Did you see that big twist with Jimmy Tatro’s character in The Hawk coming? Well, neither did he.
**Spoilers ahead for the Season 1 finale of The Hawk, now on Netflix**
If you all of watched Episode 10 (“Pickle”) of Will Ferrell and Tatro’s new comedy series, you know by now that Lonnie (Ferrell) misses his last putt on the 18th hole at Pebble Beach, paving the way for his son, Lance (Tatro), to claim the title. Whether Lonnie did it on purpose or not is still up in the air, but one thing that isn’t being questioned by the fans: Lance was never in any danger, and it was a mind trick to make his dad lose.
“I thought it was an unexpected way to go. I also was caught by surprise when I first read it,” Tatro told Decider in a chat ahead of the show’s release.
The entire season finale — which includes a heartfelt scene between Lonnie and his estranged wife (Molly Shannon) begging him to throw the game — leads fans to believe that Lance is in serious financial trouble after a gambling spree in Vegas. Remember, just a few episodes earlier, Lance wound up in a hush-hush poker game with Tony Hawk and others, betting money he didn’t have and requiring his parents to bail him out of the situation. Lance later came to his mom to share that he had mob guys coming after him for the money, which, in turn, caused Stacy to go to Lonnie and beg him to lose on purpose.
In the finale, there are even shots of Lonnie eyeing down two of the “mobsters” from the Vegas poker game, who are standing in the crowd at the game, seemingly watching to see what happens to Lance and — going out on a limb here — to find him after the game. What really happened is that Lance lied to his mom and manipulated his dad into thinking he was in serious trouble.
That only comes out after Lance wins the championship, turning to his father and saying none of it was real, just a tactic to get inside his head. The episode even cuts to the grumpy-looking muscle men in the crowd now smiling and shouting, “Thanks for the tickets, Lance,” as they are very clearly on good terms. Truly a twist we didn’t see coming.
But for anyone wondering how much of the Vegas stuff was real, Tatro says he’s right there with the audience and wants to have a serious conversation with the creators about when it stopped being real and started being a ruse to play a mental trick on his dad.
“I think THAT was all real,” the actor said of the Vegas poker scene. “This might be more of a question for the creator, but I think that was all REAL. I don’t really know where it started [though], like when they started to be paid actors.”
“Layers, layers to the show,” added Tatro’s co-star, Fortune Feimster, who plays Lonnie’s caddy in the show.
It sounds like fans will just have to make that decision for themselves, or ask Ferrell if they ever see him in the street. Here’s hoping a Season 2 of The Hawk answers our questions.
The Hawk Season 1 is now streaming on Netflix.
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