Who killed Trevor in Maximum Pleasure Guaranteed? The viewers already know — the police are circling the wrong woman
Maximum Pleasure Guaranteed shows you who killed Trevor in its second episode, then spends five more letting the police build a case against someone else.
The Apple TV thriller, created by David J. Rosen and directed by David Gordon Green, ran for 10 episodes from May 20 to July 15, and Apple renewed it for a second season in October. Tatiana Maslany plays Paula, a divorced fact-checker in Sunnyside, Queens, locked in a custody fight with her ex-husband Karl, played by Jake Johnson. Paula pays a webcam model named Trevor, played by Brandon Flynn, mostly to listen to her. One night, mid-session, she watches him get beaten and dragged away on camera.
Who killed Trevor
Dennis, Trevor's older boyfriend, played by Murray Bartlett. The show doesn't hide it: a flashback in episode 2 shows Dennis killing him.
His real name is Frank Budkin, and he kills people for a corporate syndicate. Trevor had been running a small extortion scheme with two friends, fellow camboy Sky and Ash, and it drew police attention a little too close to Dennis's real work. In episode 5, Dennis kills Sky as well.
"Turns out, he's a bit of a sociopath," Bartlett told Deadline of Dennis.
Why the police want Paula
Paula does everything an innocent witness shouldn't. When she reports what she saw, she's told it was a hoax. So she starts looking for Trevor herself, and she's the one who finds his body. By the time Detectives Baxter and Gonzalez, played by Jon Michael Hill and Dolly de Leon, take a serious look at her, the evidence is piled up:
- her fingerprints at both crime scenes, Trevor's and Sky's;
- a possible sighting of her car at the motel where Sky was hiding;
- pawn shop footage of her selling Sky's necklace.
In episode 7, Paula shoots Dennis, and his body disappears. He has faked his death. At the end of that episode, the police arrest Paula for both murders.
The only person the audience knows to be a killer is officially dead, and the woman who went looking for the truth is in handcuffs.
Baxter thinks the case is closed. Gonzalez doesn't believe Paula fits the profile of a calculated killer, and she keeps digging.
How season 1 settles it
In the finale, "Queens," Dennis goes off the terrace of a high-rise. Police find a note in which he confesses to killing both Trevor and Sky out of jealousy. It clears Paula.
Gonzalez still doesn't think Dennis acted alone. The people he worked for are untouched. The season also closes a separate thread about Paula: security footage shows her deliberately driving into her neighbor, Caleb, whose death has followed her all season. Someone sends her that footage with a message saying they own her now.
Don't miss: Lupin Part 4 ending explained: why the finale has fans fighting about what Part 5 can even be
Paula answers the phone.
Previously we wrote: Who's the villain in Fall 2: Deadpoint? Jax and Luce brought him up the mountain themselves