‘VIEWERS THOUGHT THEY WERE READY FOR THE ENDING… THEY WERE WRONG.’ — RICHARD GADD FINALLY BREAKS HIS SILENCE ON THE ‘HALF MAN’ FINALE THAT LEFT FANS STUNNED, SHAKEN AND COMPLETELY EMOTIONALLY WRECKED! Half Man didn’t just end with a shocking finale — according to viewers, it delivered the kind of emotional punch that stays with you long after the credits stop rolling.

The ending of Half Man is here, and it’s just as devastating as we feared, if not more so. Warning: The following post contains spoilers for Half Man‘s finale, Episode 6.

The episode begins right where the show first started, with Ruben (Richard Gadd) and Niall (Jamie Bell) in the barn. Ruben asks Niall how it feels to love him, and Niall admits the truth, “It’s like dangerous. It is the best and the worst thing all at once. It’s like the only thing. It’s the only thing I’ve ever felt. It’s like I’m f**king high off you or something. Chemically dependent, I don’t know.” Then Ruben asks him the question he really wants the answer to: “How long did you wait before you swooped in, before you took what’s mine?” This time, Niall refuses to answer.

The episode then flashes back to the not-so-distant past as Niall, who’s just snorted a line in the bathroom, faces a gaggle of journalists who only want to talk about one thing: Ruben. Niall is, ostensibly, an accomplished author now, but his brother, the inspiration for the story, is the real appeal for the media, it seems. When Niall’s agent demands questions not about Ruben, the room goes quiet.

Niall “strives his whole life to achieve something — and even in his success, Ruben is still the focal point,” Gadd tells TV Insider of the scene. “No matter which way Niall turns, Ruben’s shadow looms large.”

This amuses Ruben to no end when he reads about it in the newspaper during Niall’s prison visit. “Come on, Bambers, I’m the main character in this relationship. When are you going to realize that? At best, you’re my sidekick. At worst, you’re the guy who brings me my lunch,” he says. About four years have passed by now, and Mona (Amy Manson) still denies having a dalliance with Benji, the man Ruben nearly killed. She and Ruben are in touch again after Mona broke things off with her subsequent boyfriend, and now she wants to make a go of it again with him — and little bouncing boy Baird is all the motivation he needs to get good behavior credits inside.

Niall is, naturally, panicked and visits Mona to find out what she plans to do. She reveals that she’s lonely and wants just to tell Ruben the truth to wipe the slate clean — it’s Niall who Ruben will kill, not her, she reasons.

Niall then drowns his anxiety in a chemsex party that leaves him puking all over Maura’s dying body afterward. His horrified mother (Neve McIntosh) instructs Niall to inform Ruben about Maura’s passing so he can get a stay from prison for the funeral. She also knows of his extracurricular activities and encourages him to see a doctor to test for diseases.