"Trust me, Kevin, this is the ending everyone wants, and they still won’t see it coming," M. Night Shyamalan (yes, that M. Night Shyamalan) assured Kevin during a set pep talk in the Tuesday, Jan. 28 This Is Us episode, "A Hell of a Week: Part Two." The director may have been referring to the Pearson sibling’s fictional movie, but barring any unforeseen Shyamalan-esque twists, one ending that everyone now does see coming is that Sophie is likely the mother of Kevin’s son on This Is Us. And, hey, maybe it’ll be the ending everyone wanted, too.
Fans have certainly considered Kevin and his childhood sweetheart as potentially being endgame, ever since the Season 3 finale flash forward scene showed he’d be settled down and fathered at least one child in the future. The This Is Us fall finale added even more intrigue, revealing that just nine months post Thanksgiving, Kevin would be engaged and expecting a baby with somebody.
Given that, at the time, Kevin had no stable romantic prospects on the horizon, jumping to such an uncharacteristic level of commitment would seem to indicate that the woman was someone with whom he already had a romantic history. Sorry, Cassidy, Madison, and "hall pass" Lizzy, but you just didn’t quite seem to fit that bill. And now it seems Sophie may just be that somebody.
Their past was certainly more deeply examined in this week’s Kevin-centered episode. As it turns out, Kevin was extremely close with Sophie’s mother, Claire, who had just died in the episode from MS — also the cause for the on-and-off exes reconnecting. Sophie desired the warmth of her old flame because, unlike her current fiancé, Grant, he’d not only already dealt with the crushing blow of losing a parent, but had also known her mom intimately. "It’s crazy I’m going to spend the rest of my life with somebody who never really knew her," Sophie admits to Kevin in one scene in the episode.
Aside from their "history of getting each other through funerals," Kevin and Sophie also have this comforting, ongoing game of imagining endings to Good Will Hunting. That was because their trip to see the 1997 Robin Williams and Matt Damon movie as teens had ended abruptly due to technical difficulties at their local dollar theater. (Perhaps not so coincidentally, this night viewers get to relive via flashback also happened to be the same Super Bowl Sunday that Jack died.)
The duo made a pact at the time to never watch the movie’s real ending, so they could imagine their own perfect conclusions for the rest of their lives. That changed, of course, when Kevin flew from L.A. to Pittsburgh to attend Claire’s funeral, and he and Sophie ended up watching the final scene together in his car.
Even from beyond the grave, Claire seemed to be the powerful "force of nature" that Kevin knew in childhood. The episode revealed that he’d, as a teen, asked her for Sophie’s grandmother’s emerald ring, but Claire reluctantly had to refuse his request. "I love you, kiddo, but I can’t give you that ring. Not yet," she told Kevin. "Your marriage is too new and you’re too young. You’ve gotta earn it, baby doll."
In the present day, Sophie shared with Kevin that she’d found her mom had held on to his teenage acting headshot (complete with their "never settle" mantra written on it in Sharpie). "She was always rooting for you," Sophie told him. "She was your biggest fan." While pouring out a Fresca and Prosecco (or "Fresecco") for Claire at her gravesite, Kevin expressed regret that he’d "messed things up" with Sophie — more than once — and wished he "had another crack" at earning that emerald ring. Alas, he lamented, "it’s too late."
Or was it? Throwing in yet another classic This Is Us red herring, back in L.A., Kevin encountered Madison, fresh off a breakup, at Kate’s apartment. For a moment Kevin even showed some growth and maturity, and for a brief second, it seemed like maybe, Madison would be the woman with whom Kevin ends up starting a family.
In subsequent scenes, however, Claire had a final trick up her sleeve, seemingly leading Sophie to find her grandma’s ring in her mom’s belongings. After doing a side-by-side comparison with the sparkler Grant had given her, Sophie likely had a change of heart. The evidence: She’s the woman whom fans had previously seen sleeping next to Kevin in his bed.
What happens between that moment and the few months that will follow until viewers catch up to the future timeline where Kevin’s an engaged dad-to-be at the Pearson family cabin remains to be seen. Either way, Kevin may have said it best when he remarked to Randall, "It’s been a hell of a week."
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