Bodkin (Season 1) ‘Netflix’ Recap & Ending Explained: True crime podcasts have seen a boom in their popularity in the recent past. Hulu’s “Only Murders in the Building” explored such podcasts’ inner workings and their obsessive fan clubs. Now, Netflix’s “Bodkin” (season 1) revolves around a similar theme. It follows an investigative journalist based in London who is forced to go to Ireland to help an American true-crime podcaster uncover a decades-old murder mystery. Along with a researcher assistant, he tries to find a compelling story for his podcast. While following these three outsiders in a quaint Irish town, the show fuses the elements of black comedy, drama, and mystery thriller.
Spoilers ahead.
Bodkin (Season 1) ‘Netflix’ Recap: What is ‘Bodkin’ about?
“Bodkin” (season 1) is about a London-based journalist who joins a true-crime podcaster and his wide-eyed research assistant to solve a murder mystery in a small Irish town. However, the locals want the past to remain buried and forgotten, so along their suspenseful journey, they encounter many challenges. The series stars Siobhán Cullen, Will Forte, and Robyn Cara in the central roles.
Episode 1: One True Mystery
An award-winning American podcaster, Gilbert (Will Forte), decides to go to Ireland for his next true crime podcast. He hopes to cover the story behind a 25-year-old cold mystery case of 3 people who went missing on the Irish Night of the Dead. For this job, he is joined by the Guardian journalist Dove (Siobhán Cullen) and a wide-eyed researcher, Emmy (Robyn Cara). During Dove’s recent investigation, her key informant hung himself to death. So, her boss forced her to accompany Gilbert to his work.
Eventually, they all land in Bodkin, a small town in Ireland and get driven by Sean (Chris Walley) to their local residence. Sean says that he is originally from Romania and was later adopted by his mother (Pom Boyd). He tells them about the Samhain festival organized by Fintan (Charlie Kelly), also referred to as shitpants. Fintan went to Silicon Valley and returned to a server farm in Bodkin. Although Gilbert & Emmy are excited about their podcast, Dove isn’t.
The Quaint Town
Gilbert expects the town to reflect his imagination of a quaint town. He looks at everything in Bodkin with a childlike awe. Dove gets irritated by his attitude. She wants him to understand the difference between his story and the truth. Bad things happen in Bodkin just like anywhere else. Dove gets him out of a touristy bar to a local one. There, he meets Seamus Gallagher (David Wilmot) and reveals that he is Irish. Gilbert believes their Sergeant Power (Denis Conway) is at least his distant relative. At night, he gets too drunk with the locals.
The next morning, Sean isn’t at the homestay to offer them a ride. Dove goes looking for him on her own. She breaks into his house and realizes that Seamus is looking for him. So, she follows Seamus to the seaside. He soon realizes that she is following him. While walking back, she gets attacked by two masked people in a car. They warn her not to snoop into their internal matters. Meanwhile, Gilbert & Emmy try to interview the locals but receive no response. They meet Sergeant Power, who evades their questions. Nevertheless, Emmy steals a folder of documents from the year three people went missing. Eventually, she and Gilbert find Sean’s car on fire.
Episode 2: Who We Are
After getting a death threat from two strangers, Dove returns to Ms. O’Shea’s homestay to realize that Sean is her son. Since Sean didn’t tell them this, Dove tells Gilbert not to trust Sean with their research. Later, through the police documents Emmy stole, Dove learns about Edward P. A nun found him a few days after he went missing. The next day, they travel to the island where this nun resides. Sister Bernadette shows them around the place and the services they offer to the visitors. In her absence, they go meet Sister McDonough. She reveals that the boy she found is Sergeant Power’s son, Teddy (Ger Kelly).
Dove, Gilbert, and Emmy meet Teddy aka Edward P and question him about the missing couple. He reveals that Fiona was his teacher. Before he can share anything more, his father comes there and stops them from questioning. While walking back, they speak with a local man named Darragh about Fiona, Teddy, & Malachy. Darragh fears oversharing can prove fatal for him. Later, Gilbert learns that he owes 8000 euros to a local hippie named Frank from the night he got drunk and gambled with the locals. Dove & Emmy find a lead to Malachy’s past.
Seamus’ Past
Dove and Emmy head to the local library to find a group photo that shows Seamus next to Malachy a year before he disappeared. Seamus’ real name is Jack McFadden, aka the badger, who was infamous for smuggling all sorts of things. Jack had been living as Seamus for over twenty years.
