S05E24 - Always

"Always" is the Season 5 finale and the series finale of We Can Fix Pawbert, the 104th episode. It picks up after "Golden Again" on the day of the double wedding at Zootopia World Celebration Gardens, where guests from every part of the pack's life gather for one ceremony and two marriages.

Synopsis

Guests gather at Zootopia World Celebration Gardens for the double wedding of Nick Wilde and Judy Hopps and of Luther Pawthorne and Pawbert Lynxley. They include Chief Bogo, ZSI Director Costa, the crews of Station 118 and Precinct 99, Reacher's team, Pawbert's Snarlbucks and ZRS coworkers, Finnick, attorney Nikki Bramble, therapists Fuzzby and Venn, Gary De'Snake, and both families. In the suites beforehand Pawbert tells Luther he wants to shed the Lynxley name, and the two work out that the replacement produces an unfortunate nickname; he also tells Bonnie Hopps about his mother and restages for Judy his clumsy gala introduction. Mayor Winddancer officiates. Nick vows to follow Judy into every crusade she invents, Judy vows to see past his mask, Luther vows to stay, and Pawbert vows to let himself be loved. At the reception Bogo gives a twelve-word toast, Lane and Stu Hopps speak, Jake Peralta discards his prepared remarks, Nick collects cub-hood stories about Luther from the Pawthorne household staff, and Finnick says his goodbye. The next morning Pawbert surprises Luther in his old Snarlbucks apron, and Nick walks in on them and adds it to The Chart. That afternoon the pack settles together and Pawbert answers Nick's question about what comes next: they live, they work, they come home, they are pack. The series closes on Lillian's green sweater watching over the sleeping pack, and a title card dedicating the story to all who call Zootopia home.

Plot

Guests fill Zootopia World Celebration Gardens for the double wedding. White chairs stand in rows across the lawn, an arch of purple irises and white roses waits at the front, and fairy lights hang unlit through the trees. Bogo comes through the entrance on his cane, still carrying the list in his stride that the precinct bombing left him, while Clawhauser cries beside him before anything has happened. Director Costa arrives with O'Brian and Bauer, the cougar rolling his shoulders like a mammal who expects tactical gear and cannot find it. Station 118 follows Athena Grant-Nash in, and she stops at the arch long enough for Bobby's absence to surface before she carries on. Chimney and Maddie arrive as captain and dispatcher; Hen straightens the tie of her wife Karen on the way to their seats. Precinct 99 comes in loudly around Holt, with Jake scouting the open bar, Rosa counting exits, and Charles weeping over the mammal he once handed a recipe. Reacher's team waits near the back looking like an extraction detail that took a wrong turn.

The rest of Pawbert's life arrives behind them. Lane sprints in sobbing with Brim on his shoulder, trailed by Mika, Renny, Selma and Tara; Sorrel and Wendell come up from ZRS, where Sorrel now admits Pawbert runs intake better than he does. The GYU study group clusters by the entrance, out of place among older guests, and the Meadowlands neighbors take the middle rows. Stu and Bonnie arrive still dwarfed by the city, Stu announcing his intention to refresh the shovel talk a third time. Fru Fru holds court with her polar bear bodyguards and little Judith. The Pawthornes come in without ceremony, Maris and Harlan trailed by wolf cousins and by two elderly members of the household, the groundskeeper Crispin and the housekeeper Scalesby, who both watched Luther grow up. Finnick turns up alone in his least-torn clothes and makes straight for the bar. Nikki takes a seat with a good view of the mammal she once defended. Fuzzby arrives with her husband and, unexpectedly, with Dr. Venn, who explains that Pawbert invited her personally, telling her he wanted her to see what he had done with the life she kept him alive for. Gary attends the first wedding of his life at full volume, and Nibbles arrives to document all of it. Winddancer, who is officiating, finds Bogo in the crowd, and the two trade old scars until the string quartet begins to tune.

In the groom's suite, Luther fights a tie that does not need fixing while Nick and Jake keep him company, Jake working through the catering tray and rehearsing the words "best mammal." Nick's answer to why he is not nervous is that fifteen years of running cons taught him how to walk into a crowd and perform. On the way out he stops to thank Luther for making Pawbert happy and for staying when staying was hard. Luther says Pawbert made it easy. Nick tells him that is not true, and that is precisely why it counts.

Luther then slips into the bride's suite and takes a pillow to the face from Judy for it. He and Pawbert get a few minutes alone, and Pawbert raises the question of surnames: he is more than happy to shed Lynxley. Luther says the replacement aloud, hears what it shortens to, and the two of them laugh until they cannot breathe. Elsewhere in the room Bonnie fusses over Judy's veil and Lane cries through his third tissue. Pawbert says his mother would have loved this, and Bonnie asks to hear about her; he repeats what Lillian used to tell him about someday finding a mammal who loves all of him, and admits he never believed her. He and Judy then restage their first meeting at the Zootennial gala, the spilled champagne and the botched introduction, and this time he offers his paw under the name he is about to take and she shakes it properly. Maris arrives to say it is time, cups his face in her paws, tells him Lillian would be proud, and sends him off to marry her son.

