The truth has been revealed on Cruel Summer Season 2 Episode 10!

Luke's murder has kept us hooked as we debated whether we could trust Megan, Isabella, or anyone in Luke's life. The murder mystery weaved a layered web of "ride-or-dies" and lies.

But while we were all assessing the suspects and preparing for the twist, Cruel Summer Season 2's showrunner and executive producer, Elle Triedman, was ready for the big day!

BEWARE: SPOILERS AHEAD! We got to chat with Triedman about the big reveal, the motivations of the killer, and the relationships and secrets that led to the fateful day. Plus, we discussed some fan theories that popped up during the season.

Make sure you watch the episode if you don't want to get spoiled. Check out the interview below!

My jaw was on the floor in the last few minutes when Isabella was revealed as the killer. What made you choose her as the big killer reveal?

You know, it's funny because at the beginning, in the first few weeks, we had so many different killers on the board.

What's interesting about this season is at its heart, it's about loyalty. "Loyalty" has so many different facets. It can come from the best place; it can get twisted and misguided.

When it comes to your average villain or killer, Isabella doesn't go back to the cabin to kill Luke. She goes back to talk to him.

And when she gets to the dock and sees him basically half-dead, she suddenly has this moment where there's a decision to be made.

Do you save him? Or do you let him go or finish him off? I think it was a snap judgment.

If she had been there for 20 minutes or an hour, she might not have come to that decision. But at that moment, she sees her friendship with Megan is basically in shatters. She still loves her friend and wants the best for her best friend, her "ride-or-die."

And as soon as she found out Megan was pregnant, and then seeing how, even when they're back at the cabin, Megan has second thoughts or remorse. She just saw the path flipped in two directions.

One of them is where Megan has this great, huge life. Or, she can be stuck with Luke in Chatham and have this small, terrible, stifled existence.

In Isabella's heart, she's saving her friend by killing him.

With those snap judgments, she found him at the dock, but she nearly shot him at the cabin. At that moment, was it an accident, as she said, or a happy snap judgment she saw to get him out of the way?

She's a terrible shot. We established that earlier in the season and summer.

I think it was an impulsive move. She got very close; she got a lot closer than she expected.

I don't think at all she meant to kill him at the moment. She wanted to scare the hell out of him, and she did.

Now that all is said and done with Isabella's killer reveal, were there easter eggs or clues you dropped in to hint to her? Do you have any favorites?

I don't know if I would call it an easter egg, but you could see on Cruel Summer Season 2 Episode 9 how three is an awkward number. Three is never comfortable.

When Isabella came into the summer, Luke and Megan were more aligned. Especially through Fall 1999, we've seen how Isabella was sorta pulling Megan away from Luke.

There was a moment when they came back from the club, and they'd gone without him, where she was baiting him. And at the cabin and we found out she was helping Megan get a passport, and they were going to go on this trip and travel.

Actually, one of my favorites is when they were dressed up like The Matrix for Halloween. I loved that!

And she basically comes out and says, "There isn't room for both of us."

It's kind of a gauntlet being thrown down.

Again, that to me, isn't an easter egg for her killing him; it's a moment where there was a line in the sand.

You did mention that you had other suspects on your board. Besides Isabella, was there another person at the top of your killer list whom you could've led the story?

We had a bunch of different endings very early on. Debbie was a potential killer just for something surprising.

Like most of the season, how far would a parent go to protect their child? So, that was a fun one.

The sheriff was another one that you wouldn't see coming.

The sheriff was quite popular as a suspect on the internet last week. So, that was fun!

The fun thing about a show like this is for people to guess and for a lot of different theories to be floated.

There was also a theory going strong since Cruel Summer Season 2 Episode 1 that Luke isn't dead.

I found that one funny because we don't show him in the body bag.

In hindsight, would you have loved to have done that storyline?

That he wasn't dead? No!

I like a good old-fashioned murder.

I always, always wanted it to be a dead body and a mystery.

During our previous chat, we discussed the themes of "ride-or-die" and Megan's and Isabella's interpretation of being a ride-or-die. Isabella made that snap judgment and killed Luke, but we also saw a side of her that made it seem like her friendship was an obsession.

Could this be the pattern that happened to Lisa and now could occur in the future with Michelle?

