Exclusive | You showrunners reveal shocking alternate ending for the Penn Badgley thriller

Joe Goldberg’s reign of terror is over. Spoilers ahead for the fifth and final season of “You.” In “You” Season 5, now streaming on Netflix, Joe Goldberg (Penn Badgley) finally meets his fate. For five seasons, Joe – who thinks of himself as a sensitive romantic – has gone around killing his girlfriends and anyone else standing in his way. At the end of Season 5 – which sees Joe returning to his roots in New York City – he’s finally exposed to the world, caught for his crimes, and put in prison. While he’s married to Kate (Charlotte Ritchie), he has an affair with Bronte (Madeline Brewer), who turns out to be catfishing him in order to take him down. But that wasn’t always the plan.“You” showrunner and exec producer Michael Foley exclusively told The Post, “We hadn’t landed on [his ending] until very late in the season.

Throughout the series, there was a shared belief among the writers and the creators that Joe wouldn’t get away with his crimes.”He added, “We came into the season knowing that we didn’t want to redeem him, that he would get his comeuppance, that he was going to face some of those whose lives he ruined.And most importantly, we knew he was going to be made to face himself.” Foley explained that, while the writers knew they didn’t want to redeem Joe in terms of whether he would die, be captured, or go on trial, “it was late in the season that we finally locked that down.” He explained that they thought death would be “too easy” of an ending for Joe. “We liked putting him in a veritable cage [in prison].

We liked him not knowing the touch of a lover.”In the final moments of the series, the former “Gossip Girl” star’s signature voiceover still doesn’t take responsibility for his crimes. Foley said that was also a key part of the ending, “having the chance to have his pithy coda, and of course put [the blame] on everybody else, rather than himself.”Co-showrunner and exec produc...