The processional carries both couples down the aisle, Nick and Luther first and then Judy and Pawbert arm in arm, and by the time the four reach the arch half the garden is crying. Winddancer marries them in a single ceremony on the grounds that their lives are not separable: what happens to one happens to all. Nick promises Judy that he will love her, annoy her in equal measure, and follow her into every idealistic crusade she dreams up. Judy promises to love the real Nick rather than the mask he wears for everyone else, and to let him steal her fries. Luther, who spent his life learning to be silent, says that for Pawbert he is learning to speak, and promises to stay, which is what the ring says and what he means. Pawbert makes the hardest vow of the four: to let himself be loved, to believe Luther when Luther says it, and to love loudly and determinedly, the way his mother always said he should. Winddancer pronounces all four of them married, and the garden comes apart.

The reception runs late under the fairy lights. Clawhauser catches the bouquet and has to sit down. Bogo's toast is over before the garden has settled and lands anyway. Lane weeps through a speech about the mammal who once burned the milk steamer every day for a week and now saves lives as a licensed social worker. Stu recounts Judy trying to arrest a carrot at the age of three, admits Nick has spent years proving his assumptions about foxes wrong, welcomes him to the family, and reminds him he still owns a shovel. Jake abandons the speech Amy helped him structure and speaks off the cuff instead, ending on a line that brings the Precinct 99 table up in unison. Nick corners Crispin and Scalesby for stories about Luther as a cub and comes away with midnight cookie raids and a stuffed rabbit, intelligence he promises never to forget. Athena and Reacher recognize the same watchfulness in each other and the same loss. Holt tells Luther that he provided the conditions in which love could grow and to guard it well. Finnick finds Nick at the edge of the dance floor, asks whether he is happy, floats one more job for old times' sake, and accepts the answer they both already know. Gary wraps Pawbert in coils at the dessert table, tells him Agnes would be proud, and gives him their old phrase; Pawbert answers that they already have.

The pack goes home to Pawthorne Mansion. Nick and Judy spend their wedding night arguing cheerfully about surnames. Luther and Pawbert make it as far as the bed and no further, too tired to do anything but promise each other the morning. The next day, with Nick and Judy off celebrating with the 99, Pawbert is waiting in the living room in the Snarlbucks apron and nothing else, and the years-old apron incident is finally closed over the back of the couch. Nick comes back for a forgotten phone at the worst possible moment, sees them still knotted together, and dissolves into rapture about The Chart's prophetic powers while typing a new starred, circled and underlined entry. Judy hauls him out by the arm.

That afternoon the pack reassembles on a couch that Nick and Judy now refuse to look at directly. The Chart 2.0 leans against the wall with its newest line. Luther says he hates it; Judy calls it a monument to love, aggressive and documented. Nick asks what comes next now that they have won and survived and married, and Pawbert answers that they live, they work, they come home, they be pack. Nick tells him his mother would be proud, and Pawbert repeats Lillian's words about loving loud and determined. The closing montage travels the city: the mansion grounds, the boarded ruins of Lynxley Manor with its overgrown hedge maze, Gary's family coiled together in rebuilt Reptile Ravine, the GYU campus at dusk, the Snarlbucks friends painting in Mika's repaired studio, Costa and his team climbing the steps of a ZSI Headquarters under reconstruction, Bogo at his office window with Clawhauser talking behind him, and Fru Fru holding Judith beneath her father's portrait. Night falls. The camera drifts back through the mansion, past Nick and Judy asleep, past the corkboard in Luther and Pawbert's bedroom, to the two of them in bed with their rings catching the light. Pawbert thanks Luther for all of it and says that being here no longer feels like something he stole. He asks one last question, and Luther answers it. Lillian's voice reaches him as he falls asleep, and the green sweater on the chair keeps watch over the room before the lights go down and a final title card dedicates the story to all who call Zootopia home.

Key Moments

• Guests from every crossover team and friend group across the series arrive at World Celebration Gardens
• Athena pauses at the arch in private grief for Bobby before pressing forward
• Luther and Pawbert share a private moment in the bride's suite where Pawbert chooses to take the Pawthorne name, and the two of them work out what it shortens to
• Pawbert tells Bonnie about Lillian, then restages his awkward gala introduction for Judy under the name he is about to take
• Maris cups Pawbert's face and tells him Lillian would be so proud
• The processional plays "Come What May" as both couples walk the aisle
• Winddancer officiates, declaring their lives inseparable
• Nick vows to follow Judy into every crusade; Judy promises to see the real Nick beneath the mask
• Luther vows to stay and to love Pawbert unconditionally; Pawbert vows to let himself be loved
• Bogo delivers a brief toast to the couples; Lane weeps through his tribute to Pawbert's transformation
• Jake abandons his prepared speech for something from the heart
• Nick learns baby Luther stories from the household staff, including a stuffed rabbit
• Holt tells Luther to guard what he has built
• Gary and Pawbert complete their shared phrase at the dessert table
• Pawbert fulfills the apron promise the morning after; Nick walks in and updates The Chart
• Pawbert answers what comes next: they live, they work, they come home, they be pack
• Nick tells Pawbert his mom would be proud; Pawbert repeats his mother's words about loving loud and determined
• The final exchange between Luther and Pawbert closes the series
• The green sweater watches over the sleeping pack as the camera pulls back through the city

