Masters of the Air ending explained

❘ Updated: 2024-03-15T08:24:18

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Much like Band of Brothers, Masters of the Air has an incredibly emotional ending for the men of the 100th – here’s a breakdown of what happens.

Across nine episodes, Masters of the Air has illustrated the Bloody Hundredth’s namesake in brutal, traumatic, heart-rending detail, following them from their arrival in the UK through their calamitous missions over enemy territory.

In the closing episodes, the hierarchy of power at Thorpe Abbotts was shaken up: Buck and Bucky became POWs in Nazi Germany, while Rosie and Crosby climbed the ranks of the 100th as they played instrumental roles in the D-Day invasion of western Europe.

Ahead of the finale, there was one big question: would Buck and Bucky survive to see the end of the war? Well, we’ve got the answer and much more – this is a comprehensive rundown of Masters of the Air’s ending.

How does Masters of the Air end?

Masters of the Air ends with Buck escaping during a march between POW camps. Bucky is freed along with the other prisoners when American forces liberate their camp, and they reunite at Thorpe Abbotts before flying home with Rosie and Crosby.

The finale begins with Rosie being downed over Berlin. He lands in no man’s land, but he’s saved by Russian forces as they’re executing German soldiers near the Oder River. They take him to the nearest airport; en route, they stop near a concentration camp, where Rosie sees hundreds of corpses (very much evoking the camp discovery in Band of Brothers).

He eventually makes it home, where Crosby reveals his wife is pregnant – but he’s worried about what war has done to him. He cites a quote by Nietzsche: “Whoever fights monsters, should take care not to become a monster himself, because if you gaze into the abyss, the abyss gazes right back into you.” Rosie tells him they’re there to “fight the monsters… and yeah, that’s made us do some tough things. But we had to. There’s no other way. The things these people are capable of… no, they got it coming. Trust me.”

Meanwhile, Buck, Bucky, and the rest of the men at Stalag Luft III are forced to endure long marches through the night to Nuremberg and different camps. In a small town, Buck makes a break for it with two other men, but Bucky is caught before he can join them. The Germans don’t kill Bucky, fearing deadly retaliation from Americans surrounding them.

Buck makes it to the nearby woods, where one of the men is killed by a member of the Hitler Youth armed with nothing but a bayonet and an empty handgun. Buck fights the temptation to avenge his friend’s death and allows the boys to run away. They make it to a town near the Bavarian countryside, where they find American troops.

Buck and Bucky in Masters of the Air Episode 9

Soon after, Buck arrives back in England and starts flying on “mercy missions” to the Netherlands, dropping tons of food for starving Dutch people as part of a flak truce with the Germans.

What about Bucky? Not long after rolling into Stalag VIII in Moosburg, a P-51 swoops in and peppers the camp with gunfire, cueing the arrival of tanks and American infantry to liberate the camp. Bucky finds a US flag and raises it over the camp, officially claiming it from the Nazis.

Later, we see Buck flying back to base when a familiar voice gives him his landing instructions. “You heard me the first goddamn time, Gale,” Bucky tells him, before they reunite on the ground.

“We made a few of those supply drops in the last days of the war. And then, one day… it was over,” Crosby narrates, as we hear Winston Churchill’s announcement of the German surrender. If there’s a better excuse to start partying, we’d love to hear it.

As everyone at Thorpe Abbotts drinks, dances, and shoots flares with joyful abandon, Buck and Bucky enjoy a quiet drink together; they vowed to make it to the end together, and they did. “At first it felt unreal… impossible, unimaginable. And then, inevitable. We were going home, all of us. I had a wife to see, a son, a life to start,” Crosby narrates, as the men ready their planes for their final flight.

Everyone flies home, with Buck and Bucky sitting side by side. “On occasion, the world must confront itself, answer what we are with who we are. I was going home. I just wished more of us were,” Crosby narrates as everyone waves them goodbye.

As the credits roll, we find out what happened to everyone after the events of Masters of the Air. Episodes 1-9 are streaming on Apple TV+ now. You can also check out our other coverage below: