Animal Kingdom’s Shock Season 4 Death Explained

Animal Kingdom season 4 bid a shocking farewell to a main character, but which Cody family member met their maker? Characters dying on TNT’s über-violent crime drama Animal Kingdom isn’t necessarily a surprise. The show is based on the Sundance Award-winning Australian film of the same name directed by David Michôd (The King), which was in turn inspired by the exploits of real-life Australian crime family the Pettingills.

Consequently, there’s no shortage of violence or death on Animal Kingdom. Throughout Animal Kingdom’s four seasons, the show has racked up an impressive body count and has shown no mercy when it comes to killing off characters both major and minor. But when you’re part of a family like the Cody clan – who spend most of their time either committing heists or stabbing each other in the back – that’s to be expected.

Animal Kingdom set the tone that none of its characters were safe early on with the death of Catherine (Daniella Alonso) at the hands of Pope (Shawn Hatosy) in season 1, and later when adopted Cody sibling Baz (Scott Speedman) succumbed to a gunshot wound in the season 3 premiere. Not even family matriarch Janine “Smurf” Cody (Ellen Barkin) was safe as her death in Animal Kingdom season 4 proved.

Just a few episodes into Animal Kingdom season 4 it was revealed Smurf had terminal cancer, so it wasn’t really a case of her death being shocking but rather the circumstances of how it came to be. As any fan of Animal Kingdom could’ve probably predicted, Smurf wasn’t about to go gently into that good night – she was going to go out with a bang, quite literally.

Accordingly, Smurf plotted an elaborate last hurrah that involved stealing a load of stockpiled gold from Jed (Joseph Morgan) – the survivalist brother of her one true love Colin and Pope’s uncle – whilst getting revenge on him for attempting to rape her years ago. It was pretty obvious Smurf planned the heist as a suicide mission so it was surprising when she didn’t go down in a blaze of gunfire as planned when Pope dragged her away to safety.

At the end of Animal Kingdom’s penultimate season 4 episode, an enraged and unhinged Smurf ordered Pope to kill her and threatened to shoot him if he didn’t. Pope refused but before Smurf could make good on her threat, she was shot dead by her grandson J (Finn Cole). As shocking as Smurf’s death was, it’s going to have a major impact going forward into the fifth season of Animal Kingdom and the fallout will be amazing to witness.