u/Puzzled_Exchange_924

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I had made a couple of posts with lists of lingering questions before the finale. I guess many didn't get definitive answers because they aren't really that important to the story. I have consolidated the lists and the following are some the things I am still curious about.

1. KC is part Augustine, Landry and Goodwin according to the show runners. (Jacob - Landry Abby - Goodwin) Where does the Augustine part come from? My guess is Sam's ex wife was an Augustine or Sam was half Augustine. He said he had ties to the area. And their daughter was married to Lewis. Or simply, Lewis was married to a decendant of Mo.

2. Why did Sam lie about going to Toronto to the parole court case to keep Calvin Prentice in jail? He said he was going to visit his kids. Why not just say he was going to do both? Why was it a secret? Why not mention the trial? This upset Del when Rita showed Del the newspaper story about the trial? Was the purpose to have Del be upset with Sam and cause tension between them? Del was already upset at the time about Colton not telling her about the pond, so this had even more of an impact.

3. Was there any point to the Calvin Prentice trial other than to establish that Sam was a lawyer in Toronto? Or was this an abandoned storyline? I think at one point we were told we were going to explore more of Del's history. Since this was a financial crime and Del and Evelyn's fathers had business together, I think this was meant for a season where they introduced the era of Colton, Evelyn and Del’s parents - one of the 2 ERAs we are missing.

4. Why was the address of Lingermore, 18 LeBlanc Ridge? This was Noah and Wally's last name. Were they in a founding family also?

5. Did Lewis know about the pond? Did he leave the film reel with Kat on it purposely running and leave to take a phone call so that Alice would see it?

6. Grayson commissioned a mural of him and his sister, Cassandra, being watched over by the White Witch at Lingermore? What was Cassandra's experience with The White Witch?

7. Was it a coincidence that the Lingermore pool looked like a mini pond replica complete green water and lily pads? There is a statue fountain of 3 women and a statue of a little boy with pond ferns encircling his lower legs. I had theorized that Lingermore was built over a spring line that also supplied water to the pond.

8. Fern's brother, Frankie, was MIA and presumed dead and his body wasn't recovered in the War. Was he a deseeter that went AWOL through the pond

9. Why does the clock play "Beautiful Dreamer"? Why does Fern make a point of singing it to adult and baby Kat? Beautiful Dreamer is a song about someone being called away from the ordinary world into a dreamlike realm. The lyrics blur the line between reality, memory, and another place or time. Are the characters able to communicate with one another in their dreams? Is this how Thomas knows the house is blue?

10. There are at least 2 scenes where Colton is talking with Del after his death and we are shown shots of just a mirror with Del and Colton’s reflection in the mirror as they are talking to one another. Why show that reflection. Usually, when a mirror is shown in a scene with an imaginary person, the imaginary person doesn't have a reflection. Is Colton somehow actually communicating with Del?

11. What is the significance of 11:11? 11:11 is said to be the best time to make a wish. 11:11 Angel time and a thin space between eras and the symmetry represents the time when past, present and future line up. Is 11: 11 the best time to enter the still point of now. The still point of now is a state of consciousness or awareness. It's the experience of being fully present, where the mind isn't occupied with the past or future. Or it could be a space that exists outside of time?

Liminal spaces are often found in sci fi and could represent the still point of now:

Harry Potter Kings Cross Station

Interstellar – The Tesseract ( Tessa)

Dr Who - The Time Vortex

The Umbrella Academy - The Subway

Dark Matter - The Box and The Hallway

12 Monkeys - The Red Forest

12. Why can't Del locate Griffin? Where has Griffin been since 2000? We don't know where Griffin has beem since early 2000's.

This is what we know:

Season 4 Episode 1

Del: Griffin left long before Tessa, and he came back for other visits after she was already gone. Believe me, I've been looking for him. Griffin Landry doesn't want to be found, even if he still alive.

Later:

Kat: Okay. I give up. I am hitting the same walls as mom has in this search for Griffin. There is literally no sign of him past the early 2000s.

He may have been TTing all that time and he may have discovered some nice hidden features about TT and the pond.

13. Does Jacob tell Danny the truth about the pond and does Danny believe him if he does? I really want to see that conversation 🤣 . I think a practicle demonstration is the only thing that would work.

14. Does Jacob tell Abby about the pond? I think he has to in order to explain Lewis's blackmail accusation.

15. KC told Alice that they just wanted to have fun before everything changed. Since they have their mom's ring, are their parents divorcing? This would mirror Alice as she was fighting with her parents and was upset by her parents splitting up. She went to the pond and threw her mom's bracelet in and fell in trying to retrieve it. (Colton fell in after arguing with his mom, throwing his back pack in and trying to retrieve it.) Did Abby pass away?

