All the Signs That Wayward Was Heading Toward That Wild Conclusion

This recap covers the entire season of Wayward, now streaming on Netflix.

Finding the town of Tall Pines would be like walking into a Stephen King story. The adults are intensely focused on maintaining a perfect, peaceful community, but they come across as strangely vacant and overly nice. At the heart of Tall Pines is a teen rehab facility – which feels more like a secretive prison – run by the powerful and mysterious Evelyn Wade (Toni Collette). She has a firm grip on everyone in town and within the facility. Even though Toni Collette is captivating to watch, she plays a chilling character – a controlling mother figure who closely watches for any sign of trouble or disagreement.

The characters in Mae Martin’s series, *Wayward*, are instantly engaging, from the people held at Evelyn’s facility to the eccentric townsfolk. Martin not only created the show, writing and directing episodes, but also stars as Alex Dempsey, a newcomer to Tall Pines. Alex’s wife, Laura (played by Sarah Gadon), was affected by Evelyn 15 years ago and has now returned with her husband hoping for a fresh start. As Laura and Alex adjust to life in Tall Pines, the show reveals a town that outwardly embraces everyone – including Alex, a trans man, who is fully accepted – as long as they conform to a set of unusual rules. As the show’s mysteries deepen, Alex joins forces with two teenagers, Abbie (Sydney Topliffe) and Leila (Alyvia Alyn Lynd), to uncover the truth. Gradually, the disturbing practices of the institution and the town’s involvement are revealed, leading to a surprising and unexpected climax.

I’ve been completely captivated by this show, Wayward. Over eight episodes, it really dives into some tough stuff – like what it even means to grow up, how to create a truly supportive community, and how deeply trauma can affect us. The central idea is pretty radical: the show proposes that we should stop having kids until we figure out how to deal with trauma that gets passed down through families. Obviously, that’s not realistic! But the main character, Evelyn, believes she’s found a way. She runs a program where she basically breaks people down and then tries to rebuild them, and it all leads to this really unsettling and secretive process she calls the Leap.

Evelyn’s therapy uses a symbolic green door to represent moments of self-discovery and confronting the past. In each episode, we’ll explore these ‘door-opening’ moments, revealing the characters’ breakthroughs, long-held secrets, childhood experiences, and underlying motivations – all of which foreshadowed the dramatic ending.

Episode 1, “Tall Pines”

The show *Wayward* immediately throws you into the action with a kidnapping and a murder, and a memorable scene of Toni Collette riding a recumbent bike. We’re introduced to Abbie and Leila, two carefree friends who are more interested in 60s British rock music than schoolwork. Leila is dealing with a past tragedy and a distant mother, while Abbie’s family doesn’t approve of her new, more rebellious lifestyle since becoming friends with Leila. By the episode’s end, Leila faces the threat of being sent to Tall Pines, a strict alternative school, but surprisingly, it’s Abbie who is unexpectedly kidnapped and taken to the facility.

The story introduces Alex, Laura, and their dog, Toast, as they move into a new home in Tall Pines – Evelyn’s old house. Alex, a police officer, learns that the town is usually quiet, but this changes quickly when a barefoot man named Riley, who has escaped from the Tall Pines facility, runs into the street in front of Alex and his partner Dwayne’s car. Riley flees into the woods, but after Alex speaks kindly to him, Riley begins to trust him. Later that night, Riley goes to Alex and Laura’s house, but senses something is off about Laura, believing she’s one of ‘them,’ and attempts to attack her. A struggle ensues, and Alex unintentionally kills Riley while defending himself and Laura.

We discover Alex used to be a police officer in Detroit, but he left the force after a puzzling event. It’s also interesting how easily he was able to control Riley, and that he’s so determined to protect Laura, even though he doesn’t know much about her history.

Episode 2, “Burrow”

After Riley died, Alex first met Evelyn at the police station. They met again later at Alex’s house for dinner with Laura. While Alex was getting wine from the basement, Evelyn suggested they play a game called Hot Seat with Laura, explaining it was a way to be completely honest and take responsibility for their actions. Alex wasn’t happy about the idea.

Okay, so we haven’t *seen* a full Hot Seat session at Tall Pines yet, but the introduction to Abbie immediately throws you into this intense world. She quickly meets the other teens – Daniel, who’s understandably furious, the sweet Rory, and Stacey, who seems completely unhinged. We get a rundown of Evelyn’s four phases – Burrow, Break, Build, and Ascend – and it’s clear this program isn’t about self-improvement, but a total dismantling and rebuilding of these kids. The problem is, that ‘rebuilding’ is built on a foundation of deprivation, abuse, and shame whenever anyone steps out of line. Honestly, watching this unfold feels like a really disturbing mix of *One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest* and *The Breakfast Club* – but with much higher stakes and a lot more darkness.

