Based on the bestseller by David Nicholls, One Day is the new Netflix romantic series, in 14 episodes, which tells the story of two boys, Dexter and Emma who know each other at university and who become a cornerstone for each other. Their relationship is one of friendship, esteem, brother and sister but also much more which is told with great depth in this series in which we are shown just one day, the 15th of July, of each year of their lives. . But how does Em and Dex’s story end? Do they get together, break up or will they never speak to each other again in the future? Let’s find out together in this article which delves into the ending of One Day.
One Day, the review
One Day tells the story of Emma Morley and Dexter Mayhew, who speak to each other for the first time on July 15, 1988, the night of their graduation. The following morning they take different paths, but where will they be on this ordinary day next year, the year after and every year after that? In each episode we find Dex and Em on this particular day, a year older, as they grow and change, they find each other and they separate, they experience joys and disappointments. One Day is a love story spanning decades based on David Nicholls’ international bestseller.
The best romantic series on Netflix
One Day: the explanation of the ending
(SPOILER WARNING!)
In the penultimate episode of One Day, comes the biggest twist in the story: Emma dies. Now that she had finally gotten together with Dex, Emma’s life ends. While she was cycling towards the new house that she was supposed to buy with Dex to live their life together as husband and wife ready to have children who, however, were struggling to have, she Emma was hit by a car and dies. It’s 2002. The last episode of One Day instead it begins with a flashback that takes us back to 1988 when Emma spent Christmas at Dex’s house, a moment that had been hinted at in previous episodes but never shown. Here we see that the girl, then twenty years old, reads to Dex an excerpt from a book that she gave him for Christmas. A book that talks about how in people’s lives there is a date of birth but also a date of death, subtle and invisible. Emma, in fact, has been dead for a year now and we see Dex dealing with a very difficult loss that puts him to the test. He goes back to drinking, getting drunk and getting into fights. A year later, however, things start to go better and Tilly, Emma’s best friend since university, groups everyone together to visit Dex in her new house on the day of Emma’s death, creating a new tradition. Everyone is there, Dex’s father, Silvie, his ex-wife who has now broken up with Calumn, the man with whom she cheated on Dex years before, but also Ian, Emma’s comedian ex-boyfriend who is now married and she has three children and Tilly with her husband and their two children. It’s a bittersweet moment where we see how much Dex is struggling but also how much love he has around him. And after they all leave, Dex will find himself drinking and talking to the image of Emma who will tell him that things will get better with time. And so it will be because at the end of the episode we are in 2007, a few years have passed since Emma’s death and Dex decides to return to visit the places where he met Emma for the first time together with his daughter and his dad. So, Dex returns to university and remembers the party where the two saw each other for the first time, their climb up the London hill which he now does together with his daughter Jasmine, the place where he and Emma they are kissed and he does it with a serenity on his face that shows that his life is moving forward. And so, with the image of Dex and Emma kissing on the stairs like they did 10 years ago it ends One Day which leaves everyone with a bad taste in their mouths and also with a good dose of tears in their eyes.