Fool Me Once follows Maya as she tries to uncover the mystery surrounding the deaths of her husband and sister. The show is now streaming on Netflix.
Warning: This article contains heavy spoilers
Plot summary
Maya Stern, a former army captain, lost her job after she killed civilians during a mission. Even today, their deaths haunt Maya.
When a whistleblower, Corey the Whistle, leaked the details related to that mission, Maya faced public condemnation.
Not long after that, Maya loses both her husband, Joe, and sister, Claire, within a short period of time.
Joe came from a very rich and powerful family that owns Burkett Global Enterprises. Additionally, Claire worked with Joe.
Claire was killed in her home during a burglary, and Joe was killed when a few men attempted to mug him and Maya.
As Maya has gone through a lot in the past few months, her mother-in-law, Judith, keeps insisting Maya get psychiatric help, but Maya refuses.
To make matters worse, Maya sees her dead husband playing with their daughter, Lily, on the nanny cam that her friend gifted her.
When Maya questions her nanny, Izabella, about it the next day, Izabella steals the camera’s SD card, pepper sprays Maya, and runs away.
At the same time, Sami Kierce, the detective who is handling Joe’s murder case, starts experiencing strange blackouts.
Years ago, Sami was engaged to a police detective who was killed in the line of duty. After her death, Sami took to drinking.
Although he has been sober for quite some time now, his superior is still worried about him, as he is going to marry another woman soon.
Due to that, Sami is partnered with a detective named Marty. Sami and Marty then inform Maya that her sister and husband were killed with the same gun.
Maya takes it upon herself to find out what happened to her sister and husband. She employs the help of her friend, Shane, who is in the military police.
If seeing Joe on the nanny cam was not enough, Maya finds out that Joe’s will cannot be read because his death certificate was not issued.
Joe’s sister, Caroline, also tells her that Judith never allowed her to see Joe’s body. Maya herself did not go to identify the body because she was grieving.
Caroline reveals that Judith, the only person who saw Joe’s body, has been bribing Sami. Then one day, she calls Maya, claiming to have seen Joe.
At the same time, Claire’s children find out that before their mother met their father, she had a baby with a man named Alexander Dosman. The baby was given up for adoption.
Maya goes through her sister’s things and finds a secret phone, which leads her to Corey the Whistle, who has been following Maya for days now.
Corey reveals that Claire was working with him. She was going to help Corey take down the Burkett empire.
The medicines sold by Burkett Global Enterprises have strange side effects and can even lead to death. Claire knew that the Burketts are covering up medical trial fixing.
It was Claire who had convinced Corey not to release the audio of the video of Maya killing civilians, which would have made matters much worse for Maya.
Corey tells Maya about a man named Tommy Dark, who is being bribed by the Burketts.
Years ago, Joe’s older brother, Andrew, killed himself by jumping off a yacht; Tommy Dark was the captain of that yacht.
Andrew’s suicide was portrayed as an accident by his family. Now, Tommy Dark has suddenly gone missing.
Sami collapses while working on the case. He gets tested and is told that his brain is degenerating, and this will kill him.
The doctors do not know what caused this condition. Meanwhile, Maya is told that the nanny cam can be hacked.
Claire’s children find their half-brother, who tells them that a day before Claire was killed, she took him to the school Joe and Andrew went to.
Maya meets the principal of the school, and he tells her about the death of Andrew’s best friend, Theo Mora, from alcohol poisoning. A few weeks after Theo died, Andrew killed himself.
To get the answers that she needs, Maya meets a school friend of Joe and Andrew’s, Christopher Swain. He reveals that Joe took a prank too far and killed Theo.
Andrew, wracked with guilt, wanted to come clean about Theo’s death, so Joe killed him as well. It was Joe who pushed Andrew off the yacht.
Maya and Corey then discover Tommy Dark’s body. Maya calls the police but does not tell Sami that Corey was with her when she found the body.
She also confronts Sami about accepting bribes, but he assures her that he is not being bribed by the Burketts.
Soon after, Tommy Dark’s blood stains are found in Maya’s car. Additionally, Sami comes to know that Corey was with Maya when she found the body.
