The Jetty ending explained: Stars react to "heartbreaking" reveal

Ahead of The Jetty's final episode, three huge questions remained: Who set fire to the boat hut, and why? Who murdered Riz (Weruche Opia), the podcaster who was investigating the link between the abuse of underage girls in the town and the disappearance of Amy Knightley (Bo Bragason)? And what became of the missing teenager, who vanished 17 years ago and was never seen again?

However, as she came closer to the truth, things started to unravel for Ember as she realised that her late husband Malachy (Tom Glynn-Carney) had been sexually involved with Amy and was with her the night of her disappearance.

So, how did it all wrap up? Read on for a full breakdown of The Jetty episode 4.

The Jetty ending explained: Who was the killer?

In the finale, it was revealed that Amy had been killed, but not in the manner you might have anticipated.

She died after she was hit by a car which Ember was driving while under the influence of drugs given to her by Mack as part of her birthday celebrations.

To "protect" Ember, Mack had convinced Arj (Matthew McNulty), who was also high while travelling with them in the car, that he was responsible, a lie which he came to accept as the truth.

Amy's body was then buried in the boat hut and that's where she remained for 17 years, until the renovation began, which forced Arj to dig up her remains and set fire to the property to conceal any evidence.

But then Riz arrived on the scene and her private investigator discovered a bone fragment in the rubble, which prompted Arj to take drastic action – only for Ember to later uncover his crimes.

"I'd made my predictions of who I thought it was going to be, and obviously the way a thing is told, it nails you onto someone," said Ruby Stokes, who plays Ember's daughter Hannah, in an interview with RadioTimes.com. "But no, I had absolutely no idea that it was Arj or Ember that had done either of those things.

"I love that, though, that it was the person you're rooting for who ultimately did the bad thing. It's interesting that Arj is presented as the nice guy... when ultimately, he did the bad thing. I liked that and the way it went."

Archie Renaux, who plays Ember's junior colleague Hitch, joked that he "knew everything" when he first read the scripts, before adding: "I had no idea, I really had no idea."

He added: "What I love about this is its exploration of how our memory, our brains can misremember things to protect us and deal with trauma or a bad event. I just love how that was what happened."

Read more:

• The Jetty creator says BBC crime drama was inspired by experience as teenager
• Jenna Coleman: The Jetty would have been made “through a different lens” 10 years ago

Renaux went on to say that Arj's close relationship with both Ember and Mack makes the big reveal "even more heartbreaking".

"It would have been a lot better for Ember if it was just some mystery murderer that was doing this for some sort of other gain," he added.

"And especially that Ember herself was putting all this time and effort and emotion into finding out what happened, only to be led down the path of going straight back to herself.

"It does make it more heartbreaking."

When asked if Ember would be able to carry that secret with her for the rest of her life, Renaux told RadioTimes.com: "I don't know. It's one of those things that if you're in that situation, what would you do? You don't really know what you would do.

"I guess maybe her mum, she might say something to her. But because it is just her and Caitlin who have this secret... there won't be any repercussions. If she tells someone else then it's out there, and you have no real control over where that goes."

Stokes went on to say that people "like to imagine" what they'd do in a given situation, but "you never really know until you're put into it".

"It's an individual's game," she added. "I'm not really sure anyone can tell someone else how they'd end up dealing with something like that."

All four episodes of The Jetty are available to stream now on BBC iPlayer.

Check out more of our Drama coverage or visit our TV Guide and Streaming Guide to find out what's on. For more from the biggest stars in TV, listen to The Radio Times Podcast.