‘Dead to Me’ Season 2 Recap: Where We Left Jen, Judy, and Ben Ahead of Season 3

It’s been more than two years since Dead to Me Season 2 dropped on Netflix, and at long last the series is back for a third and final season. All 10 episodes of Dead to Me Season 3 will hit Netflix on November, 17, 2022. But before you devour them, be sure to read our Season 2 finale recap to remember where we left Jen, Judy, and the rest of Dead to Me‘s chaotic crew.

Netflix first introduced Dead to Me, starring Christina Applegate, Linda Cardellini, and James Marsden, in May 2019. The series follows grieving widow and mother Jen Harding (Applegate), whose husband died in a hit-and-run. She sets out to solve the crime with help from her new friend Judy (Cardellini), but when Judy reveals a shocking secret, everything changes. Season 2, Episode 10, “Where Do We Go from Here,” left viewers with several major cliffhangers — the biggest related to Marsden’s character, Steve.

Here’s everything you need to remember from Dead to Me Season 2 ahead of Season 3.

Jen Comes Clean to Detective Perez

Episode 9 ended with Jen standing at Detective Perez’s door about to admit to Steve’s murder, and Episode 10 picks up right where we left her. Before Jen gets a word out, Perez breaks down in tears about her ex, Michelle, who Judy had started seeing. Perez reveals that Michelle moved out because she thought she was too obsessed with her job and cared more about being a cop than a human. (This comes in handy later.) After she finishes her vent sesh, Jen admits to the crime, tells Perez everything, and swears she acted alone. Jen takes Perez into the forest where she and Judy buried Steve, but she struggles to locate his burial site. Perez and Jen bump into a woman walking her dog, and Jen keeps flashing back to Steve telling her that her late husband, Ted, killed himself and he’d want to kill himself too if he was married to her.

When Jen and Perez can’t find Steve’s body, they start driving back. Jen tries her best to get her son Charlie off the hook, since police have photos of him driving Steve’s car, and she gets emotional at the thought of her kids growing up without a mother. Detective Perez tells Jen her version of events will carry a lot of weight in court, but she starts feeling sorry for her and decides to finally “be a human instead of a cop.” Perez and Jen both lost their moms when they were young, so they bond over that. And Perez tell Jen that instead of following standard procedure and charging her, she’s taking her home and they’re never going to discuss their trip to the woods again. “I don’t want to be a cop right now. I want to be a person,” Perez said. “And sometimes justice just works itself out, so go home to your kids and tell them you love them.”

Jen Leaves Judy And The Kids Detailed Letters Before Turning Herself In

After we learn Jen turned herself into Perez, we see Judy reading a letter from Jen that explains everything. In the letter, Jen tells Judy that she’s taking sole responsibility for Steve’s murder, she apologizes for taking so long to forgive her for Ted, and she entrusts her with caring for her kids. Judy makes kids breakfast, and just as she’s about to break the news, Jen walks in. After the two debrief, Jen apologizes for killing Steve and Judy not only forgives her, she encourages her to forgive herself. As for that revealing letter? We haven’t seen the last of it yet.

Jen and Judy Start Unpacking Their Complex Relationships With Their Moms

After ~everything~ that went down in Dead to Me‘s first two seasons, Jen heads back to her grief support group and opens up about her mom, who died from cancer. Jen admits she was mad at her mom for not being able to fight anymore, and she has been mad at herself ever since.

Meanwhile, Judy goes to visit her mom in prison with the intention of wiping their slate clean. Judy is honest about their past and her childhood, but when her mom asks her to get her a lawyer, she says she can’t find the money. And when she asks her to write letter to parole board saying she’s better and she’s changed, Judy says no because she doesn’t feel she has changed.

Detective Perez Returns Judy’s Paintings

After Charlie gives Judy a bag he found in the back of Steve’s car, Judy uncovers dirt on the Greek mafia and the police chief. Judy hands the evidence into the station, and Perez pays her a visit later on to inform her that because of her actions, Hastings will no longer be chief of police and “is going to federal prison with a few of his Greek friends.”

As a kind thank you/good job/sorry I hated you gesture, Perez brings Judy her “valuable” paintings from the police locker. Turns out the paintings themselves aren’t valuable, but when Perez leaves, Judy smashes the frames and tons of cash (from Steve) falls out. “Holy fuck,” Jen says when she lays eyes on it. Then Judy gives her the money to buy her mother-in-law out of the house.

Charlie Finds His Mom’s Letter To Judy

Remember that extremely revealing letter Jen wrote Judy, which, in hindsight, was a horrible idea and should have been destroyed the second Jen walked through the door? Yep. Judy kept that letter in a box under her bed, and Jen’s son Charlie found it when he went snooping for weed. Uh oh…

Police Found Steve’s Body

Before the episode ends, police recover Steve Woods’ body in the forest where Jen and Judy buried him. Even worse, the woman whose dog dug Steve’s corpse up was the same woman Jen and Perex saw the day they visited the trail.

As Steve’s brother Ben and his mother are packing up her house, she tells Ben that his lovely realtor friend (Jen) was asking for him. She encourages him to call her, and he leaves the room to do so, but before he has a chance to he gets a call that makes his face drop. “They did? Are they sure? Thank you for letting us know,” he solemnly says. He tells his mom he was on the phone with his realtor friend, then lies and says he’s running out to get ice cream. In reality, the police had just called to say they found Steve’s body.

Ben Hit Jen and Judy! And Then Ran!!

After the unexpected call, Ben heads to the police station as Jen and Judy are driving a new car with a big red bow on it that they got Charlie for his birthday. While the women chat about their dream vacation on a beach sipping piña coladas, Judy yells, “STOP,” and Jen stops at the stop sign she advocated for. “Look what you did…That’s your stop sign. You’re probably going to save lives,” Judy tells Jen. The two celebrate briefly, then Jen drives forward, but just as she enters the intersection, a car SMASHES into them. In the episode’s final moments, we learn that Ben is the one who hit them. He wakes up with a bloody head, drives away, and we see a bottle of whisky on the seat next to him. “Jen wake up! Are you OK?” Judy asks. Jen asks what happened, and after learning they got hit, she delivers an appropriate, “Oh shit,” before the screen fades to black.