Plus, Lacy opens up about the challenges of avoiding a “mustache-twirling trope” villain.

All Her Fault star Jake Lacy reacts to finale twist and reveals which character ‘had to go’

Plus, Lacy opens up about the challenges of avoiding a "mustache-twirling trope" villain.

By Lauren Huff

Lauren Huff

Lauren Huff is an award-winning journalist and staff writer at ** with over 12 years of experience covering all facets of the entertainment industry.

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November 7, 2025 9:00 a.m. ET

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Jake Lacy as Peter in 'All Her Fault'. Credit:

Sarah Enticknap/PEACOCK

**This article contains spoilers for the season 1 finale of *All Her Fault*, "Episode 8."**

*All Her Fault*? More like All *His* Fault.

In the end, after a twisty season of wondering who lived, who died, and who took Marissa (Sarah Snook) and Peter Irvine's son Milo and why, it all came down to one terrible decision by Peter (Jake Lacy).

Turns out, years ago when Milo was just a baby, he and his biological mother Josephine (also known as Carrie, played by Sophia Lillis) got in a terrible car accident with the Irvines and their infant. Peter was the only one not knocked unconscious in the crash, and when he realized his son did not survive the accident but Josephine's son did, he swapped them.

When Josephine — who always maintained her son survived the crash because she remembers him crying before she lost consciousness — randomly came into contact with the Irvines in present day, she realized that Milo was actually her long-lost son because of their shared synesthesia and his undeniable resemblance to his grandfather, and hatched a plot to kidnap him back.

During a final confrontation, all of this comes to light, Josephine accidentally shoots and kills Irvine family friend Colin (Jay Ellis), and Peter not-so-accidentally shoots and kills Josephine. Peter thinks he's won — Milo is home, the threat to his family is gone — but not so fast. Remember his deadly soy allergy mentioned earlier in the season? Marissa, who doesn't want to live happily ever after with a kidnapper, liar, and murderer, sure does. At Colin's funeral, she makes sure she brings an expired EpiPen, eats some soy-laced food, and gives her husband the kiss of death — literally.**

Jake Lacy as Peter, Sarah Snook as Marissa, Michael Peña as Detective Alcaras in 'All Her Fault'.

Sarah Enticknap/PEACOCK

Ahead, ** gets Lacy's hilarious, brutally honest reaction to his character's wild fate, and he opens up about who knew the twists when, whether or not an alternate ending exists, and the challenges of avoiding a "mustache-twirling trope" villain.

**: You've done a number of mystery thrillers or crime shows of late — *A Friend of the Family*, *The White Lotus*, *Apples Never Fall* — do you like mysteries? Do you find these roles or do they find you?**

**JAKE LACY:** I feel like those are just the opportunities that have come up, but I've been very happy to be a part of them. I always wanted to have one foot in comedy or one foot in drama or some mix of those. And to get to play these characters that are layered and complex and multidimensional is really fun — anything where there's a public and a private life, and a secret, and different elements at play, and having to keep different balls in the air is really fulfilling and fun.

**Your character, Peter, does a lot of awful things. When you first read the script (or the book upon which it's based) what was your initial reaction to him?**

I read the book concurrently as the scripts were coming out, which was helpful and a little messy. Our story is divergent from the book in certain ways, though I think it's true to the spirit of the story or the narrative in general. And I'd only read the first one or two scripts when I got to Melbourne. So I had a general understanding of Peter, or at least of how the story begins. And then I sat with Minkie [Spiro], who directed the first four episodes, and she offered up having a full discussion of how much Peter is responsible for what's occurred or not, that I could just say, "No, I want to be left in the dark," but because I didn't know what I was being left in the dark about, I decided to hear it all. And so it wasn't until I got to Melbourne and we started filming that I really knew what I'd gotten myself into, which is awesome.

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**Of all the cast, I imagine you probably most needed to know all the twists in advance, but was there anyone who didn't know what was going to happen until you filmed it?**

No, I think everybody was clued in around the same time. Yeah, you're right. I am the person I think most who should know that information from the jump. If I was on the other side of that, maybe I would've been more interested in waiting for that reveal to come out, for me to learn that as an actor or something. But it's tricky with these limited series often because most of the time you don't have access to all the scripts because they haven't been written yet. *White Lotus* was an aberration to that, where Mike [White, series creator] had all five or six scripts completed. So when we landed in Hawaii, they were in our hotel rooms in binders, which was so exciting to just sit in quarantine and read five hours of the best TV I'd ever seen. But that's the only time I've ever experienced that.

