Vanished ending: Alice and Tom's big twist explained and if there'll be a season 2
Is Tom one of the bad guys, and what happens to Alice? Read on...
Vanished, Amazon’s thriller starring Kaley Cuoco and Sam Claflin, ends on a huge twist that completely changes the series – here’s a breakdown of what happens.
The new Prime Video series, David Hilton and Preston Thompson, starts almost like an anti-Before Sunrise. Partners Alice (Cuoco) and Tom (Claflin) meet in a Paris hotel and eventually board a train to Arles to stay in their dream hotel.
However, Tom disappears somewhere along the way. Alice gets off at Marseilles to investigate, and she finds herself drawn into a harrowing conspiracy more insidious than she would have ever imagined.
Except, by the end, things could definitely be worse. So, whether you gave up before the finale or want to catch yourself up on the ending of Vanished, you’re in the right place.
How does Vanished end?
The Vanished finale opens with Alice and Helene (Karin Viard), her journalist ally, tracking a serial number to a containment port, where they find refugees.
Suddenly, Alex (Matthias Schweighöfer) and his weapon-wielding helpers appear and chase them. As they run along the top of the containers, they fall off the end, and they wake up in front of Alex, Tom, and Mira (Dar Zuzovsky).
Alex asks Alice who’s working for, but no matter how much she insists she’s just an archaeologist, he doesn’t believe her. “Why did you go home?” he asks, before pointing a gun at her head.
Tom – who, at this point, is believed to be a human trafficker like Alex and Mira – advises him that killing an American woman on foreign soil would attract a lot of attention. “She’s just a girl in way over her head,” he assures Alex.
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Alex knocks out Helene instead and demands that Tom hand over his phone.
While they’re alone, Tom hands Alice a syringe and tells her to stab Alex’s enforcer if he attacks her. Why would he want to help her? All will be revealed in due course.
Thankfully, she’s able to escape and convince DI Drax (Simon Abkarian) – at knife point – to come and see the evidence. When they get there, everyone is gone, and as it dawns on her that Tom is fully involved – or is he? – she seems to give up.
When they arrive at a factory connected to the trafficking ring, they find Tom, Alex, Mira, and the refugees, and a stand-off takes place.
Vanished ending explained: Who were the traffickers?
Throughout the series, we learned that Alice met Tom in Jordan when he was working for SOS Global, a charity organisation.
However, after his disappearance and everything that happens to Alex (Maurice’s death, the hitman, and Helene revealing the details of her investigation), she suspects that Tom is actually involved in an international trafficking ring.
While it appeared he was helping the refugees, he was helping Alex and Mira ship them abroad.
So, is Tom one of the bad guys?
No… well, not quite. Here comes the big twist: he’s actually been working undercover for Interpol for three years!
After Alex commands his hitman to shoot Alice, Tom shoots him instead and reveals his secret.
This leads to a shootout in which Helene gets hurt (again) and Alex dies, thanks to Alice clubbing his head multiple times. That leaves Mira, who holds Alice and Tom and gunpoint… before Drax arrives just in time to shoot her.
Drax tells Alice she’s free to go, as everything has proven her to be innocent – but he asks Tom to give her a good explanation, which leads to the closing scenes of the series.
Vanished ending explained: Alice ditches Tom… for some reason
Tom, obviously, apologises to Alice for abandoning her on the train. He didn’t have any other choice: time was of the essence and he needed to get to Alex and Mira to protect his cover and ultimately the refugees.
He promises Alice that he wants them to have a future together, and she reluctantly agrees. They go back to the hotel and have sex, but the next day, she’s gone.
“Dear Tom, at least I had the good manners to leave you a note,” it reads. As the finale draws to a close, we see Alice getting in a taxi and leaving Marseille.
So, in short, her longtime boyfriend was an undercover agent, but she couldn’t trust him anymore, so she left.
Will there be a Vanished season 2?
Vanished hasn’t been confirmed for season 2, but given it was billed as a mini-series, its story is likely over.
However, that doesn’t mean its stars aren’t “curious” about what could come next.
In an interview with TV Insider, Cuoco said: “I’d be curious what her life would be like after, but I think she should be a lot more careful.
“Unfortunately, it might cause her to have a lot of walls up, but I think she learned a big lesson in this experience that you just never truly know who you’re with.”
Claflin had another idea. “What do I think happens afterwards? I think he probably goes looking for her. I think we turn into Vanished 2, and it’s she’s vanished, and it’s his intention to track her down.
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