Note: This episode contains spoilers for “The Other Two” Season 3, Episode 10.
Romance and redemption abounded in the series finale of “The Other Two.” Though the third season of the Max comedy series saw Brooke (Heléne Yorke) and Cary Dubek (Drew Tarver) take a morally questionable turn at times, both siblings took the chance to make things right in the show’s concluding chapter.
For Brooke, that meant making a big sacrifice for her family and reuniting with her fiancé Lance (Josh Segarra). As Brooke and the family attended the Peabody Awards, where Brooke was set to win an award for her telethon for mental health awareness headlined by her brother ChaseDreams (Case Walker), a scandal erupted when Chase was caught trying to boost his album sales through the project. Controversy also swirled around Pat (Molly Shannon), after she mistakenly posted a series of tweets maligning her Ohio friends — and essentially her fanbase — along with sexually suggestive messages intended for her ex-boyfriend and manager Streeter (Ken Marino).
When she noticed the fans starting to turn on her family, Brooke decided to publicly take the blame for both mishaps and resign her position as Chase and Pat’s manager. After her fall from grace, she ran into Lance outside the event and the pair rekindled their relationship with a romantic kiss in the rain.
“I’d never shot under a rain tower like that. I felt like I was in ‘The Notebook,’” Yorke told TheWrap ahead of the finale’s release, days before Max announced the show would end with Thursday’s episode. “You really only have one chance at it, so it was rehearsed within an inch of its life — because we were running out of time, it was 3 a.m. and we were on Lexington Avenue — and then we crossed our fingers and went for it and it ended up working out. What you see is just that one take.
“I’ve known Josh for, I think, 15 years. We came up in New York theater together and he’s just been the most wonderful actor to work with,” she added. “He really is so giving and it’s just like a volley back and forth with the two of us. He just makes everything feel and look easy.”
Brooke had been on a downward spiral of questionable choices until her sacrifice in the finale. She organized the telethon as part of her season-long mission to do good — sparked by insecurity after Lance quit his job as a shoe designer to become a nurse during the pandemic. But in her efforts to make sure everything went smoothly during the broadcast, she locked a COVID supervisor in a supply closet to prevent her from sending a special guest home, and nearly chloroformed Ben Platt in order to preserve a massive donation from a conservative donor.
She later learned that Lance had been named People Magazine’s Sexiest Man, after seeing the cover in a newsstand, and decided to try to prove he had hired a public relations team to secure him the spot. That ordeal ended with Brooke nearly burning down Lance’s apartment building.
“What I love about that is that you can do the absolute most bats–t thing, but then remember who you are and what matters most,” Yorke said of Brooke’s journey toward redemption in the finale. “I can relate to that… you just go through so much as a person and an artist, striving, willing to kill, bleed and die for things until you realize that what matters most is your family and what you go home to. It felt like a nice resolve for the season.”
And the big gesture ended up paying off. The show’s final moments saw Brooke, happy to be reunited with her man, receive a call from Streeter to let her know that taking the heat for her clients caught the attention of every big name in Hollywood, who now hope to hire her.
“It was very fun and silly to shoot. It was on a weird day, on a strange street in downtown Manhattan,” Yorke said. “Looking directly in the camera was just like an off-the-cuff idea and they went with it. It really makes me laugh and I hope it makes everybody else laugh too.”
Cary’s storyline also wrapped with vindication, after realizing the lengths he was going to in his mission to become an A-list actor. He made up with his best friend Curtis (Brandon Scott Jones), and decided to pass on his opportunity for an Academy Award-worthy role to focus on himself and cherish time with new friends.
Max announced Wednesday that “The Other Two” would be ending with its Season 3 finale, as creators Chris Kelly and Sarah Schneider had intended.
“It is bittersweet to say goodbye to the Dubek family after three seasons, but we always knew, both creatively and personally, that this was where we wanted to end their stories,” Kelly and Schneider said in a joint statement.
All episodes of “The Other Two” are now streaming on Max.
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