Pieces of Her

Netflix's 'Pieces of Her' ending explained: did Toni Collette's Jane kill her father Martin Queller? Or was it Nick and Jasper?

When Jane is seen copying a move she learned from Nick to save Andy in the present day, her “heroic” act blows her cover and draws Nick’s operatives her way. Jane’s actions put the organization in danger and spark a series of events that lead to Andrew’s death, the academic’s death, and her decision to betray Nick. A pregnant Jane goes to the police after the death of her brother Andrew and offers to testify against Nick in exchange for a lightened sentence. Nick is never caught, but Jane is able to restart her life with Andy a few years later with a new name. Pieces of Her was created by Charlotte Stoudt and is based on Karin Slaughter’s best-selling novel of the same name. Andy embarks on a wild cross-country journey to figure out who her mother really is and finds herself solving a murder mystery in the process.

Based on a novel by Karin Slaughter, Netflix's Pieces Of Her is a no-frills thriller.

Despite its foreseeable conclusion, Pieces Of Her is still a pleasant thriller, especially due to Collette and Heathcote’s work. Pieces Of Her spends a lot of time building up to the obvious final reveal, but the payoff doesn’t remotely live up to expectations. As she depicts Laura’s undoing, Barden is limited to being mostly expressionless, stuck in the anticipatory past and therefore more boring of the two storylines. It’s as much a serious family drama as it is a no-frills thriller. To figure out why she has to relinquish the life she knew, Andy begins to investigate Laura’s origins. Pieces Of Her sits firmly in this serviceable limbo.

Netflix's "Pieces of Her," starring Toni Colette and Bella Heathcote, departs regularly from the source material, but the spirit of the novel remains ...

You know, in your 20s, you’re just kind of freaked out and you’re like, “Oh my God, I’m going to have to be an adult someday,” and then in your 30s, you’re like, “This is the day. I’ve got to start being an adult: I’ve got to work out, I’ve got to sleep.” And in your 40s, you’re like … “If I make it through the day and no one dies, I’m winning.” And Andy is a millennial — so let’s be honest, your 20s are really your 30s now if you’re a millennial — and trying to figure out who she was and what to do with her life. But it was really important to keep the spirit of the characters and the emotional story between the mother and daughter, because that’s the real heart of the book for me. Kind of weirdly the best thing that happens to her is she finds out that her mother was in a homicidal cult. it was mostly that a lot of my readers I’ve had from the first book, and I feel a real responsibility toward them and I want them to love it because I just think it’s my job to be the gatekeeper for these stories and I don’t want to disappoint them. And you know, there are hundreds of people on set for this thing that was in my head while I was in my pajamas writing it a few years ago. Let’s be honest, this is a story about a mother and daughter, and a lot of guys aren’t into stories about mothers and daughters. I mean, even back to when she was a young woman inside her family, she was a liar. So both of us were looking up at all these big guys who were wrangling all this stuff on the set, but they were using Matchbox cars on a table to show where the cars went. I was more involved on being a resource for, “Why did this character do this?” Or, “What were you thinking when this happened?” Or “What was your motivation?” And I got to read scripts and I got to be on set for one day. Because it’s a moist heat?” And I said, “Well, not if your skin is on fire.” That was a huge relief for the author, whose nervousness over the show could be alleviated only by hours on her treadmill.