'Dead to Me': Who killed Judy's ex-fiancé Steve at the end of season 1? Here's one possible theory
Netflix's 'Dead To Me' returning for a second season was something we were counting on. Created by Liz Feldman and executive produced by Will Ferrell, starring Christina Applegate and Linda Cardellini, 'Dead To Me' is a delightful dark comedy about two women who, connected by a tragedy, become the closest of friends – wading together through the painfully unfiltered, weirdly funny waters of grief, loss and forgiveness.
Christina Applegate plays the role of Jen Harding, a sardonic widow determined to solve her husband’s recent hit-and-run murder. Judy (played by the endearing Linda Cardellini) is an optimistic free spirit who’s recently suffered her own tragic loss. The two women then meet at a support group becoming unlikely friends despite their polar-opposite personalities – and the tragedy that ties them together. But as they bond over bottles of wine, Entenmann’s cookies and a shared affinity for The Facts of Life, Judy desperately tries to shield Jen from a shocking secret that could destroy her life as she knows it.
Given the number of plot twists throughout the first season, we knew that the show wasn't going to end easy. A little refresher: we last see Jen standing over the dead body of Steve (played by James Marsden), Judy's ex-fiancé. She then calls Judy – who is surprised to get the call – for help and also because, well, it is Steve. Sometime later, both of them are staring down at the floating dead body – the whole time giving the implication that Jen murdered him.
But given how the show started on a sober note before Feldman gave us the many twists that made the plot this convoluted, we know for a fact that it is not going to be as easy as "Jen killed Steve, case over".
Our real guess is that Marsden's Steve was actually murdered by... cue drumroll... Jen's older son Charlie (played by Sam McCarthy)!
Before we are shown the final scene, Jen and Steve are tussling over things and it reaches shoving. In the midst of all of this, our guess is that Charlie walks in on them and in a bid to protect his mother – because he thinks her life is in danger, which it truly is – he attacks Steve in defense.
Not entirely easy, but definitely possible – he could have his grandmother's stolen gun.
Following this encounter, Jen calls Judy for help. Which is pretty weird in itself because why not call the police? If Steve was refusing to leave her home premises and she killed him in defense, she technically also has security footage to prove that. But what if the cameras never captured Jen killing Steve?
Charlie also has a temper since the death of his father – all natural, we're not blaming him. But he also truly adores Judy. So what if Steve threated Jen that he would come out with the truth about Jen's secret putting her into potential danger. And in this debacle, Charlie took it up as his duty to protect the two women (teenagers, we tell you), and took matters in his hands? It could be a very plausible reason for murder.
Well, we will have to wait for season 2 to give us answers to our theories but for now, we have no official statement about the specific release date for the second season. We're looking at a 2020 release.