When Corey is arrested, he tells Sami about the Burkett drug conspiracy, and Sami realizes that he is sick because he has been taking those drugs.
Sami and Marty track down PJ, one of the boys who were in the park the night Joe was killed. PJ falls off a roof while trying to save Sami, but not before giving him a name — Rambo.
Due to PJ’s accident, Sami is suspended. Despite that, he goes after Rambo on his own and questions him about the murder.
Meanwhile, after several failed attempts, Maya finally finds Izabella, who reveals that Judith asked her to deepfake the nanny cam footage to make it look like Joe was alive.
Judith believes that Maya has not been entirely honest about the circumstances surrounding Joe’s death, and she attempted to get her to confess by making her doubt her own sanity.
Maya comes to the conclusion that Judith was responsible for Caroline’s assertions about seeing Joe and the allegation that Sami was being bribed.
After Claire’s death, Maya had asked Shane to test a bullet but did not tell him how she got it. The same bullet was later used to kill Joe.
This leaves only one possible explanation — Maya killed Joe. Maya finally decides to tell Shane the whole truth.
Ending explained:
Joe’s murderer
Four months ago, when Claire was killed in a burglary, Maya suspected foul play because her sister’s family did not have anything valuable to steal.
With time, Maya started suspecting Joe of murdering Claire, who had come to know the truth about Andrew’s death and was investigating the drug scandal with Corey.
Maya’s suspicions were confirmed when she asked Shane to test the bullet of one of the two guns Maya and Joe owned.
One of the two guns was deactivated. Maya switched the two guns and called Joe to meet her in the park, where she confronted him about killing her sister.
As Maya had expected, Joe brought a gun to the park, but he did not know that he was carrying the deactivated gun and that Maya had the gun that worked.
Maya promised Joe that she would expose his crimes, and Joe did not hesitate to point the gun at her and pull the trigger.
This prompted Maya to kill Joe. She then covered herself in his blood to give the impression that she held him in her arms when he died.
She had seen a few bikers in the park that day, and she told the police about them to mislead their investigation.
Joining hands with Sami
Maya returns home after telling Shane everything and realizes that Tommy Dark’s blood was found in her car because Joe killed him and used her car to dispose of his body.
After questioning Rambo, who had witnessed Joe’s murder, Sami comes to know that Maya is the killer.
He goes to her house to arrest her, and she decides to reveal the whole truth to him. She is willing to cooperate and surrender, but she wants to expose the Burketts first.
As Sami himself has been suffering from the side effects of the drugs sold by Burkett Global Enterprises, he decides to aid Maya.
While Maya goes to meet her in-laws, she sends Sami to Corey. Sami and Corey will be working together to help Maya.
One last death
When Maya pays the Burketts a visit, she takes a gun with her. However, she does not use it and keeps it on a table.
She then proceeds to confront them about putting dangerous drugs on the market. Maya now knows what made Judith think that Maya was lying about Joe’s death.
Judith suspected Maya because she knew Maya had a motive. It turns out that Judith was well aware that her son killed Claire and others before her.
Maya tells the Burketts that she will bring the family’s crimes to light and that their wealth will not be able to protect them this time.
Judith then offers to make a deal with Maya. She is ready to blame Joe for the drug scandal and claim that his involvement in it got him killed.
Even though Maya will get to walk free if she makes a deal with Judith, she refuses, which leads to Judith’s son, Neil, killing Maya with the gun she had brought.
The downfall of the Burketts
It is only after shooting Maya dead that the Burketts realize that Maya had placed her nanny cam in the room before her death.
The nanny cam was hacked by Corey, who live-streamed the confrontation that led to Maya’s death. The whole world witnessed her getting killed by the Burketts.
It turns out that Maya’s death was a part of her plan. She knew that she cannot get her old life back after killing those civilians and Joe.
She took a gun to the Burketts’ house and placed it on a table where they could see it, expecting one of them to kill her in front of the whole world.
Before going to meet the Burketts, she left letters for Lily and Eddie, Claire’s husband. Just as Maya had wanted, Eddie raises Lily.
18 years later, Sami, who got better after he stopped taking the harmful drugs, comes to visit Lily in the hospital. Lily has just given birth to a daughter, and she names her Maya.
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