‘Pieces of Her’ Ending Explained: Who Killed Martin Queller?

Netflix‘s new thriller Pieces of Her follows what happens when a young woman discovers her mother isn’t the mild-mannered nobody she thinks. The series stars Bella Heathcote as Andy, a police dispatch operator whose life is turned upside down when she’s trapped in a shooting. Her mother Laura (Toni Collette) disarms and kills the assailant, but doing so puts them in danger. As soon as Laura’s deed goes viral, she and Andy find themselves hunted from people from Laura’s past. Andy embarks on a wild cross-country journey to figure out who her mother really is and finds herself solving a murder mystery in the process.

**SPOILERS FOR PIECES OF HER AHEAD!**

Pieces of Her was created by Charlotte Stoudt and is based on Karin Slaughter’s best-selling novel of the same name. The series reveals that Laura’s real name is Jane Queller and that she and daughter Andi have lived the past 30 years in Witness Protection. Jane was the daughter of a wealthy, evil, and controlling pharmaceutical CEO named Martin Queller (Terry O’Quinn). When she met her brother Andrew’s (Nicholas Burton) revolutionary best friend Nick (Joe Dempsie), the two fall in love (and Jane joins Nick’s revolutionary group).

30 years prior, Martin Queller is shot and killed by a member of Nick’s cult while onstage at a conference in Oslo. It is believed that Nick orchestrated the murder and the killings of others. A pregnant Jane goes to the police after the death of her brother Andrew and offers to testify against Nick in exchange for a lightened sentence. Nick is never caught, but Jane is able to restart her life with Andy a few years later with a new name. When Jane is seen copying a move she learned from Nick to save Andy in the present day, her “heroic” act blows her cover and draws Nick’s operatives her way. (So it seems.)

The final episode of Pieces of Her seems to tie everything up in a neat bow, with Andy stopping her mother from killing her father, her father behind bars, and family safe and sound. However Andy pieces together that Nick wasn’t the killer at all…

Pieces of Her Ending Explained: Who Killed Martin Queller?

While later episodes of Pieces of Her seem to suggest that Jane left Nick upon realizing her brother Jasper (Calum Worthy in the past, David Wenham in the present) worked with Nick to kill their father so he could take over the company, that’s not what happened. As it happens, Jane killed her father.

Nick’s plan was to kidnap an academic who’d share the stage with Martin and replace the woman with one of their aggrieved acolytes, Grace Juno (Catherine McClements). While on stage, she’d toss money at Martin and there would be an exploding dye kit designed to make it look like Martin was covered in blood. Everyone assumed Nick changed the plan and gave Grace the gun. The recording Jane has been saving (and Jasper’s been after) suggests that Nick and Jasper were in cahoots to kill Martin. But that’s not what happened!

Jane meets Grace at the bar before the panel and reveals she’s pregnant. She stresses how evil her father is and reveals that Martin has already tried to drug her (which he had) to force a miscarriage. Jane opens her purse to reveal she has a gun (because she and her father got to bypass customs). Grace understands and the women switch purses. Grace kills Martin and then herself. Jane’s actions put the organization in danger and spark a series of events that lead to Andrew’s death, the academic’s death, and her decision to betray Nick.

Andy figures this out and tells U.S. Marshall/love interest Michael (Jacob Scipio) on the phone. Jasper has Andy’s phone bugged, which means he knows the truth now. He calls Jane with a demand, which we never learn.

The final scene is of Andy meeting her mother on the beach and the two taking a walk. We don’t know if Michael will tell the authorities what happened or how Jasper will deal with Jane now.

If the ending was confusing to you — that’s because it is confusing. But Jane killed her father and framed Nick for it.

Watch Pieces of Her on Netflix