The Gilded Age Season 3 Ending, Explained

All seems well enough when George shows up for the the end-of-season ball. He even gives Larry some promising advice about his relationship with Marian Brook. “There will always be disagreements,” he says, “but you must weigh those against the value of what brings you together.” That same night, he tells Bertha that the near brush with death has altered his perspective.

But then! In the final moments of the finale, George tells Bertha that he’s leaving Newport for New York, and he doesn’t plan to return to their shared home on 61st street. His appearance at the ball, he adds, was only to “protect the business.”

The shooting “has made me examine my life, and I don’t like everything I see,” he says, leaving Bertha (and the audience) with her jaw on the floor. At this time, George’s killer is still on the loose.

Should things take a turn for the worse in season four, Bertha has unknowingly woven a safety net for herself in society. As the new hostess of the end-of-season ball, she ended the ban on divorced women. Though she did so to protect allies and friends like Mrs. Aurora Fane and Mrs. Charlotte Astor Drayton, the move may well have saved her, too.

Larry Russell and Marian Brooks

Larry Russell (Harry Richardson), eldest son of George and Bertha, had one of the more infuriating arcs of the third season, at least from a viewer’s perspectives. He and Marian Brooks (Louisa Jacobson) seemed to be on cloud nine after he proposed to her in Central Park, but a convoluted game of telephone (can we call it telephone if the actual telephone was a brand new invention at the time?) threatened to muck up the happy couple’s future.

Through her cousin Oscar, Marian got word that Larry had visited a “house of ill repute” on the night of their engagement. Though the audience knew that nothing untoward happened, Marian called off the engagement while Larry was away in Arizona on business. Despite his pleading for her forgiveness, Marian seemed unwilling to give Larry another chance—that is, until Jack corroborated Larry’s story.