I have to say, Leila is a really engaging character – super loyal and likable, though maybe not the sharpest tool in the shed. This week, she hitches a ride toward Tall Pines and has a quick run-in with Alex. But honestly, when she finally gets inside, she totally loses it! She sees Abbie outside and just *sprints* towards her, screaming, and gets caught immediately. The episode ends on this incredibly unsettling image: a bird’s-eye view of the yard, filled with kids frozen in place wearing gray, and the staff running around in bright orange. It’s a really creepy visual – everyone looks like they’re imprisoned, it’s honestly disturbing.

As Alex goes down to the basement, there’s a quick shot of him noticing a bloodstain on the ceiling – a chilling reminder of Riley’s death. The camera then reveals even more blood splattered across the floorboards upstairs in the living room. It’s unsettling. Interestingly, Alex tries to share details about his past, but Evelyn, who seems to consider herself an expert on trauma, quickly shuts him down. It’s becoming clear that Alex’s own unresolved issues are central to the series’ conclusion, and we’ll understand how later on.

Episode 3, “Break”

Abbie, Rory, and Leila try to convince a girl named Oatmeal Beth to help them escape from Tall Pines, but she discovers their plan and traps them in a supply closet. Inside, they find a hidden hatch leading to a basement with a strange, ceremonial area-including a small pool and a broken door. Abbie has a terrifying realization, reminiscent of a scene from *The Silence of the Lambs*, when she notices a fingernail stuck in the door. It’s a truly unsettling discovery.

Alex discovers that eighteen children have previously escaped from Tall Pines. He meets Leila and Abbie while retrieving Riley’s things from Evelyn at the facility. Seeing the two girls, Alex arranges for Leila to briefly hit him, creating a diversion so he can secretly pass a walkie-talkie to Abbie. Later, while Leila is being punished in a room Evelyn calls the “Mirror Room,” Abbie and Alex manage to connect using the device.

Laura is starting to lose her grip on reality. Whatever Evelyn does to children during the Leap appears to have lasting and deeply unsettling consequences. The frogs around Tall Pines seem suspiciously connected to the loss of sanity – are they the ones people lick? This episode also features a quick memory of Laura’s parents, where she tells Alex she doesn’t want to go with them. The episode begins to explore the idea that parents can damage their children either by being overly controlling or by being neglectful. Laura’s disturbing inability to feel any connection to her baby suggests that Evelyn’s treatments might be far more dangerous than they appear.

Episode 4, “Mud”

Life at Tall Pines is pretty awful. Abbie explains to Alex that they don’t even provide ketchup for their Tater Tots, which is a sign of how bad things are. Plus, the kids are forced to do pointless, exhausting work like moving huge piles of rocks. And the famous “Leap” isn’t what it seems – it’s actually a scary way of manipulating the children’s minds.

The town of Tall Pines has a disturbing secret: there are no children. We discover Evelyn has deliberately filled the town with people from her facility, forbidding anyone from having their own families – all in her attempt to break cycles of trauma. The first hint of this odd situation comes when a woman named Harper unexpectedly greets Laura’s baby, showering it with affection. Though surprised, Laura calms Harper with a soothing touch. However, the town’s strict no-children rule becomes a point of conflict with Alex. Later, Laura tries to bargain with Evelyn, offering to leave with Alex if he wants to, but Evelyn retaliates by threatening to reveal details about Riley’s death to Alex’s future employers. Evelyn sees herself as a mother figure to everyone in Tall Pines, but her controlling and vengeful nature makes her a deeply flawed one.

This episode features several genuine psychological techniques, but Evelyn and her team are misusing them. While Evelyn correctly identifies Leila as the family’s ‘identified patient,’ she shares this information not to support Leila, but to control her. The guided meditation Evelyn leads with Stacey is so distorted it barely qualifies as therapy. Once again, the episode concludes with Laura experiencing a distressing mental state – this time, muttering to herself while standing in a pond – suggesting the Leap is causing more damage than benefit.

