Does Queen Elizabeth die at the end of 'The Crown'? Series ending, explained
This contains spoilers for the final episode of “The Crown.”
It's the end of an era. A year after the death of the real Queen Elizabeth II, the Netflix show "The Crown" pays its farewell to the long-running monarch in the series finale — and brings back stars Claire Foy and Olivia Colman to do so.
The final episode of "The Crown," entitled "Sleep, Dearie, Sleep," is like a changing of the guards. As Queen Elizabeth II (here played by Imelda Staunton) and Prince Philip (Jonathan Pryce) reflect on their time, the younger generations — heir Prince Charles (Dominic West) and his two sons William and Harry (played by Ed McVey and Luther Ford) — look ahead.
Speaking to TODAY.com, McVey says he's pleased the show ended when it did, before their characters William and Harry went through more of their own headline-making events.
The real Prince Harry (who says he watches "The Crown") stepped back from his royal duties in 2020, two years after marrying the actor Meghan Markle. Today, the two brothers and their wives are thought to be estranged, which Harry touched on his tell-all memoir "Spare."
"I think it ends in the perfect place. I think if it went any further, it would go away from a historical drama and something more journalistic. It would become more like a soap opera. I think it was the right place to finish it," McVey says.
Here's how the show says goodbye to its fictional royals, and what happens in "Sleep, Dearie, Sleep."
Queen Elizabeth II faces a crossroads, and says hello to her past selves
Like all episodes of "The Crown," real events that played out in the public are used to explore Elizabeth's private life.
In the finale, the confluence of two things — Prince Charles' wedding and her own funeral planning — prompt Elizabeth to consider the idea of succession.
As she approaches 80, she wonders: Should she step down and cede the throne to her eldest son? Or should she stay on the throne and surpass Queen Victoria as the longest ruling monarch?
She contemplates stepping down in her speech to be delivered after Charles' impending wedding to the then Camilla Parker-Bowles. To make her decision, Staunton's Elizabeth is visited by her younger selves, played by Claire Foy and Olivia Colman in earlier seasons.
Colman's Elizabeth speaks to the part of the queen who is feeling, well, exhausted. During a conversation at Elizabeth's stables, Colman points out how "ready" Charles is to be king, and how "ready for a rest" she is. "Stepping down is the right thing to do as queen and as mother," Colman's Elizabeth says.
Foy, who was the queen at the start of her reign, urges the older Elizabeth to remember her oath. "If you step down, you will be symbolizing instability and impermanence," she says. "You'll also be indicating the luxury of choice which is the one thing we cannot have if the Crown is our birthright."
She reminds the queen that she is in her prime. "I don't see you as decrepit ... I see you as liberated. Confident. You say that Charles is in his prime. Well, I say you are in yours," she says. She reminds the queen that the pre-monarch Elizabeth — "Elizabeth Windsor" — is gone, and wouldn't return if she stepped down.
In this conversation, she sees there is a "difference" between Queen Elizabeth and the rest of her family. The role comes naturally to her, Foy's queen says, whereas the rest "seem to make such a mess of it."
The "mess" is exemplified later on in this episode via Prince Charles' wedding to Camilla, cast in the shadow of the late Princess Diana, as well as Prince Harry's costume party scandal (more on that later).
Ultimately, Elizabeth decides to spend the rest of her life on the throne. At Charles' wedding, she pointedly skips over the page that had the part about her ceding the throne.
Charles and Camilla get married
King Charles and Queen Camilla got married in 2005. "The Crown" shows the lead-up to the wedding, including Charles asking his mom for permission to marry again.
The queen speaks to priests from the Church of England and asks Prince William and Prince Harry for their takes. William agrees; Harry is less enthusiastic.
The brothers' reactions to their father's wedding points at a difference in approach, and a point of fracture between them. William, the heir to the throne, seems to value what's best for the crown over what's best for the individual, decisions his grandmother wrestled with throughout the series. Harry is thinking more about himself.
“I can’t believe you caved like that,” Harry says after their conversation with the queen, in which William OK’d the wedding.
“I didn’t cave. I’m just being a realist,” he says. Harry responds by calling him “a company man.”
Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip plan their funerals
Prince Philip and Queen Elizabeth approach the planning of their funerals with different attitudes. Philip is eager and has been planning his — and his Land Rover-turned-hearse — for years. Elizabeth is more reluctant.
The title of the episode gets its name from the name of the lament that a royal bagpiper proposes he play for Elizabeth's funeral. The queen, in the show, tears up while listening to the song. Indeed, "Sleep, Dearie, Sleep" was the lament played at the end of her 2022 funeral.
Prince Harry stirs up a costume party controversy
Prince Harry would go on to call this one of his "biggest mistakes" of his life.
In January 2005, he showed up to a party dressed up as soldier in the Nazi Afrika Korps. The party had the “cringy” theme of “natives and colonials,” the real Harry later wrote in his memoir “Spare.”
The fallout was swift, with photos from the party, and Harry's costume, making headlines for antisemitism and callousness. There were calls for Harry to be barred from joining the army (though he wasn't).
Harry apologized in 2005, writing, “I am very sorry if I caused any offense or embarrassment to anyone. It was a poor choice of costume and I apologize.”
He's reflected on the incident in more details since then. In “Spare,” Harry called the media swelling a “firestorm ... which I thought at times would engulf me. And I felt that I deserved to be engulfed.”
He continued, “There were moments over the course of the next several weeks and months when I thought I might die of shame.”
The last scene appears to symbolize Elizabeth's death
The show ends with Philip and Elizabeth standing in the church where they would one day be buried. This moment of intimacy is a return to the couple whose marriage has been the backbone of their lives — a return to, for all its detours and one-off episodes, the show’s main characters.
Elizabeth has just made her speech and decided to stay queen for, well, the rest of her life. Philip surprises Elizabeth by showing, yet again, how well he knows her: He knew she had been contemplating stepping down, and decided not to.
Philip takes a similar stance to the young queen, played by Claire Foy: Elizabeth should stay queen because no one else can handle the role.
"You will continue as queen for as long as you possibly can, for one reason: Because those that come after you are not remotely ready to take over," he says.
Still in ultimate wife guy mode, Philip says she was "born ready," and is "one of a kind."
He turns their impending deaths, which had been stressing Elizabeth out, into a good thing. When the monarch changes (and maybe falls), they won't be around.
"The Crown" has challenged the place of monarchy for six seasons and, for the most part, came down on the side of the queen, applauding her work in a strange role. But what is the crown without Elizabeth? It's a question the U.K. asked after her death in 2022, and one the show raises. Philip isn't hopeful.
"We're a dying breed, you and I. I'm sure everyone will carry on pretending all is well. But the party's over. The good news is, that while Rome burns and the temple falls, we will sleep, dearie, sleep," he says.
Elizabeth does not disagree. Instead, they end the show like they began it: Holding hands, then Philip leaving Elizabeth to do the work that only she can do.
The show's final moments appear to symbolize her death. Elizabeth hears a piper playing "Sleep, Dearie, Sleep" from above. She walks past the regalia of her coronation and a coffin, which has suddenly appeared. She salutes her youngest self, the final version to appear in the series. Foy and Colman later join and stand behind Staunton's Elizabeth, and she leans toward each, acknowledging their presence.
The camera pans out as she crosses a long white floor — alone. When she approaches the door, it opens by itself. She is swallowed into the light. The doors closes — and with that, so does "The Crown."
This article was originally published on TODAY.com
