A Taste For Murder Recap & Ending Explained: What Does Joe Learn About Sofia's Death?

ITVX and Britbox’s latest British crime drama, “A Taste for Murder,” is a fine amalgamation of family crisis, police procedural, and underworld conspiracy, and setting such a potent narrative in the picturesque Italian coastal setting elevates the experience even further. Divided into six episodes, the series follows British Met police detective Joe Mottram, who joins hands with the local PD on the island of Capri while visiting his in-laws with his daughter, and at the same time trying to cope with a personal tragedy with the help of his close ones. Things spiral as Joe gets inadvertently involved with gangland intricacies, and by the end of the season, he has a shocking revelation which sets the stage for future continuation.

Spoilers Ahead

What Brings Joe and Angelica To Capri?

Almost eight months ago, Joe lost his dear wife, Sofia, a famous cookbook writer, in a hit and run incident, and the driver, who hit Sofia while she was riding her bicycle, was never caught. Despite being a sharp investigator, Joe couldn’t bring himself to look closer into the incident, and shut himself away from other people, even his seventeen-year-old daughter, Angelica, was his sole coping mechanism. At present, he arrives at Capri with Angelica to visit Sofia’s parents, Gennaro and Elena, a kindly elderly couple who run their beautiful bayside family restaurant, to spend a couple of weeks mending his shaky bond with his daughter. While Joe only ever tries to avoid any conversation regarding Sofia, living with the persons whose lives revolved around her obviously makes him face the harsh reality of her passing. It doesn’t help that Angelica gets romantically involved with a local boy named Daniele, whom Joe initially doesn’t approve of, and growing up with abandonment issues due to his absent mother, Joe is protective towards Angelica to a fault. Gennaro and Elena try their best to make Joe more emotionally responsive and understanding, and the medium they choose for the lessons is cooking. However, like a moth to a flame, Joe inevitably gets entangled in investigating local criminal cases by assisting Inspector Lara Sarrancino, especially because the first case involves Gennaro’s nephew, Luca, who works at their family restaurant. 

How Does Joe Get Acquainted with Lara?

After the corpses of local fishermen with past family feud issues, Matteo Capasso and Nico Massi, who have ties with drug smuggling racket, are recovered from the bay, the cops arrest Luca on the suspicion of murder. While Matteo is revealed to have been hammered to death before getting thrown into the ocean, Nico was shot to death, and ballistics reports reveal the bullet was shot from a Barretta M1935. On the island, only Luca possesses such a registered firearm, and it belonged to his grandfather. Luca’s boat is also seen trailing Matteo’s the last time the latter was seen alive. Given Luca used to smuggle designer bags and shoes, Inspector Lara is convinced that he has a role to play in the dual homicide. Even though Luca, who maintains his stance of being innocent, claims to have never smuggled drugs, one of his colleagues in the restaurant, Daria reveals he used to buy her marijuana to be used as medication for her sister’s cancer treatment. It also doesn’t help that, contrary to Luca’s statement, Joe finds out he knew Matteo’s widow, Bianca – with whom he got acquainted while acting together in a stage play and had a spat with her abusive husband after someone in the theatre group spread the rumor Bianca had slept with Luca. Joe investigates the stage play group, as there is another link with the case, given Luca took his gun to the play to be used as a prop. As Bianca is unwilling to divulge any information related to the case, Joe approaches Dante, the prop guy/ cameraman of the theatre group, who hands him the recorded video of the play. Taking a good look at the video, Joe deduces that Dante was having an affair with Bianca, and as he informs Lara of his findings, she too shares that Dante was the last person Nico called and texted before his demise. As the investigators raid Dante’s house, it turns out someone pushed him from the balcony. A stash of money is found at Dante’s place, which prompts Joe to theorize Bianca and Dante planned together to have Matteo removed from the picture, and Dante paid Nico to have Matteo murdered while they were together during the smuggling operation. Dante killed Nico after Matteo was taken care of, took his drug money, and strategically framed Luca for the entire ordeal. Bianca, keen to cover up her tracks and take the drug money, pushed Dante from the balcony before the investigators arrived. As a search begins for Bianca, Lara and Joe catch her trying to flee the island, and later on, as Dante regains consciousness, he corroborates their theory while confessing to his crimes. Luca is released from captivity and Lara is impressed by Joe’s deductive skills. 

