SPOILERS

There are things that we never do find out. Why was the garden so un-garden-like? What ultimately happened to Eve (whose true form we never did get to see) after Doc (Tim Rozon) kicked her through a portal and out of the garden? And who built the machine that apparently controlled that place? We know that Black Badge was trying to prevent Eve from leaving the garden and that Rachel’s mom Gloria Valdez and quite a few others died trying to keep that portal closed, but it seems beyond the capacity of Black Badge to have built the machine that drew energy from blood and controlled Eve’s shapeshifting.

In Season Four, the Black Badge Division begins to look more and more like The Initiative from Buffy the Vampire Slayer in that they seem increasingly determined to capture, dissect, and analyze various sorts of demons. After BBD orders the complete destruction of the Triangle, Jeremy (Varun Saranga), with some help from Nicole Haught (Kat Barrell), leads the escape of several such beings including Doc and newly-sired vampire Mercedes (Dani Kind). Jeremy stages a kind of coup by arranging for the BBD agents preparing to destroy the triangle to be eaten by local demons. Jeremy’s enmity toward BBD isn’t a permanent thing, though. At the end of the season, he learns that BBD will return to Purgatory, and is ordered to report for duty again. (Did another faction take control of Black Badge?)

Then there are the Clantons, who turn up when Nicole asks The Swamp Witch for help getting Waverly (Dominique Provost-Chalkley) out of the garden, and the Witch turns out to be the head Clanton Margot (Paula Boudreau). All the Clanton ancestors are afflicted with becoming reapers after they die (with the possible exception of Margot). Reapers are pretty much what they sound like they should be, undead creatures visible only to their immediate target. Waverly kills The Swamp Witch to end a curse placed on Nicole, precipitating a chain of events that leads to many more Clanton deaths. Dark Angel Waverly transforms all of the Clantons into a tiding of Magpies, allowing them to continue to be harbingers of death and other things but in a less zombie-like way.

Pursued by a reaper and lost in The Fog (a memory-erasing mist created by Black Badge Division), Waverly stumbles upon a cabin in the woods where Jolene happens to be living. **When Bulshar (Jean Marchand) died (Episode 3.12), Waverly’s demon twin Jolene (Zoie Palmer) was released from the tree roots that had bound her. — The two fight, and Jolene plucks a feather from Waverly’s back, causing her to sprout dark wings and manifest the angel side of her genetic heritage. The first thing the Dark Angel does is kill Jolene, who seems quite content with that after having seen Waverly’s transformation. (Inducing this may have been Jolene’s purpose the whole time.)

Dark Angel Waverly seems bent on taking her place as the guardian of the garden, but is persuaded to do a few other things first. Taking on a valkyrie-like role (deciding the fate of those fallen in battle), she cures Doc of the wounds inflicted by Wynonna (Melanie Scrofano) **some magical trick shooting was involved — and at the same time makes him no longer a vampire. She creates the aforementioned Clanton magpies. (Cleo, who is still alive, probably does not become a bird though she might become one when she dies.), Then Waverly heads for the stone stairs that lead to the garden where she is intercepted by Nicole and an deal is struck.

The basis for the deal is somewhere in that book Waverly took from the garden. **the book named “Waverly Gibson”, which was generated by the machine running the garden after Waverly gave it some of her blood — The result is that Waverly is returned to human form and is released from her duty as garden guardian, while Nicole takes on that role. “Let me extend my watch over all of the Ghost River Triangle in every realm,” Nicole says. “Let me be the guardian for all of us, supernatural and human.” She gets her wish and becomes the “angel shield” complete with neck tattoo, and is bound to the triangle for the rest of her days. (It’s not clear what happens at the end of Nicole’s days. What if Waverly outlives Nicole? Does she revert to her Dark Angel form and take over?) Also, how significant is the Triangle’s boundary? Revenants could not cross it, but there are no more revenants. How does the boundary affect other demons? Doc’s wife, Big Nose Kate (Chantal Riley), was able to cross it without any difficulty.

Waverly, now human again, marries Nicole in the final episode of the season, but not before needing to deal with a haunted wedding dress. After Wynonna shoots out the tires on Doc’s ’77 Camaro, Doc and Wynonna leave Purgatory on her motorcycle, which she finally gets to ride again. (It’s been sitting in the barn since Episode 2.12.) Their first stop will be Miracles, Montana (not a real place) where Gus (Natascha Girgis) has been hiding their daughter Alice, who is about three years old by now. (The time dilation experienced by Nicole and Doc in the garden vaguely corresponds to the actual time between seasons three and four.)

The situation heading into a (still possible) fifth season is this: Nicole is the Sheriff of Purgatory again. Black Badge is preparing to return to the area. Jeremy has a date with Waverly’s wedding caterer Damon (Tenaj Williams) for the following Monday. Robin (Justin Kelly) was a victim of The Fog, lost his memory, and tore his own face off. His face was replaced with that of another actor (Jim Watson) and he is now undergoing therapy at Black Badge HQ. Nedley (Greg Lawson) is the proprietor of Shorty’s. Mercedes is a vampire. Nicole Haught and Waverly Earp are married and living at the Earp homestead with their unofficially adopted daughter Rachel (Martina Ortiz-Luis). Wynonna and Doc are on the road to Montana.

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All 49 episodes of WYNONNA EARP can be streamed on TUBI, as can the 2024 film WYNONNA EARP: VENGEANCE.

WYNONNA EARP: TALES FROM PURGATORY, is available from Audible.com.