If you’re anything like me, you’ve utterly been swept up in the latest season of Netflix’s twisty anthology series, Beef. Arriving with a fury on the streamer on April 16, the latest instalment swaps out the Ali Wong road-stage incident for a new batch of characters who are just as engrossed in feuding as their predecessors.
As a recap, Beef season two follows a pair of couples couples — namely Carey Mulligan’s Lindsay and Oscar Isaac’s Josh, and Charles Melton’s Austin and Cailee Spaeny’s Ashely — as they plot, scheme, and machinate in the wake of an intense and almost-physical argument caught on camera in the first episode.
Like the first season, Beef’s second outing is about much more than the inciting beef, touching on everything from class systems, to the corrupting power of money, and the inescapable dynamics of relationships.
Creator Lee Sung Jin does all that while also delivering shocking cliffhangers and gradually cascading plot devices, which is what we’re here to talk about. So, what the actual f**k happened in Beef’s season two finale, and where does it leave the group of insufferable and truly horrible characters you somehow can’t help but root for?
There will be spoilers for Beef season two ahead, because… Duh!
What happens in the Beef season 2 finale?
By the time the Beef season two finale rolls around, all of the characters’ schemes have caught up with them. At this point, the core four have found themselves in Seoul, Korea, the home country of the truly sinister Chairwoman Park (Youn Yuh-jung).
Park detained the group in Seoul after discovering they knew — and had evidence of — both the death at Trochos earlier in the season, and her efforts to conceal it through the money laundering scheme that all four of them are implicated in.
At this point, Park’s husband Dr. Kim (Song Kang-ho) considers turning her into the authorities, but is ruthlessly killed by her men before he can do so. Austin manages to escape with the USB containing all evidence of Park’s crimes, and initially intends to hand it to the authorities.
Before he does so, and after a brief phone call expressing unreciprocated feelings for Eunice (Seoyeon Jang), Austin also has a change of heart. He chooses to return the USB to Park, allowing her to erase all the evidence of Trochos death.
In turn, Park promotes Austin and Ashley to high-ranking roles at the country club, filling the shoes of Josh and Lindsay. Park, ever the villain, rewrites the entire story, including ruling Dr. Kim’s death a suicide and pinning the dirty money scheme entirely on Josh.
What happens in the Beef season 2 epilogue?
The Beef season 2 finale jumps forward eight years in the last moments to find the characters after an eight-year time-jump. We learn what happened to the characters after the events of Seoul, and it’s not exactly pretty.
Josh took full responsibility for the crimes, recusing Lindsay of all guilt, and we learn that he spent eight years in prison while Lindsay moved on, remarried, and had a child in England. Austin and Ashley, on the other hand, appear to have it all figured out.
Ashley took on Josh’s role as the general manager of the country club, while Austin replaced Lindsay as the smiling, supportive face. By this point, they’ve also had a child, and much of their financial concerns appear to have vanished. But, in a show like Beef, there’s no such thing as a happy ending.
In a mirror of the opening episode featuring Josh and Lindsay, we notice tension between Austin and Ashley as they drive throughout the country club. They’ve gotten what they schemed for, but are destined for the same patterns that caused Josh and Lindsay to implode.
So, there you have it folks, the clusterf**k of a Beef season two finale. It was certainly a ride, and while a third season of the anthology has not yet been greenlit, there are enough details to pore over in the latest instalment to last us for some time to come.
Lead images: Netflix
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