Episode 3: Perfectly Innocent Life
The night after refusing to share any information about Malachy, Darragh dies by accident. At his wake, Dove meets Mary Donovan, who took over the local funeral home. Meanwhile, Gilbert asks Maeve (Kerry McLean) what she was doing at the festival when Malachy and Fiona disappeared. She says she missed it and gives her friend Greta a lift to Dublin. While Emmy speaks with Fintan about the case, Gilbert learns about the past connection between Darragh and Malachy.
Malachy used Darragh’s fond feelings toward him for his personal gain. Seamus is Malachy’s brother. They both moved to Bodkin and rented Darragh’s land. Meanwhile, Dove finds some old photos and a ring, which establishes that Seamus once loved Fiona. Later, she meets Gilbert at the bar, and they share their findings. Outside, Frank starts irritating Gilbert about his debt. So, Dove punches him in the face and runs away. Gilbert opens up about his financial woes. Meanwhile, Emmy spends the night at Fintan’s house. He reveals that he was friends with Teddy but ditched him on the festival night for a date.
The Personal Tragedies
During Darragh’s funeral, Seamus asks Gilbert to join him on his boat. Gilbert opens up about the podcast that made him popular at the cost of his relationship because he shared intimate details about his marriage with the world. After that, his wife beat cancer. Then, Seamus admits that he loved Fiona. But he doesn’t know how she and Malachy suddenly disappeared. Meanwhile, Dove & Emmy follow another lead to suspect a car inside a ditch. Once the car is taken out of the water, they find two bodies inside the trunk, presumably of Malachy and Fiona.
Episode 4: Poison or Something
Emmy remembers that her phone is in Sean’s car. So, they follow its location to find Sean using local kids to shoot the seagulls. The group hides behind a tree and sees Seamus walk out of the shed with two men and talk about a deal. Once they leave, the group walks inside the construction to find eels stored inside a tanker. Moments later, two Interpol operatives, Annika (Sabine Timoteo) & Charles (Peter Bankole), tell the group that they are part of an operation to expose an eel smuggling operation. So, the group should steer clear.
The next day, Dove & Emmy meet Sergeant Power to ask about Seamus’ connection to Malachy & Fiona’s murders. The sergeant claims that the McArdle brothers killed Malachy & Fiona. Dove doesn’t trust him. So, she & Emmy decide to find the car in the ditch for any helpful evidence. Dove finds a blade inside the car. So, she asks Emmy to use Fintan to check its connection to Power. Fintan speaks with Teddy to learn that he gifted that exact blade to his father when he was barely eleven. Right after, Fintan realizes that Emmy used him to get a recording for her investigation. So, he ditches her.
Seamus & Gilbert’s Deal
Seamus offers to help Gilbert with his debt to Frank in exchange for a favor: Gilbert must keep his name out of his podcast. Gilbert accompanies Seamus as he speaks with the Interpol operatives for his eel deal. But Seamus doesn’t know that they are from Interpol. So, Gilbert hides himself and holds on to the secret. Later, Seamus recovers his hidden cash and gives it to Frank. During their interaction, Gilbert realizes Seamus has severe anger issues. Later, they both go check the recovered skeletons. Seamus concludes that the female skeleton is not Fiona’s.
Episode 5: Peace in Our Time
After seeing the recovered skeletons, Seamus wakes up to the possibility that Fiona might still be alive. While driving back, Seamus tells Gilbert about his past. Seamus & Malachy were part of the trade of all sorts of things, and so were the McArdles. One day, Seamus learned that the McArdles had been arrested. So, he decided to steal their big shipments. But McArdles soon got out of prison and learned about his loot. That’s why Seamus believes they are behind Malachy’s death. In the morning, Seamus & Gilbert go meet McArdles’ sister, Jackie, to find out what happened to Fiona. Jackie claims that she doesn’t know any Fiona.
While Gilbert was away at night, Dove got drunk at the pub and confronted Sergeant Power about his car being connected to the murders. Subsequently, he had a heart attack. After that, Dove showed up at Mary’s house and spent the night with her. But in the morning, she made her angry by speaking against her parenting. So, Mary threw her out of the house. On the other hand, Dove had been frustrating Emmy about her relationship with Fintan. At the pub, when Dove stirred up trouble, Emmy got furious at her. Therefore, she went to Fintan’s place and slept with him. The next morning, he motivated her to shake up the power dynamics between her & Dove.
Sergeant’s Confession
After his heart attack, Sergeant Power told Dove that he wanted to protect Malachy & Fiona from Seamus. That’s why he offered them a ride out from their car. But Fiona didn’t show up. When he returned home, he found out that Teddy had a fight with Malachy over Fiona, which turned violent. Teddy ended up killing Malachy with a brick. To cover up Teddy’s connection, Sergeant Power decided to hide the body. On the way, he hit a girl, which led him to put her body in the trunk next to Malachy’s. Meanwhile, Emmy finds out that the girl’s name is Greta. While listening back to the recordings, she realizes that Maeve spoke about her. So, she, Dove, and Gilbert break into Maeve’s house. That’s where they learn that Fiona was pregnant at the time she went missing.
