Spoiler Warning: Firefly Lane Season 2Firefly Laneis aNetflixdrama based on the book of the same title by Kristin Hannah. It tells the story of best friends Kate and Tully through a combination of flashbacks from their past and updates from their present. The story spans three decades and shows the beauty, challenges, and power of female friendship.
At the end of Season 1,Tully and Kate had their biggest fight yet. Tully drove Kate’s daughter Marah home from a party Marah felt unsafe at, and because of Tully’s past trauma didn’t even think twice that she had a glass or so of wine. She heard that Marah was in danger and sprang into action. Her heroism was foiled when the pair got into a car accident, and it was blamed on Tully for being under the influence of alcohol. This causes their biggest fight of all time resulting in Tully taking a remote job in Antarctica at the same time Kate is diagnosed with cancer.
Where Firefly Lane Season 2 Beings
In Season 2, Tully is unreachable and Kate is getting sicker. As soon as Tully is back in cell service, she checks her phone, sees that Kate is sick, and it’s like nothing was ever wrong. These two women are sisters and no fight matters anymore when a “Firefly Lane Girl” needs help.
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Throughout the season, we see Johnny and Kate rekindle their romance after their divorce and proposal last season. The two get married and despite Kate’s cancer making her weak, it’s a beautiful day. Tully finally settles down this season. Throughout the series, especially in flashbacks, Tully and Dan the sports anchor are clearly in love. Whether it’s a job out of town or another woman, these two can never get the timing right, until now. Even then, Kate’s cancer takes precedence for Tully and Dan almost leaves again, but Tully finally does what she wishes she would’ve done a long time ago: she fights for him.
Braking Down the Flashbacks
The flashbacks in Season 2 show a much deeper side of Kate than they did in Season 1. In the second season, she blossoms. She was always Tully’s sidekick, but young Kate finds romance, passion, and strength in the flashbacks of Season 2. She falls for a popular boy who treats her badly and when he finally realizes he isn’t embarrassed of her, she tells him to get lost. She experiences loss for the first time when a close friend dies in a horrific accident. Subsequently, she grows a backbone and sticks up for her friend after her death.
Inthe young adult flashbacks, we see Kate finding herself even more. She and Johnny break up because she wants a family, and he doesn’t, but they eventually get back together when he fights for her. This reunion does involve breaking up Kate’s second engagement, but true love knows no bounds. After Marah’s birth, Kate grows once more. She loves being a stay-at-home mom, but she loses herself a little in the process. She finds her voice helping Tully shape her new show in a way that Johnny couldn’t: from a best friend’s perspective.
These flashbacks make Kate’s current self so much richer and more developed than she was in Season 1, which makes the ending so much more painful.
The Ending of Firefly Lane
Firefly Laneends in the way everyone knew it would, but hoped it wouldn’t. Kate’s cancer spreads, and she loses her battle with cancer. Right before she dies, she gives Johnny the book she was ferociously working on the whole season. The book is the story of her life for all of her closest friends and family to remember her by. The show we all watched two seasons of is that book she wrote.
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Even after her death, Kate knows Tully better than anyone. Knowing she won’t be able to go to the funeral, she leaves Tully a care package to mourn her in their own way. The box is full of things to help Tully cope including a joint, an iPod, and a note that says “Play me and dance.” She clicks play and the iconic Firefly Lane Girls playlist kicks off withDancing Queenand Tully dances their song with Kate one last time.
Thisshow was based on a book, so there wasn’t anything else written thus nowhere else for the show to go, despite its success. Not all shows based on books honor the original text as closely and drag on seasons too long, resulting in it being canceled with a dissatisfying ending. BecauseFirefly Lanequit while they were ahead and didn’t embellish for popularity’s sake, they had control of the ending, and they did a beautiful job tying up this heartfelt drama.