16. Was there any significance to any of the objects?

There are just so many objects. Everyone seems to have one tied to them:

Augustine ring - with the Augustine compass rose

passed from Sussanah, through the Augustine family to Tessa and now to Kat

Evelyn's bumblebee - now on Max's keychain

Griffin's pocket watch or compass - It was interesting that Grandma Fern suggested that Colton add the pocket watch/compass that Griffin sent to him to the time capsule. That made me think it was going to be needed in 2026. Tessa seems to know how events unfold, putting the watch in the capsule could be a way of ensuring it survives until it's needed.

Most time capsules contain items that represent everyday life, culture, and important memories from the time the capsule was buried. Colton had just received that pocket watch/compass. A time capsule is normally meant to preserve a record of the past. But Griffin's object feels more like something intended to be retrieved and used in the future.

Alice's fish hook bracelets given to her by Nick

Tessa and Fern's matching bracelets with a key

Kat's wedding ring - KC has one and so does Alice

The bracelet Bradv gave Kat - Alice threw it in the pond before her first trip and the pond returned it.

Cyrus (or Thomas's) pistol from the 1800's - Kat puts in the PH Hearld office.

17. Who was Evelyn waiting for in her wheelchair by the window with her binoculars? Was it Alice? Was she just on the lookout for Landry time travelers?

18. Why was Fern so coincidentally by the pond when Kat and Alice TTed to the past? She told Alice she had less direction that any time traveler she had ever met. How many time travelers had she met?

19. Was Stormy just a plot device to bring Sam and Del together? Was Stormy getting spooked by someone walking by the pond just a storyline to have Del realize that she loves Sam and for her to move on?

20. Who was the man walking by the rock at the entrance to the path to the pond?

21. What was Tessa's family background? She said it wasn't a family that recorded generations in am Almanac. Were they carnival/circus people? She told Evie she was learning to palm read. How many places can you learn to do that? Were they Coyle's? Did the moons on her poster point to the Coyles?

22. When Tessa shot the gun in the tunnels, who was aiming at? Did she fire accidently?

23. Who was watching the broadcast of the News report of Jacob's rescue in the past in the Landry family room? Who taped it and took the VHS tape to the past?

24. Was there a significance to all of the moon references? The Circus in 1925 that Tessa is a part of is called the Hunter's Moon Circus. Colton dies during a Snow Moon. Colton tells Del to look at the moon before he leaves for his grief meeting. Alice arrives the first time during a pink moon. Is it because the moon had an effect of bodies of water? There are books in both Elliot and the Landry bookshelves by Keeley Coyle with Moon in the title.

25. Jasper has always intrigued me. I doubt we learn anything else about him but he was shockingly helpful.

When Jasper got to town, he got a job with the town council, a job that gave his access to the town's archives.

He just happened to have a tape from a town meeting about filling in the pond after Colton and Evie almost drowned 9 years earlier in his hippie van. How much room is in a hippie van that he thought he should keep that tape? And shouldn't those tapes be in a town council archive somewhere?

He befriended Fern and took her fashion magazines from the 1920s. How much did Fern tell Jasper about Time Travel?

When Kat got to town, Jasper happened to be driving past and offered wet Kat, fresh out of the pond, a ride.

Jasper told her that he had become a surrogate father to Colton since his dad died and his brother bailed.

Jasper. filmed Kat and Alice in the past and figured out that Kat was Alice's mom.

The pond story is pretty amazing and Thomas probably passed it down! I can't think of a reason Thomas could have to not pass it down. I really think Jasper knew what's up with the pond.

Jasper pointed out that history is often recorded in the art if the times. His booklet had a symbol on the back that seemed to represent the Coyles, Goodwins and Augustines. There is a Ship for the Goodwins, a moon for the Coyles on the shape of a C and the Augustine compass rose. Could KC stand for Katherine Coyle?

Jasper pointed out certain songs at pertinent times:

"By the Light of the Moon" - could have been written by Thomas and helped with the night of the eclipse.

"Fare the Well" - could have been written by Thomas.

The interesting one on this season was

"Five Went In".

Who could have written it and how did Jasper get a copy of it?

26. Besides finding Tessa, what reason did the pond have for sending Kat to the 1920's?

Kat says the following about the 1920's:

"The pond didn't bring me here just to find Tessa."

