This post contains mentions of sexual assault, violence, and murder.
Spoilers ahead for A Good Girl’s Guide To Murder season 1 and the book.
Summary
Netflix’sA Good Girl’s Guide To Murderseason 1 is full of twists and turns no one saw coming. Based on the book of the same name by Holly Jackson,A Good Girl’s Guide To Murderhas one shocking revelation after the other, like any good mystery. Pippa Fitz-Amobi is determined to solve Andie Bell’s murder, but she cannot do it without making several scandalous discoveries. Just when it might seem like the narrative has finally revealed everything, there is always one more twist that stimulates the show.
Some of the plot twists are not that surprising, but others are jaw-dropping, includingA Good Girl’s Guide To Murderseason 1’s ending. Even smaller twists have impacted the narrative.The soundtrack forA Good Girl’s Guide To Murderset the tone for the show, which included a lot of foreshadowing and played with audiences' expectations.
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15Andie Bell Stayed At The Ivy House Hotel
Pippa Discovers Andie Bell’s Handwriting In The Guest Book & Matches One Of Andie’s Selfies To The Hotel Room
One of the least shocking revelations inA Good Girl’s Guide To Murderseason 1 that still shakes up the narrative is Andie Bell’s history at the Ivy House Hotel. Pippa and Ravi discover Andie’s handwriting in the hotel’s guestbook, which is not surprising on its own. However, Pippa realizing that Andie took a suggestive photo of herself in the hotel room’s bathroom certainly raises the stakes, especially sincethe same photo was in Max Hastings' room. While far bigger twists throughout the season make this one seem insignificant, this revelation still provides a shock factor.
14Nose Stealer Is Daniel Da Silva, Nat’s Brother
Nat Da Silva Was One Of Andie Bell’s Best Friends
Nose Stealer’s identity is a mystery untilA Good Girl’s Guide To Murderseason 1, episode 3 when Pippa discovers he is a police officer. However, the real twist occurs in season 1, episode 4, where Nose Stealer is Nat Da Silva’s older brother, Daniel. Nat and Andie were best friends, and Dan was deeply connected to the Bell family. It wassurprising to learn that a guy who seemed like just a weird stranger ended up being important to the narrative—but otherwise, the show has many more shocking twists that make this one seem insignificant.
13Someone Else Is In The Woods At Cara’s Birthday Party
Pippa, Cara, & Lauren Are Spooked
Pippa and her friends have a camping sleepover in the woods for Cara’s birthday. Pippa, Cara, and Lauren are spooked during a bathroom break when they see someone with a flashlight in the distance.The moment even gets a little scary when Pippa charges forward to confront the stranger, and she almost gets lost before Cara finds her. Similarly to Andie Bell’s Ivy House Hotel connection, this revelation is not shocking other than providing a brief jump scare. However, when the girls return to the tent, just before they sleep, Pippa discovers a printed note that says, “Stop digging Pippa.”
Furthermore, the musical score in the background amplifies the scene, illustrating the real danger Pippa might be in if she continues her investigation.
That means whoever was in the woods with the flashlight was not just a lost hiker like Pippa initially believed—this person snuck in and left a note in Pippa’s sleeping bag before successfully escaping. Pippa receiving her first threatening note in the middle of the night when she and her friends are isolated in the forestputs the scene on edge and raises the shock factor. Furthermore, the musical score in the background amplifies the scene, illustrating the real danger Pippa might be in if she continues her investigation.
12Barney The Dog Is Killed
Someone Kills Pippa’s Dog
InA Good Girl’s Guide To Murderseason 1, episode 5, Pippa receives an anonymous text threatening to drop Andie Bell’s case if she “ever wants to see him again.” This moment is shocking, given that for the first time,whoever is threatening Pippa is not afraid to go to extreme lengths to get her to stop her investigation—they would even kidnap her brother. However, Pippa finds her brother, making her think that the anonymous texter was bluffing until the real twist occurs:Pippa’s dog Barneydisappears, and Pippa realizes whoever sent the text was talking about her dog.
In the bookA Good Girl’s Guide To Murder, Barney is a golden retriever.
This scene is even more astounding when Pippa heartbreakingly finds Barney lying on the side of the road, deceased, as a victim of a hit-and-run. The storyline going from zero to 100 so fast is part of what makes the twist shocking, but the camera lingering onthe black ribbonsjust before Pippa finds Barney eerily foreshadows the devastating event to come.It also suggests that Pippa’s investigation is far from over, given the critical role the ribbons played in the third episode.
