All Her Fault Ending Explained: Why Did Carrie Kidnap Milo?

Created by Megan Gallagher, Peacock’s ‘All Her Fault‘ follows Marissa Irvine, whose son, Milo, goes missing from a playdate that seemingly never took place. As the police investigation tightens, more layers to the mystery unfold, pointing inwards, to the Irvine family’s intricate web of secrets. In a parallel narrative, Jenny, the mother of Milo’s best friend, gets unexpectedly embroiled in the mystery and has to balance the negative spotlight with her professional commitments. However, as the days pass and no leads come out, Marissa, along with many others, begins to fear the worst, and an unlikely alliance of hope begins to develop between her and Jenny. The finale of this psychological thriller series brings the investigative lens into the past, capturing the exact turn of events that led to several tragedies unfolding in the present. SPOILERS AHEAD.

All Her Fault Plot Recap

‘All Her Fault’ begins with Marissa Irvine arriving to pick up her son, Milo, from his first playdate. However, when the person at the door claims to have no information regarding Milo, nor Jenny Kaminski, the mother who contacted Marissa, she begins to panic. Not long after, we learn that the number was never Jenny’s to begin with and has since been discarded, along with the GPS tracker placed in Milo’s bag. As reality begins to set in, police forces begin to arrive on the scene, where the entire Irvine family has assembled: Milo’s father, Peter, and his uncle and aunt, Brian and Lia. Soon, the police figure out that the person most likely behind the kidnapping is none other than Jenny’s hired nanny, Carrie Finch, who has since disappeared from the scene. As the search intensifies, Marissa finds herself increasingly lonely by the minute, and Jenny becomes her new friend and anchor in these harrowing turn of events.

While no one in the family circle claims to have interacted with Carrie in any capacity, Milo’s nanny, Ana Garcia, turns out to be lying. A closer look reveals that the two nannies had struck up a friendship over the past few weeks, and on one occasion, Ana had noticed a suspicious man talking to Carrie. The man, later identified as Kyle, an ex-convict, is deemed an accomplice in the kidnapping, and Detective Alcaras, who is leading the search operation, soon locates Kyle’s dead body in the ocean. Meanwhile, Jenny, a publishing agent, hopes to land a big deal with celebrated thriller writer Logan Lee, but the news controversies surrounding the kidnapping leave a toll on her psyche, making way for a deeper bond with Marissa. The discovery of one of Milo’s old toys in Kyle’s possession, however, brings the focus back on the immediate family as potential suspects, as the toy got lost well before Carrie became Jenny’s nanny.

As tensions escalate, family secrets are revealed, and it becomes clear that Milo’s father, Peter, is not the man he claims to be. Brian, who is disabled, learns that his accident was not caused by his sister but by Peter, who has let Lia carry the burden for decades to avoid any blame. Just when the domestic conflict is about to reach its climax, the police inform that Milo has been found and safely returned to the station. While Marissa and Peter are delighted, fear remains, and the discovery of a dead body in the motel room where Milo was kept only leads to more questions. As the family gathers together to plan their next course of action, Carrie sneaks her way into the house with a gun pointed towards them. In the brief, violent exchange that follows, Colin, Marissa’s business partner, is shot to death, but Carrie’s shock reveals that murder might have never been her intention in the first place.

All Her Fault Ending: Why Did Carrie Kidnap Milo? Who is His Real Mother?

In the finale of ‘All Her Fault,’ Carrie is revealed to have been Milo’s real mother all along, and the kidnapping is reframed as a twisted, but desperate attempt to reclaim her son. What follows is a flashback to six years ago, where we learn that the Irvine family’s car accident was the result of a crash with Carrie AKA Josephine’s car. This lines up with the previous episode’s version of events, where she had gotten into an accident moments after giving birth to her son, but at the same time, it becomes clear that the distant crying of a baby she remembered hearing was no coincidence. Peter, upon realizing that his child did not survive the impact, made the chilling decision of swapping Carrie’s baby with his, and Marissa is left none the wiser. Years later, Carrie’s chance encounter with Milo leads her to this exact harrowing realization, setting into motion her elaborate kidnapping plot.

The first similarity between Milo and Carrie that catches her eye is the fact that he has synesthesia, a rare phenomenon where one’s senses overlap. In Milo’s case, he has the unique ability to feel the taste of words based on their sounds, and the fact that Carrie has this exact ability is the first pointer to their connection. As Carrie gets closer to Milo and the Irvines, the timeline of events begins to add up as well, and the final straw comes when Kyle, her partner, exclaims that Milo looks just like his father. Convinced that she is his mother, Carrie confronts Marissa and Peter, but it isn’t until the latter confirms her claims that the full picture comes to light. Notably, in the climactic scene, Carrie asserts that she is not there to attempt a second kidnapping but to ensure that Marissa, as Milo’s mother, protects him from Peter.

