Grantchester Season 8 Finale Recap: Will and Geordie Decide Their Futures While We Decide to (Gulp!) Like Larry
We all know Grantchester is an ensemble drama, but Season 8’s final two hours made us feel it. Yes, there were big questions to answer for the leading men: Would Will end his guilt-and-pill-fueled bender in time to see Bonnie give birth? Would Geordie retire? But we also got enough growth from Larry to suddenly ‘ship him and Miss Scott (let’s call them Scarry!), touching scenes between Leonard and Jack, and Leonard and Daniel, and multiple reminders that the actresses playing Cathy and Mrs. C have incredible comedic timing.
Episode 5 began with a montage setting up Will’s manic behavior: When he’s down, he pops pills; when he’s up, he delivers a fiery sermon about the dangers of not moving on from the past, types a letter to the editor encouraging readers to protest nuclear arms, and leads a scout troop in song. Mrs. C thought Will was back to his old self. She was more worried about Leonard now: “I swear I’ll hear the seven trumpets of Revelation before the two of them are happy at the same time,” she said.
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The case for the first hour was the poisoning of two men at a club. A doctor had died, and the bartender who served him, Mike, was fighting for his life. Since Elliott had put Geordie on desk duty, Larry had to go solo to the hospital to speak with Mike’s Hungarian wife and to the club, where a barmaid told him that the doc had been arguing with the club’s owner, Bernie, before his death. Bernie tried to bribe Larry to let the club stay open during the investigation, but to his credit, Larry refused. He took a bottle of 50-year-old cognac and used glasses back to the office for testing. He didn’t go check out the doctor’s office until Geordie suggested it, though. There, he found the doc’s niece stealing money. She said he owed her wages — and that her uncle wasn’t the man people thought he was. That’s something she should have been asked to explain, gents!
At least Geordie was free to accompany Will to the halfway house, where Leonard was preparing to win over the local councilor with scones to keep his doors open. Keith was the only resident left at this point, so Will suggested Jack pretend to be a new arrival and Mrs. C act as the housekeeper. Leonard hugged Geordie for agreeing to show his support alongside Cathy, but he felt nervous about the ruse. Will assured Leonard that the end justifies the means… before he downed more pills. The councilor was moved by the presentation, but Will snapped and shouted at her for offering false hope.
Meanwhile, Larry struggled to have an original thought of his own, but he did one thing right: He brought Miss Scott in on the case as his partner. He showed her a small book of codes that he’d found, and took her with him to the hospital to speak with a recovering Mike. The field trip gave them time to discuss why Larry is loyal to Elliott — because Elliott treats him as though he has a right to investigate cases, whereas Geordie and even Miss Scott think he’s clueless. Larry knows he has a lot to learn, but he’s trying. The fact that he believes a woman would make a good detective is promising. Miss Scott’s bedside manner is stronger than this already: She pieced together that the couple had come to England after Hungary’s 1956 uprising, noted that the couple had changed their names, and recognized Mike’s accent as Russian. Larry was smart enough to realize that Geordie should run point from here.
The niece later confirmed that her uncle would blackmail patients with information that he’d learned about them, for money or whatever he could get. He’d treated Bernie for an STD and threatened to tell his wife about the affair if he didn’t let him drink for free at the club. Larry and Miss Scott figured out that the doctor had discovered who Mike’s wife really was: a Hungarian university professor who’d led protests of Soviet policies with her husband and was blamed for the deaths of some of her students. Everyone assumed Mike had placed the cyanide in the bottle, but Will questioned how he’d have known the proper dose. Ding! Ding! Ding! The wife had been a chemistry professor. When the doctor threatened to tell his friends at the Soviet embassy about her, she went to the club, asked to see the bottle Mike was about to serve, and thought she’d just be poisoning the doc. But that night, the doctor had asked Mike to join him.
As for other huge developments in the first hour, Geordie confronted Will about his drug use. He had to physically take the bottle from Will’s jacket. “Is this who you are now? Popping pills and preaching sermons?” he asked. Will admitted he can’t shake the guilt and claimed the pills bring him focus, but they both knew what kind of damage drugs do to people and their relationships. It’s hard to say who had more tears in their eyes when Will said he was trying to stop and Geordie barked, “Well, you try harder! I mean it.” Actor Robson Green conveyed so much in those seven words: Geordie’s sadness, anger, and fear over what Will was doing to himself and his growing family, but also how scared Geordie was at the thought of having to watch it continue.
Geordie also learned Elliott’s next step: He was going to loan him out to other towns until Geordie’s miserable enough to retire. Geordie took Cathy on a romantic walk with chips and told her that he’d rather be home for her and the kids than following Elliott’s whim. With her promotion in mind, he was ready to talk about retiring — they’re a team, and he wants to make sure it works for both of them. Bravo, Geordie. In my mind, those two did more than kiss (because you know Bonnie told her aunt about her outdoor romp with Will!). Eventually, Geordie typed up his resignation.
