How to Get to Heaven from Belfast ending explained: What happened to Greta?

You know her as the creator of the hit teen sitcom Derry Girls, but Lisa McGee is stepping into darker and slightly more mysterious territory with How to Get to Heaven from Belfast.

The new Netflix series follows three lifelong friends whose lives are thrown into chaos after they receive shocking news about the death of a former friend they’ve long been estranged from. When the trio reunites for the wake, strange events begin to unfold, pushing them into an unexpected journey that forces them to confront buried secrets, unresolved tensions, and the complicated history they all share.

All eight episodes of How to Get to Heaven from Belfast season 1 are now available to stream on Netflix. Although the show just dropped, most people have already made their way through the entire season. So, how exactly does the first installment wrap up? We shared a breakdown of what happened at the end of season 1 right below.

Major spoilers are ahead from How to Get to Heaven from Belfast season 1!

What happened to Greta in How to Get to Heaven from Belfast?

We'll start off by saying that she survives. Greta does not die in How to Get to Heaven from Belfast season 1. Although she was believed to be dead at the beginning of the first episode, we eventually learn that she's alive and on the run. Why? Well, it all stems from her accidentally killing a childhood friend.

Her name was Jodie. When Jodie and Greta were kids, they did a really bad thing. They burned down a church in the village where they were raised. The village was called "Heaven's Veil," or "Caille Neamh" in Irish. Both girls were victims of severe neglect and abuse while growing up there, which left them emotionally scarred and desperate for some kind of escape.

They had been told that God would come to Heaven’s Veil and save them from their suffering, and when that never happened, their frustration and hopelessness turned into something far more destructive. In an act fueled by anger, they set fire to the village church. Tragically, they didn’t realize there were children inside at the time, and the blaze resulted in multiple deaths.

Greta's real mom, Nora O'Hara, eventually gave her up for adoption. A psychiatrist named Margo then took Greta and moved her away from the village, while Jodie was forced to stay behind. Greta would go on to attend Our Lady of the Sorrows, where she would meet Saoirse, Robyn, and Dara. She thought she had finally gotten a fresh start, but then a man named Jason Meadows showed up and started bothering her.

Greta told her friends that Jason was her ex-boyfriend who was stalking her, but we find out later in the season that she lied. Jason's real name was Charles Sampson. He was an investigative journalist who had been looking into the dark history of Heaven’s Veil and the tragic fire that killed several children years earlier. As he dug deeper into the case, he eventually tracked Greta and Jodie down.

While Jodie was on board to confess and finally tell the truth about what happened at Heaven’s Veil, Greta was terrified of their past coming to light and what it would mean for their futures. A tense confrontation finally happens in the caretaker's cottage near the Our Lady of the Sorrows campus. Greta finds out that Charles was recording their conversation, which immediately sends the situation spiraling.

A struggle breaks out, and amid the chaos, Jodie fatally stabs Charles. Greta then urges Jodie to leave and take the recorder with her, while she stays behind and enlists Saoirse, Robyn, and Dara to help conceal the crime. Together, they bury Charles’ body on the school grounds and try to set the cottage on fire to destroy any evidence. However, the plan ultimately fails when heavy rain prevents the building from fully burning down. Saoirse, Robyn, and Dara don't find out Charles's real name and who he was until later in the season.

Greta and Jodie eventually go their separate ways and live entirely different lives. Years later, however, they unexpectedly cross paths again when Greta is on vacation in Portugal with her family. The reunion is tense and uncomfortable, and the two quickly go their separate ways. Their paths cross once more on the day Greta is believed to have died, when Jodie arrives at Greta’s home and tries to pressure her into confessing the truth about Charles’ death to his son, Andrew.

But Greta doesn't want to come clean, and they get into a slight physical altercation that ends with Greta accidentally pushing Jodie down the stairs to her death. Her husband, Owen, and Margo then arrive at the house and quickly come up with a plan to protect Greta from facing the consequences of what happened.

Instead of calling the police, they decide to stage Greta’s death. Jodie’s body is placed in Greta’s coffin, allowing the town to believe Greta has died while she secretly disappears. With Owen reluctantly agreeing to go along with the cover-up and Margo taking control of the situation, Greta is forced to abandon her life and go into hiding. How?

Well, Margo hires a mysterious organization that helps women disappear and assume new identities. The group arranges for Greta to be moved out of the country and set up with a completely new life. However, as the plan begins to unfold, Greta struggles with the reality of leaving her family behind and starting over as someone else. Her hesitation ultimately leads her to turn against the escape plan, and she returns to Heaven's Veil. Of course, the organization doesn't like this and has two of its top members track her down.

Greta gets to start over

Shortly after Greta makes her way back to Heaven’s Veil, Saoirse, Dara, Robyn, and Liam arrive as well. Liam, however, leaves soon after, having learned from Saoirse the location of Charles’s buried body. That's his primary concern at the moment, especially after joining forces with Andrew. Once Greta confesses the full truth to Saoirse, Dara, and Robyn, Booker and Feeney show up. The friends initially fear that the pair has come to kill them, but their worst fears do not come to pass.

Booker and Feeney were told by the leader of the mysterious organization to eliminate Greta and those connected to her after she escaped. At first, it looked like that's what they were going to do. But instead of carrying out the orders, Booker made a surprising choice. She turns against the corrupt leadership of the organization, realizing that their true agenda was to exploit and harm vulnerable women rather than help them. She ends up ordering one of the organization's trusted members to take out the leader and all the members, while she and Feeney travel to Heaven's Veil.

After arriving at Heaven's Veil, Booker provides Greta with new documents. This gives Greta a fresh identity and the opportunity to start over completely with Owen and their daughter. Knowing that the immediate danger has finally passed, the entire friend group is able to move on. Meanwhile, Andrew gets his closure after Liam takes him to where his dad is buried.

The first season concludes with Saoirse, Robyn, and Dara at a convenience store, where Dara pulls out a pink bag that Greta had left behind. Earlier in the season 1 finale, Greta had accepted a ride from a mysterious man named Conrad. He handed her this pink bag, but we didn't get to see what was inside it.

At the end of the season 1 finale, we learn that someone killed Conrad with a screwdriver. But we never get to see what's inside the pink bag when Saoirse, Robyn, and Dara open it in the convenience store. However, whatever is inside it must be valuable based on their shocked reactions. The episode ends with the trio zipping up the bag before it cuts to the credits.

Could this be a setup for a potential How to Get to Heaven from Belfast season 2? Possibly! The show wasn't billed as a limited series, so the door is wide open for more episodes. We'll just have to wait and see.

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