At its core, the Apple TV+ sci-fi series Dark Matter is all about the paths we choose in life. In the ninth and final episode of the first season, our hero must forge a new path forward with his family, but their future remains a mystery even as the show fades to black.
The finale, titled “Entanglement,” aired on June. 26, 2024, and the ending was just open-ended enough that some viewers were left scratching their heads. Did the Dessen family escape that literal horde of Jasons to forge a new life together in another reality? Let’s dive in and find out.
Spoilers for the ending of season 1 below
Throughout the first season of Dark Matter, we got to know the original Jason (Joel Edgerton), or Jason 1, pretty well. By the finale, Jason’s wife Daniela (Jennifer Connelly) and teenage son Charlie (Oakes Fegley) finally realize that the multiverse story is true, and they’re pretty sure the guy they’re with is actually their husband and father. The family hops in Daniela’s friend Blaire’s (Amanda Brugel) car and heads out of town.
In the car, Charlie and Daniela’s phones start blowing up with text messages from other Jasons, all claiming to be the original Jason. Obviously this is a bit freaky, especially because the “real” Jason is currently driving the car they’re riding in. The family decides to let Charlie decide where to go to hide out, knowing that all of the Jasons think too much alike for him to make any selections. They drive to Charlie’s friend’s vacant summer home to hide.
Later, Jason checks his email and finds a secret folder called “Entanglement.” An email leads him to a chat board populated by hundreds, possibly thousands of Jason clones. These versions of Jason are conversing about what to do next, how they could try to “share” the family, and hatching plans to take out their competition and get what they want. As he reads in horror, private messages start popping up from miscellaneous Jason clones. Many of them want to secretly team up to take out the others.
Creepy, huh? We thought so too.
Even creepier is the fact that Jason 2, the original bad guy, has been captured by another clone and held hostage. Here we learn that Jason 2 is the scientist who created the Box, thereby setting the entire plot into motion. If it weren’t for his universe-jumping, all of the other clones would never have been made, and the Dessen family would still be happily living their lives, none the wiser.
Blaire pops by the Dessen house to retrieve her car, only to be greeted by a totally wackadoo scene: Jason (the one with a hat and a wound on his temple) has locked up his identical clone while he tries to track Daniela and Charlie’s whereabouts using credit cards and cell phones. Awkward!
Things get even more entangled after that. A mob of Jasons descends upon the summer home where the family is hiding out. There’s a big scene with tons of Jasons fighting each other, but ultimately Jason 2 shows up and kills a clone who was about to kill Jason 1. It seems Jason 2 has had a change of heart somewhere along the line. He confesses that he’s responsible for “all this mess,” tells them he used Blaire’s car to track them down, and says he wants to help the family escape. He removes Jason 1’s wedding ring from his own finger and returns it to its rightful owner, symbolically admitting defeat and ending the drive to steal Jason 1’s life.
After running over one more Jason clone (the one with the hat … it’s okay, we hate him!), the family zooms straight to the Box, which Jason 2 has loaded full of supplies to make jumps between realities. Jason 2 has even thoughtfully left behind a video message to apologize for everything he did to them. Thanks … but maybe next time don’t alter reality and create hundreds of angry clones of yourself? Just an idea.
The surprising final moments
At the Box, the Dessens are startled to find a huge crowd of cloned Jasons waiting for them. After all the fighting, we’re just as shocked as the family when one clone steps forward and tells them the mob is not there to harm them; they merely want to say goodbye. They understand that if the family ever wants to live in peace, they have to use the Box to find an alternate reality to live in.
It’s an oddly moving scene, because each and every clone believes he’s the original Jason, and they all feel love for Charlie and Daniela and envy for Jason 1. Each Jason represents a different path one man could have taken in his life, which is why there are infinite Jasons.
The concept of different paths and life choices is mirrored in the final moments of the show, when the family walks down an aisle of doorways. Charlie picks one at random and opens it, and we see a bright light shine on all three of their faces before they step into the new world together. The choice has been made, the dye is cast … What will happen next?
Lots of potential for season 2, if there is one
Apple TV+ has yet to make an announcement about whether there will be a second season, but Crouch told Radio Times that he wrote season one knowing it was a possibility. “I think we went into this open to the idea that there could be more, but it wasn’t a situation where we declared ‘Oh, it’s this many seasons and this is one, two and three,'” he said, adding, “If we end up doing more we’ll just have to come up with other cool things.”
We’ll keep you updated as more details about a second season become available. In the meantime, all 9 episodes of Dark Matter are now streaming on Apple TV+.