Episode 5, “Build”

The show is full of well-chosen songs, but “Happiness” by Elliot Smith stands out in a particularly powerful scene. After the teens at Tall Pines take over the facility following a tense group discussion, they rediscover personal items and reconnect with who they used to be. The song plays over a montage of them happily changing into their old clothes, smoking, and looking at CDs – a brief moment of joy and relaxation for almost everyone. However, Daniel is focused on revenge. Instead of joining the celebration, he tracks down Rabbit, Evelyn’s close ally, and subjects her to a brutal interrogation, seeking payback for past hurts. Through a heated conversation, we learn that Daniel’s arrival at Tall Pines stemmed from an incident where he filmed a hazing ritual that resulted in another teen’s death. While he insists he isn’t a murderer, Rabbit responds with harsh judgment instead of empathy. In retaliation, Daniel reveals he wasn’t violent before being incarcerated, but the cruel treatment he’s received has changed him, making him capable of inflicting pain. He then violently attacks her with chemicals. It’s a shocking and disturbing moment, and it highlights how harsh prison environments can actually worsen outcomes for inmates in real life.

Evelyn confidently instructs her team to remain patient, believing the teenagers will inevitably make mistakes that lead to their own downfall. Surprisingly, she’s proven correct when Ello, Leila’s roommate, suffers a heroin overdose, prompting Abbie to unlock the doors so staff can provide assistance.

Alex accidentally started trouble when he told Abbie that Riley had died while trying to get away. Leila then shared this upsetting news with everyone, causing a lot of emotional fallout. Throughout the episode, Alex makes several poor decisions, including seeking out a conspiracy theorist named Maurice (played by Mark McKinney) for information about the missing teens from Tall Pines. Things escalate when Alex violently attacks Maurice and then runs away.

I’m really starting to worry about Maurice’s stories about Tall Pines. Honestly, almost everything he tells Alex feels like a warning sign. He believes the camp is brainwashing teenagers and then sending them off to become spies – it sounds crazy, but I can’t shake the feeling he might be onto something. Remember how different Stacey seemed after her Leap ceremony? It was like a complete change in personality. And then there’s Laura’s family… it wasn’t the teen who vanished, but her parents after they went back to Tall Pines to pick her up! That really threw me, especially considering Evelyn’s constant talk about parents being the real danger and kids needing to break away. It makes me wonder if anyone *ever* gets to take their child home once they’ve enrolled them.

Episode 6, “Mirror”

As punishment for rebelling, Abbie, Rory, Daniel, Stacey, and a few other teenagers are forced into the woods. They’re each given basic supplies and told to hike 50 miles to the top of Mount Otis – the first one to finish wins their freedom, though this turns out to be a lie. Abbie and Rory get off to a bad start when another teen, Alexandra, steals their supplies, but Daniel helps them by sharing food he’s hunted and a dry place to shelter. Later, Rabbit seeks revenge on Daniel for something he did to her, and sends Stacey to confront him. In a shocking turn of events, Stacey brutally murders Daniel, stabbing him with a sharpened stick. The show doesn’t fully explain Stacey’s motives, but it suggests that the mysterious ‘Leap’ has changed her, making her capable of violence when manipulated by the staff at Tall Pines. This raises the possibility that Maurice was right about the teens being brainwashed for some unknown purpose. It’s disturbingly unclear if Stacey even remembers killing Daniel.

Things at Tall Pines are getting really unsettling. Evelyn is spending hours alone with Leila, trying to help her remember the night Jess died, but it feels like she’s twisting things around. It seems like Leila had a tough upbringing and Jess wasn’t exactly a good sister, but Evelyn is pushing this idea that Leila somehow caused Jess’s death. Honestly, it’s hard to know what actually happened because Leila’s memories keep changing. It’s becoming clear Evelyn doesn’t care about the truth; she just wants Leila to rely on *her* completely. Then, when Leila finally starts to understand something, she cries out for her mother, and Evelyn… she just steps in and acts like the mother Leila always needed, offering comfort and acceptance, but it feels… conditional. It’s creepy.

Episode 7, “Ascend”

Several weeks have passed since Evelyn convinced Leila to drink the Kool-Aid. Now, Leila and Abbie are arguing, but still trying to plan an escape. Evelyn interrupts them with a forced, private conversation where Abbie accuses Leila of taking advantage of her grief after her sister’s death. This devastates Leila, and she reluctantly agrees to participate in the Leap ceremony the following day. Evelyn then reveals to Abbie that Alex was responsible for Riley’s murder, continuing her pattern of manipulating and harming those around her.

When Abbie sees Alex, she learns he already knew about her plan to leave town. He’s even parked his car nearby to help her escape, assuming she can reach it. Abbie confronts him about Riley, but ultimately still seems to trust Alex. She asks him to find Daniel’s body, which he does – it’s buried in a simple grave, showing how careless the people of Tall Pines are. While Alex is shocked by what he finds, Dwayne suddenly attacks and takes him away.

