'Guilt' Season 2's Finale Ships Everyone Out

Mark Bonnar as Max and Jamie Sives as Jake in 'Guilt' Season 2

Mark Bonnar as Max and Jamie Sives as Jake in 'Guilt' Season 2

Expectation/Happy Tramp North 2021

We start the finale of Guilt where we left off at the end of the last episode, with Maggie, Jake, and Max in a warehouse. Maggie delivers a lovely monologue about family, with a flashback to Jake and Max parting ways before the elder McCall got arrested. Maggie said it broke her heart to watch, but she got over it. Max wonders why the Lynches were there before remembering they helped Jake set him up.

Jake returned to Edinburgh because the police notified him Max was hit by a bus. Max is annoyed he fell for it; however, Maggie is impatient for Max to reveal the details of his plan. Max explains the land is in Erin’s name; she is to pay him off. Only he can fix the deal, so he’s taken precautions. If something happens to him, there will be retaliation against the Lynches. Maggie says they’ve taken precautions, too; Max will go to Erin and say what they tell him as she departs. Left alone, Jake suggests Max should come with him to Chicago; he rejects Jake’s invitation, blaming everything that happened to the family on him. Jake leaves, with Roy taking him to the airport, bestowing the parting gift of a slash across the palm -- forcing him to hold the blade and get blood on the handle.

Max calls Erin, warning Maggie is heavily involved. Strategies are in place, and it’s just a race to the finish line. First, Max sees Davie (Simon Weir), the front for Phoenix, and offers to sell him Erin’s land for half market value. The man hesitates to cross Lynch, but Max says Roy will be in jail before word gets out. Davie asks if they have the church, and he lies that they do. 

Phyllis Logan as Maggie in 'Guilt' Season 2

Phyllis Logan as Maggie in 'Guilt' Season 2

Expectation/Happy Tramp North 2021

Yvonne visits Kenny and explains that Stevie used her drinking problem to get a promotion, assuring him a domino effect will bring down Roy and possibly Max. Jake is next to visit, accompanied by a Lynch hoodlum, who warns him to stay away; Max shouldn’t get away with this. Max makes his fake confession at Erin’s place, saying he was planning on taking everything for himself. Erin pretends to be angry with him.

In the meantime, Stevie calls Roy; Max is working undercover for Jackie. (It’s a setup. Jackie is next to Stevie and hands him the file as Roy roars down the phone for Stevie to get it immediately.) As Max and Roy leave Erin’s house, they have a civil chat about ending on good terms for both parties; Roy suggests a meeting the following day. Both know one of them is going down. At the legal office, the Divorce guy stops by as Kenny asks Max for the account details from Roy’s dirty bag of cash. Max apologizes, hands over the paperwork, and says the business is in Kenny’s name. Theirs is a surprisingly emotional goodbye.

Erin’s parents tell her they will reunite, but she insists on clearing up the past, starting with Christmas Eve. They tell her Roy was abused as a kid; Maggie killed the culprit and would do it again, but she let Roy take the blame to keep Erin. Max arrives at the church to wait for Roy, saying he understands Sandy’s life has been damaged. He hints that he has a child who doesn’t know he exists. As Roy pulls up, Sandy invites Max to stick around. As Sandy and Roy discuss the Church higher-ups accepting his offer, Max finds the confirmation of his theory: a photo of a child who is obviously Erin in Sandy’s office. Roy sees it, freezes in shock, and is devastated. 

Roy shows up at Maggie’s place as she wakes. He tells her he never wants to talk about it, but she can tell Erin after he’s gone. Maggie’s parting excuse is that she had no good options; Roy’s trauma kept him from being intimate with her.

Mark Bonnar as Max in 'Guilt' Season 2

Mark Bonnar as Max in 'Guilt' Season 2

Expectation/Happy Tramp North 2021

Erin deleted Maggie’s murder confession, leaving Max without his needed slam dunk for Jackie until he remembers the Teddy and Joe situation but deleted the recording. He tells Jackie that Joe McLean, a recent suicide case, was most likely killed at Erin’s house over the money Roy later brought him. He emphasizes Erin didn’t have anything to do with it, but Roy did. Jackie seems satisfied until she dismisses Yvonne from the investigation and threatens her to stay out of Leith. 

Max is being set up for Roy, and even Stevie objects, giving Jackie info on an attempted murder stabbing involving Roy, ordered by Maggie. Erin stops at Roy’s to tell him she sold the land. She knows Maggie holds the most significant blame, but the time has passed for father-daughter bonding, so she’s leaving with Max to start over. Roy shows her proof that Max is helping the police. Sensing they may never meet again, Roy expresses his pride in calling her his daughter. 

Jackie comes to arrest Maggie for the attempted murder of the “investment” salesman; Maggie says she feels terrible about what happened to Jackie’s family. (Ok, sure.) Immediately, Maggie goes into preservation mode, claiming she takes pills for dementia. Meanwhile, on a tip from Max, Teddy walks into Roy’s flat. Understanding why he’s there, Roy seems at peace with dying at the hands of this grieving brother as long as Teddy accepts Erin’s innocence. 

Kenny steps out of his AA meeting to warn Max of the trap, but Max doesn’t answer. Instead, Yvonne shows up, and they leave. Meanwhile, at Leith Legals, the Divorce guy enters instead of Max, surprising Lynch’s henchman. Erin walks into the church; she and Sandy smile at one another. Max walks into a bar in Chicago where the bartender knows his name.

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Guilt

A hit-and-run plunges brothers Max and Jake into a farcical cover-up.
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Carmen Croghan

Carmen Croghan often looks at the state of her British addiction and wonders how it got so out of hand.  Was it the re-runs of Monty Python on PBS, that second British Invasion in the 80’s or the royal pomp and pageantry of Charles and Diana’s wedding? Whatever the culprit, it led her to a college semester abroad in London and over 25 years of wishing she could get back to the UK again.  Until she is able, she fills the void with British telly, some of her favorites being comedies such as The Office, The IT Crowd, Gavin and Stacey, Alan Partridge, Miranda and Green Wing. Her all-time favorite series, however, is Life On Mars. A part-time reference library staffer, she spends an inordinate amount of time watching just about any British series she can track down which she then writes about for her own blog Everything I Know about the UK, I Learned from the BBC.  She is excited to be contributing to Telly Visions and endeavors to share her Anglo-zeal with its readers.

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A writer since her childhood introduction to Shel Silverstein, Marni adores film, cats, Brits, and the Oxford comma. She studied screenwriting at UARTS and has written movie, TV, and pop culture reviews for Ani-Izzy.com, and Wizards and Whatnot. You can usually catch her watching Hot Fuzz for the thousandth time. Find her very sparse social media presence on Twitter: @CeriseMarni

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