11A Secret Older Guy Exists
Andie Bell Was Seeing An Older Guy While Seeing Sal
When Pippa talks to Nat Da Silva inA Good Girl’s Guide To Murderseason 1, episode 2,Nat accidentally slips that Andie was sleeping with a new partner, even though Andie and Sal had not slept together yet. This slip-up leads Pippa and Ravi to pretend to be Nat while texting Emma, which is where the real shocking twist occurs. Not only is Andie cheating on Sal, but she is also seeing someone her friends refer to as Secret Older Guy.
This moment was surprising because the narrative had already suggested that Andie and Sal cared about each other despite the potential arguing toward the end. Pippa now has her first real suspect as to who might have killed Andie and framed Sal, which amps up the shock significantly. However, the show still had more jaw-dropping plot twists, given that having a real suspect does not automatically clear Sal’s name.
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10Daniel Da Silva Helped Cover Up Max & Naomi’s Hit & Run
Max Hastings Was Blackmailing Dan
Pippa figured out that Daniel DeSilva helped cover up the hit-and-run that Max and Naomi were part of — the same incident that someone had used to blackmail Sal’s friends. Given Dan’s suspicious nature, it is not entirely shocking that Dan would cover up a crime. However, the shocking twist is not Dan’s involvement — it is that Max was blackmailing Dan, not the other way around. Even more shocking was Dan admitting he had an affair with Andie when she was 15. These new tidbits of informationchanged the direction of Pippa’s investigation entirely.
9Two Different People Were Threatening Pippa
Pippa Received Notes From Different People
InA Good Girl’s Guide To Murderseason 1, episode 6, Pippa compares all the threatening notes she received. They were spaced out during season 1, but when Pippa puts them together, a blatantly shocking twist occurs—two people had been threatening Pippa. It was one of those moments that displayed the truth, but no one thought of it until Pippa placed the notes side by side. This revelation also meant that someone else had been responsible for killing Barney and Andie Bell. The narrative planted the clues, butit only ignited a twist when Pippa put them together.
8Andie Bell & Sal Singh Were Going To Run Away Together
Andie & Sal Were Genuinely In Love
While Andie Bell’s friends and family paintedSal and Andie’s relationshipas a sweet high school romance, the truth is much more serious. Although Pippa and her town will never find out,A Good Girl’s Guide To Murderseason 1, episode 6, reveals through a flashback thatAndie and Sal were deeply in love and planning to run away together.Sal was only upset with Andie because she felt like she had to sell drugs to earn the money they needed to escape, but he still loved her.
The show’s plot twist suggested that there may have been more to Andie and Sal’s relationship in the book than anyone knew.
This scene was especially shocking for book fanssinceA Good Girl’s Guide To Murderbookportrayed Andie and Sal’s relationship as superficial and meaningless. Andie was only passing the time with Sal, and Sal just thought Andie was attractive. The show’s plot twist suggested that there may have been more to Andie and Sal’s relationship in the book than anyone knew.
7Andie Bell Sold Drugs At Calamity Parties
Andie Needed The Money To Run Away
InA Good Girl’s Guide To Murderseason 1, episode 2, Max Hastings revealed that Andie Bell sold drugs at calamity parties, a far cry from the girl the public believed she was. The fact that Andie sold drugs at events like calamity parties proves she has a darker side. It alsosuggests that Pippa will go down a dark rabbit hole to discover the truthabout the deaths of Andie Bell and Sal Singh. This truth is even more surprising when Pippa meets Howie in the third episode, the man who provided Andie with the drugs to sell.
Although the show did end up justifying Andie’s actions because she was desperate to get away from her abusive father,the idea that she would resort to selling drugs at parties where girls were often sexually assaulted is shocking in itself. This twist is more surprising for Andie than it is for the audience. However, book fans might be shocked purely because Andie had a genuine intention for selling drugs—in the book, she just did it because she could.
6The Girl In Elliot Ward’s Attic
Elliot Ward Hid A Girl Named Isla For 5 Years
When Pippa confronted Elliot Ward about his relationship with Andie Bell, she expected to find Andie in his attic. So it was a surprise when Pippa discovered Elliot was hiding someone, but it was not Andie at all. Instead, it was a girl named Isla that Elliot found on the side of the street after murdering Sal. The reason he kept her in captivity for five years is because he confessed that he killed Sal, the only genuinely shocking part of this twist.