The latest episode delves into Evelyn’s past, revealing how she gained control of the community in Tall Pines back in 1974. Abandoned as a baby, she joined the group and became fascinated by Weldon’s stories of his father traveling through a mysterious green door during a coma. Inspired, Evelyn used psychedelic drugs to try and experience this ‘leap’ herself. She ultimately murdered Weldon while he slept and took over as leader.

Meanwhile, in the present day, Laura is attempting to overthrow Evelyn, uniting her friends with the goal of continuing the community’s work without Evelyn’s harmful methods. While their intentions are good, it remains to be seen if they can overcome the psychological damage Evelyn has inflicted. Evelyn’s grip on power appears to be slipping, even Rabbit is starting to question her. A particularly telling moment occurs when Evelyn cruelly rejects Rabbit’s request to adopt Stacey, leaving Rabbit heartbroken and raising the question: does Evelyn understand the power of simple kindness?

Episode 8, “Leap”

In the final scenes, Evelyn tries to force Alex to participate in the Leap ceremony. Meanwhile, Laura goes into labor, and Abbie, Rory, and Leila try to escape Tall Pines. Only Abbie successfully gets away; Leila chooses to stay, and Rory sacrifices himself to ensure Abbie’s freedom.

With help from a frustrated Rabbit, Alex breaks free from Evelyn and injects her with the mind-altering Leap serum. Evelyn had been trying to “cure” Alex of his violent tendencies and emotional pain, and as he escapes, she reveals a shocking truth: she killed Laura’s parents. She also cruelly tells Alex he’ll never have the loving family he desires, as Laura isn’t capable of providing that. Alex races to find Laura, but along the way, he kills Dwayne, who attacks him. Dwayne’s dying words, “Alex, I see you,” are deeply unsettling.

The whole community came to celebrate Laura’s new baby. Alex joined his wife in the birthing pool to greet their child, and they shared a sweet moment of skin-to-skin contact. However, things quickly became unusual when everyone present started passing the baby around, as if it belonged to the whole group. Laura declared the baby belonged to everyone, hoping to avoid repeating past family patterns, without even talking to Alex first. While the idea of a community raising a child is nice in theory, Alex strongly disagreed. He felt the baby was his and Laura’s, and if they couldn’t both be parents, he wanted to be the sole caregiver.

I was on the edge of my seat as Alex sprinted to the car, finding Abbie and Toast already geared up to go. He had a baby in his arms! Abbie was definitely surprised, but she went with it – it was clear Alex was trying to get this little one out of Tall Pines. When she asked who the baby belonged to, he just said, “Mine.” It was a really sweet moment. As they drove, they talked about what family means, and when Alex told Abbie she was a good kid, she sweetly said he was good, too. It felt like a turning point for all of them.

The ending of *Wayward* raises a lot of questions, suggesting a possible second season. (What’s causing the dangerous side effects of the Leap, for example? Will that ever be explained?) I’d love to see more of this story, but even if it ends here, the first season provides plenty to think about.

For the past ten years, TV shows and horror movies have frequently used inherited trauma as a simple explanation for troubling events. While painful childhood experiences can definitely affect communities and lead to harmful actions, the story of *Wayward* explores this topic in a more complex way, without clear heroes or villains. The main character, Alex, is driven to extremes by his past, even considering harming Laura to take their baby. He desperately wants to create the family he never had, and this need leads him to commit what another character, Evelyn, considers the worst possible parenting mistake: treating a child as property.

You know, as someone who really gets lost in movies, I always felt Evelyn had a point about being overly protective of kids, but she was way off about love itself. The whole idea of ‘The Leap’ – cutting ties with everything, like we saw with Laura and her baby – just doesn’t ring true. Real connection and love are what help us feel safe and secure. Trying to find quick fixes for emotional pain, like that procedure promising instant ‘peace,’ always backfires. That’s why when Evelyn finally goes through the green door after Alex gives her something, it’s so heartbreaking. There’s no peace waiting for her, just endless, confusing doors – a total dead end. It really hit me that you can’t just *erase* your feelings and expect things to be okay.

Wayward believes that healing from trauma requires both understanding yourself and having a supportive community, but it doesn’t offer simple solutions. While loving communities like Tall Pines can have their challenges, and even strict environments can offer a sense of belonging, ultimately we’re responsible for finding what helps us heal, especially if our upbringing was difficult. Unlike the strict rules of places like Tall Pines, there’s no single path to wellness – everyone’s journey of self-discovery is unique.

2025-09-26 01:59