Welcome back to Unforgotten with Nicola Walker and Sanjeev Bhaskar; we’re at the finale now and ready to find out who REALLY brought about the end of our Jimmy Sullivan. All the spoilers after the break.

Claire (Gemma Jones) is being released to her sons Matt (Adam Astill) and Les (Dominic Power) but they won’t be getting their dad back any time soon, Willets (Pippa Nixon) advises; Eric Slater (Tom Courtenay) has been charged with the two murders and sent to prison.

There have been three deaths, we lost Lizzie last time too. She climbed over a bridge; the shame and public humiliation for her past was too much to bear.

Matt looks particularly affected, we haven’t seen him much but now we’re looking for someone with access to both burial sites that isn’t Eric Slater, since he told us at the end of last episode that he wanted to tell Cassie who REALLY killed those people. Nah, he was too young, but there’s someting… Willetts advises them to take everyone away for a bit, the press will be swarming.

Sir Phillip (Trevor Eve) is getting MOAR bad news. Josh’s Turkish friend Asil (Akin Gazi) needs two million dollars extry for killing Gordon Fenwick, the arsonist has been caught and they need to take care of his family. Mobs are just like tar pits: soooo easy to get in, sooooo hard to get out.

Sir Phillip’s had just about enough of this hands-off business; he asked for their help because the cops were watching him, guess what?

I think that’s only the second time I’ve felt the pure menace he’s capable of projecting. His wife Shirley (Cherie Lunghi) overhears and stares at him in judgement. He’s not taking that, though, without looking at her he reminds her that she knew what he was when she married him. And then turning to her: in fact, she liked it.

Ooooohhhh

Father Bob (Bernard Hill) is in with…? a sympathetic ear whose name I didn’t quite catch…if he can pay all the money back, he’ll get a light not-prison sentence but it might take a little while longer to sort that out with everyone. YOU THINK?

Curtis (Ade Oyefeso) and Ray (Brian Bovell) are canvassing the homeless in the bridge underpass, Curtis is determined to find Lizzie but we know she is swimming with the fishes and I am in no hurry for them to find out.

Eric is for sure going to tell Cassie (Nicola Walker) and Sunny (Sanjeev Bhaskar) who killed everyone, right after he gets moved to a prison near Les and he wants a doctor. Cassie politely explains that they can’t do that without the information, see, some people might think that he was stalling or stringing them along or somefing…English and Canadian, sooo polite. You know she wanted to throw a “BOLLOCKS” at him.

Hahahahahha and later, while Sunny and Cassie are discussing, SUNNY calls it bollocks! I’m in his BRAIN. Cassie is inclined to believe Eric, though, it’d be easy enough to discount whatever name he threw out. She just doesn’t think the arrest feels right. Sunny reckons she’s “gonna do whatever” she wants to do, so, she’s gonna call Eric’s bluff! She’s the boss, Sunny, she has to go with her gut! Don’t take it personally

Oh Father Bob. Caroline (Tamzin Malleson) has had her baby early and his agitation when he thinks it was caused by him…whew.

His angry daughter Ellie (Claire Goose) lets him wait with her, so he perches, tense, waiting for news of his first grandchild.

Oh and time is up, Curtis and Ray have found someone who saw Lizzie jump. Ray’s howling.

One minute

Ellie wants to know about Father Bob’s other daughter, how often does he see her? At least once a week, sometimes twice. That’s time stolen from the rest of them and Ellie cannot swallow it. He was trying to conceal his true nature as well, and just then Grace (Hannah Gordon) bursts through the door: the baby is fine! Yay! Father Bob is not allowed to celebrate with them.

Cassie’s made the requested arrangements for Eric; time for him to pony up the name of the real killer. It was Claire. Claire?? Claire with the slipping mind? How could slight Claire kill two grown men? I mean, it happens, but I can’t be the only one who thought “you just ratted your WIFE out, you arsehole??!!”, can I?

Eric tells the tale of their romance from the very beginning, they courted and got married and wanted kids, but there was a problem, you see, which I DID see: he liked men. He would really liked to have not been gay, but he really was and not bisexual, although he did manage to father two children with Claire.

That was the basis of the assault on Paul West, who had asked Eric to “rough him up a bit” so. Well. He loved Jimmy, though, who just needed money. Nicholas was someone he picked up in the pub. He starts to cry and we take five.

Sunny doesn’t believe Eric, but Cassie does, she can tell he wasn’t lying. They need to re-arrest Claire Slater.

What?? Lizzie is alive?? Someone saw her go in and she’s in the hospital! She jumped off a high bridge, man! What kind of sorcery is this?? I mean, I’m glad for Ray and Curtis, but

The detectives are trying to track down the Slater boys and Claire, they’re all off in the middle of nowhere on Willets’ advice, so that’s proving tricky.

