Written and directed by Dharmaraj Shetty and starring Keerthy Suresh (Mahanati), Radhika Apte (Raat Akeli Hai), and Tanvi Azmi (Thappad), the five-episode series Akka follows the matriarchs of a society that’s been ruled by women for 800 years. That is, until their dealings with gangsters lead to their society being threatened. Five episodes, one gold-draped matriarchy, and a finale that leaves a lot of bodies on the floor. Read on to find out how the series wraps up, and get the answers to all your burning questions.

What happens in Akka?

Akka begins in Pernuru in 1947, a fictional kingdom lying between the Arabian Sea and the Western Ghats. Pernuru has been ruled exclusively by women ever since the king (and all the region’s men) perished while at war in the Deccan, eight centuries ago, when the king’s sisters took the throne. In the absence of men, the kingdom’s women took on all the work the men used to do, even learning traditional martial arts to protect themselves.

Since then, three sisters of each generation have been appointed to rule each region — Malemar (House of Fields), Perplady (House of Seas), and Herkada (House of Mountains). Matriarchy can only be passed down to daughters, marriage isn’t a societal norm, and the literacy rates are sky-high. Pernuru is rich, while other villages are decimated in the aftermath of the Indian independence struggle. By 1947, when India is no longer under colonial rule and the government asks princely kingdoms to join the union, Pernuru’s matriarchs at the time — Mutthakka (Tanvi Azmi), Duggamma (B. Jayashree), and Subbamma (Nivedita Bhargava) — negotiate the protection of their kingdom: They promise to pay the Indian government a tax in return for no interference. For the people of Pernuru, there’s only one rule: The matriarchy must be protected at all costs. 

Cut to the mid-1980s: Bhavani (Keerthy Suresh) sits in the Tehsildar’s office in Mumbai in 1985, as an officer yet again awards her kingdom the sole contract for producing and selling liquor. It hasn’t been an easy win, as her blood-streaked gold hair pin indicates — even though her kingdom of Pernuru has remained unchallenged on this matter for decades. But when, minutes earlier, Bhavani and her tribe of warrior women slaughtered a group of Mumbai gangsters who dared to challenge their claim, she set in motion a chain of events that will eventually cost her nearly everything she holds dear in life.

Bhavani returns to Pernuru from Mumbai feeling victorious, just as Kaveri (Saisha Salvi) is being crowned the next Akka — the name for the matriarchal rulers in the region. But trouble is brewing in the west: a woman named Rudra (Radhika Apte) is planning her revenge. She and Mumbai don Shankar Anna (Mahesh Manjrekar) were the ones who attempted to thwart Bhavani’s liquor business. But because Bhavani quashed their plans, Rudra convinces Shankar Anna to send her to Pernuru to overtake the kingdom. To Bhavani, Rudra is a mere stranger. In reality, she’s anything but. Rudra is the estranged daughter of Mutthakka’s brother, Padmanna, and Mutthakka is Bhavani’s mother — making Rudra and Bhavani cousins. 

How does Akka end?

After engineering rampant violence that takes everyone but Bhavani and a handful of Pernuru’s women; ruthless, relentless subterfuge that decimates Pernuru’s gold and liquor trades; and a bloody duel that does not go her way, Rudra decides to strike directly. She gathers as many of the men of Pernuru as she can and invades people’s homes. But just when it appears that the patriarchy is about to win in Perplady, Bhavani shows up with reinforcements. The bitter battle ends with Amar being killed by the mother of the now-dead Kaveri, Devika (Poornima Indrajith), while Rudra takes her own life by biting into a cyanide pill as she’s cornered by Bhavani. The series ends with a bittersweet victory for Bhavani: She succeeds in performing her duty to protect Pernuru, but loses all that she desires — particularly the man that she loves, Nanda (Vishak Nair), whom she’s compelled by duty and honor to kill because of his betrayal after he joined those attempting to overthrow Pernuru. 

What fueled Rudra’s rage?

Rudra is Bhavani’s cousin, and her mother, Kusuma, was a poor woman from the Yeruma tribe, which dwells in the hills around Pernuru. Kusuma’s relationship with Bhavani’s uncle, Padmanna, was forbidden under the kingdom’s customs. When Padmanna takes his own life after Mutthakka forbids him to marry Kusuma, the pregnant Kusuma runs away in a bid to survive the matriarch’s wrath. While Mutthakka adopted young Nanda and banished the entire tribe to pay for her grief, Rudra grew up the hard way, shunned by the very family that she felt should have claimed her, too. 

So Rudra grows up and takes matters into her own hands, desperate to turn Pernuru’s own people against one another. She recruits resentful men, among them Bhavani’s cousin Amar (Anshuman Pushkar) — who’d sent out the challenging bid for the liquor license to begin with — and Bhavani’s lover, Nanda — Rudra’s brother, who feels betrayed when Bhavani tries to have a child outside their relationship. Rudra also wrecks Bhavani’s supply chain, has Bhavani's adoptive mother Mutthakka killed, poisons the two other elderly Akkas, and lures all the sisters (save two) to their deaths. Until her own bitter end, Rudra blames the Akkas for her hardships.

Who is Shankar?

Shankar Anna is a powerful gangster in Mumbai. He encourages Amar’s bid for the liquor license early on in the series, and influences Rudra to help Amar make Shankar become even more powerful by opening a new trade channel. In that first conversation between Shankar and Rudra, it’s hinted that he has roots in Pernuru. In the epilogue to Akka, after Bhavani calls Shankar to warn him that she’s about to breach his boundaries, Shankar reveals a secret to Bhavani: He’s her father, and he’s ready to fight her for power over Pernuru. 

Does Bhavani prevail?

In that final battle, Bhavani forms an unexpected alliance with the warrior women of the Kathawa tribe. Decades ago, the women served the Akka until a young Mutthakka staked claim on land that the Kathawa believed to be sacred to their goddess. When the tribe’s leader went up against Mutthakka, she questioned their loyalty, leading to their banishment from Pernuru and years of hardship. Bhavani approaches the Kathawa women with an offer to restore their former power in the kingdom, and as a result they agree to fight on her behalf.

As the leader of Pernuru, Bhavani is forced to reckon with what’s left of the carnage, though, and to reconsider notions of tradition, loyalty, and inheritance — as well as redraw the boundaries of Pernuru by negotiating an alliance with the Kathawa and Yeruma tribes. In the end, she rights Mutthakka’s wrongs and emerges as a true leader once again.

Why does Bhavani kill Nanda?

Nanda had always maintained that he wants nothing more than a simple domestic life, married to Bhavani while farming the land. While Bhavani wanted them to have a daughter, he refused to have one unless they were married. In more desperate times, when significant chunks of the clans have been killed, including heir-apparent Kaveri, Bhavani tries to get pregnant by sleeping with someone else in order to keep the hereditary lines alive. 

Nanda gets word of this and, feeling betrayed, runs to his sister Rudra and eventually decides to join the men revolting against Pernuru. Later, Bhavani tracks Nanda down, conveys to him the heartbreak he caused, and shoots him. Nanda was holding a child, a baby girl, and Bhavani whisks her away and adopts her, making the child the next in line for the throne.