'Maximum Pleasure Guaranteed' Ending Explained And Season 2 Theories

If I have to be honest, the first half of the finale felt a little flat. Everything was a little too good to be true and quite out of character for the show, but if you have the patience to stick around till the end, then I promise things get better (and even crazier)! Apple TV’s Maximum Pleasure Guaranteed is entertaining and thrilling, and perhaps it would’ve been more engaging if it had been a limited series, but that’s just my personal opinion. In the previous episode, a shot was fired, did Paula die? Did Detective Baxter kill the contract killer? Or did Jennifer shoot the detective? Episode 8 has the answers to all our questions, so let’s get into the details of the ending of season 1 and discuss a few ideas that might be explored in the upcoming season. 

Spoiler Alert

How did Paula manage to get herself exonerated?

First things first, Paula wasn’t shot, she successfully crashed the Leadership Retreat and managed to strike up a conversation with Cecilia Vanderwalle, the owner of a risk analysis company called the Souter Group. Cecilia is taken by surprise when a woman approaches her and frantically states that she knows her every secret. Paula explains how she got entangled with Trevor and Dennis and tries to clear the confusion. She states that she is aware of how the Souter Group helps their clients achieve their desired result, and she is ready to forget everything she discovered if Cecilia agrees to stop messing with her. Cecilia at first pretends not to know what Paula has been talking about; she obviously won’t admit that she hires contract killers and intimidates her clients’ rivals to get things done. But it looks like she is impressed by Paula’s hustle. Here’s a mother who has spent hours researching what her company has been up to, and she has proven to be more resourceful than the cops who still don’t know what they are dealing with. 

Cecilia decides not to mess with Paula’s life anymore, did she feel intimidated by a single mother desperate to do anything to be with her daughter? Well, I’ll get back to this discussion later in the article. Now, to prove Paula innocent, someone has to pay the price, right? Cecilia and William decide that Dennis is the right fit. But isn’t Dennis dead? Turns out, he isn’t! Even after being shot in the face, Dennis’ heart didn’t stop beating, and the company has been looking after him. But given his physical condition, and the mess that he and his boyfriend had gotten the company into, they are eager to get rid of him. Dennis has no idea about Cecilia’s plan, he assumes that he is being taken out for a walk because he is getting better. As soon as he walks up to the edge of the terrace, he figures out what their plan is, but it is too late by then. Dennis is pushed off the terrace of a high-rise, and the cops find a suicide note with him. In the note, he admits that he’d murdered Trevor and his friend, Sky, because he got jealous of them. Paula is ecstatic when she discovers that she has been exonerated, and she is finally free! She feels proud of herself; after all, her hard work and planning paid off. But is Paula smarter than Cecilia? Maybe, maybe not. 

Who killed Jennifer?

Interestingly after the whole Dennis episode, Cecilia’s right-hand man, Brian, gets rid of Jennifer, the contract killer who was tasked with finding Paula. Jennifer was under the assumption that she would have to take out Paula. She had dyed her hair, hoping that her new appearance would help her escape from the cops who’d been searching for her. At the end of the previous episode, when Detective Baxter had asked Jennifer to put down her weapon, she’d shot the detective and escaped. Since then, Jennifer had become a loose end for Cecilia. She knew too much, she had exposed herself by meeting Paula in prison, and she’d shot Detective Baxter, who’d survived and therefore could identify her. If the cops found her, then the Souter Group as well as their clients would’ve been in trouble, and Cecilia obviously couldn’t let that happen. Jennifer had been observing Paula’s every movement, and she was ready to get the job done. She had no idea that the people who’d hired her were conspiring to get rid of her. Jennifer was in her car when Brian walked up to her and shot her multiple times (he wanted to be sure I guess, after the whole Dennis episode!). He calls his boss and informs her that the job is done, but is this the end of all their problems? With Jennifer gone, Paula won’t have to worry about someone tracking her down and killing her. Can Paula now live her life peacefully?

Why did Paula refuse to help Detective Gonzalez?

Paula is over the moon, and why not? Lately, her life has been a rollercoaster ride, she was almost about to lose custody of her daughter, but somehow things turned in her favor. As expected, Mallory stooped low and ensured that her lawyer mentioned Portland; they tried to prove that she was an unreliable mother, who flirted with camboys even when her daughter was around. But Paula didn’t let the allegations get to her, and she spoke earnestly when she took the stand. She explained how depressive her post-divorce phase was and how scheduling calls with a camboy had become her only respite given her busy life trying to be a good employee, and a great mother. The judge recognized that Karl and Mallory’s demand for complete custody was unfair, and he decided that Karl and Paula must maintain the custody that had been previously agreed upon, which meant that Hazel would continue living in New York. 