This seems like a parallel with Alice. Alice watches Del and Colton kiss after Del gets off the boat and she muses to herself, if Del and Colton don't need my help, why did the pond bring me here." Then she looks beside her at Evelyn who is upset at seeing Del and Colton kiss and Alice says, "Oh, I'm here to help you".

Did the pond take Kat there to help Fern?

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27. Did KC enlist Sam's help to get Jacob to go to Toronto? Did Sam gave Jacob the money to go to Toronto?

When Jacob left for Toronto, he reassured Del not to worry because he had some money. At the time, that seemed like a small detail, but it may have been more important than we realized.

Jacob needed to go to Toronto because that's where he was meant to meet Abby. Later, Sam tells Del that he knew Jacob would be okay. What's interesting is that he says this to Del on the phone while standing by the pond, watching KC jump in—a scene that closely mirrors Alice's jump into the pond while Elliot talks to Kat on the other end of the phone. Perhaps KC emlisted Sam's help and told Sam that Jacob would be fine. That would explain how Jacob got the money and Sam's certainty that everything would work out.

Sam and KC's relationship parallels Elliot and Sam's relationship.

Sam was KC's Elliot. KC gave Sam future knowledge and Sam helped KC. Sam and Elliott told KC and Alice the same thing. I will always be able to help you whenever you need in any time.

28. Why was Cliff's hat look completely clean and unharmed when Mo showed it to Tessa.

29. Did Tessa escape to Lingermore through the door that Grayson showed Kat through earlier to enter the tunnels?

30. Does Fern know that Elliot survived the gun shot? Does someone go back to let Fern know? Do they go back for Tessa?

I think that when Alice visits Granda Fern and asks her why she told Tessa she would kill her son, Fern said that because she needed Tessa to jump in order to continue the chain of events that led to Fern's son being born. It also led to the continuation of the Landry line.

The following conversation between Fern, Kat and Elliot takes place the day Kat comes home from the hospital after she was born.

Fern: Elliot! Oh, what a joy to see you!

Kat: Fern, listen, we need you to help us. New Year's, 1925, do you remember an explosion in the tunnels under Lingermore?

Fern: Oh, so that's still to come, is it? Oh... Such a sacrifice you made.

Fern doesn't seem to be surprised when she sees Elliot alive. She seems to assume the Lingermore tunnel explosion has already happened for them. Fern knows that Elliot made a sacrifice and jumped in front of Cliff and Kat when Tessa aimed the gun at them.

30. Why did it look like Colton TTed when he was in the murky water in the dunk tank at the carnival?

31. Were ERAs started to bleed into one another? Why did Kat see Thomas with his coins at the present day Founder's Day? Did something like this happen when Thomas saw the house was blue?

32. I think it would be interesting to learn how many of Fern's ancestors time traveled. How many time travelers has Fern met?

Fern tells Alice the following:

Fern: You have less sense of direction than any time traveler I have ever met.

That doesn't sound likemKat was then only other time traveler that Fern had met.

Fern greeted both Alice and Kat the same way she first met them at the pond:

Fern: And who might you be deary?

She said this in a totally non pulsed tone of voice as if greeting time traveling Landry's at the pond was not an uncommon occurrence.

33. Why does Nick have the camera strap from Griffin's camera draped over his shoulder in his last scene from the finale when he is talking to Alice by the boat? Did Nick just find of on the boat? Was this meant to be a clue for season 5?

34. Over time, will there be adverse effects the from affecting the entropy of the universe with time travel?

35. The finale ends with Kat and Alice jumping in the pond. Where are they going? I think they are going to see Fern and Tessa. They Will let them know that Elliot survived.

Want to show Netflix there's interest in The Way Home Season 5?

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Go to: Netflix's Title Request Page

In the Title Suggestion box, enter: "The Way Home Season 5"

Then click "Submit Suggestion".

Netflix says it uses title requests to gauge viewer interest in content, so if you'd like to see The Way Home continue, this is one simple way to let them know.

If you know other fans, please share this with them. Every request helps show there's an audience for Season 5! 💙

Hallmark+ posted this before the finale asking for feedback on the show and theories for the finale.

All the comments are about the cancellation.

If Hallmark is reading this, maybe it's another way to reach out.

When Fern TTs back, she tells Cliff that no matter what, at midnight to come and find her for their midnight kiss. But at midnight, it would have been to late. All Fern wanted was for Cliff to know that he would be a father.

Much like Colton knew his death lead to Alice, Fern knew that Cliff's death lead to the future of the Landry line. Colton and Fern knew they couldn't make changes in the past because it effected their descendants.

