No loose ends: that’s what we were promised by trailers for the third and final season of Netflix’s Top Boy, and so our expectations were raised for a neat, tied-up-with-a-bow ending (kind of like the way Harry Potter and Friends ended, we guess; no wriggle room for audience speculation about the characters’ futures whatsoever).

So, yes, it’s no surprise that fans had something to say when the six-episode season delivered twists and turns aplenty – leading to a seemingly ambiguous ending.

In the immortal words of one viewer on Twitter: “Top Boy said no loose ends and left bare ends loose.”

Still, this writer can’t help but think that the final chapter was… well, that it was pretty damn perfect, actually. 

Spoilers ahead, obviously.

We dived into this one assuming that the question posed by the show’s title would be answered at long last: who is the Top Boy of Summerhouse? Dushane (Ashley Walters), Sully (Kane ‘Kano’ Robinson) or some other pretender?

Well, at first it seemed as if Sully would ascend the metaphorical throne. Dushane had, after all, displayed some distinctly unnoble behaviour in jumping Jaq (Jasmine Jobson), stealing a pitiful slice of the fortune he once owned, fleeing his former best friend and dying a distinctly unceremonious death.

“I thought we were brothers,” he gasped, bleeding out from a stomach wound in a back alley – because it was Sully who fired the fatal shot, of course.

“If we’re not monsters, we’re food. And I could never be food,” replies Sully, the enormity of what he’s done hitting him with all the weight of a ton of bricks. 

Later, Sully is confronted by a vengeful and gun-wielding Stefan (Araloyin Oshunremi) in the park, who demands to know how it feels now that the tables have turned.

“To be honest Stefan, that feeling done left me a long time ago,” replies Sully dully.

Stefan, however, chooses not to pull the trigger, wisely determining that the bittersweet relief of revenge is “not worth” a future riddled by gang violence, hefty prison sentences, and likely worse. He turns, he leaves, and Sully gets into his car – only to be shot dead at point-blank range by an anonymous figure in a black coat.

Now, I know what you’re thinking: Sully’s murderer remains at large, with their identity still unknown. Countless fan theories, too, have erupted online as people try to figure out who killed Sully, presumably of the belief that uncovering the truth will unveil the identity of the new Top Boy (or Top Girl) of Summerhouse. All of these people, however, are surely missing the point of the show, right?

Think about it: there was no real way that Dushane or Sully could survive the world they had created for themselves, and no real way that either could emerge victorious. Each perpetuated a murderous cycle, which saw victims reduced to numbers in a running body count. Each was granted relevance by the other’s existence, too; come the end of it all, their lives only mattered to each other.

Is it any wonder, then, that Sully was left feeling dead inside after Dushane bit the big one? Is it any wonder, too, that showrunners allowed an unknown killer – a metaphor for the cruel anonymity of the world in which these two characters lived – to take out our anti-hero? Hardly. Because, just as Tony Soprano had to die for his sins when the screen suddenly cut to black on the final episode of The Sopranos all those years ago, so, too, did Sully and Dushane. If either had survived, then they themselves would have been a loose end, as another rival would have risen up to take the other’s place… and thus the cycle would have begun again.

Personally, this writer feels that Stefan is the true Top Boy of the series, as he was able to (pardon my Game Of Thrones reference) break the wheel and rise above the violence of it all. 

In choosing not to pull the trigger, in realising that vengeance isn’t worth a damn, he hopefully has a chance at something better. 

… that or, y’know, Jaq did it. You decide.

Images: Netflix