Joe and Lara Partner Up

Throughout the next couple of weeks, Joe continues to assist Lara in a series of investigations, starting with the death of a British tourist named Shannon Gemma, which is initially identified as an accidental death caused by her falling off the seaside cliffs while taking a selfie, but eventually, evidence surfaces which indicates foul play. Shannon, who had recently signed a deal worth twenty million to sell her dating startup, was accompanied to Capri by her fiancé, Manny Sanghera, who confesses that he was apparently busy cheating on his wife and was completely unaware of her predicament. Shannon’s father reveals he had advised her to sign a prenup before her marriage after learning about Manny’s licentious activities. Joe finds out Shannon was taking fentanyl, and her father reveals she took it as medication, as she sustained nerve damage from an accident in the past. Joe deduces that someone was present with Shannon during her final moments, and as he looks at the nerve damage clue and the last image on her phone gallery, he realizes that Shannon did not take a selfie, someone took a photo of her. Additionally, shredded pieces of her prenup are found from their room’s dustbin, and investigating further, Joe and Lara find discrepancies in Manny’s statements. As it turns out, he paid his cousin, Totti, and his girlfriend, Viviana, to have Shannon overdosed with fentanyl so they could take over her wealth. Lara and Joe manage to arrest Manny and his accomplices and bring them to justice. 

British Consul Martin Laxman visits Naples and meets with Joe, who has been garnering high praise from the local PD thanks to his assistance with the recent cases. Martin requests Joe to attend her niece Camilla’s murder mystery activity weekend activities for the elites, which is being hosted in an old school villa in Capri, and offers a good sum in exchange. Joe is accompanied by Daria to the event, and meets gamemaster Andrea, who is seemingly having problems with Camilla regarding the management of the event. Not long after, Andrea is found dead, and initial suspicion falls on Martin’s niece. However, it is revealed that Camilla berated him for swindling her out of money. Andrea was a type-II diabetic, and as it turns out, his boyfriend, Santino, who has abandonment issues, had been administering higher doses of insulin and giving doses of warfarin to keep her lover dependent on him. Santino is arrested, but the insulin overdose didn’t kill Andrea – it aggravated the injury she sustained before, and caused a heart attack due to heavy blood loss, and Santino doesn’t have any motive behind killing him either. It is revealed that Andrea’s brandy decanter was laced with lithium, and no clue about who might have done that, is found. Joe looks into the history of the villa, originally built by a smuggler, which once belonged to an artist named Franz Muller, who formerly helped Hitler use the island as a Nazi stronghold, and fled from the villa after Allies took over, and the deed to the villa was left inside its unknown corners. Looking at the photos of the event guests which Santino had taken, Joe figures out that a certain actor, Oscar Miller – whom Joe identifies to be Muller in reality, sneaked out of the event for a brief while, and might have been responsible for spiking Andre’s drink. Joe and Lara enter the villa through its secret cavern entrance, and find Oscar trying to look for the deed to the villa, as he wanted to reclaim what originally belonged to his great grandfather. Being a bipolar who is on a prescription of lithium bicarbonate meds, it was not tough for Oscar to spike Andrea’s drink and knock him out to search for the deed. However, despite having a credible motive, Oscar too didn’t intend to kill Andrea, and when he shockingly passed away, Oscar needed to realign his strategy. The case closes with both Santino and Oscar behind bars, charged with involuntary manslaughter. 