I've posted before that the pond took KC to crucial times and places in the past where they needed to perform actions that would ensure their own existence. The pond did the same with Alice.

Fern understands the importance of not changing things and makes the comment that meeting Kat shows her that the Landry line doesn't end with her. It leads to Kat and her daughter, Alice. Fern knows that Tessa needs to TT to the past in order for the Landry line to continue as it has. This is why Fern told Tessa she would harm her own son.

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The following conversation led to Cliff's death. If Kat hadn't told Cliff that whatever she amd Elliot did, they were doing it to keep Fern safe, Cliff might not released Elliot and followed Elliot into the tunnels and his own death. Instead Cliff would have put Elliot in the car with the undercover cop and then looked for Fern amd that midnight kiss.

Fern went back in time, witnessed the conversation between Kat and Cliff and didn't blame Kat. She didn’t blame Elliot but accepted Cliff's fate.

Kat: No! No, I just, um... The thing about Elliot is that he always tells the truth.

Cliff: Tom Buchanan sure didn't.

Kat: Just trust him, please. And me. Because whatever we may say and or do, it's to keep Fern safe.

While Colton and Fern understood and accepted their fate, Kat continued to try and intervene. Cliff may not have trusted Elliot, released him and followed Elliot into the tunnels to his death if Kat had not told him to trust Elliot at the paety becuase Elliot would be trying to keep Fern safe.

As an aside in science fiction shows, the way this is treated is that it was Colton and Cliff's time to die. A death can't be changed. If they hadn't died in the way that they did, the universe would just find another way for them to die.

How did the clock get in the wall?

Tessa bought it and put the inscription Elliot told her about on the bottom and put it in the wall of the Augustine house.

This is a causual loop/ predestination paradox -

The information about where the clock belongs travels in a circle, but the physical clock itself still has an origin. For the clock, because of all the details, blanket, inscription, song, etc, a bootstrap paradox would ne hard to wrap our minds around. The clock has a origin. Tessa bought it (or stole it, 😆). And then Tessa had the Eliot quote that Elliot told her about inscribed on it, added the setting to play My Beautiful Dreamer at 11:11, and put it in the Wall. That was the origin.

This is the loop:

1. Elliot tells Tessa about the clock in the wall and the TS inscription on the clock.

2. Tessa later buys a clock, wraps it in Elliot's receiving blanket with the stars on it (that she had tucked under her coat in the1980s when she jumped in the pond with Griffin) and puts the clock in the wall. From Elliot, Tessa knows she is predestined to put the clock there.

3. Elliot finds the clock because Tessa put it there.

4. Eliiot tells Tessa about the clock and the inscription.

An example of a bootstrap paradox would be the key to the prison cells in Lingermore. This would be a bootstrap paradox if Elliot had taken his clock back to the past.

A bootstrap paradox is when an object, piece of information, or event has no identifiable origin because it exists only through time travel.

Tessa was doing one last job and settling her debts with Al Capone to protect Mo and Percy

Tessa said she wanted to "settle her debts" . She also talked about how she was close to and and had always taken care of the Augie boys. She planned on faking her death and disappearing and this job would keep Al Capone from going after the boys.

Tessa must have had money to buy the house.

Tessa was a grifter and a bootlegging boss. She used her money to buy the house.

How did Tessa escape?

We were shown Grayson showing Elliot and Kat the doorway between Lingermore and the tunnels for a reason!

Besides Elliot and Kat, the people who were in the tunnel, entered through the tunnels.

Kat dragged Elliot through the tunnels to escape because it was the fastest way to get to the pond.

I think Tessa knew the fastest way to escape the blast was to use the route Grayson showed Kat and Elliot to enter the tunnels from within Lingermore. Tessa ran back up the stairs to Lingermore and entered the mansion through that same door Kat and Elliot had used to enter the tunnels. That also put a wall between Tessa and the blast. Anyone she had said, "Follow me" to could have followed. But Tessa wasn't the best person. Percy may have tried - who knows?

Why was the body count off?

Anyone could have easily lied about the number of bodies. And Editor in Chief, Grayson printed whatever he wanted. He was already prepared to do so for Tessa in his prior plan to fake Tessa's death so that she could escape Al Capone. History is told by the winners.

Was Tessa really planning on returning with Elliot?

If the blast in the tunnels hadn't happened and Tessa was able to go through with her original plan to fake.her death with Grayson, I don't think Tessa would have ended up going back to the present with Elliot. I think she did entertain the idea, but I don't think that Tessa would have followed through and jumped.

