What Happened To Filip Inaros (Nagata) After The Expanse Finale?

One of the most interesting characters in The Expanse is Filip Inaros, the son of Marco Inaros and Naomi Nagata. He was first introduced as a teenager committing war crimes on behalf of his father’s Free Navy. However, as the series went on, the mental effects of committing mass murder weighed on him, as he eventually turned his back on his father in the season 6 finale. But what happened to Filip Inaros after The Expanse finale?

At first, Filip appeared to have died during the destruction of the Pella, but it was revealed that he escaped prior to that event. He changed his surname to Nagata, but there was nothing revealed about what he did or where he went after that. However, he may have started out fresh like what he did in the book.

The Expanse is one of the shows that stays true to the source material as much as it can. However, this change in Filip’s ending is one of the few changes they introduced to the series, but it was a welcome change because of how it allowed us to see more of how Filip matured into his own character and how his story can branch off from there.

What Happened To Filip Inaros After The Finale?

Filip Inaros is one of the most intriguing characters in The Expanse because we are talking about a character that was reared by an extremist father who cared more about his own goals than actually properly raising a son. In that sense, Filip practically grew up as an extremist himself but not because he wanted to. Instead, he only became such because that was what his father taught him was right.

True enough, when we were introduced to Filip in season 4 of The Expanse, he was committing war crimes on behalf of his father’s Free Navy. Filip was so in touch with his father’s visions and teachings that, in season 5, he rejected his own mother Naomi and imprisoned her in the Pella when all she wanted to do was to help her son realize that he needed to turn his back from what his father had been teaching him. 

While Naomi’s imprisonment may have allowed Filip and Naomi to form a bond, it still failed to eventually turn Filip away from the path of violence. Still, it had a lasting effect on the boy and how he eventually learned to think for himself by seeing things through his own eyes and not through the lenses that his father was making him wear throughout his entire life.

You cannot blame Filip for the way he was thinking throughout the series, as Marco was good at manipulating people. He manipulated Naomi and his son into committing acts of violence for his own selfish goals. That is why Marco and Naomi have a long history. Meanwhile, through his appearances from seasons 4 to 6, Filip engages in the execution of the Free Navy’s acts of terrorism, which includes Marco’s asteroid attacks on Earth that caused countless deaths.

We all know that Naomi was able to eventually free herself from Marco when she joined the Rocinante. Filip mirrors her mother’s decision by eventually separating himself from Marco to find his own path in life. This was something that both the books and the show were able to portray. However, the live-action series does it a little differently compared to the books.

In season 6, what happened was that there was a subplot that allowed Filip to gradually see his father for what he really was. Marco controversially abandons Ceres Station and the people there while stripping it of its resources and whatever he could ransack. 

While this happened in the books as well, the difference is that, in the books, the docks and the water supplies had already been destroyed when Earth and Mars took control over Ceres. But, in the series, what happened was that the dock explosions happened after Earth and Mars took over the station. This resulted in countless deaths, which Filip believed was the responsibility of the Inners.

After those events, Filip befriended someone named Tadeo, who was revealed to be the one who planted the bombs in Ceres on Marco’s orders. Filip found out about this and was shocked by the fact that his father was willing to kill the Belters he swore to protect just so he could gain a small advantage over their enemies. But the most surprising part was that he couldn’t believe that his father would keep this a secret from him.

In this case, we see Filip having a more focused character development in the sense that he was able to open his eyes to the different events that caused him to reconsider his father’s way of thinking as the right philosophy in life. The Ceres events essentially became the last straw for Filip, and that wasn’t something the books were able to properly show. In the books, Filip’s reasons for turning on Marco were more of an epiphany after nagging frustrations.

But what really happened to Filip Inaros after the events of the Season 6 finale? At first, we are led to believe that he died during the destruction of Pella. However, the truth is that he was actually able to escape the ship prior to its destruction.

After that, aside from the fact that he changed his name to Nagata, we were never shown what exactly he did. The finale neglected to indicate where Filip went or what he did with his life after the events that led to the destruction of the Free Navy. However, it’s reasonable to think that Filip either did the same thing he did in the books, or he simply followed a different path that would allow him to redeem himself for the sins of his past. 

What happened to Filip in The Expanse books?

While Filip still left Marco in both the books and the series, what you should know is that the books portrayed it in a less dramatic fashion. Unlike in the show, Filip did not open his eyes after the Ceres events. Instead, it was more of a series of mounting frustrations that allowed him to realize that his father had been manipulating him the entire time. 

In the books, Filip was discussing the attack on Callisto with a local in a bar while also asking what had happened to the Belters. That was when he realized that the Belters had lost a lot of people during the attack and that Filip himself lost a lot as well on behalf of his father. After leaving the bar, Filip realized that his father had been manipulating him the entire time.

Shortly after that, he received a call from his father telling him to return to the Pella immediately because they were going to hunt down James Holden and Naomi. Filip pretends that he is excited but drops his gun and communicator in a recycling bin following the call. He never returned to the Pella signs on as a workman at the local employment office using the Nagata surname instead, all while the Pella and the Free Navy are killed by the Ring.

So, as you can see, the way Filip Inaros left his father was more passive-aggressive in the books. However, he took a more active role in the show as he was involved in the final events of the series finale instead of trying to wipe his hands clean, just like what he did in the books.

Why Did They Change His Ending For TV Show?

The reason why they changed his ending for the show was probably to give more meaning to the way he turned his back on his father. There was more weight in the events that transpired during the time when Filip steadily realized his father was wrong compared to the passive-aggressive and somewhat sudden approach that the book used.

However, there are some people who believe that the reason why his ending changed was to make it more open-ended. An open-ended conclusion to Filip Inaros’ story in The Expanse could open more possibilities for his character in the future, especially if a spin-off series were to come.