Joe helps Lara in two more cases, the drowning of a USA based marine archaeologist’s husband, and the identity crisis issue of a former actress, both of which turn out to be quite unremarkable. However, during this period, Lara and Joe form a strong bond and, at one point, the narrative floats the idea of the duo getting together. Fortunately, that doesn’t happen, as both continue to work as professional partners and friends. 

Does Joe And Lara Take Down Rocco Di Biasi?

Joe gets entangled with local gangland drama after he spots lackeys of drug kingpin, Rocco Di Biasi, trying to misbehave with Angelica in the restaurant. Rocco and his men frequented Gennaro and Elena’s restaurant, as in the past, Gennaro made the mistake of taking a loan from the gangster – who continued to coerce him for a monthly commission even after the loan was returned in full. An enraged Joe approached Lara with Di Biasi’s situation, who appears ashamed of the fact that the local PD couldn’t even touch the gangster in the past, due to his immense influence in the island. However, eventually, situations take shape in a way that Lara and Joe get a chance to nab Di Biasi, although in a most unexpected way. After learning that Daniele, Angelica’s boyfriend, is secretly acting as a mule to one of Di Biasi’s henchmen, Fabio, Lara informs Joe of everything. Much to his horror, while searching for Angelica, Joe finds out Daniele had spiked her drink and knocked her out, trying to rape her. Joe beats up Daniele, and Lara takes the teenager into custody. Lara suggests Joe not press charges against Daniele and instead use him to expose Di Biasi’s drug smuggling ring. However, due to sheer negligence by the local PD, Daniele is able to escape, much to Joe’s dismay. 

Angelica and Joe reconcile their grievances with each other by remembering Sofia, and Joe opens up about his broken childhood. Elena and Gennaro had hoped Sofia would carry on the family’s legacy by managing the restaurant after their passing, and at present, they hope Angelica will stay with them. Even though Joe struggles with the idea of having to live away from his daughter, he eventually accepts her decision to stay with her grandparents. While smuggling gold with Di Biasi’s gang, a Libyan crime organization known as the Kings of Maghreb took down one of their own members, Omari Hassan, who had secretly tipped off the coast guards about the operation as part of his early parole arrangement. To send a message about the traitor’s demise, the Maghrebs traffic Omar’s hand and several kilos of gold within a blue shark and send it to Capri, which gets seized by police before ending up in the hands of the gangsters. Joe figures out Omar’s true identity and existing larger connections after taking help from his contact in Interpol. Using the shark as bait by inserting a secret GPS tracker inside it, Joe and Lara manage to locate Di Biasi’s secret lair and lead a tactical unit to arrest the kingpin’s cronies. Even though Di Biasi is still untouched, his top enforcers are behind bars and he has been severely weakened by the success of this operation as his ties with Maghreb are severed as well. Lara’s superior arranges for Joe to take a cross-country transfer and settle in Capri as a special investigator. Also, Daniele has been caught while trying to cross the borders, and he will be tried on all the original charges.  

What Does Joe Learn About Sofia’s Death?

As a form of gratitude towards Joe, Lara had offered to take a look at Sofia’s case, as having fresh eyes and no personal connection might bring up new clues which Joe might have missed. Lara spots a playing card in the crime scene from the photos, which symbolizes the involvement of the Camorra crime family. As Lara informs Joe of her findings, almost at the same time, Angelica calls him to inform Gennaro and Elena’s restaurant has been set on fire. Joe and Lara rush to the scene and rescue everyone, and a Camorra calling card is recovered from the scene. As it turns out, Fabio had seen Luca divulging crucial intel to Joe about the gold smuggling connection of Di Biasi, and to get back at them, Di Biasi might have orchestrated the arson incident. Then again, finding Camorra’s calling card indicates a larger conspiracy, which is inevitably linked with Sofia’s murder. It’s impossible for Joe to leave Capri at this point, as if the series gets a continuation, Joe will begin investigating the truth of Sofia’s demise, by going deeper into the Italian mafia crime scene. 

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