September 2023
Alice tosses her bracelet into the pond. She’s pulled in and under, back to Kat’s outstretched arm. Her journey through time begins. Colton knew Alice was something more than just a girl swimming in the pond since the very beginning.
Everything she said made him question who she was, and he remembered singing with her, even if she didn’t know it happened yet.
Colton tells Kat Alice is interesting and unique. Kat’s bummed she’ll be going to camp. She also thinks it’s weird that Alice’s name is Alice, just like the stories she’s reread so many times. Colton says sometimes truth is stranger than fiction.
Sam helps with Jacob’s predicament. Attempting anything is never good on a permanent record, and Lewis wants to press charges. Jacob says it’s his mess, and he’ll deal with the consequences.
Kat, Alice, and Elliot meet at the pond. Kat’s jumping back to 1999, she hopes.
Alice walks onto the farm and greedily embraces Kat and Elliot. She needed to be with them. It’s only been two days for them, but she can play MASH with them. MASH is a “who are you marrying” type future predicting game using stars.
Elliot has burned a mix-tape of all of their songs for Kat to take to camp. Kat is so touched. Alice is in tears. She acts like she’s known everyone for a long time because that’s how she feels. They feel the same way. They’ll never forget each other.
Jacob tells Elliot he’s so ashamed, even letting him rebuild his family’s home while he was here tearing everything down. Elliot shows him the clock piece. Only then does Elliot notice the quote on the bottom of the clock:
Time past and time future.
And in between is the still point of now.
Find me there.
The missing piece is a pendulum. One is past, and one is present, and in between is the now. Jacob feels like he’s pulled between the past and the present, swinging between both times. How does he find the still point of now?
Colton finds Alice at the pond. So she is who he thinks she is – the same Alice from 1974. She’s a time traveler. Alice didn’t think he recognized her here. He wonders why she denied being a time traveler all of those years ago.
He has so many questions. She stops him. He can’t ask them, at least not in this time. The Alice he gets to know in 1999 is a different Alice, she’s Alice, but an earlier Alice. She hasn’t lived those visits to 1994 yet. Time travel is brand new to her, so she won’t know anything, about anything.
There are some things he may want to ask her someday, but she won’t have the answers, so don’t ask her even if you really want to.
He wonders why she’s here then. The pond takes you places for a reason. She says they’re looking at the reason. He wants her to tell him something more. She says those trips to ’74 with him and Evelyn were magic and so groovy, and she’ll never forget them.
Del is again perplexed that Colton never shared any of this with her. She decides that Colton must have resented her since, because of her, he gave up music. Alice knows better. She was always the choice over anything.
Del decides to go clean out the rest of Colton’s things. It’s past time.
Elliot receives his mother’s ring back in the mail from Vic. Vic is starting fresh with no regrets. He never should have taken it, but he took so much more. There is a letter with the ring. It’s from his mother, left behind when she walked out on them. Vic never told him about it.
Jacob thinks he should take a cue from Vic while he waits for more news. An apology is overdue.
Alice found a reel to reel in Monica’s basement. She hoped the tapes would be there too. Max tells her he didn’t hate their kiss last night. There’s Noah, too. She didn’t hate the kiss either, but things are complicated.
Jacob apologizes to Danny for using him. Danny can’t believe Jacob threw him under the bus to commit arson, bringing Del and his whole family into it. Jacob cries. He destroys things, and he even let Danny think his disappearance was on him when he did nothing wrong. Danny doesn’t want to hear any more.
Kat couldn’t let Del take all of Colton’s things to the dump. She finds reel to reels from Del and Colton’s wedding and the demo, where Colton says Del is the dream and all he’ll ever need to be happy. He looked at his music as a way to find her, not to give up for her.
She’s so touched. And she decides. Take me to see him, please Katherine. She wants to go to the pond. Finally, the three Landry women jump, but only Del and Kat make it to the same time.
Colton, like Thomas centuries ago, is waiting by the pond. He needs to know. Jacob fell in the pond, didn’t he? But it’s a dream, and one that Colton wakes up from. (I’m confused here).
Colton, wearing his sweater, goes to the mailbox. Past-due letters surround one from Evelyn. He visits Evelyn at Lingermore. He can’t accept her money. She came home to hear the police had called off the search.
She figured he’d taken matters into his own hands, spending his own money, and she wants to help. It won’t ever be enough, not until she finds him. He says she still knows him better than most, even after all these years. She offers him a drink for old-times sake.
The portrait of My Katherine is on the wall. That’s when he realizes who she is. “My Katherine,” like your daughter, right? Evie always wondered who she was back then.
Colton’s memory is rushing back to him, when he saw Kat and when she thanked his earlier self for saving her brother – Jacob. It’s the pond! It was the pond! He runs out and toward the pond. That’s where he sees Alice and asks her: Jacob fell in the pond, didn’t he?
How did he know that? The portrait. She was in 1814, 1916, 1965, and now in 2000. His daughter, she’s a time traveler. And he met Jacob too! Alice is shocked. You know who mom really is? He asks… Alice, are you my granddaughter? (and tears well in my eyes). She acknowledges it, and they embrace.
Del and Kat are at Del and Colton’s wedding. It’s too much for Del, but she plunges forward.
Colton didn’t tell Del because some secrets are a burden, meant just to be carried. The pond didn’t work for the kids either. Jacob went in while they were camping. He was gone, but he was in the pond. Colton demands he never come here again.
But why didn’t he think Jacob might have gone in the pond when he disappeared? Because all of the clues led elsewhere. He thought his breaking the rules broke the magic of the pond. He knows you shouldn’t tell someone their future, but he needs to know if Jacob ever makes it back.
