The Young Pope · Season 1 · Episode 10 · 18 November 2016
S1E10 Episode 10
THE MOMENT The final scene on the beach is the moment most often used to explain what the show is really about.
The finale resolves the season's central mystery about Lenny's faith and his parents with an image of such crystalline beauty that it retroactively earns the series' every indulgence. Sorrentino earns his epilogue.
Full episode analysis below. Spoiler-light verdict above.
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The Young Pope Season 1 Episode 10 aired November 18, 2016 on Sky Atlantic as the season finale. Season 1 holds 79 percent on Rotten Tomatoes from 87 critics; Metacritic 68; audience score on Rotten Tomatoes 87 percent. The RT consensus noted 'over-the-top melodrama with profane comedy.' The finale is the episode that justifies the preceding nine: the central mystery about Lenny's faith, his parents, and the nature of the show's theological argument resolves in a beach scene of such visual precision that critics who had found the season's pace punishing were most often won over here. Sorrentino's directorial instinct for the single crystalline image that retroactively earns an entire film's or series' indulgences - visible across his feature work - is at its most concentrated in the final scene. The 87-percent audience score, substantially above the critical score, reflects viewers willing to wait for exactly this payoff.