**What's the most difficult part of playing a character like Peter?**

Oh boy. Well, Peter is, in essence, the villain. And I'm not particularly interested in black hat, white hat, good guy, bad guy storytelling. But you also do have to have a villain who is a bad guy. And I don't think Megan [Gallagher, showrunner] or the producers or anyone else was interested in this mustache-twirling trope kind of character. But also at some point there has to be a turn in which the villain is revealed. And so the hard part was, or a challenge, was ensuring that that stayed organic and grounded and true to the character that we had set up for the first 4, 5, 6, 7 episodes. And that the reveal was more like, you've opened the door, but you haven't stepped all the way in, and do you understand what's actually behind the corner there as opposed to this ripping off the mask and being like, *I would've gotten away with it too if it wasn't for you meddling kids* kind of vibe.

**What was the best part?**

The most fulfilling part was, maybe it's two things, but one is Peter really believes his lies, there's a lot of justification and he believes it wholesale for him. There's no questioning in the choices that he's made, and then that provides room to really commit to his story. As an actor, you go like, okay, this is what he's going after, and he's shameless about it because he has no guilt surrounding it. He has no shame. He's like, *I did the right thing. If you disagree with me, it's not even a matter of perspective. You're incorrect. I've done the right thing here*. And so that's really freeing. And the back part of that is that the most fun is getting to act opposite people who are incredibly good, which is true for this cast. My job gets so easy when I go, *oh, I believe everything that comes out of Sarah's mouth*, for instance.

Jake Lacy as Peter, Sarah Snook as Marissa in 'All Her Fault'.

Sarah Enticknap/PEACOCK

**I saw a funny video of you learning that Sarah said you'd be the person in the cast that she'd trust the least with a secret, so I wanted to give you the chance to make your case.**

Well, that's the thing. I said that Sarah *would* be the best, and she was like one microphone down from me on the [premiere red carpet] line, and they were like, "Oh, because Sarah said you'd be the worst." And I was like, "What?!" Which I think she partially believes, and honestly, I partially believe as well. So who am I to get upset about it? [*Laughs*.] It depends on the severity of the secret.

**You've kept *All Her Fault*'s twists a secret.**

Yeah, that's right. I haven't talked about switching boys! [*Laughs*.]

**What is your reaction to Peter's fate?**

Well, yeah... [*Laughs*.] Peter had to go, let's be honest, Peter had to go. I was disappointed to see him go, I have a fondness for Peter, but Peter had to go. There was some dialogue stuff in there that we sort of massaged... It's tricky. Those are the hardest episodes — I have no envy for a writer trying to answer how do we organically tie everything up and land the plane, but not make it obvious that we're tying things up and landing the plane, and every story is still serviced, but not in a tacky way — that is just a thankless job. And I thought Megan crushed it. So it felt like a good ending has to be surprising and inevitable, and I think that's both. That, as Peter is dying, I would assume an audience is like, *Yeah, that makes sense*. But the way in which he goes out, you're like, *Oh, of course*. It is fun that that's planted seven episodes earlier and then left to kind of fester.

Dakota Fanning and Sarah Snook in 'All Her Fault'.

**Were any alternate endings shot or discussed?**

I think there was an ending where Peter has a hot air balloon on the roof and then sort of just flies off into the sunset, but somehow that never made it to Megan's desk. I know I sent the email, but I guess it didn't make it, or the server crashed. [*Laughs*.] No, I think from the jump, Peter was going to die at the hands of Marissa and the soy allergy, and lack of EpiPen, but the path to there was sort of what they had to chart.

**How do you hope audiences are reacting to all of the twists and turns?**

It's such a bingeable show in the best way, really, at least in my opinion. I feel like you finish one and go to the next, and the story, the subject matter, touches on a lot of themes or has comments on society or perspective on gender roles in these straight marriages and responsibilities. But ultimately, I just want it to be a thriller. I want people to be shocked by the twists and the turns and to think that they know and then have the rug pulled out from under them, and to be unsure as to whether they agree with a character's motivation or justification and ultimately get taken on a ride.

*This interview has been edited for length and clarity. *

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