“Locke & Key” Season 3 is the finale season in the franchise, and thus, to give appropriate closure to the characters and the storyline, the creators have portrayed Captain Frederick Gideon, the root of all evils, as the main antagonist of Season 3. In Season 2, it was depicted that the portal to the other realm from where the magical keys came from, was opened for the first time in 1775, and it was Frederick Gideon who had found it, and thus he could be held responsible for bringing the demons of the other dimension to the human world. At the end of “Locke & Key” Season 2, a demon who had possessed a teenager named Eden Hawkins summoned Gideon’s Echo with the help of the Echo Key. Eden tried to command Gideon to open the portal for her, which had earlier been destroyed by the Locke family and their friends. But Gideon was not the kind of person whom one could tame, and so he threw Eden into the deep well after snatching away the two magical keys from her. With the help of the Anywhere Key, Gideon’s Echo was free to travel to anywhere in the world and thus could leave its prison, i.e., the wellhouse. Eden’s greed had unleashed a dangerous demon onto the world, the wrath of which we will see in “Locke & Key” Season 3.
If we consider that the Demonic Portal and the demons that came to the human world were the centers of all conflicts in the lives of the Lockes and their friends, then to put an end to these magical problems for once and for all, they have to get rid of the magic overall, and that includes the magical keys as well, that have been with the Locke family for generations. But are they going to make that sacrifice for a peaceful and normal life? Let’s find out.
Spoilers Ahead
Who was Captain Frederick Gideon? What Did His Echo Want?
As a part of the King’s Army, Captain Frederick Gideon arrived in Matheson, Massachusetts, with his regiment in order to stop the local rebellion. He heard some rumors that a Black Smith named Peter Locke was manufacturing colonial weapons for the American Revolutionaries and thus decided to inspect his house. He knocked on Peter’s door at night when Peter asked him politely to leave the premises, but Gideon and his men attacked Peter and captured his family. Peter’s younger son, Benjamin, sought help from local rebel leader, Captain Richard Crais, who arrived at Locke’s house with his battalion, and Gideon and his men had to run away. He escaped to a nearby sea cave with his two most loyal soldiers, Samuel Coffey and James Bolton, where Gideon found the demonic portal that opened into another realm. However, before they could understand the magical world that had opened for them, Crais and his men, along with Benjamin Locke, attacked them. The revolutionaries killed Gideon’s men, which was when Gideon embraced the demon coming out of the other realm. The demonic spirit possessed Gideon’s body and gave him superhuman abilities, yet he was captured by the revolutionaries who hanged him till death.
Before getting the death sentence, Gideon was imprisoned in Locke’s wellhouse. During his imprisonment, he wrote a diary in which he mentioned the gateway between two worlds and its staggering power. This diary was found by Gideon’s descendant, Josh Bennett, the history teacher who arrived in Matheson with his daughter, Jamie. Through Bennett’s research work and Gideon’s diary, a demon who had possessed a student named Eden Hawkins found out about Gideon’s first encounter with the portal, and thus she summoned him with the help of the Echo Key. However, as soon as Gideon’s Echo came to life, he killed Eden Hawkins, whose dead body was later found by Kinsey Locke at the bottom of the well inside the wellhouse. Eden might not be Kinsey’s most dear friend or a humble classmate, yet she and her other friends paid their last tributes to Eden and threw her body into the water so that her soul might rest in peace.
As per the limitations of the Echo Key’s power, an echo couldn’t leave the boundaries of the wellhouse, but Eden had also given the Anywhere key to Gideon, which helped him to escape his prison. He later summoned his two most loyal minutemen, Samuel Coffey and James Bolton, and together they decided to steal all the keys from Locke’s family. The demon inside Gideon’s body believed that these magical keys were a part of his/her realm and, hence, the humans didn’t deserve them. However, his main motive for possessing all the keys was something else. With each key that Gideon possessed, he was able to make a larger portal or gateway between the two worlds, and he believed that once he had all the keys in his possession, he would be able to crush down barriers between the two realms. Once he had fully drawn the demonic world to the human world, he would command his demon army to capture the human world and recreate the world in his own image.