Tessa ultimately jumped in the pond with Griffin because of her Post Partem Depression and becuase Fern told her that she was going to harm her son. But even before Elliot was born, Tessa was struggling with her decision to become a wife and mother.

Once she told Alice she recognized a fellow ""wanderer". Vic said she had been having trouble sleeping. She said that she didn't come from a family that couldn't record their family history on am Almanac.

Tessa said she was learning to read palms which sounded like she was part of a carnival family. Tessa told Evelyn that she didn't know if she could ever be a mother.

Tessa was intrigued by the Landry's and thought that type of family was what she wanted. And she tried to make that happen. Vic said that she made their house a home.

But then she started having doubts again. She told Alice that Alice and Griffin could come and go as they pleased. They were their own boss and the baby was her boss. Elliot finally got an answer from Tessa as to why she left him. Her answer was it was because of the person that I had become. Tessa didn't recognize that person.

I don't think Tessa wanted to start over again at 65 in another ERA. Her life was in the past. She knew how to make money in the past. She had connections. She had the advantage of knowing the future and using it to her advantage.

And after shooting at Cliff and hitting Elliot, there really wasn't much of a choice left for her.

They say "Season Finale" and not "Series Finale".

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Wouldn't that be great if it was intentional?

1. Is Jacob "The One"?

Fern probably learned about "The One" from Jacob Jr.'s son, Fern's father, when she was a child. Ellijah and Rebecca knew that Jacob came through the pond from the future. They knew that he was a Landry. They just didn't know which year in the future he came from. Also, Jacob probably told Fern that "The One" returned later and brought an injured man from the future there to be healed by Sussanah.

According to Fern it feels like time travel and encounters with traveling Landrys were once understood as a normal part of family life. But Fern took a more cautious approach. She tried to keep Colton and his brother away from the pond as children because she didn't want either of them to become "The One." But Fern clearly knew about the pond, knew what it could do, and even passed down information to Colton she thought future generations might need through her easy-to-remember sing-song rhymes.

What's interesting is that Fern wasn't keeping the pond a complete secret from them. She was trying to manage their relationship with it, not erase its existence.

That changed with Colton. After Colton told the 1800s Landrys about planting potatoes and rye and causing a chain of events that led to the farmhouse fire. Colton carried tremendous guilt over that and it didn't help Grandma Fern was very upset with him. Colton seemed to believe that he had interfered with history and caused real harm. When he later jumped into the pond and didn't time travel, he interpreted that as the pond rejecting him or no longer working for him. And when both Kat and Jacob fell into the pond when they were small and didn't time travel, Colton decided there was no need to pass down the stories becuase the pond was broken.

Kat: You think we're related? No, Kitty Kat. I know we are. We're like two peas in a pod, you and I. Only Landrys can time travel. So you must be one of us from sometime beyond now.

Kat: You speak so openly about the pond. Well, naturally.

Fern: It's been passed down from parent to child since my great-grandfather. Now you're here. Proof that the Landry family doesn't end with little old me.

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2. Fern knows that Elliot survived the gun shot. Does someone go back to let Fern know? Do they go back for Tessa?

The following conversation between Fern, Kat and Elliot takes place the day Kat comes home from the hospital after she was born.

Fern: Elliot! Oh, what a joy to see you!

Kat: Fern, listen, we need you to help us. New Year's, 1925, do you remember an explosion in the tunnels under Lingermore?

Fern: Oh, so that's still to come, is it? Oh... Such a sacrifice you made.

Fern doesn't seem to be surprised when she sees Elliot alive. She seems to assume the Lingermore tunnel explosion has already happened for them. Fern knows that Elliot made a sacrifice and jumped in front of Cliff and Kat when Tessa aimed the gun at them.

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3. If Cliff was taken to the past, why wouldn't Fern go to the past and stay with him?

Does this parallel Colton accepting his death because he knows that it leads to Alice?

Tessa knows that her child leads to Kat.

Fern: It's been passed down from parent to child since my great-grandfather. Now you're here. Proof that the Landry family doesn't end with little old me.

The reason that Fern chooses to not be with Cliff if he is alive in the past is because Fern knows she carries on the family line.

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4. What was Tessa and Fern's relationship like?

Before the Lingermore explosion, Fern and Tessa shared a close, almost familial relationship. Fern cared deeply for Tessa. Tessa was a surrogate mother to her. And Tessa admired her for her strength, confidence and independence that was uncommon in women in the 1920s.