She tells him he will come home after she determines what time she’s in. But she cries when he says, “I get to see my boy again,” and he remembers Kat telling him she lost her dad, which led to her greatest gift: her daughter. He takes it in stride, but Alice sobs on his shoulder.
This pond is a curse, but it’s a gift too. Look what it gave him: the chance to play music with his granddaughter – in two eras! Keep singing, he says. She wants to tell him everything that happened to see if she can change things.
But this road they’re on leads to her. She has to jump. He wants her to tell Jacob he loves him, and he loves her, too. Alice says, “I love you, too, Grandpa,” and they hug before she jumps again, this time wearing his sweater.
Colton jumps next: Please, please take me to my boy.
Alice emerges in the dark. She’s sobbing. She removes the sweater and puts it next to the tree.
Colton arrives at the farm on the day of the summer kickoff, the day Jacob goes missing. When time-appropriate Colton goes elsewhere, Colton future tells Jacob he loves him, and no matter what happens, remember he loves him.
Alice is in front of Elliot’s when she spots herself in the house. She’s the person she saw running in the woods, and she pushed herself into the pond in the dark right after Alice left Kat the message that she saw someone in the field and someone else was using the pond.
KC Goodwin visits Jacob. Aren’t you Landrys used to time travelers showing up at your door? Jacob looks at KC with a mischievous look on his face. So KC is who Alice says KC is? KC can’t deny it anymore. Alice kind of caught KC red-handed.
KC is looking for Kat. Is now the right time? The time when KC is not the only one caught red-handed? KC removes something from an old stove. It’s Susana’s will. That’s what KC hid in the folder.
Cyrus gave Susana the power to leave Lingermore to wherever she wanted, and she left it to the Landrys. Cyrus’s sons changed the will after Susana’s death. KC wanted to show Kat on Founder’s Day, but Kat went to rescue Jacob in 1814.
Too much time passed between the time KC put the will in the folder and when KC returned, and Lewis bought the land in the meantime. KC showed Sam the will, who said old documents could still be legit.
That’s what KC used to ensure Lewis backed out of taking the land. KC blackmailed him, saying if he didn’t return the land he purchased, the will would be published. Sam knew the threat of a court battle would send Lewis running. It will now also keep him off of Jacob’s back and stop Del’s letters.
Jacob didn’t know what letters, and he’s shocked that Susana left them the Lingermore.
Colton is sad that both his brother and Evie were no-shows at his wedding, but Jasper says Evie didn’t come because it was the most important day in his life.
Fern moseys up behind Kitty. Fern says she just always liked the nickname before. And if Kat doesn’t know the answer, it hasn’t happened yet. She starts singing, 65 there they thrive, 65 in 25.
KC and Alice run into each other. Alice says she’s KC’s mom, and Max Goodwin is KC’s dad. KC almost laughs. No. But KC is a Landry, right, and also a Goodwin? KC doesn’t want to break any more rules. Alice says thank you. Maybe it’s OK to break the rules sometimes. KC says good luck.
Delilah and Colton get married while Del and Kat watch. Del, in two timelines, has never looked happier. Her wedding is exactly how she remembered it. Colton is in 1999. It’s exactly how he remembers it.
Jacob laughs that Alice pushed herself. She says someone had to start her adventure. Del returns. Seeing the past was magical. He’s got good news about the present, too. Kat is shocked that Susana left them Lingermore. But Alice has news too: when he did, Colton knew exactly who they were in all time periods.
Del remembers Colton telling her that tomorrow, they will sit at that table and he will tell her everything. He just needed the night. But he was killed that night. But why did he go?
Colton was looking for Rose aka Kat, hoping to see her at group. He knew he was dying and didn’t know how much time was left to look for her. Kat sees his dying moment in an entirely new light. He knew who she was, and he still loved her.
Kat runs to Elliot’s. She loves him. She wants to try again. Elliot messed up. His whole childhood was do dark, but the Landrys were the light – so perfect. He put Kat on a pedestal she could’t possibly live up to. He’s been in love with the idea of her. What he felt wasn’t real?
No, it was real, but it was so damn unfair to Kat because she tried showing him her real self every day, but he just refused to see it. He tells her she is incredible, brave, and takes risks for the ones she loves. He saw that woman in 1816. That’s the woman he’s in love with or wants to be, if she’ll have him.
Kat says she messed up too, and hasn’t loved him in the right way, either. She let her past affect them, not Brady or Thomas, but their friendship and how it was.
She always just assumed he would be there because he always was. She takes him for granted, but his love, how he loves her, is such a gift. So let’s just love each other as we are, Elliot says, and they kiss.
Kat spots the ring on the table. Is he… he will. He will find the perfect moment. She knows it’s going to be perfect because the ring is Susana’s.
Alice is playing Colton’s guitar in the loft when she gets a message from Noah. He’s home and wants to talk. Del heard her singing and it made her so happy. Alice will keep dreaming about her love for music, too.
Del sees all the letters on the kitchen table with a note from Jacob. Maybe the letters will disappear if he leaves. She’s distraught. Sam calls. He’s certain things will be just fine. How could know that? He just knows, he says, standing next to the pond.
Elliot reads the letter from his mother. Leaving was the only choice. Love is unmoving but it is the cause and the end of all movement. She’s leaving and jumping for love. It’s impossible to say what she means, but she’s sorry. Go, go, go says the bird, which is from a TS Elliot poem.
Alice remembers meeting her at Coyles. The clock inscription is from the same poem, Burnt Norton, published 1936. But the clock was put in the wall in the 1920s. Elliot cannot believe it. His mom was a time traveler. The only way she could have time-traveled was to go with a Landry.
Elliot was the baby in the basket, and El’s mom and an uncertain Landry are the time travelers who left him behind.
For a discussion of the episode, please visit our The Way Home Season Finale review!