Slow Horses season 5 finale ending explained: Is Claude Whelan dead?

Slow Horses season 5 finale offers a humorous and poignant conclusion to Slough House, setting the stage for the next installment. Titled 'Scars,' episode 6 is all about the team trying to prevent a mass carnage and stop the final act of the destabilization strategy. While everyone calls the final step an attack on a place of worship, there's a trap within a trap in the Libyan's plan.

Claude Whelan becomes a target in what River's grandfather calls the "sting in the tail," the real final act. But he doesn't die in the Slow Horses season 5 finale, thanks to River becoming a last-minute hero. However, he is not as lucky when it comes to his seat at the top of the MI5 food chain, as his past actions come back to haunt him.

Meanwhile, things are changing at the Park, but nothing changes for the Slough House.

Disclaimer: This article contains major spoilers for Slow Horses season 5 finale. Reader's discretion is advised.

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Why is Claude Whelan targeted in the Slow Horses season 5 finale?

Claude Whelan is targeted (Image via Apple TV)

River stops Whelan from ending up dead in the Slow Horses season 5 finale, but the latter has another thing coming for him. Unlike the previous steps in the destabilization strategy, Lamb is spot on in the finale. He predicts what happens in step 5: attack a place of worship, leading to Tara's arrest and the mass shooting in Abbotsfield being stopped.

But while everyone believes that the attacks are over, River's grandfather, David, despite his dementia, calls it that there's still one step left in the 'bee attack.' It turns out that there is indeed one last stage of the attack left, which targets Claude Whelan. The remaining Libyan perpetrator, Sami, targets Whelan for his hand in Zliten in 2011.

His life and country were destroyed when the UK left Libya. Whelan was a forecaster for the British government at the time, and his opinions influenced the UK's decision to vacate Libya. Libya was left on its own devices, and people like Sami had to pick up the pieces. Sami corners Whelan at the park and holds him at gunpoint, but River arrives just as Sami is about to shoot at the helpless head of MI5.

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Slow Horses season 5 finale: What is Whelan's plan for Slough House, and does he succeed?

Earlier in the Slow Horses season 5 finale, Diana Taverner clocks it when she says that Whelan will find a way to cover his a** after the chaos at MI5. She's not wrong because Whelan thinks he can throw the Slough House into the fire. He plans to pin the blame on Slough House in the narrative that Judd warned them about the Libyans and Tara's connection to Roddy Ho, but that Lamb did nothing.

Lamb threatens Whelan (Image via Apple TV)

This way, Whelan can ensure that he retains his job at MI5, and he plans to dissolve Slough House, as he has always wanted to do since the beginning. However, as season 5 has established, Lamb has far superior skills compared to Whelan, who isn't very good at his job. His plan doesn't succeed because Lamb has something incriminating about him.

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Lamb's threat in the Slow Horses season 5 finale marks the biggest, long-overdue change in the Park

After Claude Whelan threatens Lamb in the Slow Horses season 5 finale, the Slough House leader gives a counter-threat that will force Whelan to resign from his post at MI5. Jackson Lamb has Dennis Gimball's recording device, the one Coe snatched and gave him in Slow Horses season 5 episode 5.

In it is the recording from Gimball's house when Whelan threatened the politician and his columnist wife that he would ruin their lives if they didn't comply with his demands. There's also a recording that Whelan had relations with s*x workers, or escorts as he calls them. Lamb threatens him that if he doesn't resign, he will make those recordings public, and he doesn't care if MI5 is affected in the process.

The end signals that Whelan has resigned because Diana Taverner has confirmed that she's finally getting the job she deserves: the head of MI5. Roddy Ho is returning to Slough House, and while River thinks he has a chance to return to the Park, Diana doesn't want him, so he's staying.

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Catch all six episodes of Slow Horses season 5 streaming on Apple TV+.