‘Endeavour’ Series Finale Delivers Shocking Resolutions & Heartbreaking Goodbyes (RECAP)

Exeunt

Season 9 • Episode 3

[Warning: The below contains MAJOR spoilers for the July 2 Endeavour series finale, “Exeunt.”]

Many TV shows are well past their prime by the time they hit their final season. Not Endeavour. The magnificent British series, a prequel to another mystery drama classic, Inspector Morse (1987-2000), bid farewell to American viewers Sunday night, July 2, on PBS with shocking resolutions, heartbreaking goodbyes and even a bit of Shakespeare.

Over nine seasons and 36 feature-length episodes, the Oxford-set show has treated viewers to richly drawn characters, cerebral mysteries and 1960s and ’70s nostalgia. We got new insight into the beleaguered and brilliant Endeavour Morse (Shaun Evans) by watching him evolve from a neophyte detective constable into someone more like the jaded loner played by John Thaw in the original series.

In the last season’s third and final installment, appropriately titled “Exeunt,” Evans’ Detective Sergeant Morse and Roger Allam’s Chief Inspector Fred Thursday finally close the book on one of their most gripping cases. The storyline began way back in the second-season finale, “Neverland,” when they investigated a murder connected to a boys’ home for troubled youths and uncovered a history of child abuse that was perpetrated there and covered up by police.

Shaun Evans and Sara Vickers (Courtesy of Mammoth Screen and MASTERPIECE)

Now, in 1972, Morse discovers that a missing boy named Peter Williams, whom he believed was buried on the grounds of the former facility, hadn’t been killed years ago — he was still alive until just recently. The young man, now known as Tomahawk and part of a biker gang, became one of the episode’s murder victims. And the killer: none other than Morse’s esteemed mentor, Thursday.

That leads to one of the explanations the final season promised to deliver: why Thursday is never mentioned by his former partner in the original series. Of course Thursday wasn’t created by Colin Dexter, the novelist whose mysteries inspired that show. He comes from the ingenious brain of Russell Lewis, the prolific scribe who wrote every Endeavour episode, so he had yet to be invented when the original series was airing.

Thursday stabbed the young man to protect his son, Sam (Jack Bannon, returning to the series after leading the cast of Pennyworth for three seasons). Since coming back to Oxford after going AWOL from the army, Sam has been battling addiction and getting drugs from Tomahawk (Jack Hamilton), who threatened Sam. Now, to keep Sam safe from the biker gang’s revenge, Thursday, his wife, Win (Caroline O’Neill), and Sam will have to go into hiding. Thursday can never see Morse again.

Shaun Evans (Courtesy of Mammoth Screen and MASTERPIECE)

Evans’ and Allam’s performances in that scene were pitch-perfect. Both actors are masters at conveying big emotions with small gestures and subtle expressions that speak volumes, and that was especially evocative as their characters — who aren’t comfortable expressing emotion — tried to keep it together while saying goodbye forever.

As if that parting wasn’t painful enough, Morse promises Thursday that he will keep an eye on his daughter, Joan (Sara Vickers), the woman Morse loves, who has just married his detective sergeant colleague Jim Strange (Sean Rigby). That turn of events will give added poignancy to anyone now watching Inspector Morse (which streams on BritBox). In scenes between Strange, who by then has risen in the ranks to become chief constable, and Morse, “Mrs. Strange” is mentioned, though her first name is never spoken. Decades later, the woman Morse loved so much is still nearby.

References to the original series were numerous, and clever. Earlier in the episode, when discussing a murder victim with the surname Lewis, Morse mentions that the man has a young cousin named Robert who’s a police cadet. Surely this is the same Robert Lewis who will become the sergeant sidekick — played by Kevin Whately — on Inspector Morse and get his own spinoff series, Inspector Lewis, in 2006.

As the episode closed, Anton Lesser, whose character, Chief Superintendent Reginald Bright, retired from the force, recited Prospero’s “We are such stuff as dreams are made on” speech about mortality from The Tempest over a montage of clips of the set and cast members past and present. Young Endeavour Morse drove off in his black Jaguar. Driving in the other direction was a man who looked a lot like the older Morse — in that character’s signature red Jaguar.

So Endeavour, which has been a glorious staple of Masterpiece’s summer season, concludes with a reminder that nothing lasts forever. But as we said goodbye to these characters, I couldn’t help hoping that when not writing the BritBox series Grace, Russell Lewis will find the time to pen a prequel to the prequel featuring a young Fred Thursday, or explore the adventures of Sergeant Jakes (Jack Laskey) in Wyoming.

And like Inspector Morse, which viewers still enjoy more than two decades after it ended its run, I expect Endeavour won’t be leaving our screens anytime soon. Is it too soon to go back and rewatch the pilot?

Endeavour, Season 9, PBS app and PBS Masterpiece Prime Video Channel