This Is Us dropped major clues about the future timeline during the Season 3 finale, including the reason why the Pearsons are meeting Rebecca.
While “Her” spent most of the time in the present following the aftermath of Randall (Sterling K. Brown) and Beth’s (Susan Kelechi Watson) big fight, and Baby Jack’s health problems after his premature labor, the show shifted to the future and gave major insight into what is going on with the Pearsons in that time period.
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The beginning of the episode saw future Beth brewing coffee before the show shifted back to the present to the day after the fight. After a sequence in the present of the family making coffee in the respective homes, the show shifted back to the past, revealing Rebecca (Mandy Moore) once suffered injuries after being in a car accident.
In the present, Kate (Chrissy Metz), Rebecca and Toby (Chris Sullivan) get directions from the doctors on Baby Jack’s care. On the East Coast, Beth and Randall apologize to each other for what they said the night before, but she tells her husband she doesn’t see a way out of their argument.
In the past, the Big Three visit their mom in the hospital and they are shocked by her injuries. Rebecca tells them to wait outside and tells Jack (Milo Ventimiglia) to take them home so they don’t have to see her like this. Tension rose in the present later, when Kate got frustrated with her mother’s hovering by baby Jack’s side and lashed out at her.
While Beth realized her dancing dreams may not be worth the end of her marriage, Deja (Lyric Ross) tricked Randall into a trip to one of her worst foster homes to get him to see how lucky he is to have his wife. On the way back home, Randall considers the possibility of resigning his new position on city council. Without his knowledge, however, Beth meets with a realtor to see houses closer to his new job to make things better for him.
When she gets home, Randall tells Beth his plans to resign his job to save their marriage. Beth, however, tells him they are moving to Philadelphia so he can do his job, and she will open her own studio there. Though it will be an adjustment, the couple knows their family can handle anything when they’re together.
Not all couples reached a happy ending however, as Kevin (Justin Hartley) and Zoe (Melanie Liburd) reached an impasse in their relationship because of the subject of kids. After telling him that she will never change her mind about having children, the couple decides to go their separate ways.
After the young Big Three wake up in fear in the middle of the night, Jack takes them back to the hospital to see her. The show then shifts back to the future and reveals Beth and Randall are still together and in love, as the family is shown packing their old home.
In Los Angeles, Kevin arrives to Kate’s as she is bringing baby Jack to her house and announces he is moving in with them indefinitely.
In the episode’s final moments, older Toby arrives to Kevin’s (Justin Hartley) home — announcing that Kate and his son are also on their way — and Randall steps into his mother’s room and finds her unresponsive in a hospital bed, with Uncle Nicky by her side.
“It’s Randall. Your son, Randall,” he says as the episode came to a devastating end.
This is the first time the NBC series returned to the future storyline since the reveal earlier in Season 3 that the older Randall and adult Tess were on their way to visit Rebecca, along with Beth, who was also revealed to be the head of a dance academy.
Other previous visits into the future showed Randall calling Toby to ask if he was also going to see Rebecca, showing him sitting in his bed looking depressed and without a ring on his finger.
What do you think about the tragic future twist? This Is Us has not officially been renewed for Season 4 by NBC.
