WARNING: SPOILERS ahead for the Disclaimer ending.
The end of Apple Disclaimer shows Stephen taking one of Jonathan’s photos from the fire as he burns them after discovering the disturbing truth about his son. Cate Blanchett leads a talented cast of Disclaimer as Catherine Ravenscroft, an acclaimed and hard-working television documentary journalist from London, England. Catherine’s world unravels when a mysterious novel titled The perfect stranger arrives at your doorbringing back memories of one of his deepest, darkest secrets. Disclaimer is based on the 2015 book of the same name written by Renée Knight.
The majority Disclaimer episodes cast Catherine as a villain responsible for the death of a twenty-something vacationing American named Jonathan. Disclaimer is told primarily through the fictional lens of Catherine and Jonathan’s experience in Italy, through the imagination of Jonathan’s grieving mother, Nancy. The perfect stranger The novel is the culmination of Nancy’s grief and denial of a painful truth she learned about Jonathan from her girlfriend Sasha’s mother. Stephen finds out The perfect stranger and interprets this as true, which triggers his journey of revenge against Catherine. In the end, however, Stephen Couldn’t Be More Wrong About His Son.
Nicholas saw what happened between Jonathan and Catherine
It is revealed in a photograph that Stephen burned in the fire
The final revelation in DisclaimerJonathan’s ending answers the question of whether Nicholas was affected by Jonathan’s horrific abuse of Catherine. As Stephen burns all of Jonathan’s photos in a bonfire in his backyard, he quickly takes one down after spotting something he apparently hadn’t noticed before. In the reflection of a large mirror in the corner of the room, a young Nicholas stares at the frightening scene between Jonathan and Catherine. Catherine never mentioned that she had seen Nicholas looking at her, meaning she either didn’t realize it or couldn’t remember.
The photo also reveals that Nicholas probably blocked everything from his memory, as he couldn’t even remember the trip to Italy at any point in the series. The fire represents Stephen abandoning the enormous lie he has lived by since Nancy’s death and doing what little he can to make things right with himself after nearly killing Nicholas and destroying Catherine’s life. There is certainly some contempt for Nancy for writing The perfect stranger firstly, what he believed to be fact. In her defense, she hid it in a locked table and didn’t ask Stephen to publish it and go on a revenge trip.
Photo explains Nicholas’s story in disclaimer
Nicholas was deeply affected for most of his life
As for Nicholas, the fact that he witnessed his mother’s abuse shows how he has harbored deeply internalized trauma for most of his life. Throughout the beginning of Disclaimer, Nicholas is strongly adverse to his mother, despite his constant efforts to connect with his son. For some mysterious reason, Nicholas doesn’t want to pay attention to his mother. This behavior may be typical of a school-age teenager, but Nicholas is 25 and has struggled to find motivation and hold down a job. The internalized trauma that Nicholas carried explains his despondent behavior throughout the series.
When Nicholas was a child in the series’ flashback sequences, he was full of life and joy. Although these memories proved to be false representations of reality created by Jonathan’s mother, Nancy, in The perfect stranger book, it is still plausible to believe that Nicholas was a happy child. After seeing the horrific sight of Jonathan abusing his mother, Nicholas was likely never the same. His response to witnessing the abuse was not to believe it, which extended to the point where he did not fully remember the vacation. One of the potential symptoms of PTSD is completely forgetting that the event ever happened..
The disclaimer’s ending is hopeful for Catherine and Nicholas
They finally manage to reconnect after years of unresolved tension
It is evident that Nicholas’s Unprocessed Childhood Trauma Affected His Ability to Be a Functioning Adult. What is remarkable about Catherine is that despite being the victim of such a horrendous crime, she never spoke about it and became an accomplished documentary filmmaker. In addition to highlighting the various forms of violence inflicted on women by men, the series also portrays the different ways in which individuals can respond to trauma throughout their lives. In the end, the trauma shared by Catherine and Nicholas over Jonathan’s experience builds a bridge between mother and son, leaving her Disclaimer with a note of hope for the future of their healed relationship.