Peter’s inhumane course of action serves as a direct continuation of his established behavioral patterns thus far. In a previous episode, we learn that he was the one who accidentally pushed Brian down the stairs when they were little, leading to a lifelong disability. Upon being confronted about keeping things a secret, however, Peter’s strategy devolved to circling around his toxic blend of love, guilt, and responsibility. However, Colin is the first to point out that all of Peter’s decisions stem from an unending desire for power and control over other people’s lives, and that is a key factor in why he stole Carrie’s baby. When the truth comes out, he immediately attempts to steer the blame away from himself, claiming that his actions not only saved Marissa from a feeling of loss but also gave the baby a better life than he could have with Carrie. Nonetheless, these ultimately register as futile attempts, as both mothers realize that they have been irreparably wronged.

Does Carrie Die?

Over the course of the story, we learn that Peter’s hunger for control is not just a passive personality trait but something that drives him to unimaginable lengths. This first comes to light when we learn that he lied about Brian’s potential treatment to keep him under close supervision, and later, when he kills Ray Murphy to ensure that the truth doesn’t come out. As such, with Carrie on the verge of making his life’s biggest lie public, Peter gives up on his facade entirely and launches at her before taking her life with her own gun. Carrie’s sudden death is made even more tragic by her final words, where she desperately tries to convince the family that she consents to them taking care of Milo. However, Peter’s desperate attempts to keep things under a tight lid lead him to kill her without a second thought. The complete absence of remorse on his face only cements the fact that he is significantly more dangerous than he lets on.

With Carrie dead, Marissa is the only person alive to know the truth about Peter, and every conversation that follows is tinged with fear and paranoia. During the police investigation, he forces her to lie about what transpired and frames Carrie’s actions as the result of a delusion. To that end, Carrie’s dying wish of keeping Milo safe from harm’s way takes a more tragic turn, as the minor interactions between father and son now reveal themselves to be his subtle attempts at exercising control over the entire family. The fact that Carrie frames the words as a request from “mother to mother” narratively places Marissa as the new torch-bearer who is tasked with bringing Peter’s terror to a stop.

Is Peter Dead? Who Killed Him?

As things gradually begin to get back to normal, Peter relaxes, knowing that his crimes will go unpunished so long as Marissa does not reveal the secret. While she initially agrees to keep the secret, guilt soon begins to eat away at her, and glimpses of Peter’s darker side prompt her to reevaluate their relationship. The turning point comes when she listens to a video recording on Carrie’s phone, which she tried to give to Marissa moments before her death. In it, Carrie’s father, Rob Murphy’s, final moments are taped, and we learn that there was indeed a ransom call by him, and Peter was on track to pay it in secret. However, the fact that he killed Murphy in cold blood proves to Marissa that she can no longer lead a safe and peaceful life with her husband. Still, she recognizes that going to the police can harm Milo in the long run, and that a divorce is too risky given Peter’s violent tendencies. As such, she begins concocting a plan of her own, intending to kill Peter for good.

At Colin’s funeral, Peter and Marissa look back at their tumultuous few weeks and share a kiss. Except Peter realizes that Marissa had ingested soy shortly prior, triggering a strong allergic reaction in him. Worse, his stock EpiPen is nowhere to be found, and the nearest ambulance has no chance of making it on time. As Peter gradually begins to lose breath and then consciousness, a panic-stricken Marissa sits over him, but a change in her expression brings the truth to the surface. We learn that it was she who secretly took out his stock of allergy medication, before intentionally ingesting a soy-based product and making contact with her husband. In the end, Peter watches in horror as life slips out of his reach, slowly and painfully, and Marissa looks on with a barely contained smile. Although his death is not shown on-screen, the detectives’ discussion in the follow-up scene confirms it.

Does Detective Alcaras Know the Truth?

In the aftermath of Peter’s death, Detective Alcaras sits down with his team to reassemble the case from the ground up and examine it. While officially, Peter’s death is ruled an accident, and the truth about Milo’s parentage never comes out, the police officer has doubts of his own. Upon comparing Carrie’s psychiatric evaluation with that of Milo’s, he stumbles upon the genetic nature of synesthesia, which lends more credence to Carrie’s initially absurd-sounding claim. However, with no way of reinvestigating the case, he turns to the one person who holds all the answers: Marissa. The final segment of the show features a heart-to-heart conversation between the two parents, with Alcaras simply wanting to know the truth. Though he implicitly realizes that Marissa not only knows the truth but is also behind Peter’s death, he is unable to prove it and has to walk away empty-handed.

While much of the drama is built on the domestic conflicts of the Irvines and the Kaminskis, Detective Alcaras’ story is an equally compelling look into how circumstances affect decision-making. At the start of the show, he refuses the offer of his son’s admission to a prestigious school in return for witness tampering, but ultimately gives in to the temptation. To that end, he understands that deep down, he cannot place himself on a higher pedestal than Marissa, and both of their twisted measures are based on complicated scenarios. The same also holds true for Lia, Peter’s sister, who is the last person to be interrogated about his suspicious death. On that fateful day, Lia saw Marissa inspect the soy content label on the food before ingesting it and kissing Peter anyway. However, when asked about the same by the officers, she chooses to lie and cover for Marissa, deep inside acknowledging that Peter brought the family more harm than good.