What Was The Significance Of The Timeshift Key? What Happened To Dodge?
The Time Shift Key and the Creation Key were the two most important keys introduced in “Locke & Key” Season 3. Bode, who found the Time Shift Key inside the grandfather’s clock in the hall room, learned that the magical key allows a person to travel back in time. While Nina, Tyler, and Kinsey had accepted Rendell Locke’s death and moved on, Bode still missed his father and wanted to meet him again somehow. As soon as he found the Time Shift Key, he went back in time to meet his father, but while doing so, he ended up in a timeline when Dodge attacked their house with his demons in Season 2, Episode 7. In his childishness, the Bode from the future mocked Dodge, who quickly shape shifted to the character of “Echo” using the identity key and went after the future Bode to take the Time Shift Key from him. Future Bode tried to escape, and suddenly his time in the past finally got over, but before he could jump to his original timeline, Dodge held him and Bode brought Dodge to the current timeline.
Bode tried to trick Dodge with the help of Ghost Key, but Dodge understood his plan and turned Bode into a ghost and possessed his body so that he could steal the keys from the Locke family without any suspicion. Later, Dodge, in Bode’s body, met Captain Frederick Gideon, who offered him an important position in his new world in exchange for getting the keys for him, but the demon inside Bode’s body didn’t want to destroy the human world, which is why it helped Nina, Tyler, and Kinsey to defeat Gideon. However, during the fight, Kinsey found out from Duncan Locke that the hourglass in the grandfather’s clock is a fail-safe mechanism for the Time Shift Key, which sends back all the things back to their original timeline as soon as the sands run out in order to prevent a paradox. Hence, as soon as the sand ran out, Dodge, inside Bode’s body along with his own body hidden under Bode’s bed, went back to its original timeline while Bode was still trapped as a ghost. In the future timeline, Bode’s body had no vessel or body, but Bode found a way to get back to his body.
Bode’s ghost hinted to Kinsey to steal the Animal Key from Gideon as he had a plan in mind. Bode’s ghost instructed a sparrow to travel through the ghost door, and as soon as its spirit left the sparrow’s body, Bode’s ghost possessed the vessel, and later Kinsey used the Animal Key to transform a sparrow into Bode’s actual form. Hence, with a bit of magic, Bode was back to normal, and Dodge was sent away. Now they only had one crisis to deal with, and that was Gideon.
What Happened To Sam Lesser And Gordie Shaw?
Captain Frederick Gideon believed that he had taken all the keys from the Locke family, but when he tried to expand the portal, he found out that there was one key that was missing. He brought the entire family back to the Key House, but none of them had any idea about the last missing key, which was when Ellie Whedon, Rendell’s college friend, told Gideon that there was one Creation Key that they hid inside the mind of a college friend named Gordie Shaw in 1995. During their time in college, Rendell was extremely careless with the magical keys. He had recently discovered the Creation Key and, with the help of the key, brought Caliban from The Tempest to life. The monster was witnessed by a nerdy theatre geek, Gordie Shaw, which was when the “Keepers of the Keys” decided to use the Head Key to remove his memory. During their visit to Gordie’s head, Ellie left the Creation Key there so that Rendell wouldn’t toy with it anymore.
In the present time, Gideon arrived at Gordie’s house with Ellie to recover the Creation Key from Gordie’s head. When Gordie tried to fight back, Gideon stabbed him and asked Ellie to use the Head Key. While Gideon and Ellie were searching for the Creation Key inside Gordie’s head, Tyler, Kinsey, and Sam Lesser arrived at Gordie’s house and decided to walk into Gordie’s head to get to the Creation Key before Gideon could find it. They were successful in their mission and even tried to trap Gideon inside Gordie’s head, but failed. In the process, Sam Lesser, who had possessed James Bolton, got stuck inside Gordie’s head. And as Gordie took his last breath, Sam Lesser died along with him.
