Joan ending explained: Were Joan and Kelly reunited?

In the penultimate episode, Joan (Sophie Turner) makes some major decisions regarding her escape plan with Boisie (Fred Dillane), also making plans to secure her daughter Kelly (Mia Millichamp-Long) a passport, although she is in the care of another family.

Joan and Boisie's big plan revolves around clearing out Bernard's (Alex Blake) jewellery shop and taking the entirety of the premiere collection. But will it go off without a hitch? Or will Joan be found out in the end?

There are plenty of scenes within the series that have been "ripped from the real world", according to series creator and writer Anna Symon who spoke of the first episode's momentous diamond swallowing scene. So, there's plenty of dramatic scenes to come, we're sure.

With that, read on for a full breakdown of the final episode of Joan.

Joan ending explained

Working towards getting Kelly back, Joan makes a plan to go into Kelly's new school under the guise of being an American journalist who is writing about British children's playtime.

Secretly securing a passport for Kelly via Albie (Gershwyn Eustache Jr), Joan is yet to tell Boisie, but continues forward in her plan to rob Bernard's store. Along with Albie, Paul and Boisie, Joan goes over the plan and they confirm that Boisie and Paul will break into the store and take the jewels with Joan as fast as they can.

After they've cleared the store, Albie then tells Joan and Boisie that they will be on their way to another secret location where a caravan awaits them before going off to New Haven. Later that day at work, though, Tom (Jack Greenlees) is scoping out Bernard's jewellery store and is clearly monitoring Joan.

That evening, Boisie is packing up his things and sees that Joan has also packed a small suitcase for a child, clearly for Kelly. Confronting Joan about it later that night, he's clearly annoyed as he tells Joan that going on the run with Kelly isn't best for her.

Although Joan wants to take Kelly sooner rather than later, Boisie reminds her of their original plan and that he'd eventually return to the UK to take Kelly when the time is right.

Later, Boisie eventually confides in Joan about his own upbringing and that his mother continually picked men over him, putting his own safety in jeopardy and eventually just using Boisie's child maintenance money for herself.

On the day of the robbery, Joan goes to work and stays late for the stock take with Bernard. Whilst working, Bernard receives a call from someone saying they need to speak to Joan urgently about this afternoon's plans. Boisie comes into the shop later and tells Joan that Paul has pulled out of the operation because he doesn't trust Joan.

Although Boisie says they should stand down for now, Joan insists that they should go forward with their plan and that Albie should just go ahead and find someone else to do Paul's work. Later, as they're sat in the van waiting to go and break in to the shop, Boisie realises that Paul's stand-in is actually Gary (Nick Blood), Kelly's father and Joan's ex.

As they grab as much as they can, Gary is clearly executing a different plan as he proceeds to smash up the store and show Joan that he has a loaded gun. Taking jewels of his own, Gary gets into an argument with Boisie but lets slip that Joan is in charge in front of Bernard, which drives him to pick up the gun and shoot at the ceiling. Running in to protect Joan after hearing the gunshot, Boisie covers her as Bernard shoots and gets Boisie in the leg.

Does Boisie die?

Boisie starts bleeding out and Joan tries to get Gary and even Bernard to help but Gary simply walks in to retrieve his bag of stolen jewels, leaves, tells Albie that Boisie got shot and orders him to drive.

Joan tries to stop Boisie's leg from bleeding and get him up so they can escape but he deteriorates quickly. Joan thinks they just have to make it to the van outside, unaware that Albie has left them.

Boisie tells Joan to go and get Kelly and manages to make it outside with Joan's help but dies in the alleyway behind the shop.

As Joan is left crying over Boisie's body, she hears police sirens and runs away.

Were Joan and Kelly reunited?

As Joan tries to compose herself in Boisie's car and wipe Boisie's blood off of her, she tries to calm down in order to go and get Kelly. Realising the time, she quickly cleans up in a public bathroom and gets changed into her disguise.

At Kelly's school, she's ushered in to meet the children and Kelly is clearly surprised to see that the woman is actually her mother. Putting her finger to her lips to keep her quiet, Joan manages to take Kelly to one side and tells her to meet her by the gate.

The next we see of them is Kelly in the car with Joan, and Joan is trying to cheer her up by singing their song together. On the drive, Joan stops to make a call to Albie's home and Val (Laura Aikman) picks up but is in tears after finding a note from Albie saying that he's fled the country.

Going to the pre-arranged hideout caravan, Joan tells Kelly that she needs to do as she tells her and be a good girl. But clearly the grief of Boisie's death is too much as Joan struggles to remain calm, despite Kelly trying to cheer her up. As Kelly shows Joan her drawing, Joan sees that Kelly has drawn a picture of her "other mummy", which only makes Joan more upset.

Kelly goes inside and finds Joan's gun in her suitcase but luckily, Joan rushes in just in time to stop Kelly from pulling the trigger. Joan tells Kelly how much she loves her but it's clear she's made the decision to let Kelly go.

Joan drops Kelly back at her foster family's home and returning to Boisie's home, she turns herself into Tom and the police after concluding there's "no point" of life after the loss of Boisie and now, of Kelly too.

The series then flashes forward to four years later as we see Joan look out over the Spanish cliffs that she first visited with Boisie. This time, she's wearing a backlash top to show her tattoos over her childhood scars and a car pulls up, with Albie getting out to greet her.

He brings a suitcase full of money for Joan and dumps it on the floor, with Joan explaining that she got out of prison early for good behaviour. Joan tells Albie she's going back to work but not via criminal means. She tells Albie to leave but as he walks away and tells her to be careful, she says: "And you. Watch your f**king back."

Joan continues on ITV1 on Sunday 6th October at 9pm, with the series also now being available to stream in full on ITVX.

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