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The Final Scene Spoilers

Welcome to the new Computer Game Spoilers section of my gaming website. I added this section because I recently received questions about the plots of two different games which, to my surprise and embarrassment, I had totally forgotten the answers to. Then, to my further surprise, I was unable to find any existing website that would refresh my memory about the plots of computer games... lots of puzzle solutions, but no basic plot summaries.

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So I figured I'd better write some of them down while they're still fresh in my mind, just in case I or anybody else wants to refer to them at some point in the future (or in case anybody suffers a major game glitch and just wants to know what was supposed to happen in the end-- I get letters like this from time to time.) If you haven't finished The Final Scene yet and you don't want the plot of this game to be revealed to you, then you don't want to read this page. Please go back to my main The Final Scene page, where I give tips and reviews without giving away any of its plot.

But if you are looking for plot spoilers, just scroll further down the page to find them!

Plot Summary

The setup and basic plot of this game is based on the 1988 Nancy Drew novel The Final Scene. As in the book, the historic Royal Palladium theater is slated to be demolished after a final screening of a new film by popular actor Brady Armstrong. Nancy is there with her friend Maya, a journalism student who has scored an interview with Brady, but before she can talk to him she is mysteriously kidnapped, and Nancy receives a threatening phone call that Maya is hidden in the theater and if the building is destroyed, Maya will perish along with it. After much frantic investigation, Nancy learns that the family of the theater's original owner, J.J. Thompson, only owns half the deed to the theater, because he lost the other half to legendary magician Harry Houdini in a bet, and Houdini gifted it to the theater's original architect. She also learns the identity of the kidnapper: Joseph Hughes, the old caretaker of the theater who cannot imagine his life without it and feels he has nothing to lose. Nancy manages to find Maya, neutralize Joseph, and signal the construction workers to halt the demolition before they are all killed. Maya is saved, and thanks to Nancy's investigative work, the theater is too.

Character Subplots and Secrets

Brady Armstrong: The actor Maya was supposed to be interviewing in the first place. Nancy learns that he is rather immature, very insecure about his thinning hair, and resents being bossed around by his agent Simone. Brady is also the heir of J.J. Thompson (his real last name is Thompson, making him the "B. Thompson" that Nicholas is always complaining about) and therefore has okayed the theater demolition, believing it to be the best business decision. He is innocent of the kidnapping, but when he discovers Maya's notebook later on, he hides it rather than turn it over to help the investigation because he does not want the information Maya had dug up about him to become public. Although he is a greedy, shallow and unpleasant individual, in the end Brady does help save the theater for posterity by donating his half of the deed to charity. Nancy believes that he did this because he can no longer demolish the theater without Nicholas' permission, so he figured he might as well get the PR boost (and presumably the tax write-off) of a charitable contribution.

Simone Mueller: Brady's ambitious, pushy agent. She was the one who ordered the threatening funeral wreath-- not because she was actually connected with the kidnapping, just because she thought it would drum up more publicity for the crime and thus for Brady.

Nicholas Falcone: Nicholas and his protest organization, HADIT, unintentionally cause problems for Nancy's investigation by being the 'protestors that cried wolf'... they used a fake kidnapping as a stunt in a previous protest, so the police suspect Maya of being a HADIT member and faking the whole thing, even though this is not the case. Though he acts like he's just some random college kid protesting the destruction of the theater, Nicholas actually has a personal reason for his strong feelings about the value of old theaters: his grandmother Louisa was a theater architect, and in fact was the one who designed the Royal Palladium (though she never ended up getting paid for it.) In the end, Nancy discovers that Louisa was given Houdini's half of the theater in recognition of her work, so Nicholas, as her heir, is able to veto demolition of the theater.

Joseph Hughes: The elderly caretaker of the theater, Joseph is the one who kidnapped Maya, hoping that this would stop the demolition of the theater somehow. (His original plan was to kidnap Brady, which might actually have worked a little better.) Although Joseph is very unreasonable (refusing to release Maya in the end even though Nancy has already found documents that will save the theater), he is still a more sympathetic character than most Nancy Drew villains are, motivated mostly by loneliness and desperation. Although he puts on a cheerful face and pretends that he is going to go live with his brother after the destruction of the theater, Nancy learns that his brother has actually been dead for years and Joseph has nowhere to go, which is a poignant moment. In the end Nancy and Maya both end up feeling sorry for him despite the trouble he has caused.

Minor Characters

Maya Nguyen: The kidnapping victim, a friend of Nancy's. She is seen only in the intro and endgame sequences and cannot be interacted with. She is a journalism student who was planning to interview Brady Armstrong when she was kidnapped.

Eustacia Andropov, Sergeant Ramsey, Sherman Trout: You need to call these characters on the telephone to learn plot information, but they are never seen on screen and are not suspects.

J.J. Thompson, Harry Houdini, Louisa Falcone: These are backstory characters from the early days of the theater. They are all dead now and Nancy learns about them only through old letters and conversations with their living relatives. J.J. Thompson was the unscrupulous original owner of the theater. Harry Houdini, of course, was a real person, a famous magician; in the story, J.J. Thompson lost half the ownership of the theater to Houdini in a bet, and Houdini eventually gave his half to Louisa Falcone, the theater's architect, as a gift.

Bess, George, and Ned: As usual in Nancy Drew games, these characters have no subplots and exist only to chat with Nancy on the telephone and deliver hints if the player needs them.