Yes, absolutely!

She has major boundary issues. [Laughs]

She does become obsessive and possessive. It's a dangerous combination.

And in the season finale, she framed Megan with the tape. Even though Megan was her best friend, she chose her survival. Do you think Isabella, when push comes to shove, values friendship or her survival and fantasy of friendship?

I think when her back is up against a wall, she's a survivor.

And in the moment in the car outside Steve's office where she floated the idea of trying to renew the friendship and go back to the way things had been, and Megan shut it down, it was the turning point for Isabella.

That was when she knew what she would do with that tape.

Let's shift gears to talk about the Chambers family. Their storyline was a big part of Cruel Summer Season 2 and how the boys blurred the lines between being like Steve and fighting against it. Why was it essential for you to showcase this separate plot alongside the murder?

To me, it's not a separate plot but what shaped Luke into who he was and what he was fighting against.

These are high school kids; these are 17-year-olds, and they're trying on all these different personas. Some of them are pretty ugly. There's a lot of one-up-manship and big talking.

The flat-out lies that happen in high school conversations; there are a lot of "locker room" chats. They're trying to show off to each other.

And I think that's something that excelled among his friends, and it's something he felt with his brother.

There was a lot of pressure in that house to be a leader and stand out. There was an awful lot of weight put on the family and the family's reputation.

Hopefully, by the end of the season, you felt Luke's struggle with that.

We start with the more innocent boy we met on Cruel Summer Season 2 Episode 1, and then we see how complicated and messed up his life became. And then we see him walking from the cabin to the dock and being pummeled by the people he's let down. The images of the issues now, and you feel his struggles.

By the time he gets to that final confrontation with his brother, we see this isn't who he wants to be. He wants to be a better person and not follow the legacy of what he's been raised with.

Unfortunately, it's too late.

Speaking of the legacy, Luke contacted Brent out of anyone to help him on the dock, even though he's pushed against his family and that world. Why did he turn to Brent and someone in his family in his darkest moment?

Brent is kind of an asshole to him, but when the chips are down, Brent comes through.

You know, when Isabella broke up with him before his birthday, Brent threw this killer party. You see the two of them when they aligned against their father.

Blood does run deep. And yet, Luke is a little surprised he did show up. I think their mother's death changed that family, and at that the end of the day, that's sometimes the only people you can count on.

Yes! And one of the big Chambers family secrets got revealed with Luke and Brent's mother being drunk and causing the car accident. It showed how much more of Steve's control was on the family and the pressure the family had on Luke and Brent to live up to that family legacy.

Right! And also the terrible legacy that was put on Luke, which wasn't true!

That. in some way, he was messing around and caused the accident.

That's a horrible, horrible thing to have on your shoulders your entire life. For people to think your mother's death was your fault, even though you know that's not true.

He was a little kid; that was pretty awful.

Luke was planning to reveal the truth and not keep the secrets about what happened to his mother. Do you feel in some way Steve was happy that Luke was silenced and unable to say anything?

No, I think he realized certainly by the end; he seemed pretty devasted.

Even if you want to take the fact that he had the best intentions for his family's long-term health, he made some crucial and awful mistakes. He does love his kids.

He'd much rather have two sons alive and well than have this mess he found himself in at the end.

Cruel Summer is an anthology show, and hopefully, the show returns for a new season. But for this storyline on Cruel Summer Season 2, if it had continued, where would you hope the characters would go next with their lives and their mystery?

It's certainly too early to say what's in store for a potential Cruel Summer Season 3.

But as you said, this is an anthology. And to me, this story is done.

You can certainly wonder if Megan will get justice for Luke by taking down Isabella. If you look at Cruel Summer Season 1, you might wonder what happened with those characters going forward, but to me, it's all very close-ended.

I will say that Megan has that tape. She has the evidence. She's going to turn it in to the authorities.

Well, if the cinematic universe of all the Cruel Summer worlds comes together and happens, I hope one day we will see the shining moment of Megan taking Isabella down. [Laughs]

Yes. [Laughs]

Cruel Summer Season 2 is available to stream now on Hulu. Also, you can watch Cruel Summer online via TV Fanatic to catch up on the entire mystery!

Justin Carreiro was a staff writer for TV Fanatic. Follow him on X.