What happened in the 'Special Ops: Lioness' season finale? Yacht extraction, explained

"Special Ops: Lioness" entered the Taylor Sheridan-verse with a roar this summer, showcasing Zoe Saldana's tough Joe McNamara as the head of the Lioness CIA program, who trains once-troubled Marine Cruz Manuelos (Laysla De Oliveira).

The July 23 premiere set a new Paramount+ viewership record, with 6 million total viewers.

Sunday's "Lioness" season finale ended not with a whimper, but somehow managed to be strangely anticlimatic while jumping the shark in a bougie luxury yacht.

Yes, a yacht that would make Tom Brady envious was the Quick Reaction Force transport for the glitziest hot extraction ever in a finale that featured a crew including combat-ready Joe and her CIA boss Kaitlyn Meade (Nicole Kidman) on board.

It's anchors away for a "Lioness" finale breakdown that anticipates the show's future. Spoilers ahead, so stop reading if you don't want to know the ending.

What happened in the 'Special Ops: Lioness' finale?

Like any combat, it all happened so fast. Lioness Cruz got way too close to her target Aaliyah Amrohi (Stephanie Nur), the daughter of a billionaire businessman suspected of financing major terrorist acts. Their budding but doomed love earned Cruz an invite to Spain for Aaliyah's wedding, which was more like a fancy funeral considering her arranged marriage to husband-to-be Ehsan (Ray Corasani).

Hence the yacht hiding in plain sight just off the coast, filled with the ready Quick Reaction Force. Not to mention the sight of Cruz, still harboring quickly-explained facial injuries from her many secret skirmishes, awkwardly mingling with the rich, disapproving wedding party.

Major intel bonus: Aaliyah confides that her father is passing the business torch to her future husband, Ehsan. Cut to Ehsan, who is smart and jealous enough to do some deep computer research on his future wife's mysterious BFF and finds old social media posts revealing the real Cruz.

The broken cover wasn't shocking, but you can't say you saw the end coming. Leaving another late night, confusing interlude with Aaliyah, Cruz walks into a sprawling kitchen for water. While she's muttering aloud to the freezer about completing her "mission," robed businessman Amrohi (Bassem Youssef) appears, seeking extravagant gelato. Their creepier-than-it-needed-to-be exchange is blessedly interrupted by alarm-raising Ehsan, who didn't think about alerting the legions of security goons about his internet discovery and the mortal threat in their midst.

Big mistake leads to an action onslaught: Cruz takes Ehsan out with one of the hundreds of knives at her disposal. She absorbs an opulent pan attack from Amrohi and dispatches her main target with a flurry of thrusts followed by a final slit throat. Too much? Sorry. But to go from ice cream tasting to brutal "mission accomplished with bonus target" was really jarring.

Cruz flees, sending the alert that kicks the yacht into action while escaping poorly aimed fire from Amrohi's security.

We really could have used more of a QRF firefight to end it. War is hell, but it sure covers plot holes. Yet the elite team annoyingly mows down their foes like it's a training video. The only thing resembling an injury is from their own team, when the distraught Cruz, who's safely onboard the yacht, punches Joe for putting her through the agony ("My heart is not a weapon!").

Cruz predicts revenge for her history-changing actions, saying, "All we did was make the next generation of terrorists." And she quits.

Would Cruz even have returned, anyway? As compelling as De Oliveira is to watch, it would be a hard sell putting Cruz undercover again for a potential "Lioness" Season 2. Aaliyah, who discovered her dead father and future husband, is shown tearfully processing the horror.

Will there be a 'Special Ops: Lioness' Season 2?

Paramount+ has been mum about a second "Special Ops: Lioness" season, possibly due to Hollywood actors' and writers' strikes. But speaking to USA TODAY before the season began, Saldana said she and Sheridan were already discussing second-season plans. "Taylor has assured me that Joe is definitely going to get down and dirty next season," Saldana vowed.

Sheridan might lean into the "Special Ops" of the title, moving on from Lioness to a new top-secret project to fill in the title.

The juggling of Joe's top-secret job with normal family life and two kids at home has been a core element of "Lioness." Joe ends the season by returning home to her oncologist husband and family caretaker (Dave Annable) in the early morning, saying, "This one was hard." But nothing that a new national crisis can't solve.

Hopefully, any return will feature the core group of SEALs, led by Bobby (Jill Wagner), Tucker ("1883" star LaMonica Garrett) and Two Cups (James Jordan), all of whom pull off the yacht rescue with commendable earnestness and gung-ho spirit. If Tucker says he's driven a yacht before, you can be sure he's capable of believably flooring that luxury beast for a smooth water getaway.

What was the situation in the 'Special Ops: Lioness' situation room?

While Cruz, Joe and the SEALs had their butts on the line in the finale, Meade stayed on board to deal with a dysfunctional DC situation room that was more Jerry Springer than Tom Clancy. Morgan Freeman finally got serious screen time as the mission-skeptical Secretary of State Edwin Mullins. But some of Mullins' beef should have been worked out before bringing all the bigwigs into the evolving, globe-altering situation. There are so many blowups directed at CIA rep Byron Westfield (Michael Kelly) that they eventually came across as just cranky.

If I never again have to see the Secretary of State raise his middle finger to Westfield, which happens after the smoke has cleared on the successful mission, it will be too soon. Let's hope for a shakeup at the top, or maybe Mullins gets left off the war-room email chain next season.

Better yet, just let Saldana and company do their thing by getting "down and dirty" in the field.

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