Mix Tape Finale Recap & Ending Explained: What Happens To Alison And Daniel?

It aches, it drains, and it leaves scars that never quite fade, but love is still the quiet engine that keeps us going. While shows like Fleabag and Normal People take the route of keeping their lovers apart, Mix Tape takes a different path, revisiting Daniel and Alison’s shared history and leaving space for what might still lie ahead. Their young romance in Sheffield, the abrupt separation, the buried letters and suppressed feelings, and the decades spent building lives with other people—it’s all haunting, really. For most people, their first love never works out, but then again, for most people, it’s not the best thing that happened to them either. For Daniel and Alison, they were each other’s homes at such a young age; all they did was somehow survive without each other for the rest of their lives. After Daniel blocks her at the end of the last episode, the finale drifts between their intertwined past and the quiet aftermath of Sydney.

Spoilers Ahead

Michael and Alison—the end of a desperate relationship

When Alison left Sheffield after the horrible thing that happened to her, she went to Dublin and took a job in a pub. That’s when she met Michael, a young Australian med student backpacking through Ireland. Despite her heart still longing for Daniel, Michael slowly found his way in. The fact that Marian kept hiding Alison’s letters to Daniel didn’t help, and with Peter informing her that Catherine had passed, everything became all the more difficult for Alison. She refuses to go back to Sheffield for the funeral, as the trauma she went through was all too fresh, and that’s when Michael asked her to move to Australia with him. His father had enough connections in high places to make sure she’d be okay, and Alison agreed to be with him out of survival instinct more than anything else.

When one goes into a relationship with the promise of staying together for life, the foundation has to be stronger than what Michael and Alison had. After they return from Sheila’s, they try couple’s counseling to try and like each other better. But Michael’s desperate attempts to make it seem like everything is alright when Alison is clearly going through massive emotional turmoil only make things worse, and she tells him that she wants to do the England tour for her book promotion without him. The open wound of this relationship was too much to be healed by a glass of champagne, and Alison unleashes her feelings in front of the therapist the next time. She thinks that Michael feels the need to control her life and make it seem like she’s in on the decisions, and it has been going on for too long for her to stay interested in fixing him or the relationship. Michael avoids the blame like every good partner and tells the therapist that it’s the old ex-boyfriend she slept with that has led to this. In this exact moment, Alison all but divorces him in her mind and heads straight for Sheffield.

Daniel and Katja’s unfaithful marriage

After his return from Sydney, Daniel kept himself distant to avoid a  conversation with Katja. But she finally breaks the ice with Alison’s author bio on her laptop screen, and Daniel confesses that he needed an answer or some sort of closure from Alison. Katja is upset because he didn’t feel like he could be truthful about it, and she could see that their marriage is on the brink of falling apart. Daniel feels deeply sorry for hurting his wife, who has stood by him for over two decades. The guilt of letting her down, combined with the overwhelming emotions stirred by reuniting with Alison, pulls him into a grief so heavy he barely even recognizes it. Flashbacks flood his mind, reminding him of how his life fell apart when Alison left. He even used up all his money for the US trip to visit Dublin, but when he stood outside the pub, he saw Alison kissing Michael, just after she’d agreed to go to Australia with him. That time has passed long ago, but Daniel never healed from this pain. 

Daniel now finds himself trying to have a peaceful dinner with Katja, hoping it’d make things a little easier for them. But he walks in the house just as Katja is telling a certain Steven to stop calling her, and a few moments later, Daniel finds Steven texting Katja. Steven has mentioned how the one night with Katja meant the world to him and how badly he wants to be with her. Katja tries to downplay the hookup as meaningless to her, explaining that she was upset by Daniel’s antics, and she uses that to justify what she did. Daniel leaves the house and goes to see Marian, who admits that she never gave him Alison’s letters. It’s one blow after another for Daniel in a day, and his heart is too overwhelmed for him to be okay anymore. He and Katja have one last conversation in a restaurant, where Katja lays it all out for him, explaining that they’re not in love with each other anymore. Daniel reacts as though this has hurt him deeply, but really, that’s just his ego talking. If this truly meant something to him, he’d be far more miserable than he actually is. Instead, it’s clear that, in some way, he feels oddly freed now that things are over between him and Katja.

How Does Alison Find Her Way Back To Daniel?

In Mix Tape’s ending, Daniel goes to drink with Bill, and being the wonderful father he is, Bill urges Daniel to seize the chance life has offered him. Having seen the highs and lows of marriage himself, Bill understands how complicated it can be, yet he knows that Daniel and Katja’s story has run its course. He takes his son to a pub, and in another corner of town, Alison has arrived. She goes to see Peter, who now has a comfortable life with his partner. But seeing his sister again after so long leaves him unexpectedly raw and vulnerable. He tells Alison that Daniel went to Dublin, and after he returned alone, he was never the same guy again. Deep down, Peter knew Daniel never got over Alison, and she immediately runs out of the house to find the man she’s loved in secrecy all these years. Standing outside the pub, Alison contemplates if she really wants to go in, fearing it might be Daniel with his wife, or maybe he doesn’t want to see her anymore, now that he’s blocked her number. But a call with Peter drives her to take the plunge, and while she starts looking for him, Daniel unblocks her and confesses that he’s been in love with her all along. Alison sees the text, and just as she turns around, there’s Daniel standing, looking at her with just as much awe as the first time they met. The Cure’s “Lovesong” plays again, and it’s probably just the perfect anthem for these two. The longtime lovers have finally found their way back to each other, and once again, romance blooms in Sheffield.

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