The Åre Murders Ending Explained: Who Killed Amanda and Johan?

The Åre Murders, based on Viveca Sten’s book, revolves around two murders that shake the titular Swedish town. Hanna Ahlander, a Stockholm police officer is the protagonist. She gets suspended from the police force and to make matters worse, gets abandoned by her boyfriend. 

To escape all her troubles, she heads to Åre to isolate in her sister’s vacation home. But when she finds that a young woman has gone missing, she can’t help but jump in to help with Daniel Lindskog, the lead investigator of the town. But does she solve the murder? What actually happened in the end? And what about the other murder case? In this article, we will discuss all of that. 

What are the Murder Cases in Åre?

Two murders happen- one is the disappearance and death of young Amanda, who goes missing while returning home from a party. The second murder is of Johan Andersson, a former skier. The two cases seem unrelated because Johan’s murder happened weeks after Amanda’s disappearance. 

Who killed Amanda?

Amanda disappears the same night Hanna shows up in town. On the night of her disappearance, Amanda tried to call her father, Harald. But he didn’t answer his phone because he was sleeping with his coworker. So, Amanda left her friend Ebba’s home alone on a bike, only to be found dead the next day. 

Amanda’s murder mystery finally gets solved when Hanna finds out that Amanda was helping Zuhra, a cleaning service worker who Amanda had last spoken to before disappearing. Zuhra worked for Annika Risberg, a cleaning company owner. 

At Annika’s house, Hanna finds her husband, Bosse, who leads a missing persons NGO. Hanna tells him that the police are investigating reports of thefts made by tourists and so they are speaking to cleaning service providers. Further investigations and interrogations lead to the revelation that Zuhra had come to town to work and send money back to her family. 

But she found out that she was drowning in debt while working for the cleaning company. This made her steal items from the clients’ homes. Amanda discovered that Zuhra was stealing from her home too. Thankfully, she wasn’t angry upon learning this. 

Instead, she took the stolen items, sold them, and sent the money to Zuhra’s mother. This wasn’t the only problem Zuhra was facing. The biggest one was that Bosse had Zuhra’s passport, which meant that she couldn’t go back. But how did this come to be?

Annika’s cleaning company was struggling financially so Bosse took it over and instead of keeping it a clean business, he indulged in criminal activities like human trafficking. Amanda wanted to confront Bosse and demand that he give back Zuhra’s passport. 

That night, when Amanda was on her bike alone, Bosse stopped by with his car and offered to drive her home. She put her bike in his trunk and they went on a different route. In the car, Bosse tried to convince Amanda that he was actually helping Zuhra and her family. 

But Amanda didn’t believe him and threatened to expose his deeds. This made Bosse strangle her to death when she tried to escape from the car. Ultimately, Bosse got caught when he went to Zuhra’s home after finding out that she was robbing the clients of the company- the tourists. 

He arrived there with a gun, which accidentally went off and a bullet hit Zuhra. Thankfully Hanna was there and even though Bosse tried to flee in his car, Hanna chased him down. The police caught him and he confessed to Amanda’s murder. 

Who Killed Johan?

The fourth episode deals with the murder of Johan Andersson, a 35 year old former skier whose dismembered body parts are found near the train tracks. It was determined in the beginning that he died due to a harsh blow to the back of his head with a blunt or flat object. 

After investigations, it is found that Johan, who was the stepfather to Leo and was married to Marion was having an affair with Rebecka, the wife of Pastor Ole Nordhammar. She was abused by the pastor and due to the affair with Johan, was going to have his child. 

When Johan came to know about this, he promised to be with her. So, he went to Marion to break it off with her. But her son, Leo, heard him and in a fit of sadness and rage killed him by hitting him with a shovel when he went to his car. Then Marion and Jens, Leo’s biological father and Marion’s ex-husband, took Johan’s body in a restaurant car and placed it on the train tracks. 

The passing train dismembered his body. The police arrested Marion and Leo and took them to the station. So, the two cases of Amanda and Johan were not related.