Netflix‘s latest addictive supernatural series Lockwood & Co. ends with a most beguiling cliffhanger. No, I’m not talking about the true mystery of the Bone Glass, or even what The Golden Blade (Luke Treadaway) is doing with Penelope Fittes (Morven Christie). No, Lockwood & Co. Season 1 ends at the precise moment when Anthony Lockwood (Cameron Chapman) is due to finally reveal what he’s hiding behind the mysterious door upstairs. So what’s behind the door? And, come to think of it, how exactly did Lucy (Ruby Stokes) and George (Ali Hadji-Heshmati) escape the horrors of Bickerstaff’s Bone Glass?
Lockwood & Co. is based on the best-selling YA series by British author Jonthan Stroud and adapted by writer/director/cult genre fave Joe Cornish. The show takes place in a version of London that has been overrun by deadly ghosts for over half a century. While technological progress has largely stalled, paranormal research has spiked in the ensuing decades. A legendary pioneer in ghost-hunting named Marissa Fittes (Amanda Abbingdon) figured out how to classify these apparitions and how best to fight back. As it happens, some youths are marked by the ability to “see” or “listen” to ghosts. It’s a “talent” that lasts until early adulthood, meaning that teenagers are the world’s front line of protection against ghosts that can murder with a touch.
Lucy Carlyle is an extraordinarily talented “listener” who runs away from her small agency in a Northern English town after she’s framed for a mission gone terribly wrong. She’s quickly forced to join a most unusual ghost-hunting agency called Lockwood & Co. The upstart is run by a posh, but talented, teen orphan named Anthony Lockwood and buoyed by the research efforts of another scrappy teen named George. The trio soon takes on a number of dangerous cases to pursue wealth, freedom, and, in the case of Lockwood, glory.
But what exactly goes down at the end of Lockwood & Co.? Who killed Annabel Ward (voiced by Jemma Moore, ghost body by Ishtar Apsara Currie-Wilson)? Did Pamela Joplin (Louise Brealey) mastermind the discovery and theft of the Bone Glass? And what exactly is behind the locked door in Lockwood’s family home? Here’s Lockwood & Co. ending explained…
Who Killed Annabel Ward in Netflix’s Lockwood & Co.?
The first mystery that Lucy has to unravel when she joins Lockwood & Co.? The violent murder of rising star Annabel Ward. After Lucy and Lockwood discover Annabel’s corpse unceremoniously “bricked” behind a chimney, they’re left wondering if they can find her killer. Lucy feels a unique emotional connection to Annabel’s vengeful ghost, while Lockwood sees the tabloid-ready story as a way to boost the agency’s profile.
While the gang initially thinks Annabel was murdered by her lover/co-star Hugo Blake, they realize almost too late that Annabel’s secret lover/killer was in fact the powerful Sir John Fairfax (Nigel Planer).
After Lockwood did a splashy TV interview about their investigation, Sir John Fairfax sent an employee to break into Lockwood & Co. to track down Annabel’s “source,” aka the engraved ring he gave her. Not only does the ring have the power to summon Annabel’s ghost, but its engraving would point to a paper trail that would incriminate Fairfax.
The gang doesn’t put this together until they almost die on a job for the aristocrat. At first, they think clearing his ghost-infested country home of Combe Carey Hall will solve their financial problems. However, once they’re there, it’s clearly a trap. When the teens attempt to escape, they run into Sir John Fairfax, who is about to kill them. Lucy sagely pretends to hand over Annabel’s source, but actually unleashes her. Annabel’s ghost kills Fairfax and the event is covered up by DEPRAC (aka the Department of Psychical Research and Control). Still, Lucy, Lockwood, and George get a glimpse of a mysterious harp symbol DEPRAC is intent on covering up… A symbol that also pops up in the pursuit of the Bone Glass…
Lockwood & Co. Ending Explained: Who REALLY Wanted the Bone Glass?
The second have of Lockwood & Co.‘s first season follows the gang as they compete with a rival team from Fittes to track down the stolen relic known as the “Bone Glass.” Because George accidentally got a glimpse at the Bone Glass mirror, he becomes obsessed or “mesmerized” by the object.
Over the course of several life-threatening missions, the team put together that the Bone Glass was created by Victorian occultist Edmund Bickerstaff through a series of dastardly ceremonies. Bickerstaff was eventually killed by Mary Dulac, a woman who was used by Bickerstaff and his cult to look at “eternity” through the glass. In her diary, she describes how the experience affected her and how she buried Bickerstaff with the Bone Glass in the iron coffin the team was initially called out to secure in Episode 4.
While Lockwood and Lucy risk their skins sneaking into the Fittes library and a Black Market auction, George becomes closer to the cemetery’s head researcher, Pamela Joplin. As it happens, Ms. Joplin had been manipulating the entire situation. She arranged for the iron coffin to be exhumed and then hired relic men to steal it for her. When one, Carver, betrayed her by selling it to Black Market king Winkman (Ben Crompton), she kills him. Lockwood and Lucy manage to steal the Bone Glass at an auction where the Golden Blade tries to procure it…for (we later learn) Penelope Fittes and the mysterious harp organization.
Angry with Lockwood and Lucy, George brings the Bone Glass not to the authorities as planned, but Ms. Joplin. She then leads him to a ceremony in the cemetery in which she’s plotting to use George and his “talent” to look into the mirror of the Bone Glass. Lucy manages to track them down with the help of the head in the glass, aka the Whispering Skull — who is a Type Three ghost and former acolyte of Bickerstaff. Lucy gets there just in time to save George by offering herself up as more “talented” seer.
However, Lucy uses the Whispering Skull to look at the Bone Glass. What the ghost sees, disturbs even him. He tells Lucy that something is wrong and the Bone Glass is not a conduit to the eternal, but a trap holding souls. George destroys the Bone Glass to save Lucy. Ms. Joplin goes to the cracked Bone Glass and becomes consumed by it; she is destroyed by what she sees.
While this is going on, Lockwood & Co. join forces with the Fittes team to save the day, push back the relic men, and help capture Winkman. The Golden Blade arrives and shoots Lockwood, but not before revealing that Lockwood’s parents’ death was “insignificant,” suggesting that they died because of some secret connected to the “harp” organization.
In the end, the Bone Glass is taken in by DEPRAC to be burned, Lockwood & Co. saves the day, and Penelope Fittes tells the Golden Blade that it’s better the Bone Glass is destroyed than in the hands of the unwitting public.
However the last shot of the season still has us asking questions…
Lockwood & Co. Season 1’s Final Mystery: What’s Behind the Door?!?
So what’s Anthony Lockwood hiding behind that door? Declaring that there will be no more mysteries between the team, Lockwood opens the door and shows Lucy and George what’s there in the very last seconds of Lockwood & Co. Season 1. But what is it??
Well, we don’t know! Our best guess is it has something to do with Anthony’s parents’ death. Moreover, Lucy is told by the Whispering Skull that it is “dangerous.”
We better hope Netflix renews Lockwood & Co. for a second season so we find out soon!