Leonard’s love life remained in flames. In a tender moment that made me wish we’d see more of innately kind Jack, Mrs. C’s hubby urged Leonard to talk with Daniel — because love has a way of making the impossible seem possible. Mrs. C overhead Leonard tell Jack that she’s probably happy that his relationship is over. But Jack said she knows how happy Daniel makes him. She wanted to prove it and went to see Daniel. Only she saw him lighting a man’s cigarette at his door and scurried away. When she told Leonard about that, Leonard confronted Daniel, who was offended that an affair — which it wasn’t — was the only reason he’d come to see him. Team Daniel!
Will picked the worst time to apologize to Leonard about tanking things with Miss Taylor. Leonard was in pain and just wanted Will to hurt as much as he did: “Why would I ever trust you to do anything ever again? What use are you, to anyone, when all you do is wallow in self-pity?” he hissed. Will almost burst into tears. The vicar went home, wrote a letter saying that everything will be better now that he’s gone, and left town.
The second hour started with Will getting roughed up outside a club, refusing to fight back and urging the guy punching him to have another go. Back in Grantchester, Geordie was busy searching for Will, even calling the morgue. Bonnie and Ernie returned home. Leonard was feeling utterly alone now that 1) Keith was preparing to leave after reconnecting with the son he’d been too afraid to love because of how much it’d hurt to lose him and 2) photographer Daniel had announced that he’d been offered gallery space in London for a while. When Larry showed up to bring the halfway house’s residents in for questioning about a garage robbery, Leonard didn’t put up a fight: “There’s no one to round up, Larry,” he said. “Let’s just get this over with.”
A cop named Mac had found Will and phoned in his location. Geordie was about to leave the station to fetch him when Larry arrived with Leonard. Geordie tried to tell Elliott there was no need for this: Leonard doesn’t own a car or drive. But again, Leonard said, “Let’s get this over with.” Elliott was itching for a fight and told Larry to put Leonard in a cell. This time, Larry didn’t follow his orders. Elliott grabbed Leonard himself and started dragging him. Leonard pushed Elliott off him, and Elliott smacked him hard with the back of his hand while Geordie and Larry looked on in shock. As if we couldn’t despise Elliott more at this point. Still, Leonard insisted Geordie go find Will.
That reunion was not great. Will was still convinced Bonnie and the kids would be better off without him. Geordie wasn’t giving up on him yet, but he needed a smoke break. Outside the station, he talked with Mac, who we already knew was a good guy by the way he fed a hungry young brother and sister, Jacob and Sadie, cheese sandwiches. The veteran cop was a good reader of people, too: Mac could tell that Will was broken at the moment, and Geordie loved Will like a son. It’s a good thing Geordie was there, because just then, Mac was informed that the children’s aunt and uncle had been killed.
At the scene, Geordie pieced together a child’s bloody footprint. When we saw Jacob pull a bloody knife on Will back at the station and force Will to be a getaway driver, we were supposed to think Jacob was the killer. He even confessed after they ran out of gas and were stranded alongside the road. But Will didn’t believe him. He saw old bruises on Jacob’s back. He could tell Jacob was wise beyond his years, calling Will out for not being with his family and talking about suffering. After Geordie and Mac took them all back to the station, Jacob wouldn’t talk but Sadie did. It was their aunt who’d beaten Jacob for shoplifting chocolate for hungry Sadie. Their uncle stopped her, and sent the kids outside. Jacob told Sadie to cover her ears and close her eyes while he went back in to stop the fighting. The case seemed closed… until Will found the uncle’s confession, which Jacob had hidden in Will’s bible. Their aunt had berated their uncle while he was slicing food. He snapped and stabbed her, then wrote the confession and stabbed himself. They were already dead when Jacob went inside. To protect his uncle’s memory, he took the confession and the knife. He intended to tell Mac, but then he couldn’t find the words. Jacob told Will that he wished he hadn’t made her angry, that he had done more to stop her, that he could make it all go away. Will held him and repeated, “You did everything you could.” Finally, Will heard it for himself and believed it. He also showed exactly what kind of father he’d be.
Geordie suggested Mac and his wife raise Jacob and Sadie now, and then it was time to go home. On the drive back, Will gave the pills to Geordie, and Geordie held his hand. They’re in this together.
Much had gone down while they were away. Let’s start with Larry releasing Leonard, to hell with Elliott. “It’s what Geordie would do. It’s what is right,” Larry explained.
“I could kiss you, Larry,” Leonard responded. “Don’t worry, I’m not going to.”
They shook hands. Larry is growing up before our eyes!
Leonard went back to the halfway house and looked at the excellent portraits Daniel had left him. He saw one of himself looking so happy. He had to be brave enough to love Daniel. He literally ran to see him: “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you run anywhere,” Daniel said. Leonard breathlessly told him that he was his everything, and Daniel said he’d been out looking for Leonard because the idea of going to London wasn’t as appealing without him.
