The Rig ending explained: What happened to the crew of the Kinloch Bravo?

Chaos, in-fighting and eco terror ensues as threats to the crew – played by actors such as Iain Glen, Emily Hampshire and Martin Compston – continue to grow.

Speaking exclusively with RadioTimes.com, Game of Thrones star Glen, who here plays the rig boss Magnus, labelled the premise as “horribly plausible”.

"I don’t think it wants to be far-fetched. What it tries to do is set a story that is horribly plausible."There may be elements that you might not initially understand but if you go more deeply into it, there will be a reason for that happening climatically."

He continued: "So what we’re doing is messing up the planet and we know that, and most people have owned up to that now in the age that we live. So this story tries to look at the idea of the planet biting back in a very real way – and in a way that’s what the planet is doing when we have these awful floods and bush fires that destroy people’s lives.

"I hope it’s great because it's a thriller and edge of your seat drama, but also [has] a strong ecological message that comes through."

Read on for everything you know about the ending of The Rig on Prime Video, as well as answers about the fog and what the Pictor energy company was hiding.

The Rig ending explained

What was the mysterious fog in the Rig?

As we found out throughout the series, the fog itself was unimportant - what was important was what it was carrying.

The fog contained spores from what appeared to be a distant ancestor to all the creatures on planet Earth, theorised by Rose (Hampshire) to be millions upon millions of years old.

It emerged because it was responding to what it perceived to be attacks from the rig's drilling, and started to infect and possess the crew who came into contact with it. This included Baz (Calvin Demba), Garrow (Cameron Fulton), Leck (Emun Elliott) and eventually Fulmer (Martin Compston).

It also appeared to remove anything unnatural from the host bodies which it inhabited, such as fillings in teeth and skin tattoos, and ended up killing unhealthy hosts. Meanwhile, it healed those it deemed to be healthy and viable.

Those who became infected and survived started working towards sabotaging the rig, and ensuring the survival of the ancestor.

Rose and the rest of the crew later determined that the rings created by the spores, and often drawn by those swayed to the ancestor's will, were like rings on a tree. However, rather than tracking years, they were tracking mass extinction-level events - with another ring about to close.

What was Coake's plan in The Rig?

When Coake (Mark Addy), a member of Pictor's research and expansion division, arrived on the Kinloch Bravo, it was immediately clear that he knew more than he was letting on and was up to something nefarious.

He got Garrow and Dunlin (Richard Pepple) killed with his attempts to gas the ancestor, and Harish (Nikhil Parmar), a worker from the Kinloch Charlie rig who arrived with Coake, revealed he had left tens of workers to die there.

When pressed by Magnus (Iain Glen), Coake admitted Pictor had known of the ancestor's existence for a long time, and had been trying to kill it before it spoiled the oil field.

Coake believed that killing it was the only way to ensure humanity's survival, while Rose and Fulmer believed they could communicate with it and show it that they weren't a threat.

However, by the time they tried, it was already too late...

What happened at the end of The Rig?

In the end, the majority of the crew made it off the Kinloch Bravo in an evacuation helicopter sent for by Coake. However, it was not without some fatalities.

The first to fall were Leck, killed after the ancestor tried to rid his body of any unnatural materials, and Alwyn (Mark Bonnar), killed by it through Baz trying to stop it.

Next to go were Garrow and Dunlin, killed as part of Coake's plan to gas the ancestor off the rig. Finally, Baz chose to stay behind, becoming one with the ancestor and appearing to disappear into the spores.

This means the survivors included Magnus, Rose, Fulmer, Cat (Rochenda Sandall), Hutton (Owen Teale), Easter (Abraham Popoola), Murchison (Stuart McQuarrie), Heather (Molly Vevers), Harish and Coake.

As for what happened to the mainland, that's a different question entirely. The crew failed to stop the ancestor from setting off an enormous tsunami, which at the end of the finale we saw heading directly towards the mainland, threatening the lives of thousands.

Coake told the crew that the helicopter wasn't going back there, and that if they had wanted to stop the tsunami they should have listened to him and tried to eradicate the ancestor.

It appears that whatever happens next, planet Earth will be changed forever...

The Rig is available to stream in full now on Amazon Prime Video – try Amazon Prime Video for free for 30 days.

If you’re looking for something else to watch in the meantime, check out our TV Guide or Streaming Guide visit our dedicated Drama hub.

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