Readers Guide for The Safari

Flashforward: Joshua is stunned to discovers his mother‘s body (and her distinctive locket) shortly after a very unpleasant fight that she had with his brother Sam.

The Trip Begins

In the present, Violett, the resort manager, goes over the Babel family’s requirements for the wedding, which are quite extensive.

The family arrives at the Leopard Sands, which they own. Odelia reflects on her troubled son, Sam, and watcher her much younger fiancé laughing with her daughter-in-law, Davina.

Bailey and her twin brother Sam, discuss his money problems (Odelia will pay him to work for the family business and that’s it) and his new mystery man and his money problems.

At the family’s vacation kick-off dinner, Odelia’s fiancé Asher is grilled by her children and admits that his mother was in prison for murder after a drunk driving accident.

We learn that Odelia plans to change her will after the trip (and her marriage) leaving much less money to the children, a lot to charity, and some to her husband.

Violett wants to talk to Odelia alone about the wedding. But actually, Violett asked Odelia for money. Odelia reflects that the person sending her threatening notes included a picture of three young girls. Only one person knows what the photo means: Gwen.

Odelia also mentioned that her late husband was allergic to pineapple juice, so that’s very interesting.

Safari time!

The group heads out on safari, where Bailey worries that a lone and grieving mother elephant could be killed by poachers.

The rehearsal dinner, held that night, is a traditional South African barbecue. Violett reminds Odelia that she knows something about the family that could ruin them, and Odelia agrees to pay. Odelia tells Gwen that if anything happens to her, she should check inside the locket.

Sam’s toast at the rehearsal dinner is a bit passive aggressive, suggesting that Sam favored his late father Odelia reminds Sam that his very religious father did not accept that he was gay. 

Joshua is convinced that his wife Davina is texting Asher. Sam and his mother seemed to make up which Joshua finds strange. After dinner, Joshua wants to discuss the sweat shop labor situation at the company with his mother. Odelia explains that revenues are down but Josh feels like they’re losing their morals and their mission.

Joshua discovers the body in real time

The next morning, Joshua comes to Asher’s room to say that his mom is dead. Asher joins him to walk to the fire pit, where Odelia was killed near the grave of her former husband. Gwen and Sam show up. Violett says the police are on their way, but it might take some time for them to get there. They all noticed that game ranger Marcus‘s rifle is on the ground next to Odelia.

Gwen says that she saw Sam coming out of Marcus‘s room and suggests he might’ve stolen the gun. Sam fires back that Gwen is being replaced by Asher and maybe she’s jealous. Someone points out that Bailey is missing. 

The police arrive and say they will be interviewing each family member individually, but want to talk to them all as a group first. 

Asher blurts out that the night before the murder, Odelia had fights with both Sam and Joshua.

Gwen thinks it’s her fault because… tarot. She asks about Odelia’s gold locket and also suggests that Bailey says she went to look for the elephant. (Again… tarot!) Everyone tells Gwen they can’t search for Bailey during …a big storm.

Joshua asked Davina if she was in their bed the whole night. Then Joshua suddenly remember that he has his mom’s locket in his pocket. He opens it and finds a mini USB. He seems to know what’s on it.

For some reason, Gwen unplugs her lamp and takes it out into the storm. Someone walks toward her and she says: “I know what you did.” The other person (a man) has a lamp too (what??) The guy hits Gwen with the lamp.

The group starts finger pointing

Sam and Joshua fight over which one of them might’ve killed Odelia and discuss that Gwen is now also missing. Someone references And Then There Were None (funny!)

Sam is determined to go out and find Bailey, but suddenly, she shows up with Markus, who says he came back at two in the morning and noticed his missing rifle. Markus was the one who found Bailey, and they say a harrowing scene as they saved the elephant from the poachers

As Joshua comforts Bailey and gets her to bed, she tells Joshua that she thinks Sam has a new boyfriend.

Joshua gets an email with Odelia’s will, plus a letter to Gwen, which is password-protected 

Bailey tells Sam that Marcus admitted he is their biological father. Sam is upset about this, and he and Bailey argue over whether the guy they thought was their father was terrible. Bailey realizes that she told Sam the code to Marcus’s safe

Marcus asks Violet if a) she killed Odelia and b) is in love with Joshua.  

What’s in Odelia’s Will?

Joshua gathers everyone to read the will: Asher gets nothing, but Gwen gets $50 million and the locket. The rest of the estate goes equally to the children, but in a trust and Joshua is Sam’s trustee. 

The police call to say that Gwen‘s phone is tracking to the Crocodile River, which sounds bad. Bailey freaks out and runs toward the river to save Gwen.

The police call again, saying there were no fingerprints on the rifle and that everyone should lock their doors. Joshua is worried about Bailey and Davina offers to go check on her.

