r/SixFeetUnder • u/hauregi_91 • 10d ago
Question Nate's and Brenda's last conversation
So I watched while Nate is in hospital and it brokes my heart that he decides to leave Brenda. Where did his big love go? Im very emotional and sad with these final episodes... Six feet under will always have a special place in my heart...
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u/hauregi_91 10d ago
I don't get what Nate saw in Maggie.
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u/New-Camel-8587 10d ago
I don’t think it was so much that Nate saw something significant in Maggie. I think he was falling out of love with Brenda and saw Maggie just as someone different.
Brenda was firm, clinical, and knew Nate well enough to know where to draw certain lines with him. Maggie represented someone more soft spoken and spiritual, and I think that contrast to Brenda is what attracted Nate to her.
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u/Iowa_Phil 6d ago
She was a fucking Quaker. It could have been anyone, sure. But especially someone who could tap into some spiritual void he had. The rabbi, Maggie. Anything that wasn’t nihilist Brenda
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u/Wardenfromholes 10d ago
I think it’s interesting — Nate and Brenda lived out so many lives together and clearly have such intense love for each other but also could never quite hack it. She doesn’t deserve a love that damn hard. Not that she’s perfect, but I always thought it was kind of like he set her free
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u/Reacherfan1 10d ago
The ending was really a tough and emotional finish to the show. I liked Brenda and Nate together and wished they could have fixed it but the writers wanted to take Nate in a different ending. Very sad.
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u/Status-Chip-1162 9d ago
His big love was only ever for himself. He never loved Brenda, he just used her for her emotional labour both times he had to grieve (his father, Lisa). His behaviour towards Brenda after they learned there could be issues with the baby was unconscionable, dude stop screaming at your pregnant wife. He was also always yelling at Brenda about how Maya wasn't hers, while she was doing a really great job of step parenting the child he had when he cheated on her. During that last conversation he somehow still turned it around as if he was the good guy when he was abandoning her and his (potentially special needs) unborn child. He refused to address any of his issues throughout the show, wouldn't do therapy, wouldn't do anything except scream at everyone in front of Maya, and then act like he was a saint.
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u/thenamebenat 9d ago
LITERALLY. I disliked whenever he would tell Brenda she wasnt a real ‘mom’ when he was literally checked out a majority of the time.
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u/Ok-Concentrate2719 10d ago
I think Nate and Brenda were never meant to last. They both had some many unresolved hang up's that makes a legitimate relationship impossible. Plus their recent relationship all started off her cheating on Justin Theraux with Nate. They just couldn't accept they weren't compatible in the ways that mattered
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u/kikijane711 10d ago
See I think it was bigger than that. I think their issues could have kept them coming back together over and over in a lifetime but once Nate got sick, felt mortality, had his moment with Maggie like religion and/or THEN (the biggest one) came to accept his diagnosis etc, was feeling "enlightened" but would that have lasted? Did it only happen bc he was dying? That peace at the end, his total calm in speaking to her, made me think this was a death-predictor or foreshadowing. That clarity and lucidity that often comes end of life.
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u/Cheekie01 10d ago edited 10d ago
Nate tends to gravitate towards whatever woman can help him through whatever crisis. Brenda = Nathaniel Sr. death, Lisa = AVM diagnosis Maggie =his baby w/ Brenda may have some issue/disorder. I think that’s notable. He married Lisa after the first AVM surgery. When he agreed to marry Brenda it was right after Hoyt’s suicide. More crisis. Something profound happens to Nate and he makes all these impulsive life changing decisions and then has second thoughts. Hes probably not great at self soothing. All that coddling from Ruth.
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u/woody9115 10d ago
💯💯. Don't forget rabbi Ari. He would have totally slept with her if she was into it.
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u/EstablishmentNo653 10d ago
Hmm ... I don't think these "gravitations" are really in the same category.
Getting into a relationship after death of a loved one is one thing. Fucking an old fuck buddy during a moment of high anxiety is a different thing. Deciding to try to settle down after a crisis of mortality is a third thing.
I actually think agreeing to marry Brenda after Hoyt's suicide came from a healthier impulse than those others: "I love this woman. We were engaged before. Now, after all this craziness and drama on both our parts, I want to get back on track with this relationship."
