Warning: major spoilers below! Do not read until you have watched The Following's two-hour series finale...unless you want to know what happened. You've been sufficiently warned!
Fox may have canceled The Following, but it's clear from tonight's "series" finale that The Following showrunners were holding out hope for a fourth season. Not only did the finale end on a major cliffhanger, but next season was also going to be a total reboot, with Ryan Hardy (Kevin Bacon) presumed dead by the world, including everyone he knows and loves, all so he can work from the shadows to take down the mysterious organization who employed Theo (Michael Ealy) and had moles working in the FBI.
We totally got chills seeing that final shot of Ryan in disguise walking out of the hospital where Mike (Shawn Ashmore) was recuperating from his stab wounds (yes, Mike made it out of the series alive, much to everyone's very pleasant surprise!) with Max (Jessica Stroup) and a very pregnant Gwen (Zuleikha Robinson) by his side, as Ryan vowed to get revenge and take down the shadowy organization. We got excited to see how this angry Ryan would work outside of the law to make sure his family was safe...if only to realize a few moments later that we'd never actually get to see that happen, since the show was canceled.
We're really going to miss this crazy serial killer thriller, and all of its moles inside the government—and to no one's surprise, there was one mole left to be discovered in the series finale! FBI agent Lisa Campbell (Diane Neal) was controlled by this secret criminal organization, and was working for them the whole time. But Ryan figured that out during the chaos of the episode, and after he was presumed dead he found her recuperating from a gunshot in the hospital, got all the info he could out of her about who was controlling her, and then killed her (!!!). Ryan is officially off the reservation, people!
But how was Ryan presumed dead in the first place? After Theo kidnapped Gwen, Ryan hunted him down and during a standoff, he shot Theo in the head. When Ryan ran to hug Gwen, Theo got up, still alive and bleeding from the gunshot in his forehead (LOL this show), and tackled Ryan off the bridge. He fell into the water, and since the river rapids were treacherous and the FBI didn't find any bodies, they assumed he died. And we're just going to go ahead and assume that Theo died for real, because he was shot. In the head.
While Ryan goes off to hunt down these mysterious people who have a ton of money to ensure their anonymity, Max and Mike, who traded "I love you's," promise to help Gwen raise her child, as they all think the unborn baby just lost its father.
What did you think of the series finale? Did you love it, or would you have wanted to see a season of Ryan acting outside the law to take down the people making his unborn child's world a dangerous place? Vote in our poll below now!