So Joshua uses his opportunity to look at the flash drive. He learns that Odelia had two old friends: Gwen and Rachel. Rachel died in a boating accident, with the boat was driven by Gwen.

I get a hunch

There’s something else on the drive that’s “really bad.” We don’t know what, but I have my suspicions. Given that Odelia was being blackmailed and sent pictures of her, Gwen and Rachel, I think it’s likely that Odelia is responsible for the boat crash.

The flash drive contains screenshots of all the threatening notes that Odelia received. One of them includes a picture of Odelia, Gwen and Rachel. Odelia‘s face is circled with “your’e next.”

Me: hmmm interesting that Rachel has a six-year-old son named Oshri which would make him right about the age to be… Asher. And Oshri and Asher sound a little bit alike.

Joshua finally cracks the password to Gwen’s letter!

He finally gets into the letter, which says:

If you’re reading this, someone murdered me. And your’e next.

As I predicted, Odelia was driving the boat. Her late husband paid off Rachel’s nanny and for some reason, Gwen decided to take the fall. Odelia swears it was an accident. She wants Gwen to tell everyone the truth.

Joshua is figuring out what I’m figuring out what I’m thinking: Asher is mighty suspicious.

Joshua can’t sleep and takes a knife to Asher‘s room to confronts him about being Rachel’s son. But he sees his brother Sam is sleeping with Asher. Then someone hits him in the head.

When Joshua regains consciousness, Asher says that his mother Rachel was murdered by Odelia. He claims Odelia was jealous of Rachel. 

Asher describes his plan to infiltrate the company and fell in love with Sam. Then he realized how much Sam resented his mother for not giving him money.

Sam claims that Odelia poisoned their father with pineapple juice (!!)

Joshua doesn’t believe it at all. But he’s figured everything out: Sam got the gun from Markus’s room. He made sure he was with Bailey as an alibi while Asher murdered Odelia.

Asher realizes that Joshua knows everything, that he’s the one who has the locket and that he has to die.

As Joshua struggles to get himself untied, he tries to reason with Sam. Asher says he both loved and hated Odelia but that the sex was great (lolol) which upsets Sam.

Joshua can’t believe how messed up Sam is. But Asher says hold my beer…

Asher says he’ll pin everything on Gwen. He says he had to kill Gwen after she recognized a distinctive birthmark on his neck. He fed Gwen to the crocodiles and he’ll do the same to Joshua.

Sam starts freaking out, clearly upset at the dark turn this has taken. 

Joshua asks Sam if he’s going to let Asher kill him, but as this scene has clearly gone dark comedy, all Sam is worried about us why Asher slept with his mother one last time before killing her.

Asher a new story: Joshua came to the room and Asher killed him in self-defense.

Joshua starts screaming. Asher pulls out a knife. Sam tackles Asher, then grabs the knife that Joshua brought and stops Asher in the back.

The police show up and arrest Sam. They also tell Joshua that Odelia transferred a large amount of money to Violett shortly before she died.

AND Violette has kidnapped baby Ruby. What?

As, Marcus is driving all of them to look for Violett and Ruby, he asks Bailey about her malaria pills which make some people psychotic.

They get to Violett’s home and are told that she’s at the hospital with her sick grandmother.

We learn that Joshua is Violett’s son. Odelia and her husband bought the baby from Violet‘s parents. Then Violet killed her mother by pushing her off a cliff. Wow!

Violett is kidnapping Ruby because she wants her grandmother to see Ruby before she dies.

The Safari: Ending Explained

So let’s review, because that was a LOT:

• Marcus is actually the father of Sam and Bailey (with Odelia)
• Violett is Joshua’s mother
• Odelia’s husband is the biological father of none of them
• Asher is actually the son of Rachel, the woman killed in the boating accident
• Even though Gwen went to jail for that, Odelia was the one driving the boat
• Asher killed Odelia in revenge for her (allegedly) deliberate murder of his mother
• Violett kidnapped Ruby, but only because her grandmother was about to die and she wanted her to meet Ruby, Violett’s granddaughter

What happened after?

Bailey is spending time with her father, Markus. She wants to apply to vet school and train to be a guide in South Africa.

Sam has become religious (in jail I guess?)

Joshua was a bit mad at Violett for kidnapping his daughter and blackmailing Odelia (that was Violett,not Asher, as she needed the money for her grandmother’s treatment.) But Joshua says he wants to employ local artisans to make products for Circ and asks Violett to manage things. He also offers to let Violet visit them in Florida.

One final twist (?)

As Joshua, Davina, Bailey and Ruby get on the plane to go back home, Joshua confronts Bailey: their mother didn’t kill their father. It was Bailey. She confesses. Yes, she was upset about him sending Sam to conversion therapy and put pineapple juice in his coffee. She didn’t mean for him to die. Her mother knew and helped her get rid of the coffee cup.