Chad Powers season 2 manages to achieve a great build-up to a series finale that was both exhilarating and satisfying at the end. The season sets Gerry up as the main antagonist for the season, and what a villain arc he ends up having - it is menacing, vengeful, and threatening. We get everything that the climax of season 1 promised, and maybe a little bit more. The main thing here is that it all came together very well and nothing seemed rushed or undercooked.

Without spoiling much, let us dive deeper into what happened in the season finale and how it sets up the next one.

Throughout the season, Gerry has been fed the truth about Chad Powers little by little, and with every bite of reality, he keeps snapping more and more. In the finale, Gerry finds out the ultimate truth that Chad Powers is just a facade. Underneath that fake goofball persona lies someone else - someone who stole everything from him. This was the last straw in the series of lies that he discovers, which opens the floodgates to his utter madness.

A glimpse of this madness we already got to see in the fifth episode of season 2,where he threatens to hurt the one Chad loves the most. At the time, Chad thought he was referring to Ricky, but that actually ended up being a ploy to get him away from his real target. His real target was Danny, and the truth that hid in his basement.

The last episode opens with Chad coming back to a banged-up Danny who has received quite a beating from Gerry. This makes Chad furious, as this is the most extreme that the former backup QB had ever gone. But there is more, way more, that Gerry has still left to unleash to see Chad crash and burn.

The final piece of truth makes him go full psycho, totally committing to his villain arc with a weird meetup request.

Gerry invites Chad into an empty theater to have a talk with him about what he really wants, which really screams out “bad guy arc in full swing.” When Chad sees him in the theater, he quickly switches to his original personality and expresses his rage over what he did to Danny. And Gerry is actually happy that he finally gets to meet the real person behind the mask of Chad Powers. However, he is really not interested in finding out who is actually behind all this facade.

He basically wants revenge on Chad Powers and not the one behind him, as Chad is the one who came between him and his football glory (as he would like to think). He gives him a note that has the exact thing he needs Chad to do on the day of their do-or-die match against Texas. But the makers choose not to reveal that right then and keep it as a surprise for later.

Anyways, after their meeting, Chad heads to a diner to meet up with Danny and Ricky to update them on the situation. He just tells them that the situation has been dealt with while stalling with his usual weird babble for a legit lie to give them about how exactly he got Gerry to back off. But he could not come up with a convincing lie in the moment. Ricky gave up and went home, assuming he might be telling the truth.

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However, Danny does not buy it even for a second. He asks what exactly Gerry wanted, and Chad could only tell him that he is his only real friend so far in life and that he has protected him several times in the past. Now it was his turn to cover for him. Danny did not ask anything beyond this explanation. But he was still worried as to what price Chad actually paid for his own mistake. Danny actually blames himself for planting the fake gun in Gerry’s locked car and ultimately pushing him off the rails.

Well, Danny is right to be worried about Gerry’s price for keeping his mouth shut. He has something sinister planned to destroy Chad.

Match day comes, Coach Hudson is fired up and motivating his boys before the most important match of their lives. He has already had a heart-to-heart with Ricky and is now feeling invincible with the best possible team by his side. The same confidence her tries to instill in the players with his speech, and we see everyone amped up before entering the field. But as soon as the play begins, their nightmare starts.

It turns out, Chad, around whom their whole game revolves, is playing the worst football of his career. His passes are being easily intercepted by the opposition, and sometimes he is passing directly into the hands of the opponents. Everyone is frustrated, the crowd is booing, and Ricky gets the feeling that something is not right with Chad.

Just as the whistle blows for half-time, she spots Danny in the stands and chases after him to find out what is wrong with Chad. Danny, at first, lies, stating that Chad is just having an off night, but Ricky would not have it, as she has seen every Russ Holliday tape and she knows what his off nights look like. She knows that this is deliberate and that this has something to do with Gerry.

Danny folds and pulls a note out of his pocket. It was the same note that Gerry gave Chad in the theater. It actually had bets placed against Chad, with restrictions on his play that meant he was doomed to lose, and in the worst possible way. Gerry did not do this for money; he wanted to see those same people hating on Chad Powers, who once put him on a pedestal. In simple terms, he wanted to publicly dismantle the reputation that he, Russ Holliday, worked so hard to build behind a mask.

The revelation eventually sets both his partners to go on to help Chad get out of this difficult situation in their own ways.

Well, the halftime gives Danny and Ricky some time to think of their own ways to get Chad out of this bind. While Danny is walking out of the stadium, he encounters Tricia with the rest of the cheerleading squad. The head of the squad informs Tricia that Danny is banned from the stadium for deliberately injuring Gerry. Tricia is surprised as to why the team mascot would mess with a player.

To give a subtle hint, Danny equates his need to win with her own, and then it clicks for her what might have been going on. Still, we are kept in the dark for a bit about what exactly Danny spills and how exactly Tricia will be of help in this situation. Elsewhere, Ricky goes on searching for Chad, and when she finally finds him, she tells him about securing the job at Syracuse and that she is taking it.

However, she wants their last game together to be a victorious one. She motivates him to fight and assures him that she will find a way to work around Gerry’s restrictions. She even fights her dad into submitting to her plans - plans she has designed just to facilitate Chad winning without breaking a single one of Gerry’s rules.

The game that you see then is inventive, deceptive, and a lot more fun to watch than any other game sequence in the series so far. However, the makers decide not to let Chad off the hook so easily. Just as they thought that they had won, the Catfish are hit with a penalty, which means no more clever plays and only a straightforward touchdown, for which Chad must break Gerry’s rules. And that is what Chad does; he goes for the win.

After a dramatic final touchdown, the crowd erupts, and the team starts celebrating. However, the only person Chad wants to celebrate with is Ricky. As he looks for her in the crowd, he sees Gerry charging at him, consumed with blinding rage, but is intercepted by Chrisha, Tricia’s bodyguard. And the most shocking part here is not the why behind the save; it is him calling Chad Mr. Holliday.

Russ figures out that Danny told everything to Tricia, and the scene cuts to Tricia, who says to Danny that they are both now coming with her to her ranch, where she can protect their little secret. This immediately sounds the alarm of impending doom in Danny’s mind, and he realizes that he just might have made another mistake.

Elsewhere, Ricky and Chad are having their own private moment where things get a little hot and heavy between them, and they eventually end up kissing. While kissing, Chad’s prosthetics come off a little, and to make things worse, Coach Hudson walks on them. The season ends with this cliffhanger, and the story is now set to take a troublesome turn for a third season.

The ending indicates a turbulent road for Coach Hudson and Chad’s relationship, while his future with Ricky also remains uncertain as she is taking the job at Syracuse. And to add to Chad’s woes, there might be a possibility that the upcoming season will have two antagonists. One will obviously be Tricia, who will do anything to keep winning with Russ Holliday as Chad. And the second might be Jay Palmer, who has set his sights on Ricky and will go to lengths that may prove to be detrimental to Chad just to win her affections. There seem to be a lot of surprises planned for season 3, and the season 2 ending of Hulu’s Chad Powers has only hinted at a few of them.

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What do you think the ending means for Chad and Ricky’s relationship moving forward? Do let us know.