Brazen Ending Explained: Who Killed Kath And Why? Who is the Killer? Who Killed Kathleen?
Brazen Ending Explained: A serial killer of dominatrix in sadomasochistic fetish and bondage chats unleashes panic in the city, mystery writer Alyssa Milano and detective Sam Page set out on his trail: here is the resolution of this perfect guilty pleasure thriller. Netflix‘s 2022 opens in the sign of yellow. From January 13, the original film Brazen, the “romantic suspense” by Monika Mitchell, which brings to the screens Desire runs on the wire (Brazen Virtue, in original) written by Nora Roberts is available in the catalog of the platform.
The ingredients for the sculpted object are all there: the cast headed by Alyssa Milano (the Phoebe of Streghe) and Sam Page (from Desperate Housewives and Mad Men in the face of Hallmark productions); the touch of an indie-born director who moved on to direct sugary TV movies; one of the novels of the “queen of the pink” specializing in amorazzi and murky passions, crimes over the top and twists, a treatment worthy of the summer thrillers broadcast by Rai2.
In short, Brazen is the perfect guilty pleasure an ideal forbidden pleasure for this beginning of the year. An irresistible soap mystery, complete with textbook romance between the two protagonists that is consumed well before the finale. But going to the point, who is the serial killer and why does he kill his It Girls? Let’s find out together.
Brazen Story Plot: Beware Spoilers!
Grace Miller (Alyssa Milano) is an acclaimed mystery writer. She is an exceptional profiler and has a natural instinct to find the motives for the murders. During the presentation of her latest work, the writer is contacted by her sister Kathleen (Emilie Ullerup), divorced from her ex-husband Jonathan Breezewood (David Lewis), a powerful and wealthy lawyer who forbids her to see her son, and with a past problematic of addictions.
The two have not seen each other for five years and Kath’s request for help worries Grace, who immediately rushes to her sister. Kathleen tells her that she is trying to get busy: she teaches literature in a high school because she wants to change and get custody of her son at all costs. In reality, Kath is hiding a secret: in the family home where she lives, she has set up a safe room where she becomes Desiree, the mistress of online bdsm encounters based on domination, fetishism and bondage.
Desiree is the most wanted dominatrix of Fantasy Inc. the site that organizes BDSM chats for wealthy clients. On the very night she is performing, while Grace has a date with her neighbor Ed Sam Page), a charming homicide detective, someone enters the house, assaults Kathleen and strangles her to death, placing the body in a strange position Christ.
Who killed Kath and why? Was it a robbery that ended badly, are there personal reasons behind this brutal crime or is there a serial killer who identifies and eliminates the mistresses? Grace is distraught and gets tough Captain Rivera (Alison Araya) to investigate the crime as a consultant alongside Ed and his partner Ben (Malachi Weir).
The Ending And The Explanation: Who Killed Kath and Why?
The suspects are many, but Jonathan stands out above all: Kath was blackmailing her ex-husband because he had discovered some documents that would have proved his involvement in a fraud. The track cools when it is revealed that Breezewood was attending a fundraiser that night and Grace goes to high school where her sister taught. Here he meets two of Kath’s students, Rand Morgan (Daniel Diemer) and Jerald Baxter (Matthew Finlan), and the attendant Billy (Aaron Paul Stewart).
Billy knew the truth about Desiree because cousin Richie (Jack Armstrong) runs Fantasy webcams and showed him live footage. But he wasn’t the killer. Rand’s position is more complicated, son of the influential Paul (Barry Levy) and back from a fierce argument with his teacher before his death. Jerald also has strange attitudes, also a “son of”: his mother is the authoritative Senator Baxter (Colleen Wheeler), “the mother of all Missouri” (not bad that the film was shot with location in Canada in Vancouver).
The case becomes increasingly complicated when another Fantasy dominatrix, Roxanne (Mitra Suri), is killed and a third, Raven (Orphee Nguyen), manages to save herself from the killer. The description provided by the survivor, some fingerprints and evidence of the cut on his arm following the fight with the woman would seem to nail Rand, but the boy is innocent: Rand is gay and has an affair with Richie, the webmaster of Fantasy. The two were together when the crimes were committed. Rand only watched Desiree’s videos out of morbid curiosity.
Now with no leads to follow, Grace decides to adopt a less conventional approach: act as bait by “becoming” the dominatrix Desiree in a chat on Fantasy and bring the killer out into the open. The writer watches all the videos of her sister and records the video preparing the plan down to the smallest detail, starting with the look: black latex jumpsuit, plunging neckline, high-heeled shoes, fishnet stockings, corset and whip.
Rand reveals to Ed and Ben that there is a classmate of his who is obsessed with Desiree, with “his” Desiree. The killer is Jerald Baxter, the senator’s son. When the agents arrive with a warrant to arrest him, Jerald has already escaped: he has taken the bait of Grace’s trap, has rushed to her house and now wants to kill the last dominatrix. The writer has foreseen everything: she induces the young killer to confess and records his words by keeping the computer’s webcam active. But why did Jerald kill Kathleen, the teacher he admired so much, and Mistress Roxanne?
Only apparently sweet and innocent, Jerald loved Kathleen because she embodied everything that is not his mother: a caring, loving and encouraging woman. When she became Desiree, the mistress, she had to kill her: that feeling of being dominated was too familiar. She suffered in doing so, but the modus operandi is clear: with the strangulation of the victims she wanted to wrest control from the dominating women. Only death can restore lost purity and innocence, symbolized by the presence of lilies.
The killer was pretty easy to guess, as well as the ending is quite predictable: after realizing he was framed, Jerald assaults Grace and tries to subdue her, but she reacts. Ed bursts into the scene and Jerald is about to shoot the detective but ends up killed by the cop who colds him with two gunshots. The case is solved. Grace risked her life to catch her sister’s killer, proving how important he was to her, and now she can begin a new chapter in her life with Ed by her side.
