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It’s easy to poke fun at the melodramatic covers of ’80s hits that end almost every episode of Paradise. (I’ll never forget its weirdly sad take on Starship’s “We Built This City.”) But there’s no denying that the closer for both the Season 1 premiere and finale — Phil Collins’ “Another Day in Paradise” — is thematically right on the money.
The song urges listeners to think twice about the homeless people they pretend to ignore on the streets. That same ignorance of those far less fortunate is the fundamental basis for Paradise, which sees billionaires living in the idyllic underground city of Paradise while the survivors of a devastating apocalypse struggle above them.
Those themes tend to get lost in the weeds during Paradise‘s middle stretch, as most episodes primarily focus on Secret Service agent Xavier Collins (Sterling K. Brown) trying to solve President Cal Bradford’s (James Marsden) murder, then leading an uprising against Paradise head Sam “Sinatra” Redmond (Julianne Nicholson). However, these themes come roaring back in Season 1’s devastating flashback episode “The Day,” which shows us firsthand how Paradise‘s rich and powerful escaped doomsday and left the rest of the world to die.
Paradise‘s Season 1 finale, titled “The Man Who Kept the Secrets,” keeps that thematic train chugging, emphasizing again and again the monstrosity of the Paradise project. But it wouldn’t be Paradise without a few more jaw-dropping reveals. Let’s break down the finale, starting with the most important question of all:
Who killed Cal Bradford in Paradise?
Credit: Disney / Brian Roedel
In the end, it was the librarian, in Cal’s bedroom, with a rotary drill bit.
That’s right: Cal’s murderer was none other than Paradise librarian Trent (Ian Merrigan), who we’ve met very briefly in prior library scenes. Yet “The Man Who Kept the Secrets” reveals that we’ve actually met Trent before. He was the man who attempted to shoot Cal on the White House lawn all the way back in episode 1.
Who is Trent, and why did he want to kill Cal?
Before Trent kicked off his career as a librarian and presidential murderer, he worked as a supervisor on the construction of Paradise. (The cover story for the large-scale construction was that they were building a recycling facility.)
During the building process, Trent found traces of arsenopyrite residue at the work site. The substance would sicken and kill any workers who came in contact with it, but it would dissipate by the time Paradise residents moved in. The fact that no resident would be harmed is all architect Anders (Erik Svedberg-Zelman) needs to push construction along, and Trent is removed from the project because of his knowledge.
Trent knew that the recycling facility cover story was bogus, so he tried to tell the world about the construction in Colorado and the human toll it was taking. Nobody listened, which was why he resorted to trying to shoot Cal.
How did Trent end up in Paradise?
After his assassination attempt on Cal, Trent wound up in a prison in Colorado, not far from Paradise. It’s fate! During the chaos of the initial stages of the apocalypse, he managed to escape and steal a guard’s uniform. He then met Eli and Margaret Davis, a couple heading to Paradise. Trent deceived then killed them, disguising himself as librarian Eli in the process. He also recruited a young woman to pose as Margaret. You may recognize her as waitress Maggie (Michelle Meredith), who’s always singing the praises of Paradise’s cheese fries.
That love of Paradise’s deep-fried potato dish, which is slathered in cashew cheese, winds up being a red flag for Dr. Gabriela Torabi (Sarah Shahi). Due to resident records, she knows that the real Maggie has a nut allergy and would never touch these particular cheese fries. Therefore, this Maggie must be a fake.
Trent and Maggie sneaking into Paradise is consistent with Sinatra’s big reveal from the end of “The Day.” She told Xavier that the DNA tied to Cal’s murder didn’t match any DNA within Paradise, meaning the killer came from outside. But the killer didn’t sneak in after Paradise was up and running. He’d just been hiding in plain sight.
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In the present, Trent reveals to Xavier that his time in Paradise made him complacent. He accepted that he belonged there and could make a brand new start. Yet all that went up in flames when Cal came to the library to make a mixtape. Renewed in his desire to get justice for his long-dead co-workers, Trent dressed up in one of the construction worker suits on display in the library, took a large rotary drill bit from the same display, and killed Cal once and for all.
That the workers who built Paradise come up so late in the season may first seem like oversight, with the finale’s first few minutes coming out of left field and marking a shift in momentum from the propulsive action of “The Day.” But that late introduction is the point: No one in Paradise truly acknowledges the people who made their safe haven possible. (A sanitized library exhibit doesn’t count.) They certainly don’t acknowledge the construction workers’ deaths. And that’s part of the horror of Paradise: It’s the only stronghold in an apocalyptic future, yet it was designed to withhold the status quo.
As Trent says in his final speech to Xavier and Agent Robinson (Krys Marshall): “They had the chance to start over down here. Build a better world. Instead they chose more of the same. Loaded houses for the privileged few. Guns. Made this place a prison. It’s the American fucking dream.”
What was Cal’s plan with his cigarette?
“The Man Who Kept the Secrets” doesn’t just reveal Cal’s killer. It also highlights what he was trying to communicate to his son Jeremy (Charlie Evans), starting with the meaning of the six-number code he wrote on one of his cigarettes.
The code was not a plane’s serial number, as a foreshadowing close-up on a plane tail in episode 2 would have had us believe. Instead, it was a Dewey Decimal number.
Xavier heads to the Paradise library and tracks down the corresponding section. (Cal’s mixtape for Jeremy also points him to the library.) There, he finds James Spada’s book Peter Lawford: The Man Who Kept the Secrets, about actor Peter Lawford and his ties to the Kennedy family. Fitting, given the Bradfords’ status as an influential dynasty themselves.
Hidden inside The Man Who Kept the Secrets are Cal’s notes about the classified information on his tablet. These include how to open the external doors to Paradise and the details about the survivors on the surface. See, there’s some useful information in the Paradise library! (Along with one murderer.)
Still, that’s a risky plan, Cal. What if someone had really wanted to read The Man Who Kept the Secrets?
How does Paradise end for Xavier, Sinatra, and more?
Credit: Disney / Brian Roedel
In addition to the case of Cal’s murder and the cigarette code, Paradise wraps up some other major loose ends. While Agent Jane Robinson (Nicole Brydon Bloom) could have harmed Xavier’s daughter Presley (Aliyah Mastin) on Sinatra’s orders, she doesn’t. Instead, she shoots Sinatra in the throat. The gunshot isn’t fatal: Jane wants to keep Sinatra alive and under her thumb.
Meanwhile, Xavier still doesn’t know Jane killed Agent Billy Pace (Jon Beavers), or that she was Sinatra’s lackey. That spells trouble for next season, especially since Jane is a wild card whose only goal in life seems to be playing Wii games. (She’s succeeded… for now.)
But the biggest development going into Paradise Season 2 is the fact that Xavier is flying out of the mountain, using Cal’s notes as a guide as he searches for his wife and other survivors. That leaves us with several juicy possibilities to explore next season. What does the world look like outside Paradise? How will survivors react to the knowledge of a safe underground city? And is there truly a chance for a new beginning in this post-apocalyptic world, or is civilization doomed to repeat itself just as Paradise did?
Paradise Season 1 is now streaming on Hulu, with the Season 1 finale airing March 4.
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“Paradise”s finale threw major twists our way, starting with the reveal of who killed Cal (James Marsden). Let’s break it down.
