Netflix's 'Teenage Bounty Hunters' Ends With One Mammoth Twist
Netflix’s Teenage Bounty Hunters embraced a classic TV formula that more of the streaming platform’s shows could honestly put to good use—the stand-alone, or relatively stand-alone, episode. Rather than inflating its season-long story arc with unnecessary twists and turns to pad out 10-episodes (looking at you, Umbrella Academy Season One), Sterling and Blair Wesley spent a hefty portion of Teenage Bounty Hunters’ first season tracking criminals on the lam in storylines that were resolved by the end of the episode.
But near the end of the season, a more substantial story arch emerged. Here’s what you need to know.
Blair nurses suspicions about her mom pretty much all season.
While the Wesley twins are fairly close with their dad’s family, the parents of their mom, Debbie, died in a private plane crash. But over the course of the season, their mom’s story starts to look a bit flakey. After tailing her mom to a shooting range and quizzing her uncle Deacon, Blair first discovers that her supposedly gun-hating mom is secretly a sharpshooting ace.
After Blair’s prodding, Debbie shares with the girls some photos from her early years, and tells them that she’s not trying to hide her past. In one of the pictures, younger Debbie poses outside of a restaurant, and she tells the girls the photo was taken in her hometown of Savannah, Georgia. But Blair tracks the restaurant down, and it turns out to be in the tiny town of Nandina.
So the girls head off on a roadtrip to Nandina, where they find out that their supposedly super-posh mom grew up in an isolated, impoverished community as a member of an extremist snake-handling sect called “Tabernacle Church of Christ the Redeemer the Living God and His Army.” After paying a visit to a local government office, they learn that their mom is wanted for burning down an abortion clinic.
Back home, they confront her, and Debbie spills the beans. She cops to burning down the clinic back when she was a Christian extremist, but no one was harmed and she now sees the error of her ways. She built a new life and identity for herself, and is still on the lam. How awkward that her kids are secretly bounty hunters.
It turns out that the Wesleys are hiding even bigger secrets.
Sterling and Blair seem reconciled to their mom’s past, and head off to resolve the issues in their romantic lives, with Blair confronting Miles at his incredibly fancy house, and Sterling trying to convince April to go public with their relationship at the school lock-in. Unfortunately for the twins, neither encounter goes well, and Debbie pulls up outside of the girls’ school to pick Sterling up.
But once in the car, Sterling quickly realizes that something’s wrong. Her usually perfectly-appointed mom looks a bit unkempt, and she doesn’t remember the name of Sterling’s boyfriend, Luke, or the family dog. As the real Debbie, who’s back at home with Blair, is forced to reveal, the lady who’s kidnapped Sterling isn’t the twins’ mom. She’s Debbie’s identical twin, Dana. It’s Dana who’s the arsonist on the lam, and she’s been shaking down the Wesleys for money for years. Now, she’s kidnapped Sterling, and with the help of her criminal boyfriend, plans to hold her niece for ransom.
Luckily, Sterling helps Blair, Bowser, and her parents track her down by putting her bounty hunter skills to use. She overdrafts her debit card at a rest stop vending machine by buying candy, which sends a notification to Blair’s phone. At the rest stop, they find a message from Sterling written in the dust from Sour Patch Kids gummies. Her clues lead them to Dana’s home, and Bowser engages in a shootout with Dana’s boyfriend. Debbie follows, and pulls a gun on her twin sister. Right before the police show up to take Dana and her boyfriend away, Dana reveals the show’s final secret—she’s Sterling’s mother. Sterling and Blair aren’t twins at all, they’re cousins.
There’s no word yet on whether or not Teenage Bounty Hunters will be renewed for a second season, but if it is, the truth of Sterling’s parenthood will definitely offer a whole lot for the series to chew on. Here’s hoping we also get a whole bunch more from Virginia Williams as Debbie/Dana—the evil twin may only have appeared in one episode, but she definitely stole the entire show.
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