Half Man episode 6 (finale): The end of Ruben and Niall?
We had a feeling that Half Man episode 6 being the finale, was going to be one of the show’s most bleak and devastating yet. Richard Gadd never promised a happy ending to this story, and we certainly did not get it in the final moments.
What did we see? Well, for starters, the truth behind what happened to Ruben after the wedding. He was left bleeding out from the torso after a violent confrontation with Niall, one where he seemingly enacted his revenge on a prison discussion from the past. The two had started to move past all of their trauma and violence, and we also got a sense as to why the show bears the title that it does. Then, Niall revealed to him the truth about him being with Mona while Ruben was away, as well as the truth about Baird. This was as emotional a kick as any other moment this whole series, and it was the point of no return where Ruben was out to take everything from his brother — proving further that the cycle would never end. Niall is gone, and it looks as though Ruben may have lost his own life in the process.
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What we did especially see through the second half of this season was all the ways that Niall was awful, proving further that the scars were not just limited to Ruben. Sure, there is doubt and distrust, but then there is also Niall basically using his book as a reflection of what he has gone through. The power dynamics shifted, which is certainly something that happened over the course of the past five episodes. Still, this all led to one of the most startling turns yet.
As for what to take away from this show, it could be that the cycle of toxic masculinity never ends. Also, it may be that we were all a little foolish for thinking that there was going to be some sort of positive outcome for any of these people.
In speaking about the ending further to Entertainment Weekly, here is some of what Gadd had to say:
“I felt like in a show where you were always asked to fill in the gaps of things, wouldn’t it be interesting, and wouldn’t it be quite exciting to almost fill in the gaps of the ending, almost in a way? To me, I know how Ruben dies, and to me, most people, when they’re asked to answer, say the same thing in a lot of ways, but they sometimes say different things, and they sometimes say different things as to what Ruben’s final grunt means. To me, I would never want to take that away from people, but I thought that one of the more interesting things you can do in a show where you were almost asking the audience to kind of intellectually fill things in is to have them fill in the kind of crescendo piece as well, and that was my thinking behind it.”
What did you think about the events of the Half Man finale overall?
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