I think Tessa ended up being a caregiver for Jacob Jr. as Tessa arrived near the end of his life. Tessa arrived in the past in 1882 and Jacob Jr died in 1884. Tessa recorded his death in the Landry family Almanac. Since Tessa was from the future, Tessa had general medical knowledge people.wouldn't have had in 1925. And then Fern's mother died when she was young and she became a surrogate mother for Fern and probably Frankie as well. Fern referred to her as Auntie Coop.

This conversation discusses how Fern felt about Tessa:

Fern: My brother and I grew up believing the pond was our family secret. My parents, my grandparents, if they knew Auntie Coop was a time traveller, they never breathed a word of it to me. I feel like a fool for not seeing it. The books she'd bring me, she always knew which ones were going to be bestsellers. Heck, she made her living predicting the future. The future she was from. I loved her like family, Kitty Kat.

Kat: How could she abandon her own son? Or be willing to kill him. Or me. She also had no qualms dragging you into criminal activities.

Fern: Oh, she didn't drag me into any of this. I idolized her. She's the only woman I've ever known who didn't answer to any man. And I wanted the excitement. The intrigue. The chance to make something of myself.

In the following conversation, Fern is telling Tessa she will never be a real member of the family. This could be because Fern had been very close to the Landry's and now Fern was saying she was really a blood Landry because she is angry with her.

Fern: YOU!!!

Colton: Do... did you know each other?

Tessa: No, I've never met her in my life.

Fern: Take your hands off that book! It's for family and you'll never be family. No matter how hard you try.

Colton: Fern, what are you doing? I'm so sorry. Grandma, Tess is engaged to Vic. She's going to be an Augustine, not a Landry.

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5. I think it would be interesting to learn how many of Fern's ancestors time traveled. And many time travelers has Fern met?

Fern tells Alice the following:

Fern: You have less sense of direction than any time traveler I have ever met.

That doesn't sound likemKat was then only other time traveler that Fern had met.

Fern greeted both Alice and Kat the same way she first met them at the pond:

Fern: And who might you be deary?

She said this in a totally non pulsed tone of voice as if greeting time traveling Landry's at the pond was not an uncommon occurrence.

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6. Why does Fern say that Tessa will kill her son? If Tessa shot Cliff and Cliff died, why didn't Fern say, "You will kill Cliff?" Or why did't Fern say,."You will kill my son's father?"

In the following statement from Grandma Fern to Tessa, Fern tells Tessa she will kill her son and also gives Tessa another hint see knows her in the future because she uses the name, Coop.

Besides finding Tessa, what reason did the pond have for sending Kat to the 1920's?

Kat says the following about the 1920's: "The pond didn't bring me here just to find Tessa."

This seems like a parallel with Alice. Alice watches Del and Colton kiss after Del gets off the boat and she muses to herself, if Del and Colton don't need my help, why did the pond bring me here." Then she looks beside her at Evelyn who is upset at seeing Del and Colton kiss and Alice says, "Oh, I'm here to help you". Did the pond take Kat there to help Fern? This conversation takes place when Kat and Elliot are small babies.

Fern: This is how it begins, Coop. And I'll tell you how it ends. You're gonna kill your son.

This does give Tessa another reason to leave with Griffin. Tessa probably thought that if she weren't around her son, she couldn't kill her son.

But why would Fern say this when she knows that Elliot survives? Does Tessa have another son? Is Fern purposefully lying? Has the past changed?

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7. Can Tessa be redeemed?

Tessa said that she is taking care of alot of people. We only kmow of Percy and Mo Augustine. She took care of them but she also was their boss in a bootlegging ring.

She shot Eliiot when he jumped in front of Cliff and Kat. Did she accidentally fire the gun? Did she think that it was a prop gun?

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8. Besides finding Tessa, what reason did the pond have for sending Kat to the 1920's?

Kat says the following about the 1920's:

"The pond didn't bring me here just to find Tessa."

This seems like a parallel with Alice. Alice watches Del and Colton kiss after Del gets off the boat and she muses to herself, if Del and Colton don't need my help, why did the pond bring me here." Then she looks beside her at Evelyn who is upset at seeing Del and Colton kiss and Alice says, "Oh, I'm here to help you".

Did the pond take Kat there to help Fern?

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9. Did KC enlist Sam's help to get Jacob to go to Toronto? Did Sam gave Jacob the money to go to Toronto?

When Jacob left for Toronto, he reassured Del not to worry because he had some money. At the time, that seemed like a small detail, but it may have been more important than we realized.

