This story contains heavy spoilers for all six episodes of The perfect couple. At this point there is a whole subgenre of Crime Series that revolves around someone who dies in the company of a group of rich people. Big little lies was a huge success, several Must-see TV showsHow The downfall And The White Lotus– and many predictable, missable titles – have followed suit. Netflix’s latest series about rich white people behaving badly, The perfect couplewill be released on September 5, 2024 on streaming services.
The show, based on the novel of the same name by Elin Hilderbrand, follows a formula that will be familiar to many and is even remarkably produced by The downfall Directed by Susanne Bier And contains alum from both The downfall And The White Lotus(!). Actors Nicole Kidman and Liev Schreiber as the matriarch and patriarch of the Winburys, an elite old-money WASP family on Nantucket, The perfect couple sees her family fall apart when someone dies the night before her son Benji’s (Billy Howle) wedding. The wedding had already caused tension among the Winburys, particularly among famed author Greer Garrison Winbury (Kidman), who disapproved of her son tying the knot with the more working-class zoologist Amelia (Eve Hewson). When Amelia’s longtime best friend and maid of honor Merritt (Meghann Fahy) is found dead, floating on the shore outside the Winbury estate called Summerland, even more melodrama ensues.
When the Nantucket police immediately suspect that Merritt’s death was the result of crime and begin questioning people close to the Winburys, the question of who killed Merritt becomes the central mystery of the The perfect couple. At the end of Jenna Lamia’s six-part miniseries, the investigation into her death is complete, but not without some twists coming to light. Below is a breakdown of the ending of The perfect couple.
Nicole Kidman as Greer Garrison Winbury sits in her office in The perfect couple.
(Image credit: Netflix)
What is the truth about Greer Garrison Winbury’s past in ‘The Perfect Pair’?
Through The perfect coupleGreer is obsessed with her image, from planning flawless wedding celebrations to booking PEOPLE Traits that paint her and her husband Tag (Schreiber), heir to the Winbury dynasty, as nothing short of idyllic. The end of the show proves that she is not only obsessed with her own image and that of her family, but also with covering up her past. In the finale, when Greer is a suspect – and is suspected of having hired a man named Broderick Graham, an ally of the Turkish mafia, as a hitman – she speaks out about her true past in an attempt to clear her name.
When the police question Greer, they bring Broderick into the interrogation room to break the two up, and Greer admits that he is her brother. She explains that the $300,000 she demanded from Shooter Dival (Ishaan Khattar), her son Benji’s friend, and transferred to Broderick was to pay off his debt. She tells investigators that he is a middleman for the Turkish mafia, but she has been paying off his debt for years.
Greer later comes clean to her entire family. After being released by the police, she confesses to her sons Benji, Will (Sam Nivola), Thomas (Jack Reynor), as well as his wife Abby (Dakota Fanning), Amelia and her PR agents that she used to work as an escort. She reveals that she always lied about meeting Tag at a gallery, and instead he paid for her services as a high-profile escort on several occasions and her brother provided her with clients. “And now I pay for everything,” she sneers at her husband. “I’m sick of living in your damn mess. I’m not cleaning everything up for you. I’m sick of your ego. I’m sick of your bullshit. I’m done. Done. I’m not taking care of everything for everyone anymore. I’m done. I’m sick of living in the lie.”
Amelia (Eve Hewson) and Merritt (Meghann Fahy) hug at Amelia and Benji’s rehearsal dinner.
(Image credit: Netflix)
Who killed Merritt in The Perfect Pair?
From the beginning The perfect coupleGreer seems to be set up as a murderer. In the first episode, she suspects that her husband is having an affair when a jeweler makes a comment about a bracelet he bought that she never received, but for which she finds the receipt. When Merritt arrives at the Winburys’ before the wedding, Greer sees the bracelet on her wrist and immediately realizes that she must be with Tag.
As the series progresses, there are flashbacks of Benji and Amelia’s engagement and wedding celebrations over the past year, which provide insight into Merritt and Tag’s secret relationship. Shortly before the wedding, Merritt tells Tag that she is pregnant.
Merritt also tells Amelia (who is not so innocent herself throughout the show, as she is having an affair with her fiancé’s friend, Shooter), which leads to an argument. The night before the wedding, Merritt also has a passionate conversation with Tag about her pregnancy and how she wants him to leave his wife. Someone overhears their dramatic exchange, because shortly after Tag leaves Merritt alone on the beach, she says a friendly “hello” to someone walking up to her – presumably the killer.
Abbi (Dakota Fanning) being questioned by the police.
(Image credit: Netflix)
At the end of the finale, investigators conclude that Abbi, Thomas’ pregnant, wealth-and-status-obsessed wife, murdered Merritt. Abbi is the perpetrator, and she wanted to get rid of Merritt because of the way the Winbury family trust fund, which would go to her husband and therefore to her, is set up. The trust fund is set to be paid out to all three Winbury sons once the youngest, Will, turns 18, and his birthday is just weeks away in the series. However, if another Winbury son were born, the trust fund would reset—and that’s exactly what would happen if Merritt went through with her pregnancy.
So Abbi drugs and drowns Merritt, hoping that she’ll get the seven-figure sum she’s expecting in the next few weeks. Abbi follows a tip from her husband – who has a habit of stealing and abusing other people’s medications – and takes the barbiturates he stole from Amelia’s cancer-stricken mother. (When it becomes clear during the investigation that Merritt died with barbiturates in his system and Thomas stole the same pills, Amelia’s mother reveals that they are for euthanasia and that she got them from a colleague in her cancer support group.) The investigators realize that Abbi must have been the one who slipped the fatal dose into Merritt’s drink, as they remember Winbury’s maid (Irina Dubova) telling them during her questioning that she is constantly bossed around and asked to wash dishes, especially by Abbi, but Abbi demanded that they not help her wash a glass the morning after Merritt’s death. They deduce that there must have been drug residue and her fingerprints on the glass, which is why she washed it clean herself.
A flashback reveals that Abbi approached Merritt on the beach after arguing with Tag, venting her anger at how shady and unreliable men can be. As it turns out, Abbi not only wanted Thomas’ trust fund dividend for herself, but also because he owed so much money to family friend Isabel (Isabelle Adjani), with whom he was having an affair and abusing drugs. Abbi suggests to Merritt that they both take a cold bath late at night to clear their heads, and Merritt drowns when she gets in the water.
Tag (Leiv Schreiber) and Greer (Kidman) pretend that everything is fine in their marriage at a wedding reception.
(Image credit: Netflix)
How does “The Perfect Couple” end?
When the truth comes out, Abbi is arrested and, despite demanding that Thomas call her lawyer, is sent to jail while still pregnant.
Benji and Amelia also call off their wedding. He says her affair breaks his heart, but he understands her moving on. A flash-forward shows how distant she is from the Winburys when the zoologist takes a job at a zoo in the UK.
She’s not the only person who has a crush on the elites of Nantucky. Greer visits Amelia at work and says she tracked her down, is proud of her for doing it on her own and was inspired to do the same, has written a new novel inspired by her, and hopes the two get back together. All this time, the two have been more alike than different.
To top it all off, the Netflix series couldn’t end with yet another repeat(!) of the entire wedding party performing a choreographed dance to Meghan Trainor’s “Criminal” from the opening credits. Merritt’s murder may have been solved, but it’s still a mystery why that scene kicked off all six episodes. And capped off the finale. (Perhaps it’s time for the poorly behaving rich people subgenre to take a breather.)
