SPOILER ALERT: This post contains spoilers from “Ahead By a Century,” the series finale of Hallmark’s “The Way Home,” streaming on Hallmark+.
“The Way Home” is saying goodbye after four seasons, but the series finale had major questions to answer before the show could depart Hallmark’s airwaves. The most pressing matter at the top of the finale was: Did Elliot (Evan Williams) survive the bombing at Lingermore after being shot in the penultimate episode?
Spoiler alert: He does, thanks to Kat dragging him to the pond just in time for Alice (Sadie LaFlamme Snow) and Jacob (Spencer MacPherson) to arrive and take him the rest of the way home. It’s Cliff (Dan Jeanotte) who doesn’t make it out of the Goodwin estate, leaving Fern alone on the farm to raise their unborn baby, who will grow up to be Kat’s grandfather.
“My suspicion is that if there had been a Season 5, they would have ended Season 4 with the audience thinking that Elliot was dead in the past,” Evan Williams theorizes. Luckily, fans were spared the threat of a funeral for one of the show’s central characters. In fact, “The Way Home” ended with a wedding, but not the one you might expect.
Kat and Elliot finally get engaged in the final episode, but it’s Jacob and Abby Goodwin (Holly Deveaux) who tie the knot, putting an official end to the Goodwin and Landry feud. They say their vows at the pond with both families present. The show pays tribute to all the eras the pond jumpers have visited by showing fan-favorite characters peeking out from the woods to watch the nuptials as well.
Courtesy of Peter Stranks/Hallmark
“The fact that we were able to stick the landing after four seasons is the TV equivalent of a triple axle,” Williams says. “The vibe of the show was so good. The interpersonal connections were amazing. The fact that you got to see it on screen, and felt it in the audience, is the icing on the cake.”
The final scene reveals Kat and Alice back at the pond, taking each other’s hands and going for another jump, though we have no idea where their next adventure is going to take them.
“It’s very hard to bring an end to something that’s really beloved,” Chyler Leigh says. “At the same time, the way they were able to button the show in such a beautiful way that is ‘The Way Home’- style, where there’s always a chance and something new to explore. They did a really beautiful job, but obviously, it’s bittersweet.”
Ending the show with one final jump affirms that there’s no future in which the Landry family is done with time traveling, despite the trauma and heartache the pond has delivered with its gift.
“Even though the pond had its evil moments, we see over and over again that it is worth it for the healing moments,” Sadie Laflamme-Snow says.
While it’s good to know that the Landrys conclude the show happy and together, there are still a few lingering questions. Variety also caught up with showrunners Heather Conkie and Alex Clarke, a mother-daughter writing team, about wrapping up “The Way Home,” choosing which wedding to showcase and its guests — and what questions they still aren’t going to answer.
What was the most important thing that you wanted to see on screen and deliver to fans before this show was over?
Heather Conkie: Closure and answers.
Alexandra Clarke: That was our priority, obviously. We raised so many questions over four years, and the gift of knowing it’s the end allowed us to answer those questions as much as we, hopefully, did. The other thing for both of us was the very last scene of Alice and Kat on the rock and jumping. From the very beginning, we knew that would be the end scene of whenever we did end. They jumped, and we just weren’t allowed to go with them this time. That was something that we really felt was very important. We never imagined a world where the Landry family said, “ Well, OK everyone! We got all the answers. Bye, pond! Nice to know you. It’s been great.” It’s too much of a gift. It’s too much of a temptation. It’s too much of a link to these beautiful worlds that they’ve all come to know. That includes generations of their family who have become close friends. They were never going to walk away from that pond and be done with it.
Courtesy of Peter Stranks/Hallmark
Is there any member of the Landry family who is done with the pond after everything that happened?
Clarke: I think maybe Del. Part of the beauty and the curse of this pond is that it is a part of their lives. It calls to them. Fern says to young Colton, “I know it calls to you.” It does. One of the biggest things we wanted to show in the finale was just how much of a gift, in the end, the pond can be. The fact that Jacob gets to go back to the 1800s and have his five more minutes with Elijah — he was the most cynical of all about the pond and what it had done to him, and why. For him to say to Susannah and Thomas, “I know we’ll be back here. We’ll be as we were: you, me, and Kat. I believe it now. The pond will take us here.” That showed his reworking of the pond. I don’t think the pond is done with them, and they’re not done with the pond. We just don’t get to see that next chapter.
Speaking of Jacob, it’s his wedding at the end of the finale. What went into that decision, and not Kat and Elliot, who also get engaged in the episode?
Conkie: Jacob was the one who had to sacrifice the most. He needed his happy ending in the present day without any risk of thinking he wouldn’t take that step. He’s taking it. We know that Kat and Elliot are going to get married. They’re engaged. That would have been too many weddings, but Jacob is the perfect person to commit.
Clarke: The wedding is also very emblematic of where we wanted to end our show. One of the interesting things about the ‘70s and ‘80s timeline this season was showing that there was a time when the founding families were all friends. They sat around tables at the kitchen party and talked about the future — Vic, Tessa, Evelyn, Colton, and Del. Now that Jacob is marrying Abby, that wedding is a representation of all these founding families finally coming back together and being at peace with one another. You wouldn’t have necessarily had that with a Kat and Elliot wedding.
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There are so many characters we’ve grown to love in the past. How did you choose who would show up at the wedding?