Jacob needed to go to Toronto because that's where he was meant to meet Abby. Later, Sam tells Del that he knew Jacob would be okay. What's interesting is that he says this to Del on the phone while standing by the pond, watching KC jump in—a scene that closely mirrors Alice's jump into the pond while Elliot talks to Kat on the other end of the phone. Perhaps KC emlisted Sam's help and told Sam that Jacob would be fine. That would explain how Jacob got the money and Sam's certainty that everything would work out.

Sam and KC's relationship parallels Elliot and Sam's relationship. Sam was KC's Elliot. KC gave Sam future knowledge and Sam helped KC. Sam and Elliott told KC and Alice the same thing. I will always be able to help you whenever you need in any time.

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10. Who puts the clock in the wall of the Augustine

home?

Elliot needed to find the clock in order to guess that his mom had Time Traveled to the past.

The clock may be one of the most important objects in the storyline this season. Elliot finding it was what finally led him to suspect that his mother had time traveled into the past.

From our perspective, the list of people who know about the clock is surprisingly small. To place it in the wall, someone would need to know not only that the clock exists, but also its significance—especially the inscription, "Meet me at the still point of now," and possibly even the song it plays, "Beautiful Dreamer."

The most likely candidates seem to be:

Elliot - Elliot knows everything about the clock. He knows the inscription, the song, where it came from, and what it means to him. Did Elliot eventually time travel with Kat, Jacob, or Alice and take the clock back in time and hide it in the Augustine house? That would create a bootstrap paradox in which the clock is only discovered because Elliot was always the one who put it there.

Tessa -.Tessa knows about the inscription because Elliot told her about it. However, as far as we know, he never told her what the clock looked like or that it played "Beautiful Dreamer." Unless she later sees the clock herself, she seems to be missing key pieces of information. Could Tessa have bought the clock, added the inscription from TS Elliot and the song herself? (I have posted a couple of times previous ly about what I think is the significance of the song, "Beautiful Dreamer".) Does Fern know of a way of communicating in dreams?

Kat, Alice or Jacob - All three know about the clock and understand its importance to Elliot. Any of them could be sent to the right time period to place Eliot’s clock in the wall of the Augustine house as a clue for Elliot to find later.

I think that it's likely that Cliff died in the explosion. But I still want to explore the possibility that he didn't.

Here are a few points to consider:

The condition of Elliot's glasses.

If there had been a massive dynamite explosion in the tunnels, you would expect heat damage, soot, scorching, or at least debris embedded in them. Instead, when Ashley picks them up (and then drops them like a jerk) the glasses just appear cracked, much like they did when we saw them when Elliot dropped them. The same applies to the bullet casing. If Elliot's glasses survived largely intact, and the bullet casing remained visible where it fell, that suggests one of three things:

The explosion was much smaller than people believe.

It occurred somewhere else in the tunnels.

There wasn't a major explosion at all, and history exaggerated or misunderstood what happened.

The lack of cleanup.

If authorities investigated a deadly explosion, the area would likely have been searched thoroughly. Loose evidence such as glasses and shell casings would normally be collected or disturbed. The fact that they remain where they fell could suggest the scene wasn't what history later claimed it was.

Grayson's existing fake death plan.

Grayson already had a fake-death plan scheduled for the following week. Perhaps the Lingermore events forced him to use the plan earlier than scheduled. If he knew how to create a convincing death narrative once, it isn't a huge leap to imagine that the same setup could have been used to help Tessa and maybe some or all of the others disappear. Instead of staging only Tessa's death, the same setup may have been used to make multiple people appear to have died, allowing them to vanish.

In that scenario, the "Lingermore explosion" becomes less of a disaster and more of a cover story.

Grayson's reaction during the fireworks scene.

The show deliberately cuts to him watching the celebration. If people he cared about had just died in the tunnels, his calm demeanor would seem strange. He seemed to have cared about the Augie Bros. On the other hand, if he knew they had escaped and the "tragedy" was part of a larger plan, his behavior makes more sense. Anyway, the fact that Grayson appears oddly calm while watching the fireworks afterward is one of the details that keeps the possibility that people were saved alive.

Could the dynamite have been fake, prop dynamite used im movies?

I researched whether prop dynamite was available in 1926 and found out that it was. Theatrical and special-effects explosions existed long before 1926. Stage productions, silent films, and traveling shows regularly used flash powders, smoke effects, blank charges, and pyrotechnics to simulate explosions without using large quantities of blasting explosives.

I also researched what could have made the loud "explosion" sound? (Was the timing of the tunnel explosion and the fireworks display a coincidence?