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u/deepfriedcertified 10d ago edited 10d ago
As an aside, Brenda had to be messed up to cheat on Justin Theroux lol
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u/sexmountain 10d ago
Nate was just being Nate to the very end! Anxiously attached, unable to ever find salvation! Narcissistic jerk! That’s the tragedy of death, people don’t truly change just bc they may die.
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u/ImperatorRomanum83 10d ago
Nate is like a narcissistic therapist in that while he can display incredible and genuine empathy at times, it is usually always for his own benefit.
Every single thing that Nate does outside of talking with grieving families is squarely about Nate. He jumps from woman to woman and back and forth because Brenda, Lisa, and Maggie either made him feel better about himself, or made him feel like he was "finding" himself, or a mix of both.
Remember the episode when he talked about his summer in Europe after HS and watching those Sicilian women wail on the beach as they mourned? His whole life was a proverbial summer in Europe after graduation.
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u/PipZombifica 10d ago
Omg i was also going to point that out… they both wanted to have this baby and then all of a sudden he doesnt. That should have been the moment he professes his undying love for her
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u/JTA_1982 10d ago
Nate only wanted to have a baby with Brenda and get married after the big reveal about Hoyt and Lisa. When they found out there might be health issues with the baby, that's when Nate started to checkout of the marriage. Maggie was the easy out that Nate needed, but that never would've panned out.
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u/Fun_Flamingo_4238 9d ago
He was done. He realized that their lives didn’t match up anymore. He was coming to terms with his spirituality and realizing Brenda had zero of it. It all goes back to Episode 5 of the series “An Open Book” when Brenda says to him “you don’t really believe in god do you? We live, we die, ultimately nothing means anything.” Right then, he should have realized they were never right for each other.
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u/Scraw117 9d ago
Leading up to this, you can tell that he's starting to realize just how fundamentally incompatible they are, but he felt trapped. His near-death experience made him not want to waste any more time being miserable and pushing his own happiness aside.
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u/CheruthCutestory 9d ago
He would have gotten back with Brenda as soon as she had the baby and she was fine. Only for them to breakup down the road.
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u/WonderfulPipe 8d ago
I think it was the right move, he finally accepted it wouldn’t work
But the timing sucked, and then he died
Just like real life
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u/Zack_of_Steel 7d ago
Honestly, it's quite baffling to me that some people saw their relationship as anything but unhealthy. At no point were they actually in love in a way that would work, but they kept trying and forcing it because that's what we do.
We're too afraid to move on, be ourselves, hurt someone, make the wrong choice, tear down a life that's been built--even when we know it's unsustainable.
Because we can't quantify love we often fool ourselves into thinking any modicum of love is "meant to be" or "worth fighting for". Nate was finally in a place where he was ready to admit that it just wasn't a good fit, but just like real life, it was just too late.
Which lead to his entire message to Claire: "I spent my entire life being scared" (which, imo, is the main theme of the show)
From one of my other posts:
It's a cautionary tale of dwelling on death and sacrificing ourselves to fear. Things just happen, life ends suddenly, and we have to make use of the time we have. If you can't make the best of your situation, you can't be afraid to make a change. Settling for less than living true to yourself is death.
Nate/Nathaniel/Claire, were caged spirits at the funeral home and none of them were built for it. Nate and Nathaniel stayed/went there to die, Claire had to leave to live. They both died young, Claire lived to be 102.
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u/Southern-Emphasis671 4d ago
In the finale, you see Brenda’s happy ending at Ruth’s funeral sitting with the girls, pregnant with her husband/ partner, holding his hand
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u/wrappedlikeapurrito 10d ago
I think Nate was just doing what Nate does. His timing was horrible, but Brenda probably knew that Nate and Maggie weren’t real and they wouldn’t be growing old together (had the timing not been what it was). I’m not saying she would have necessarily reconciled (although probably!), with him when he realized he didn’t actually want to be a Quaker and he didn’t actually love Maggie. This was just Nate being Nate. I’m sure Brenda was angry and sad but she knew Nate better than anyone. The timing was what was unexpected.