‘Tiny Beautiful Things’ Ending Explained: Does the Kathryn Hahn Hulu Show End on a High Note?

Tiny Beautiful Things on Hulu ends with a beautiful dream. After watching our heroine Clare (Kathryn Hahn) struggle through eight episodes of messy hookups, flashbacks to drug abuse, and marital woes, she finally finds peace by realizing the only thing that matters is love. Of course, the series finale of Tiny Beautiful Things also plays with timelines and cast switches to fully immerse us in the emotional tumult of Clare and her family. It might feel confusing at times, but that’s only because the creators of Tiny Beautiful Things wanted viewers to understand how young Clare’s (Sarah Pidgeon) pain was informing present-day Clare’s rage, guilt, and trauma. But how exactly does Tiny Beautiful Things end?

Tiny Beautiful Things is based on Cheryl Strayed’s book of the same name. The book is a collection of columns from Strayed’s celebrated run as advice columnist “Dear Sugar” at The Rumpus. What made “Dear Sugar” so popular was the way Strayed combined powerful prose with incredible vulnerability. She mined the trauma of her own life to inform the most compassionate answers to the letters she received.

The Hulu series dramatizes Strayed’s story and makes many alterations to her real life story. Clare has a much more tumultuous life than the real Strayed did at this time and so Tiny Beautiful Things is the story of how this version of the character learned to forgive herself and finally fully grieve her mother. And that’s exactly what happens in the Tiny Beautiful Things finale.

Here’s everything you need to know about the ending of Tiny Beautiful Things on Hulu…

Tiny Beautiful Things Ending Explained:

In the series finale of Tiny Beautiful Things, Clare learns that her estranged father visited her house and gave her teenaged daughter Rae (Tanzyn Crawford) cash to pay back the money Clare had taken from Rae’s college fund to help her brother Lucas (Nick Stahl) keep their mother’s house. Clare is furious as she still sees her father as her mother’s abuser. In her rage, Clare makes Rae drive her to her old family home to confront Lucas and her father.

When the family is reunited, Clare is horrified to learn that Lucas has sold their mother’s house to their father. Lucas claims their father is now sober, but Clare recounts all the times she witnessed his abuse. When Lucas says their mother would preach forgiveness, Clare regurgitates the painful memories of missing her mother’s death because she needed to bring young Lucas (Owen Painter) to Frankie (Merritt Wever). Lucas fires back that no one asked Clare to get him; it was her choice to leave their mother’s side.

Throughout this tense scene, the older and younger versions of Clare and Lucas swap roles. Tiny Beautiful Things executive producer Liz Tigelaar explained that they wanted to evoke “all the versions [of yourself] that live inside of you.”

“You don’t outgrow versions of yourself. You just layer on top, almost like Russian dolls, versions of yourself, so at any moment any of those versions could come out,” Tigelaar said. “Clare can feel her 22-year-old self in her most vulnerable moments.”

After this explosive family fight, Clare and Rae depart. But when Rae starts sobbing, Clare tells her daughter to pull over. Rae believes that all the family drama is her fault because she let her uncle know about her college fund. Clare’s marital issues boiled over when she lent Lucas the money without consulting her husband Danny (Quentin Plair). Clare assures Rae none if it’s her fault and everything she did, she did out of love.

As we see young Clare and Lucas bury their mother’s ashes — and listen to Clare narrate her response to a “Dear Sugar” letter asking when is the right time to say “I love you” — present day Clare leads Rae out into the fields to meet horses the way Frankie did for her children. Rae then tells her mother that she thinks it was good she was with Lucas and not Frankie when she died. Clare tells Rae, “I fucking love you,” and Rae returns the sentiment.

Clare then wakes up in the horse field, but Rae isn’t there. Instead she sees her mother on her deathbed and Lady the horse. Frankie awakens and smiles at Clare. She then repeats her final word to her daughter: “Love.” Clare repeats, “Love.” And then Frankie says, “It’s time.” As Clare takes her mother off the machines in her dream, “Dear Sugar” ends her response to the letter by saying, “We’re all going to die, Johnny, so hit the iron bell [of love] like it’s dinner time.”

So what happened? Through remembering her mother and connecting with her daughter, Clare was able to see that the only important thing is love. She was able to dream a final meeting with her mother that allowed her closure. Most of all, she was able to understand that despite her failings — or those of the people she loved — all that mattered was expressing love.

Clare ends Tiny Beautiful Things at peace. (Though we’re still not clear on whether or not she can forgive her father or if anyone will ever find out she’s “Dear Sugar.”)

Will There Be a Tiny Beautiful Things Season 2 on Hulu?

While you might have fallen in love with Clare, Rae, and the rest of the characters on Tiny Beautiful Things, Hulu has confirmed that it is a limited series. That means there will not be a second season of Tiny Beautiful Things. Clare’s story is complete.

However, if you can’t get enough of author Cheryl Strayed’s story, Wild is an adaptation of her best-selling memoir about hiking the Pacific Crest Trail after her mother’s death. Reese Witherspoon plays a version of Strayed closer to reality than Clare and Laura Dern is her mother. Wild is currently streaming on HBO Max.