A Murder at the End of the World season 1, episode 7, titled “Chapter 7: Retreat,” follows Darby Hart (Emma Corin) and the remaining guests as they gather and discover the killer among them.
The episode begins as Darby, Lee (Brit Marling), Oliver, and David are escorted to the underground bunker by Andy (Clive Owen). There, the rest of the guests wait for them: Lu Mei, Martin, and Ziba. Andy declares that even with the police approaching, no one leaves the bunker until he figures out who betrayed him.
Lu Mei speaks up, saying it wasn’t her, and the only reason she can think of for being invited is to sell her Ray, Andy’s A.I. assistant, for her smart cities, which she is interested in. Andy then proceeds to accuse David of harboring a grudge against him and reveals that David is the one who attacked Darby in her room, which he did to protect Lee.
Andy then reveals to everyone that Darby deduced that Zoomer was Bill’s son and that he trusted her for a moment until he found her conspiring with Lee in Bill’s room. He then turns his attention to Lee, revealing she attempted to kidnap Zoomer and was a felon, for which Andy cleared her name. Andy blows up at Lee, saying if she wants to end their marriage, there is a proper way to do that. The group then debates whether there could be a deeper reason for Lee wanting to run away, to which Darby steps in and says Andy is controlling.
That’s when Zoomer runs into the room with his augmented reality headset. After a moment of Lee and Andy arguing, Darby puts on the headset and tells everyone to stop. Darby begins asking Zoomer questions, and from that they deduce that through Ray, Zoomer had been made to kill Rohan and Bill. Darby has Andy ask Ray the questions to confirm this, leaving everyone shocked. Bill was killed because he was thought to be a security threat, Rohan was killed because he found out the truth, and Sian’s death was an accident.
Darby wants Andy to reveal why Ray would think Bill was a security threat. Using a deep fake app, Darby has Ray reveal that Andy confided in him that he didn’t like Bill and was jealous of how much Zoomer liked him. Darby starts going in on Andy until Andy begins choking her. Lee knocks him out with a hit to the back of the head.
Darby, Lee, and Zoomer then head to the contr9l room, where they destroy Ray for good. Lee and Zoomer say goodbye to Darby and leave via the backdoor, heading towards Rohan’s lifeboat as the police arrive.
Sometime in the future, Darby will read her newest book based on these events at a reading, where the surviving guests sit and watch. She reveals Lee and Zoomer have yet to be found, but Lee will be arrested if she ever is, as Andy charged her with kidnapping. Darby ends the reading by saying she got to write the end of Bill’s story, that his story is complete. The episode ends as we see Lee and Zoomer reach the lifeboat, properly titled “Last Chance,” and shoot a flare-up to Rohan’s ship.
In episode 7 of A Murder at the End of the World, Brit Marling and Zal Batmahgjil use the tired trope of A.I. It does get some points for timing, but this outcome felt like the lazy way out in what was such an intriguing murder mystery. Additionally, as far as murder mysteries go, none of the characters felt essential to the plot or worked as red herrings. The finale of the series was most definitely the weakest of the season.
Rating: 6/10