Mallory is completely destroyed after the verdict, as she and Karl will have to figure out how they will divide their time between New York and Boise. Paula decides to throw a party, and her colleagues, the moms from Hazel’s school, and pretty much everyone who’d been there for her, is invited. For the first time in a long while, Paula doesn’t have to worry about getting arrested or being shot by a contract killer. She is alive, happy, and thriving, and she finally kisses Steve and they agree to go on another date sometime soon. Paula is surprised to see Detective Gonzalez when she shows up at her apartment unannounced. She wonders if Paula has any information to share with her, because she is convinced that there’s more to the story and refuses to believe that Dennis is the main culprit. She can’t get over the fact that the woman who’d attempted to kill Detective Baxter was shot dead, and she is certain that all of it is connected, and Paula most likely has a very clear idea of what’s going on. But Paula chooses not to help Detective Gonzalez, as she and Cecilia had come to an agreement, and now that she is safe, she doesn’t feel the need to expose the Souter Group. But things take a dark turn when Paula receives multiple calls from an unknown number. Soon, she receives a video from the number, where Paula is seen intentionally running her car into Caleb, her drunk next-door neighbor in Portland. 

Will Paula become a contract killer in season 2?

We never really found out about what’d happened in Portland, but given how visibly anxious Paula always felt when the case was discussed, it was somewhat expected that she might have been guilty. The fact that she had consumed alcohol before driving home with Hazel only makes the case worse for her. Perhaps it was her neighbor who’d instigated her, but regardless, the video clearly suggests that Paula had killed him, and the sender of the video wants Paula to know that they own her now. So, what does the final text mean? Will Maximum Pleasure Guaranteed return with season 2? Probably! It looks like Cecilia has dug deep into Paula’s past to find the one thing she regrets the most and that can be used against her. I don’t think it’s Mallory; her conflict with Paula is totally related to Hazel, so I don’t see the point in her going back to Portland to find video evidence against Paula to ‘own’ her. She could’ve submitted the video to the cops and reopened the case, Paula’s custody rights would’ve been revoked and she would likely end up in prison, this time for the long haul. But the person who’d texted Paula wants her to do things for them, and considering how resourceful Paula has proven to be, Cecilia’s company will benefit from having someone like her working for them. I’m not sure if they will turn Paula into a contract killer, but maybe they will use Paula to win someone’s trust to gather information. Perhaps they might want Paula to stay in touch with Detective Gonzalez and find out what she is up to. Cecilia now knows that no matter what happens, Paula won’t ever reveal to the detective what she’d found about the Souter Group. So, she can use her any way she wants without having to worry about shutting down her business. This has always been Cecilia’s modus operandi, she blackmails people who dare to go against her. 

Will Paula be stuck in this mad loop forever?

If Maximum Pleasure Guaranteed returns with a season 2, then I’m sure it’s going to be a wild ride! Paula will do everything in her power to escape from the mess that she has gotten herself into, and Detective Gonzalez is the only other person who might actually listen to her, but then again, she can’t risk getting arrested. Ash too might be able to help her, since she is the only one who knows how the blackmail scam works, and she at least won’t report Paula to the cops! But does Ash have the conviction to take down someone like Cecilia? I doubt it. Also, now that Dennis is dead, she doesn’t have any reason to help Paula; she got her revenge and she will try to stay as far as possible from this messy situation.

I think in the next season we will get to know more about Paula and Caleb’s relationship. Before she ran her car into him, he was begging her to have a word with him, and he mentioned that he’d vouched for her. It looked like Caleb and Paula had a shared history, and Caleb had been harassing her for quite some time. Of course, killing him wasn’t an option, but who knows maybe the video frames Paula in a bad light, and things might have been different? Honestly, it will be difficult to root for Paula without knowing the whole story, because right now the video evidence proves that she had murdered her neighbor. Of course, nobody is completely good or evil, but intentionally hitting someone with a car is where I must draw the line, but I’m also hoping Paula will manage to justify her actions somehow! If she can gather proof to establish that she is innocent (or has a very legitimate justification) then she can work closely with Detective Gonzalez to take down Cecilia. As exciting as it sounds, the truth is that Cecilia is an influential woman, working with people who can bend the law to make things go in her favor, so I can’t help but wonder if Paula can actually find a way out of this strange situation. But Paula has repeatedly proven that she can go to any lengths just to be with her daughter and provide her a good life and to do so she will have to prove her innocence, put Cecilia behind bars, and basically clean up the whole mess. Also, there’s Rudy, who is genuinely planning on publishing her piece on Paula’s camboy scam, and that’s just another problem that Paula will have to deal with. The last thing she needs right now is more attention, but who knows, maybe the piece can help Detective Gonzalez understand the case better, and hopefully she will figure out the truth without direct help from Paula. Although Apple TV hasn’t officially renewed the show for season 2, there’s enough room to experiment with. The first season ends on a cliffhanger, that can be interpreted as a shocking ending underlying that Paula can never escape this mad loop, or perhaps one can also interpret it as a glimmer of hope for an upcoming season. 

...