The Body ending explained: Is Grace actually God?

In Netflix's The Body, a Catholic high school dance team inducts a new member named Grace, only for her to fall into a coma after she's given ecstasy.

After trying to cover up their involvement, members Anya and Lisbeth both struggle as strange visions and miracles hit the Lions dance troupe along with the town at large. It's not long before some are convinced that Grace might in fact be a saint.

This new Netflix series, created by Quinn Shephard, plays out like a raunchy, camp love letter to 90s teen movies and erotic thrillers, but with a dash of Catholic horror. Lisbeth, especially, unsettles as a religious outsider who works her way up the ranks of the group while Anya struggles with her attraction to Elise. Because, you know. Catholic.

Do the Lions go out with a roar or does it all go to hell? And what the hell is really happening to Grace? Here's everything you need to know about the ending of The Body and how season one sets up a potential second season.

The Body ending explained: What's really going on with Grace?

Are people seeing Grace for real?

Throughout the season, people claim to have seen visions of Grace as she lay miles away in a coma. While the majority of the Lions eventually confess that they had been lying about what they saw, Anya continues to claim right up until the end that her visions were real. To be fair, though, Anya wasn't exactly sound of mind, overcome with guilt throughout the entirety of this ordeal.

And then there's Maddie. Unlike the others, she stands by her vision, fully believing that Grace must be a saint. The convulsions she experiences upon seeing her best friend also suggest something more might be at play, although it's worth remembering that Maddie had been starving herself prior to Regionals, so that could have played a role in her experience too.

Do things work out for Elise and Anya?

Besties Elise and Anya clearly have a thing for each other, but Anya is in constant denial about it due in large part to her Catholic upbringing. Further distance comes between them after her involvement with what happened to Grace. Rather than reveal the truth to Elise and risk everything, she grows closer to Lisbeth instead.

Anya eventually cracks, kissing Elise while drunk in a hot tub. But even then, she pretends that it's all just a show for her boyfriend Steven rather than what she actually desires.

These tensions come to a head in the finale at a debutante ball where Elise comes to realise that Anya was the one who drove Grace home that fateful night. What's worse is that everyone thinks Elise was the one who brought Grace's (seemingly) lifeless body home. Anya doesn't confess, however, effectively pushing her best friend under the bus.

At the end, Elise tells Steven what Anya did, breaking the trust between them all.

Do Lisbeth and Anya reveal what they did to Grace?

Wracked with guilt, Anya eventually tells the truth to Father Franklin, admitting that she was the one who drove Grace home. Lisbeth doesn't join her though. Instead, she takes a far stranger route, telling the other girls that she's the one behind all these strange, supernatural occurrences:

"Grace was dead. Like dead dead," Lisbeth told the Lions. "Then I laid my hand on her chest and I heard God speak to me. I don’t want to be dramatic, but I think I resurrected her…"

Well, you are being dramatic, Lisbeth. It's still quite smart though, bringing the believers on side just as she was at risk of having her cover blown completely. But will the truth come out? That all depends on Grace…

What happens to Grace at the end?

Just as the circumstances around that fateful night spiral completely out of control, The Body body-slams us with one more giant revelation.

At last, Grace wakes from her coma in the presence of Anya and her family. Her first words aren't directed at anyone in particular though. There is no blame here. Instead, Grace delivers three earth-shattering words that change the entire trajectory of this show.

And those words are: "I am God."

Is that a smile we see as everyone lays their hands on Grace's body, just before the credits roll?

“There’s a little wink at the end,” teased co-showrunner Gina Gammell in an interview with Tudum.

Grace actor Sofia Wylie felt a lot of pressure filming that scene, knowing how important it would be:

"I find moments like that really difficult because you want it to feel really weighty, you want it to land, and it’s a lot of pressure because if it doesn’t, then it’s so cringey. I was like, 'Everyone in this show is so good and jaw-dropping, I cannot ruin the last moment of this season.'"

"Is [Grace] fully aware that she’s even saying that," continued Wylie, "or is this coming from her confusion from having been in a coma? We don’t really know how sentient she is at this moment. With my delivery, I was hoping it could offer that level of interpretation."

"It really foreshadows Grace’s perspective coming into the center," added Shephard.

So, that begs the question…

Is Grace actually God?

Speaking to Tudum, Shephard explained that the truth behind these religious occurrences is very much open to interpretation: "Everything that happens that has a supernatural theory in the show should always have a counterpart with a totally grounded medical or scientific explanation."

Scientifically speaking, it's likely that the ecstasy Grace took put her into a coma, and her declaration at the end could be the result of brain damage. Not breathing for a while will do that to ya!

However, there is also a version of this show where God and the Devil exist, just as the Catholics at the heart of the story would attest. As such, instances of possession and saintly healing could indeed be genuine if The Body decides to go down that route.

Either way, it turns out that the showrunners do know the truth, and they clued Wylie in too. That secret stays locked with them for now, however.

"Quinn’s explanation is something I’d love to keep under wraps," says Wylie, "because I think the beauty of the show is that it stays within the mystery, whether it’s medical or spiritual."

Speaking with Swoon, Gammell said that the uncertainty around all this is "a tease and a setup of everywhere that we wish to go next season… If we’re so lucky to get one."

Regardless of what the truth might be, many people in the town will undoubtedly view Grace as a saint once she wakes. It's a story the church will be keen to perpetuate, assuming The Body does in fact return for a second season.

Want answers? You better start praying.

The Body is available to stream on Netflix. Sign up for Netflix from £5.99 a month. Netflix is also available on Sky Glass and Virgin Media Stream.

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