Clarke: We imagined, “Who are the people our main cast would want to see in that moment? Who is the first person they would think of?” For Del, it was Colton, but the Colton of the ‘90s, the one she just got a chance to dance with. For Kat, it was Fern. They truly built such a beautiful friendship over this past season. That’s first and foremost in her mind. Is Fern OK? Seeing her with Cliff was her way of saying, she is. She’s going to be OK. For Alice, it was the ‘70s. It was Evelyn. That was her best friend. For Jacob, it was the people from the 1800s. That was his other family. If he’s getting married, I would think he’d imagine this other massive chapter in his life.
This question technically comes from Chyler, but it’s a good one. Is Del the only one who can see Colton at the wedding, or is he visible to everyone?
Clarke: Kat smiles when she sees him. She sees him, absolutely. We’re all imagining him there, no question. He’s such a huge part of all their lives. He is the linchpin of the whole thing. I think in their own ways, they’re all imagining him standing with them at that wedding.
KC said a while ago that they wanted to come back before “everything changed” in their time. Do you have any idea what was going on in the future that would send them to the pond?
Clarke: That’s one of the things that I don’t know if we can say. We certainly had a plan for what that meant, but it can mean a lot of things. Look at the age KC is when they jump. They’re very similar in age to Alice when Alice first jumped. I think a lot can change in a family at that age, whether it’s because they’re a moody teenager or because things are really going on at home. There’s an innate thing in any teenager of wanting to run away. We had an idea of what it meant, but it’s up to the interpretation of the viewer.
I think it’s very important, though, that they saw the origin of their parents’ love story. It’s incredibly important. That’s why the pond took them where it took them. If you actually look at those episodes, you realize they actually might have even had a hand in helping them fall in love. It’s Jacob chasing after KC when he runs into Abby by the water. There’s the moment in the barn, and it’s KC asking, “What’s in a name?” that allows Jacob to realize they’re right and go with it. That’s hopefully a really lovely part of the finale, the sixth sense moment of revealing KC was there for their first kiss and then realizing if you go back, they’re there for every single of their really monumental moments as the relationship develops.
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You also reveal that Tessa left the clock in the wall of the Augustine house after the bombing at Lingermore, proving she’s still alive. Was that to stop Elliot from coming back to look for her?
Clarke: It’s reassurance. It’s the Bootstrap Theory. Elliot tells Tessa about the clock in the wall, and she doesn’t know what it was. Is that why she puts it in the wall later? It’s a cyclical, interesting time-travel conundrum thing. But in our minds, yes. Tessa putting it in the wall is to assure Elliot that she’s OK. What Elliot chooses to do with that information is up to the audience because we are not going to get to see it.
The finale specifically avoids talking about the origins of the pond, or the science of it. That’s not part of the closure you wanted to give. How did you define that guardrail and what you wanted to leave a mystery for the audience?
Conkie: We need to know that it’s forever. Yes, it was created for a reason, and there might be multiple reasons. No one really wanted to say exactly why the pond is the pond. It’s lovely for everyone to have their own theory instead of us feeding it to them.
Clarke: The minute you start dissecting what the pond is and why it is the way it is, you let the air out of the magic and the enigma of it. Our show isn’t sci-fi. Our show is about a time-traveling pond that helps heal a family. Our show is about how the pond can help, not why the pond is.
Were there any time periods left on the vision board that you didn’t get to visit?
Conkie: One hundred percent. There are a million eras. I actually would have liked to have seen more of the ‘20s, because I thought the ‘20s were fabulous. It would have been fun to draw that out a little more as we usually do. We usually do two seasons for an era, and this one was cut a little short for me.
Clarke: If you really look at the show, there are two generations of that family that are a bit blank right now. One is Colton’s father, so the ‘40s and ‘50s. Then there’s the era that Tessa and Griffin fell into, which is the late 1800s and early 1900s. It’s after Thomas and Susannah, and those areas are the big question marks still. I think it’s fine that they are, but they are certainly two areas that would have been interesting to go to and explore.
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Have you discussed the possibility of a spinoff? The Way Home: Port Haven Origins or something?
Clarke: We would joke on set about how we could take it on the road. Do they pop up in the Trevi Fountain, and we call it “The Way Rome?” But really, a Landry never gives up hope. We never say never. This is a family. We would all love to come back together again in whatever capacity. In the meantime, I feel very blessed that it isn’t goodbye. We have created a really lovely family, and as much as we miss working together, they’re never gone.
What do you hope fans take away from this final episode?
Conkie: I hope they feel a closure. I hope it stays in their mind for a while. I think it was food for the soul. This whole series seemed to hit people in a very personal way. Each person who watches it takes away a different thing. I think it makes them look at their own lives, and wish they had those five more minutes. Who among us hasn’t thought that?
What are you most proud of now that you’re wrapping the show up?
Clarke: The amount of messages I’ve been getting throughout, but especially in this last little while, about how the show has helped them, whether it’s dealing with depression or the loss of a family member. I’ve been getting some incredible messages. People who have dealt with tragedy in the midst of the show being on the air, and are looking for comfort. I’m so proud of that. We certainly did that ourselves. Mom and I have had some personal stuff, and the show has been a haven for us as well. I’m very proud of that, and I’m very proud of working with Mom, and what we built together.
Conkie: I’m equally proud of you. It was such a gift. I’m also proud of the soundtrack. I love shows that have music in it. I try to insert it in any show I’ve ever done. This one was so amazing. We ended with a cast that was incredibly musically talented. That doesn’t happen very often. To have a soundtrack that came out last week with all the beautiful pieces of score, plus all the original songs and songs that we created in our own way. It’s a beautiful soundtrack.
This interview has been edited and condensed.