Back to interview with Eric. Claire caught him and Jimmy at it in the basement and hit Jimmy with a hammer. Just once, but it was enough and since he didn’t want to move the body, he buried Jimmy there. He asks Cassie to tell Maureen that he gave Jimmy his rites and then loses it completely. He really did love Jimmy.

After that, he vowed to give up all That Business and they moved to the suburbs, away from London and all it’s temptation. Once the economy went a bit south, he had to start working in the city again, starting staying out late, and that’s when Claire struck again. He and Nicholas were at it in his car when she pulled him out and started punching then stabbing Eric’s lover.

I think it’s interesting that he blamed both murders on mental illness compounded by post-partum depression; post-partum psychosis is extremely rare and is usually confined to harming oneself or one’s child/ren, but we’re not experts, Eric and I.

Eric and Claire both felt terrible after the deaths, he drove his car into a tree because he wanted to die, which is why he’s in a wheelchair today. He thinks that was a fair punishment, although he allows that the families of the dead may not agree.

Sir Phillip is drinking in the mirror when Joshie (Tom Austen) walks in; he’s called the police to arrest his dad for the murder of Gordon Fenwick. He thinks his dad has lost his way. I am very concerned for wee Joshie right now.

Lizzie is fine!! Shes perfectly well and Ray’s ecstatic to see her. They have a slap fight over who’s apologizing to who but they’re together and that’s all that matters.

We getta see a bebeh! But that’s an opportunity for Ellie to get a call from Thea (Vanessa Hehir), who was the woman Father Bob was being consoled by earlier. Mend those fences, secret daughter!

Cassie and Sunny are putting forth the case against Claire to the CPS lawyer, there’s not much chance they can successfully charge Claire with anything. They want to keep with charging Eric, but Cassie thinks he told the truth and wants to prove that narrative. Eric had a harder time admitting to his homosexuality than the murders, which makes sense given that it was illegal for the first 30 years of his life and that shame was most likely ingrained in his belief systems.

I misspoke; there is NOTHING that makes sense about that. I can’t even IMAGINE a legal system that believes it has the right to govern what people do in the privacy of their own bedrooms, or a particularly poorly-lit alley. NEITHER should a religion concern itself with those very same ideas, but I’ll halt there. I go full-on mouth-foaming when it gets to what religion combined with the legal system has done to women, LBGTQ and people of colour. Stopping!

It seems Matt has inherited his father’s violent temper. Thankfully the police have found them before he can scare Claire any more. That poor woman. Okay, murderous woman, but still.

Cassie arrives home to find her dad Martin (Peter Egan) in a passionate embrace with his girlfriend Annie (Gay Soper – sounds more like a job at a Men’s Bathhouse than a name, doesn’t it?), er-oooh, nobody’s ever ready to see that. The next morning they settle it better, he’s just trying to move on. Life goes on. She just wants him to live his life the way he wants to, just please, do what makes him happy. I love her classic (Gillian-like) eyes down look.

Sir Phillip’s being interviewed but not arrested, until he says yes, he did pay to have Gordon Fenwick killed. I think Frankie C is tired of hiding.

Fences are mending all over town

They’re brainstorming in Cassie’s office again. The CPS lawyer and the superintendent are NOT happy about what could happen to Claire if they go ahead; essentially she’ll be put in a rest home (which is where she should have been AGES ago) instead of being punished for killing two people. Sunny does not think that is a fitting punishment.

Claire’s interview doesn’t go well, she’s flashing back to seeing Jimmy but she can’t remember anything solid so her lawyer calls it. She cries and we all feel sorry for her, although we wish we didn’t.

It’s time to tell Maureen (Frances Tomelty), that task falls on Cassie as we get a montage of the rest of our gang. Curtis passes with great marks, yay! Thea explains to Grace and Ellie that JoJo threatened to not allow Father Bob to see her again if he told his family about her.

I get that we’re redeeming Father Bob here, but he still had sex with a fifteen year old girl when he was almost 30. Dude.

Sir Phillip’s kiddos are visiting him in prison; he’s enjoying his Thinking Time, it’s told him that he’s accomplished his greatest desire: that his kids are better than him. We cry some more.

Matt’s come to visit his mother, DO NOT LEAVE HIM ALONE WITH HER! I am worried he’s about to wash away some dirty laundry with his fists. He is cruel.

Lizzie’s back in the football club for the first time. Curtis smooths the way for her and things are back to normal. Whew.

Ah and Father Bob is giving away his daughter after all, with Thea and the rest of his family present. Jimmy is properly laid to rest as Sir Phillip is found hanging in his cell. Ah Frankie C, sometimes there is too much to go back.

A crisply groomed Sunny and a red-eyed Cassie watch as Maureen places flowers on Jimmy’s grave after the service.

And we’re out. Thank you so much to everyone who read along as I went, what an arc we went through on this show! I was just happy to see Nicola Walker again after falling for her work on Last Tango in Halifax and River. If you haven’t seen her in River, GO! Now! I’ll wait! Then come back and tell me how amazing you thought she was because that is the only possible response. Until next season, cheers!