Night Sky's Ending Forces Season 2 To Answer 8 Questions

Leaving many of its sci-fi mysteries and characters arcs unresolved, Night Sky season 1 ends with several nagging questions for season 2.

Warning: Contains spoilers for Night Sky season 1.

Night Sky season 1’s ending resolves many of its overarching sci-fi mysteries, but it also intentionally leaves several questions unanswered for season 2. Starring J.K. Simmons and Sissy Spacek, Prime Video’s Night Sky swerves between poignant family drama and intriguing sci-fi mystery. While its character beats are grounded in the normalities and moralities of human reality, its sci-fi elements are exceedingly imaginative and ambitious.

Night Sky revolves around grief-stricken couple Irene and Franklin York, who often find escapism in a secret backyard chamber that leads to a desolate planet. However, one day, their life turns in a whole new direction when they find a young man named Jude in their outer space chamber. A parallel narrative tells the story of Toni and Stella, a mother-daughter duo who are on a dangerous mission that somehow leads them to Irene and Franklin’s mysterious backyard shed.

Night Sky season 1’s ending reveals a lot about the struggles, motives, and backstories of its primary characters. However, when it comes to its sci-fi elements, it intentionally keeps them under the covers, with the promise of unraveling them in Night Sky season 2. With so many nagging questions surrounding its overarching premise, it is hard not to wonder how Night Sky season 2 will address these in tandem with the plot developments of season 1.

What Is Caerul – What Is The Cult About?

Cornelius mentions Caerul when he tells Toni about her father’s whereabouts. Since he refers to Caerul as her father’s present location, it is likely that Caerul is either Night Sky‘s overarching cult or the name of the planet where the cult was first established. The word “Caerul” has Latin origins and refers to the color blue. This could mean that the cult was named after the boundless blue sky that envelopes the alien planet. Not to mention, considering that the cult’s guardians and members use Latin greetings and scriptures to interact with one another, it is likely that Latin is among their primary languages.

In an interesting scene, Franklin asks Jude what’s out there on the alien planet. Perhaps, to protect him, Jude blatantly lies and claims that there is nothing out there. Jude’s lie suggests that the cult is not a safe place to live in and may not even welcome outsiders like Irene and Franklin. While the cult’s indoctrination process is yet to be known, it is evident that it is somehow grounded in religion. There are several moments in Night Sky‘s second half in which Cornelius indirectly refers to the cult as God’s gift. His references to a higher power and the cult’s isolation from the real world evince that the cult members live in a self-proclaimed haven, which they believe is superior to Earth. The identities of the cult’s members are still shrouded in mystery, but season 1 hints that Jude’s mother is among its leaders while Jude, his father, and Hannah are all apostates who managed to escape.

Who Are Hannah And The Fallen World?

Hannah (Sonya Walger, Lost) initially pretends to be naive about Jude’s father and the cult, but Night Sky‘s ending shows that she, too, is an apostate. After intercepting Cornelius, she vengefully welcomes him to the “Fallen World,” which is perhaps the name of her splinter cult that is well-versed with Caerul but works against it. While the “Fallen World” reference could simply allude to the cult’s utopian religious beliefs, the first season very well establishes that Hannah has her own team—or rather, splinter cult—on Earth that is plotting against Caerul. Given that Toni and Stella also become apostates toward the end of season 1, they will probably end up joining forces with Hannah’s Fallen World splinter cult in Night Sky season 2.

Why Did Gabe Leave The Fallen World?

When Jude visits Hannah to ask her about his father Gabe (or Gabriel), she tells him that they used to be lovers until one day, Gabe suddenly left. Gabe’s reason for leaving Hannah—and possibly the Fallen World—is yet to be known, but the fact that Hannah is an apostate confirms that Gabe showed up at her doorstep for a reason. He probably left her and her Fallen World splinter cult because he did not want to support her revenge-fueled operations against Caerul and put Jude’s life in danger. Now that Jude, too, has escaped the cult, Gabriel might join forces with Hannah again.

Who Is Jude’s Mother?

Jude’s mother does not appear in Night Sky season 1, but a scene suggests that she could be the show’s primary antagonist. When Cornelius is about to kill Jude, Jude asks him if his mother knows about what he is doing. Cornelius responds by claiming that his mother not only knows about it but is actually the one who asked him to do it. Only someone with immense power in the cult would be able to pass orders to Guardians like Cornelius and Stella, which indicates that Jude’s mother is either the cult’s leader or among its higher-ups. Her willingness to kill her own son just for the sake of punishing an apostate and keeping the cult’s existence a secret shows that she is evil and explains why Gabriel decided to leave the cult.

Why Are Jude And Denise In Bangkok?

Throughout Amazon Prime’s Night Sky, Jude’s only motive is to track his father down. While doing so, one clue leads him to another and he eventually ends up at Hannah’s place, where he finds some of his father’s old books. Among them, he finds The Count of Monte Cristo with several codes inscribed on its pages. After going through the book, he soon finds a code to the coordinates that could direct him to his father’s location. When he enters the code on the control panel of Franklin’s chamber, he finds himself in Bangkok with Denise.

After Franklin asks her to trust herself, Denise takes a leap of faith and decides to tread a whole new path by joining Jude on his journey to find his father. She also realizes that Jude still has a lot to learn about the real world, and it would be challenging for him to find his father all by himself. With this new sense of purpose, Denise (Kiah McKirnan, Mare of Easttown), for once, relies on her instincts and lands in Bangkok with Jude. It’s this character development that explains why the pair end up together in such a surprising location.

What Will Franklin And Irene Do On The Planet?

Franklin and Irene always hoped for a miracle when they looked out at the planet from the safety of their bunker. Nothing ever happened, though, and they never dared to step out of the bunker to look beyond the planet’s ruins. Now that they have realized that the planet’s air is breathable and inhabits a human civilization, their curiosity will probably get the best of them, and they will not hold themselves back from exploring it even further. Amazon Prime Video’s Night Sky season 1 ends with them finding the miracle they had been looking for—but considering that the human civilization on the planet could be Caerul’s Cult, this miracle could be a disaster in disguise.

What Happened To Byron – Is He Alive?

Hoping to impress his wife, Byron wears a homemade spacesuit and excitedly wanders out on the alien planet. However, moments later, Franklin watches him disappear behind a heap of rocks, only to never see him again. Byron’s fate remains unknown, but it is likely that he, too, eventually learned that the planet sustains human life. Unfortunately for him, he is unaware of the cult’s hostility toward outsiders, which could land him in some serious trouble and potentially explain his disappearance.

Who Is The Dead Man On The Planet?

When Franklin carefully hikes on the alien planet, he first discovers Irene’s coffee table lying around in a corner. A few steps further into the rugged landscape, he finds the dead body of a man with a knife protruding from his torso. Jude’s recurring flashback in Night Sky discloses that the dead man was a cult member who had tried to stop Jude from escaping the cult. In an attempt to defend himself, Jude had stabbed him before advancing to Franklin and Irene’s bunker.