‘The Essex Serpent’ Ending, Explained

The Essex Serpent, starring Tom Hiddleston and Claire Danes, tells the story of a Victorian widow named Cora Seaborne (Danes) who travels to Essex to search for a legendary sea monster and ends up falling in love with the village vicar (Hiddleston). Based on the novel by Sarah Perry, the series is a smart and atmospheric meditation on the natural world and the unmapped terrain of the heart, and its themes all come together in a bittersweet series finale. Here’s what you need to know about the ending!

Luke, Martha, and Spencer

While Will and Cora are struggling with their feelings for each other, their friends back in London have their own battles to fight. Spencer buys a slum in order to improve it, and Martha is frustrated that he seems to think philanthropy, instead of social change, is the answer to poverty. But then Spencer surprises Martha by making her a proposal: not marriage, which would violate her socialist ideals, but partnership in fighting for tenants’ rights.

Meanwhile, Luke is left bitter and angry because his injury limits the range of motion in his hand, meaning that he can no longer perform surgery. Cora asks him to move in with her, but he can’t imagine being so close to her when his love for her isn’t mutual. However, his life turns around when he becomes head of the medical school, teaching students “the secrets of the heart.”

Stella’s Struggle with Tuberculosis

One of the most heartbreaking aspects of The Essex Serpent is Stella’s eventual death from tuberculosis. Along with her physical symptoms, Stella develops a fascination with the color blue. She remarks on how beautiful the dye in Luke’s microscope is, even though it represents a death sentence for her. As her illness progresses, the Ransomes’ home steadily fills with more and more blue objects. Stella takes to wearing nothing but blue, including a necklace that almost resembles the amulets and talismans the villagers create.

In one terrifying scene, Stella asks Frankie if he wants to see the serpent, and then has him help her fill a leaky rowboat with blue objects. She lies down in the boat and has Frankie launch it into the marsh, where it quickly sinks. Luckily Will is there to rescue her from the depths.

On the surface, Stella’s actions are a result of tuberculosis-induced delirium. In fact, altered mental states are a documented symptom of TB, since the bacteria that erode the lungs can also attack the brain. On a deeper level, though, Stella’s illness becomes tied to the serpent. The blue she’s obsessed with is the blue of the water in the marshes, or the blue of the phenomenon earlier in the series that lights up the night sky. When she gets in the boat, she tells Frankie she’s ready to meet “Him,” and Frankie thinks she means the serpent. God and the serpent become conflated as Stella prepares to give herself over to the unknown.

Cora and Will Find Love

The Essex Serpent isn’t a romance in the usual sense. Yes, it has sexual tension and an impulsive act of passion, and yes, the central conflict between Will and Cora is forbidden love. But the series is really about a much more expansive way of loving the people who are important to you.

At first, Will is afraid to let Cora come back to visit Aldwinter, even though Stella has explicitly asked him to invite her. We’re never given a concrete reason for his reluctance, but it’s obviously tied to his feelings for Cora. When she finally does come, he finds that he’s happy she’s there. The two take a walk along the shore, and Cora tries to express why she still wants him in her life, even though he’s married. “Love is not finite,” she tells him. “It’s not confined to marriage. There are so many ways to love.”

But Will has his own thoughts on love. As they continue to walk, he tells her that he’ll always love Stella, even after she’s gone. On the surface, this seems like a rejection of Cora’s unspoken desire to continue their relationship. However, the final moments of the series reveal that maybe it’s Will’s way of taking Cora’s words to heart. After Cora writes to Will numerous times, he finally visits her at an excavation. (It’s interesting to note that the novel ends with her final letter, while the series shows us what happens next.) The two kiss and hold hands, showing us that even in the midst of his grief over Stella, Will is willing to explore his love for Cora. Love isn’t finite at all, and he finds that there’s plenty of room in his heart for both Cora and Stella.

Is the Serpent Real?

Throughout the series, we get clues that there’s something real in the water, even if the villagers’ belief that it’s supernatural misses the mark. In the first episode, when Naomi’s sister disappears, we see a large shape speeding toward her through the marsh. Later in the series, a huge shadow passes underneath a fishing boat, and in the final episode, when Will is rescuing Stella, a large shape passes behind them in the water. The main theme of the series is the tension between science and faith, and the serpent captures that theme perfectly. When the nature of the serpent is unknowable, then both the science-minded and the faithful are bound to get it wrong.

At the end of the series, Naomi comes out from hiding and runs home to tell her father that she’s seen the serpent. All the villagers rush to the beach, where they’re confronted with an astonishing sight: a whale has beached itself on the shores of the marsh and died. The discovery vindicates everyone. Those who scoffed at the idea that the Devil was in the water are proven right, but so is everyone who knew some sort of creature was out there. The whale on the beach shows them that the world—like the human heart—is much bigger and richer than we can ever hope to understand.

All six episodes of The Essex Serpent are now streaming on Apple TV Plus.

(image: See-Saw Films)