Netflix’s Purple Hearts: its ending, explained

Purple Hearts is a military romance movie released on July 29, 2022 and is the current Top movie on the platform. Let’s see what the romantic ending is all about.

Cassie and Luke’s whirlwind romance… or not?

Cassandra Salazar is a hardworking girl. Working at a bar and writing songs with her band, The Loyal, she has dreams to make it big in music. But she’s dealing with type 1 diabetes and a growing medical bill.

Luke Marrow is a recently enlisted Marine waiting for deployment to Iraq in 2 weeks. He has a troubled past with drugs. That’s why, looking for mutual benefits, they both come into a marriage of convenience, just a day before deployment.

But what is that mutually benefitting arrangement?

Cassie doesn’t gel well with the Marine’s group because of differing opinions when they come in bar. When her medical bill piles up once more, she remembers that a Marine joked her friend to marry him for health benefits.

Cassie goes Frankie, a friend and Marine, to get help. Luke is there and ridicules Cassie’s plan. However, Luke himself is being chased down by Johnno, his past drug dealer for 15 grand, threatening to harm his family. He approaches Cassie to get married so she’ll get medical treatment and he’ll get extra pay for spouse.

The first few days and weeks of being married

Marrying soldiers for benefits is a crime. The two of them had to be extra careful and diligent. They made appearances before and at deployment, wrote emails, texts and video called.

Soon, their conversations flew naturally. Luke indirectly became Cassie’s muse, and her song for it rocked the charts. Cassie’s happiness started filling him light in his dark times. But then a tragedy struck.

Cassie got a call that Luke had been injured and was moving back. She unknowingly went to his incommunicado father. Luke’s leg was shattered and he’d be needing rehabilitation to get back in shape. Being his wife, Cassie took him in, an arrangement his father didn’t like initially.

But Cassie got to know that Frankie didn’t make it out alive.

Living together and helping each other

Although they had disagreements, both lived together well. Cassie worked on her career and Luke on his betterment and reconnecting with family, while supporting each other. His father seemed to believe their marriage too.

But one day, Johnno broke into Cassie’s mother’s house. Luke went to him, gave him the money and asked him not to repeat the stunt again. By then, Luke’s feelings for Cassie had grown.

Cassie moves out and Luke’s detainment

When Cassie finds about the whole thing, she moves out. And that day Luke gets called in for fraud. A court hearing is scheduled, Cassie present too.

Johnno has taken revenge by submitting evidence of their fake marriage. Luke takes all responsibility on himself and asks the judge to spare Cassie of any trial. He’s sentenced 6 months and discharge from Marines for bad conduct. Cassie is heartbroken about this all.

Cassie’s major gig and realization

Luke is given a week’s time to prepare. Meanwhile, Cassie is preparing for her opening act for Florence and the Machine concert on the same day. During her act, she realizes her love for Luke.

After her gig, she rushes out to the base where Luke is saying his goodbyes. She goes to him and confesses her love and tells him that she’ll wait for for him to come back to her. They part with a promise of future and love.

Do they get together in the end?

They both definitely do! The ending credits are shown with Luke and Cassie together, going to the beach with their dog. They look absolutely in love and happy together.

While critics and audience seem to be divided on their stance, the film is still doing great. Director Elizabeth Allen Rosenbaum says she wanted to make a romance which also showed people the realities of life. In an interview with Cherry Picks,

“…Both characters are struggling in their own way… Within our love story, there’s a layer where we explore these social and political issues, and I’m hoping people will feel seen and identified in their own way when they are watching the film.”