If the event was staged, several things could create the impression of an explosion:

A small pyrotechnic charge creating a flash and bang.

Multiple charges placed throughout the tunnels to amplify the sound.

The tunnels themselves acting as an echo chamber, making a relatively small blast sound much larger.

A confined tunnel can dramatically amplify sound. Even a modest charge can sound enormous underground.

The tunnels being repaired.

Evelyn says the tunnels were repaired after the explosion. That statement only proves that people believe an explosion happened there. It doesn't necessarily prove anyone died in it. The show often plays with the distinction between what history records and what actually occurred. History is told by the winners.

Susanna essentially teaches Kat that written history is often incomplete, biased, or simply wrong. If Grayson was editor of the Port Haven Herald, he would have had enormous influence over the official narrative. A newspaper obituary or death report could become accepted fact for decades even if the people involved were alive. This is one of the show's recurring themes: history isn't necessarily what happened—it's what people wrote down and chose to remember. As Susanna says, history is told by the winners - those who survive to tell it.

The Way Home has repeatedly shown characters being presumed dead when they weren't.

Jacob was believed dead for years.

Griffin disappeared without explanation.

Historical records are often missing key context.

There was a execution record for Thomas.

There was a ghost story about a Lighthouse Keeper rattling chains in the Lighthouse that turned out to be Thomas playing with coins.

So the show has already established that "official history" and "actual events" are not always the same thing.

Where did the survivors go? If Tessa survived, then Grayson's fake-death plan may have included a safe destination, a hidden location connected to the Lingermore tunnels. That could explain why Grayson was willing to let history record their deaths by writing an article in the PH Herald about the deaths.

The Jan 4, 2026 edition of the Port Haven Herald included an article announcing the arrest of the Big Fish, Tom Buchanan, and gave Cliff credit for capturing him. This was probably part of Grayson's plan. Fern knew about Grayson's plan to help Tessa fake her death and escape but did she know about this part of the plan?

Earlier, we see a scene where Tessa gives the page on the Alice in Wonderland book with the key Cypher on it to Cliff and tells him that this is proof that she is just the messenger. This is the page that Cliff later uses to write Fer a letter. What else had Fern confided in Cliff? Was part of Grayson's plan to publicly arrest Tom Buchanan and then Cliff would let him go so that Kat, Elliot and Tessa could go back home?

If Cliff survived where could he be?

I had posted before that I hoped one of the Landry's had taken Cliff to the

There is a poster on Alexandra Clark's IG of the Harvest Moon Circus. Alexandra has a message about Easter eggs on the poster. The ring master that looks a lot like Cliff on it.

If Cliff survived why would Fern be alone?

If the finale reveals that Cliff vanished rather than died, I could absolutely see Fern keeping his identity secret because she believed he would someday come back. In that case, naming another man as the father or declaring Cliff dead would feel like giving up hope. I am still in denial that he dies.

Is Tessa Still Alive? The 65/25 poem could be evidence that Tessa survived:

Line 1 25 first arrived - Tessa traveled to the paat when she was 25 years old.

Line 2 65 never tried - Tessa remained in the past for 43 years until she was 65 and never tried to time travel

Line 3 65 thought they died 65 still alive -

Tessa didn't die in the tunnels when she was 65.

Line 4 In 25 there they thrive, 65 in 25 -

This last refrain, Fern says to Kat when they talk to each other at Del and Colton’s wedding. Grayson told everyone Tessa died Dec 31, 1925 in the Lingermore tunnels when Tessa was 65. This allowed Tessa to hide from Al Capone. Grayson is Editor in Chief of the Port Haven Herald. History is told by the winners.

At the wedding, Fern is telling Kat to find Tessa on 1925.

‐--------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I think that the writers had written this poem to be a fake out. When I first heard it, I thought that it would fit Colton and Evelyn.Too bad it wasn't about them:

Line 1 25 first arrived -

Colton and Evelyn faked their deaths and time traveled to 1925.

Line 2 65 never tried -

Colton and Evelyn were 65 in 1925 and didn't try to return to the present.

Line 3 65 thought they died 65 still alive -

In 1965, 8 year old Evelyn fell in the pond; 8 year old Colton jumped in to save Evelyn. The pond fronds ecircled Colton's foot to try and take him to Elijah and Rebecca. 8 year Jacob was taken instead. They didn't die.

Line 4 **In 25 there they thrive, 65 in 25 - **

This last refrain, Fern says to Kat when they talk to each other at Del and Colton’s wedding. Colton and Evelyn are in 1925, still alive and 65 years old.