Simon has reached stagnancy in his life. His young boss lets him go, and a teenager is bullying him. We might think that this is what rock bottom in the life of a 56-year-old man looks like, but as Murphy’s law suggests, anything that could go wrong does go wrong in Simon’s already miserable life. Coma captures the series of misfortunes that Simon runs into. He is not a man with bad intentions, and believers in Karma can’t even blame his adversities on actions he might’ve committed in the past. That’s just who Simon is. But perhaps that is what leads to the world taking advantage of a gullible man down on his luck. But as the ways of the world work, he keeps getting caught in a web of lies—the kind he cannot seem to get out of. Coma series shows how unfair the world can be and how the powerful often prey on the weak.
Spoilers Ahead
What Is Simon’s Story?
Simon is a middle-aged man living in a quaint neighborhood in Birmingham with his wife, Beth, and daughter, Sophie. He was recently laid off by his boss, Jimmy, who is probably half his age, under the pretext of his job being made redundant. Even his payoff has been delayed by Jimmy, which in turn delays his mortgage as well. Having had a history of serious anxiety and panic attacks, it makes sense why Simon is so scared to stand up for himself. He decides to stand up against a group of teenagers harassing a homeless man; however, the unruly teenagers chase him off instead. The same night, outside Simon’s house, the group of teenagers from earlier were trying to steal a car. Simon tries to confront one of them, and while the rest of the guys run away, Jordan, the leader of these goons, recognizes Simon from earlier and harasses him. Out of concern for his family’s safety, he even installed a camera on his front porch the following day.
The next day, while playing at the park, Sophie injures herself by falling on smashed bottles left behind by unruly kids. Simon confronts them, but his concerns are dismissed by the kids. In the night again, Jordan shows up at Simon’s doorstep and begins to blatantly accuse him of being a pedophile and humiliate him. Simon had lost his job that day and was about to default on the mortgage as well. He couldn’t take it anymore, and he impulsively punched Jordan. The kid ends up falling to the ground, hitting his head. Realizing what he had done, he tries to resuscitate Jordan but is intercepted by the police, who think he is helping the child.
As it turns out, Jordan is the son of Paul Franklin, the owner of a security firm and a gangster. Because of Simon’s attempts to help the boy, Jordan survives the incident but ends up in a coma. In the moment, Simon cooks up a lie that he saw someone running away when he found Jordan unconscious outside his house. As the story progresses, Paul and his wife end up thinking that Simon is the savior of their son. However, Paul is also focused on finding out who hurt his son.
Why Does Harry Not Inform The Police About Simon?
After Jordan is hospitalized, Simon keeps getting swept into this web of deceit. He’s not the kind of man who would approve of this, but he has no choice. On one end, Paul Franklin is getting close to finding out about his son, and on the other, his neighbor Harry White reveals that he saw Simon when he hit Jordan. However, Harry is an old man and suffers from severe dementia. When officer Kelly arrives at Harry’s house because he called about information on the assault, Harry makes up a lie as well. Upon being asked by Simon, he reveals that Simon had always been nice to his wife when she was alive. Of course, Harry doesn’t approve of the situation, but as a man of experience, even he understands how much of an ordeal it must’ve been for Simon as well.
How Does Beth Find Out The Truth?
Ever since Jordan’s assault, Simon has been acting differently. To be fair, Simon was getting a lot of attention, even being revered as a hero for saving the boy’s life. Simon, however, was not fond of it. He was suffering because he knew what he had done. In fact, he was very much struggling between wanting the boy dead and confessing his crime to the police. If it were someone else, they would’ve hatched a scheme to kill the child, but Simon wasn’t anyone else. Being his spouse, Beth knew something was sincerely wrong. Simon has had a history of severe anxiety disorder, and at first she suspects he’s suffering from those again, but after she finds out that Simon has been lying about his whereabouts, she confronts him about it. Likewise, Simon ends up confessing the whole ordeal to his wife. He believes that his wife would leave him with their daughter, but instead she believes that they can fight this together.
How Does Simon Get His Severance Pay-Off?
Simon’s boss, Jimmy, was particularly against him and had been stalling Simon’s pay-off as well, which was adding to his series of misfortunes. Simon, being a pushover who struggles with standing up for himself, often ended up being manipulated by Jimmy. After the incident with Jordan, Paul ended up taking a liking for Simon. Paul, the gangster, was the man who saved his son, and despite his eccentric ways, Paul could see the woes that Simon was going through with his job and his money not being transferred. Paul encourages Simon to confront Jimmy, which he does at his farewell party, which Jimmy does not like at all.