‘Locke & Key’ Season 3: Ending Explained: How Did They Destroy Gideon? Are All The Keys Lost Forever?
The Locke family tried many different tactics to defeat Gideon, but when all of them failed, they finally arrived at the decision that to stop Gideon, they needed the Alpha Key. Tyler forged the Alpha Key in Season 2 of “Locke & Key” to stop Dodge. The key had the power to destroy the demon’s soul inside a person’s body, and thus it was their most lethal weapon against Gideon, who was an echo possessed by one of the most powerful demons. During the climax, Kinsey used the creation to make a small pocket on the Harlequin chest, inside which Gideon had kept all the magical keys along with the Alpha Key. She later stabbed Gideon with the Alpha Key, and Tyler and Nina pushed Gideon back to his realm. However, at this moment, Gideon had two keys on him, because of which the portal shrank a little, and Tyler surmised that the only way to close the portal forever was to sacrifice all the magical keys. It was a hard decision to make, but they finally agreed to do so as it was these magical keys that caused all the problems in their lives and also took away their father’s life.
Before sacrificing the keys, Bode wanted to use the Timeshift Key one last time to meet his father in the past, and the entire family traveled back in time to meet Rendell Locke. It was a happy reunion for the family that gave them enough strength to face the perils of the future and remembers their father as one of the good memories of their life. As soon as they returned to their original timeline, Nina used the Memory Key on Bode and Kinsey so that they would remember the existence of magical keys even after they had turned 18. According to the series, people would forget the use of magic or any memory created by it, and thus, to remember the keys and their magical effects, Duncan had created the Memory Key. The same key has already been used on Nina and Tyler, so they, too, would remember the magical keys forever in their lives. Finally, at the end of “Locke & Key” Season 3, the Locke family threw away all the magical keys into the portal, and the portal was closed. They all decided to move on with their lives and went back to their normal lives. However, in the absence of the Memory Key, the friends of the Locke Family, except for Ellie, would soon forget about the existence of magical keys, and may it be for the better.
What Will Happen To The Locke Family And Their Friends?
In “Locke & Key” Season 3, Duncan Locke married the love of his life, Brain, and moved away from the Keyhouse. He already despised the magical keys, as because of them, he had seen too many deaths in his life, including his brother, Rendell’s murder. Duncan was more than happy to find out that the era of magical keys had finally come to an end, and the next generations of the Locke family would not have to witness such misfortunes caused by them. On the other hand, Tyler was still struggling with the death of his girlfriend, Jackie Veda, who was possessed by a demon in Season 2 and thus had to be killed. It was because of these keys that Jackie had to lose her life, and somewhere, Tyler blamed himself for her death. He had decided to leave Matheson to overcome the grief and move on with his life. In Montana, he met a girl named Carly and was slowly falling in love with her. After the keys were dealt with, Tyler decided to go on a trip with Carly to embrace their future together.
Nina also got a new lover in the history teacher, Josh Bennett. Initially, Bode was struggling to accept Josh into his mother’s life, but at the end of “Locke & Key” Season 3, he finally made peace with his father’s death and decided to welcome Josh into the family. Nina and Josh may also get married. We never know. Ellie Whedon, too, decided to stay back in Matheson with her son, Rufus. She even rejoined as the sports coach at Matheson Academy while the school administration paid their last respect to Gordie Shaw by naming the theatre hall in his name. And last but not least, Kinsey finally made her slasher film, which also premiered in the local theatre. Her lover, Scot Cavendish, attended the premiere as well, and the love between them blossomed further. Scot will probably become a successful filmmaker one day, and maybe Kinsey will be the actress in his films; however neither Scot nor any of Kinsey’s friends would remember the magic of the keys. Before closing the doors to the key house manor for one last time, the creators teased the whispering of the keys. Though, for the current Locke family, it is probably the end. Maybe we can get a spin-off series from the creators set in the same universe. As of now, it’s a happy ending for all.
See More: ‘Locke & Key’ Season 2: Ending Explained – What Is Going To Happen In Season 3?