Key Lines

Characters Introduced

Locations

• Zootopia World Celebration Gardens — Wedding and reception venue
• Pawthorne Mansion — Pack home; morning-after scenes and final sequence
• Meadowlands — The enclave around the mansion, seen from above in the closing montage
• Reptile Ravine — Gary's family home in the city flyover
• GYU campus — Shown in the city flyover
• Mika's Studio — Snarlbucks friends painting in the city flyover
• ZSI Headquarters — Under reconstruction in the city flyover
• ZPD Precinct 1 — Bogo at his window in the city flyover
• Mr. Big's Mansion — Fru Fru and Judith beneath Mr. Big's portrait
• Lynxley Manor — Abandoned, boarded up, buried in snow

Items

• Wedding rings — Matched sets for all four pack members; Luther and Pawbert's engraved "STAY"
• Green sweater — Lillian's sweater; final shot of the series watching over the sleeping pack
• The Chart 2.0 — Updated with "APRON INCIDENT CONSUMMATION: 1 glorious instance ★★★"
• Snarlbucks apron — The long-running promise finally fulfilled
• Framed napkin — Charles's pancake recipe and "NINE-NINE!" scrawl; still on kitchen wall
• Heist trophy — Still on mantel
• Corkboard — Still in Luther and Pawbert's bedroom with Maddie's card and the squad Pawlaroid
• Fairy lights — Saved from the wedding by Maris; in a vase on the table

Featured Song

"Come What May" (From 'Moulin Rouge! The Musical'), Aaron Tveit & Karen Olivo

In Moulin Rouge! The Musical, Christian and Satine make their promise in a song they have to keep hidden, because the world around them will not permit the love it describes. The processional inverts that. The quartet stops, a guitar starts, and the same vow is sung in the open as Nick and Luther come down the aisle and Judy and Pawbert follow. The choice is keyed to cost rather than to romance: Luther almost died a few months earlier, and Pawbert watched it happen. Sung to a garden of guests who lived through the same crisis, a promise to love through anything is less a hope than an account of what these two have already done.

End Credit Songs

"No One Is Alone" (From 'Into the Woods'), Original Broadway Cast

"Finale" (From 'Dear Evan Hansen'), Original Broadway Cast

"No One Is Alone" is sung in Into the Woods to two children who have just lost their parents, and its argument is that nobody is only what they did and nobody faces the consequences by themselves. The epilogue montage is cut straight to the song, a fragment of it landing ahead of each scene — and the line about witches being right arrives over Fru Fru beneath the portrait of her father, a crime boss who died defending ZSI command. "Finale" then carries the dedication, and it answers "The Weakest Lynx" five seasons on. "Words Fail" was Pawbert's confession from the bottom; "Finale" is the letter that tells him being himself is enough, and it still addresses him by the surname he gave up to marry Luther.

Notes

• The Zootopia World Celebration Gardens is named after the Disney Fairytale Weddings venue at EPCOT's World Celebration area.
• The green sweater's final appearance watching over the pack echoes Lillian's presence throughout the series, affirming that the fear of loss does not disappear: you simply choose to love anyway.
• The final title card mirrors the failsafe code FOR_ALL and Agnes's founding vision.
• Pawbert's recreation of his Z2 gala introduction ("Paw! Pawbert. I am Pawbert. Hi.") completes his character arc: the same awkward mammal, but now confident in who he has become.
• Russell Jackhorn, Winddancer's pronghorn chief of staff (first appearing in "The Wall"), is named after Russell Jackson from Madam Secretary.
• The Dunphys attending the wedding are named after Modern Family characters. All of the pack's Meadowlands neighbors — including Cameron and Mitchell and the Delgados — are named after Modern Family families.
• Luther's vow — "Just because you're you. That's enough. It's always been enough." — is a callback to the end credit song "Finale" from Dear Evan Hansen, which closes the episode with the adapted lyrics: "Today at least you're you and that's enough." The show bookends the series with Dear Evan Hansen songs, beginning with "Words Fail" in "The Weakest Lynx".
• Finnick's line "She hustled you, Wilde. She hustled you GOOD." is a direct callback to his exact line from Zootopia (2016), where he says the same thing after Judy cons Nick into helping her.