at a gas station, leaving her to break out into laughter at the absurdity of the situation.

Swooon spoke with Grace Van Patten about Lucy’s last laugh of the series. “I think it’s like, ‘That’s on me now. I think I know now.’ I think I know now, and the freedom of that, the freedom of finally putting it together that this guy will always, without fail, do that,” Van Patten explained in our Tell Me Lies Aftershow.

When Stephen offered to give Lucy a ride out of the wedding, had he been planning this last act of humiliation? “No, that’s the whole thing. I think it was all improvisational,” White said, before adding that he spoke to the director of the episode about Stephen’s decision. “I was like, ‘Do I know that I’m gonna do this?’ And [he] was like, ‘No.'”

Lucy will inevitably need time to decompress from the chaotic wedding weekend. Even more shocking than Stephen leaving her in the dust was the revelation that Bree released the tape that got her expelled. Swooon asked Van Patten if Lucy could forgive Bree for that.

Disney / Danielle Blancher

“I don’t know. “You haven’t seen Lucy really betrayed by anyone but Stephen, so I wonder what that looks like,” Van Patten said. “She clearly forgives Steven for doing the worst things to her, but I wonder if that manifests differently with friendships. I don’t know. I think what it is to Lucy in that moment, I don’t know if she’s thinking, could I ever forgive her? It’s more of the Stephen door just opened. Now she can feel more justified in going with him. It makes it an easier decision.”

It would have been easy for Stephen’s reign of terror to include him releasing the tape, but showrunner Meaghan Oppenheimer threw in yet another shocking twist for viewers. Oppenheimer revealed that Bree being the culprit was “always the plan” from the beginning.

“We knew right away it was Bree. Before I even knew specifically about the tape, when I was prepping for the room, and I hadn’t exactly decided on the mechanics, I knew that Bree needed to do something to betray Lucy by the end.”

She continued, “I thought Jackson did such a great job in that scene with Lucy when he’s like, ‘You released it.’ Because, in that moment, you’re like, ‘Wait, maybe Lucy did.’ Maybe she’s dissociating so much that she doesn’t remember releasing it.”

Disney / Ian Watson

From the moment they shared that bus stop scene (and for some of us, long before that), viewers have rallied around Bree and Wrigley. In the 2015 timeline, these two finally had it out after Bree and Evan’s engagement party. Wrigley demanded to know why Bree didn’t give him another chance back in college after he had “sympathy sex” with Pippa. Wrigley and Bree both acknowledged that they’d never stopped thinking about each other and began hooking up after that.

As her wedding reception fell apart around her, and Wrigley got screamed at by Evan, Bree could only smile as she looked over at Wrigley. He kept his composure and sweetly smiled back at her as the dust finally cleared for them to be together.

Related

'Tell Me Lies': Inside the Bree & Wrigley Moment That Changes Everything

“I like to think that they have a happy ending, and that look between them is them realizing, ‘OK, amongst all this carnage, we are going to finally give each other a chance for real.’ But I think that friend group had to explode and disintegrate for that to clear the path for that even to happen,” Oppenheimer told Swooon.

What did you think of the Tell Me Lies series finale? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below!

Tell Me Lies, All Seasons, Streaming Now, Hulu