Bonnie hadn’t stopped loving Will either, but it didn’t keep her from worrying that he may not want her anymore. Bonnie’s heart-to-heart with Cathy in the church was priceless. Bonnie had promised herself that if she ever married again after losing her first husband, it’d be someone stable and trustworthy. But then she met Will and… “all the really good sex,” Cathy interjected. YES. Proof they’d discussed that outside tryst?
At the vicarage, Mrs. C told Cathy she blamed herself for retiring and not being there to watch over Will. She missed having someone to care about. Bonnie was out mowing the lawn, trying to hold off her contractions, which had started. She refused to leave the house until she knew where she stood with Will.
Geordie and Will finally arrived home to find three adorable puppies in a basket on the vicarage’s doorstep. Dickens’ baby mama had delivered first. Will told Geordie to wish him luck, and as Geordie held one of the puppies he told it, “He’s a dead man.” Leave it to Robson Green to hold his own opposite a puppy!
Will walked into the kitchen, and it was sort of like the end of Jerry Maguire, with Bonnie surrounded by Mrs. C and Cathy. “Ladies,” Bonnie said, and the two of them rose from their seats ready to throttle Will. “By which I mean, give us a moment,” she finished. Will didn’t know where to start, but Bonnie did: She punched his arm for herself and hugged him for the baby. If he was leaving her, she wanted him to say it quickly before she remembered why she loves him. He promised he’d never leave her again. “Good, because I bloody love you, YOU STUPID MAN!” she shouted as another contraction hit. Will’s smile when he realized what was happening was big and genuine and something we hadn’t seen since the Season 8 premiere.
The whole season was worth it to get to the hospital, with everyone rushing down the hall with Bonnie — including Geordie carrying the basket of puppies, which Cathy said he should’ve left in the car. “I tried. They looked upset,” he answered. Ha! The nurse told them only the expectant mother would come into the delivery room, but Will, keeping his word, wasn’t leaving Bonnie’s side. In the waiting room, Geordie held a puppy again and was unsure why Will would voluntarily witness childbirth. Jack had brought cigars for the men, which the women took as well. Esme wanted one, too, but the adults vetoed that in unison. At least Daniel respected her hustle. Ernie asked if the stork was going to fly through the window with the baby. No one wanted to field that question. It was perfection.
When Will came out holding his son, Leonard wasn’t the only one crying. Later, as Bonnie and Will introduced Ernie to his brother, Ernie decided his name: James. Geordie peeked in the room just in time for Will to reveal the middle name: George. Geordie nodded. I teared up again.
Geordie was set to retire this week, so he went back to the office. He’d heard Larry released Leonard. He rewarded him with the sign Sidney had given him: “Abhor what is evil, hold fast to what is good.” There is no greater sign of respect from Geordie. He told Larry that his late mother would be proud of him. As Larry left Geordie’s office grinning, Miss Scott told Geordie that she hates to admit it, but she finds Larry attractive when he’s not being a twerp (!).
Elliott stormed in, wanting to know if it was Geordie who’d reported his use of excessive force. Elliott is being transferred now, so Geordie gets to stay — which we’re happy about since Georgie had told Mac that he’d miss being a cop every hour of every day. Larry held up the sign to Geordie, signaling that it was him who’d reported Elliott. So yes, we like Larry now and are ‘shipping him and Miss Scott for as long as he remains worthy.
At the church, Leonard apologized to an exhausted Will, and Will performed his own son’s christening — attended by everyone, including one of Dickens’ puppies. After Mrs. C scolded Geordie and Cathy’s kids, Cathy realized she’d found the solution to their childcare problem. Cue a montage of Mrs. C sending Geordie and Cathy to work with lunchboxes and leading their kids, dressed in matching clothes like the Von Trapps, off marching. She’ll take care of them all! Meanwhile, Mac was doing well with Jacob and Sadie, and it appeared Leonard got to meet Keith’s adult son as he’d hoped to. Will was truly back to himself, telling his son during the service that life won’t always be easy but to look for the joy and the love.
The final scene was full of fathers and sons: Will carried James while walking with his surrogate dad, Geordie, and Dickens and his boy, Milburn, trailed behind them. (Geordie had named his new pup after footballer Jackie Milburn.) Will and Geordie’s banter was easy as ever. Geordie wants James raised with the proper amount of cynicism so he can be a detective like his favorite great uncle when he grows up. He told Will to wait for the terrible twos and the even worse teenage years. We’re going to miss this when Tom Brittney leaves the show next season. But Will’s story does feel complete: He’s happy with Bonnie and believes he can be a better father than his dad was. Will’s relationship with Geordie won’t end when Brittney’s screentime does; they’re family.
Do you agree? Are you ready to meet another vicar in Season 9? Grade the season ender, then join the congregation in the comments to share your thoughts.
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