Episode 6: Peace in Our Time
Seamus’ boat gets on fire, but he luckily survives. At Mrs O’Shea’s homestay, Dove discovers a file tied by a cincture. But, Mrs O’Shea refuses to share any information about her past as a nun or her connection to the Inish Mac Tire. Dove suspects that the nuns are hiding some crucial information. So, she and Emmy go back to the island to meet Sister McDonough. When they enter, Sister Bernadette offers them tea. Dove drinks it, but Emmy doesn’t. Soon after, she meets Sister McDonough and learns that Sister Dominica in their church is Fiona. So, Emmy starts looking for her.
Meanwhile, Dove starts hallucinating terrible events and visions about her past. She realizes that Sister Bernadette drugged her through the tea. So, Sister McDonough’s words were most likely a part of her imagination. Back in Bodkin, Gilbert’s wife, Amber (Ahna O’Reilly), arrives to get him to sign the divorce papers. He still tries to talk her out of it. But it is too late for her to think otherwise. She is upset that he used their personal tragedy for his podcast and their secreats are now a public knowledge. So, he accepts his defeat in this matter. Afterwards, he confronts Maeve about her connection to Greta & Fiona. She admits she tried to help Fiona escape to Wales. That’s when Maeve hurt Teddy, thinking he was Seamus coming after Fiona.
Fiona’s Truth
While Maeve sent Teddy back home, Fiona stayed on the island where Mrs. O’Shea took care of her pregnancy. Suddenly, Sister McDonough claims that Fiona and her baby both died. But she just uses it as a trap to keep Dove on the island until the police arrive to arrest her for her previous charges. The police take her and Gilbert into custody. Meanwhile, Emmy realizes that Fiona’s baby didn’t die. Mrs. O’Shea left with Fiona’s healthy baby. So, Sean is Fiona & Seamus’ baby.
Episode 7: Ends Justify Means
In the prison cell, Dove admits that she found her informant from her recent, controversial investigation in a poor state. But if she had contacted the police, she could not have left with the evidence. It would have ruined her strenuous investigation. Gilbert doesn’t appreciate that she insists on uncovering the truth by any means necessary. So, Dove insults Gilbert by calling him a pornographer and not a journalist. Later, Dove suggests a quid pro quo deal to the Interpol officials where she will help them get hold of Seamus in exchange for no jail time for her.
Bodkin (Season 1) ‘Netflix’ Ending Explained:
Seamus comes to Mrs O’Shea’s house, looing for Sean but doesn’t find him. Soon after, Emmy returns and reveals that she knows the truth about Sean. Mrs. O’Shea says Fiona wanted her to keep Sean away from Seamus. She tells Fiona to find Sean and talk sense into him. Emmy finds him in the woods with the eel storage. She warns him about the deal being a trap by Interpol operatives. But he doesn’t believe her. While he starts driving the van, she informs Mrs. O’Shea about their location.
Dove learns that the McArdles are trying to kill Seamus. She apologizes to Gilbert for her words and asks him to help as a journalist. So, he gets Seamus to meet him at the Samhain festival. Gilbert tells Seamus the truth about Sean. While hiding from the McArdles, Seamus meets Sean and tells him about their father-son relationship. Sean doesn’t believe him. During their argument, he ends up hurting Sean. Moments later, the Interpol officials arrive there to arrest Seamus. But Seamus kidnaps Gilbert and drives away.
What happens to Gilbert’s podcast in the end?
While driving, Seamus stops the car and confronts Gilbert. He realizes that Gilbert kept recording their conversations despite his help with Gilbert’s debt. So, he decides to kill Gilbert with a bomb. Meanwhile, Dove & Emmy steal Sean’s van to reach the festival venue. Emmy tries to stop the music and warn people about the bomb. Seamus is surrounded by the McArdles, the Interpol officials, and Dove. In that state, he decides to do one thing in his control: detonate the bomb. It triggers a shower of eels from Sean’s van.
Dove & Emmy get emotional thinking Gilbert died in the bomb. But he unties himself and survives it. After the end of this tragedy, Gilbert throws away his recorder and plans not to cover such stories, at least for the time being. Emmy returns to her office and demands a senior position based on her experience of working with Dove. Meanwhile, Dove decides to get past her black-and-white perception of the world. Although she had terrible experiences with nuns in the past, she now decides to improve her relationship with them.
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