After another attempt to get his money, Simon threatens Jimmy with a lawsuit. Jimmy instead frames Simon as having assaulted him in the bathroom of the pub during his farewell. During another meeting with Simon, Paul gets to know what Jimmy is doing. Without Simon’s knowledge, he visits Jimmy’s house and threatens him to get him off Simon’s back. The next day, Jimmy apologizes to Simon and immediately transfers his payoff to him.
What Happens When Jordan Wakes Up?
Simon was hoping that Jordan would stay comatose for longer, but once again, tragedy strikes when the boy ends up waking up. Initially, Jordan doesn’t remember anything about what happened that fateful night. But, when Simon pays him a visit upon Paul’s request, Jordan reveals that he remembers everything, clarifying that he now owns Simon. Jordan plans to use Simon as he wishes, threatening Simon that he’ll reveal everything to Paul if Simon doesn’t comply.
How Does Paul Find Out About The Truth?
Ever since Jordan woke up, Paul suspects his own son of foul play. Paul had another son, Danny, who died of leukemia when he was only 9. Danny was good at studying, which is why, after Jordan’s accident, Paul became stricter with him so that he put his nose in books instead of the world of crime that Paul worked in. That is why Paul asks his right-hand man, Mark along with his partner, to keep an eye on everything that Jordan does.
Meanwhile, Jordan blackmails Simon to give him five thousand pounds each month in return for keeping his mouth shut. When Simon and Jordan meet for the exchange, Mark spots him and confronts the boy about it while reporting the incident to his partner. Simon makes a run for it, but after a short chase, Mark is accidentally run over by Beth’s car instead. After Mark goes missing, Paul is informed about Simon and Jordan being seen together exchanging money. He heads back home to question his son about it and walks in on him snorting cocaine and buying a bunch of expensive stuff. Upon being asked by Paul, Jordan confesses that it was indeed Simon who had hit him.
Why Does Paul Spare Simon?
Having received his money, Simon and his family contemplate moving to Florida temporarily, where Beth’s sister lives, but after Mark’s accident, they need to immediately go into hiding. To avoid getting found out by Paul and his men, they check-in at a hotel, but then Sophie ends up having an asthma attack, making it difficult for her to breathe. Realizing that she left her inhaler at home, Simon is forced to go back home despite the danger of being found out by Paul. He goes back home and retrieves the inhaler, but before he can leave, Paul and his men break into the house looking for Simon. Paul, however, finds the hotel keycard, which Simon dropped earlier. Paul heads to the hotel to find Simon, but Beth had already figured out that Paul was at the hotel and made a run for it.
Back at the house, as soon as Paul’s men leave, Simon heads to meet with his family. However, he is struck down by Jordan, who is humiliated by how Paul treated him, blaming it on Simon. He throws a few punches at Simon, but then Harry shows up and stabs the boy. Realizing what had just happened, Simon asks Harry to call the ambulance while he tries his best to save Jordan from bleeding to death. As expected, Jordan survives with minimal blood loss, but since the cat is out of the bag, Kelly takes Simon into custody for obstruction of justice. After a week or so, Kelly mentions to him that Jordan has confessed that it was someone else who stabbed him. She asks Simon for the truth, but he denies all charges, thus acquitting him of any charges as well.
As he steps out of the police station, Simon is picked up by Paul, who takes him to a deserted warehouse where he plans to shoot the man. Simon begs for his forgiveness; he has not confessed to anything, and he even intends to leave Birmingham and move somewhere far away. Paul attempts to kill him but shoots just above his head, sparing his life. Paul reveals that he lives with his son, but Jordan is a difficult kid. In a way, maybe Paul is indebted to Simon because, even after everything Jordan did to him, Simon stayed back and tried to save the boy’s life. Paul might’ve been a gangster, but he didn’t want his son to turn out to be like him at all. Maybe Paul even spared Simon’s life to set an example for his own son to make a difference from the criminal ways that they were acquainted with. With his life being spared, Simon and his family leave their lives in Birmingham and move away together. After a series of misfortunes, Simon was finally in the clear. He finally got his money, and that was enough of it, but he wanted a house somewhere else.
