Marcus and his friends storm the Shabnam residence to take on Chester and his family. Meanwhile, Lin tries to escape with his daughter from the clutches of El Diablo, while Gao watches from the shadows.

Fair play to this show, after what felt like one of its more lacklustre episodes last week, it really delivers the goods this time around with a finale that fires on all cylinders for the entire hour.

Running alongside one another, Lin’s extended flight from Diablo and his goons with his daughter and Marcus et al’s storming of Chester’s base of operations ensure that there’s never a dull moment, keeping the episode bubbling along at maximum action pacing without risking it becoming too much by constantly switching between the two.

And during the madness of the siege, there’s some nice character stuff too – Lex becomes a much more sympathetic character than perhaps we are used to, Petra and Billy have a few touching moments of their own and Saya and Maria get to (sort of) work out the tensions that exist between them over Marcus. It’s no mean feat fitting this kind of stuff in between the horde of rednecks throwing themselves at our heroes in various violent ways, but it all strings together quite nicely.

It’s funny too, in a very dark way. The violence can’t help but be massively exaggerated and almost cartoonish at points as the show makes maximum use of its mature credentials, and there’s also the odd genuinely funny line from Chester and his crew as the kids go up against them. It all rides towards what looks like being an odd anti-climax before the show says ‘gotcha!’ and gives you the sort of conclusion you were probably expecting, but which is no less satisfying for that fact.

Meanwhile Lin’s desperate attempts to escape with his daughter are tense but always feel futile. A master of assassins he may be, but we know that Lin lacks the very qualities he insists upon in his students – he has emotional attachments, he doesn’t follow the rules he himself is there to enforce, and he’s outnumbered. There’s always a sense that between Diablo and Gao, if one doesn’t get him the other will. It all comes down to a question of which it will be and exactly how it will play out.

But just as both these threads seem to tied off and you’re maybe wondering exactly how the show will return for a second season to address some of its dangling threads (like ‘Where the hell is Willie?’) it serves up one final cliffhanger before the credits which is guaranteed to have fans sitting there open-mouthed with anticipation. I can think of perhaps one way it could play out favourably for our protagonists, but given how things get left that seems unlikely. Hopefully the writers get that second season order because I for one want to see what happens next.

Verdict: Explosive, action-packed and full of surprises (including just how many times I laughed). A fitting finale to what has overall been an excellent genre show. 9/10

Greg D. Smith