The 6 Main Suspects For Andrea's Killer on The Night Of

Updated on Aug 22, 2016 at 6:30 PM

Your prestigious TV addiction is about to suffer a great loss: there's only one episode left of The Night Of. The crime thriller stars Riz Ahmed as Naz, a shy college student with maybe the worst luck ever: after a chance night on the town with a beautiful stranger, he wakes up from a drug-induced haze to find his new friend murdered. There's blood all over him and he runs out of fear, and before you can say Making a Murderer, Naz is in jail as the very obvious prime suspect. Or is he? We spend "the night of" with him, and it seems pretty clear that this kid is no murderer. But who else could it have been? Ahead of the finale, we have a few theories for the potential killer.

Nasir Khan

Combine bad luck with even worse decision making, and there's Naz (Riz Ahmed). He's the prime suspect and the main character, and it would seem like the focus on his apprehension and his getting a lawyer (John Turturro) is meant to prove his innocence. But we pretty much still only know what Naz knows, so here's how the evidence stacks up right now.

Why It Could Be Him:

Naz takes drugs with the victim, Andrea Cornish, then takes her home, where they do more drugs and drink. When he wakes up the next morning, Andrea's dead. The blank space in his memory is the first thing that points to his possible guilt. If he isn't sure he didn't do it, can we be?
He runs. Naz is understandably scared, but why doesn't he call the police? A smart kid must know that there would be ways to trace him back to the crime scene eventually. Instead, he runs, gets stopped by the police and then taken to the crime scene and then the police station, where the presumed murder weapon (!) is found in his jacket. He never says anything first, making him look so guilty.
Before Naz blacks out, he and Andrea have sex, and their foreplay consists of some knife play wherein he accidentally stabs her hand. After things heat up even more, is it possible they continued it upstairs and things went way too far, with Naz on drugs he had (probably) never tried before?
The toxicology results reveal that Naz had another amphetamine in his system that Andrea didn't give him. He sort of cops to Stone's suggestion that he took Adderall as a stressed college student, but this could be an indication that Naz isn't as squeaky clean as we thought.

Why It Might Not Be Him:

We spend all day with Naz, getting to know him outside of the context of the crime. It could be a red herring so we build sympathy for the real killer, but the look into Naz's life appears to show that he's not a killer. He's a promising student, so smart he's a tutor, living with his family in Queens. But if we were cops? He looks so. Freaking. Guilty.

Duane Reade

Yep, this guy is actually named Duane Reade; he's one of the guys who encounters Naz and Andrea on the street and tosses a racial slur at Naz. One of them, Trevor, is the only one to come forward as a witness, which set off our initial suspicion of him.

Why It Could Be Him:

When he's with Trevor that night, Trevor does all the talking, and then camera rests on Duane, staring intently at the door after Naz and Andrea go in the house. At first it seems like all the glowering will mean that he's memorizing Naz's face and will be a witness later, but when Andrea's body is discovered, he's nowhere to be found. Were they casing the neighborhood?
Duane's absence after this scene — and Trevor's cover-up — is his implication. First, Trevor tells Sgt. Box he was walking alone, and he also maintains that when he meets the prosecutor.
When Stone finds Duane to question him, he runs. Suspect!

Why It Might Not Be Him:

We don't know anything else about this guy except that he glowers. He glowers hard.

Andrea Cornish

We acknowledge that this is the least likely theory, but that's what makes it so interesting. We don't know a lot about Andrea (Sofia Black-D'Elia), but we do know that she seems very troubled, engages in casual drug use, and seems pretty wealthy. Here's why we think she could be her own killer.

Why It Could Be Her:

Thinking Andrea stabbed herself so many times is pretty implausible, but what if she had it set up? We know she could afford it. The drugs she has at her disposal also imply that she may have some dark connections.
On the night she meets Naz, she seems deeply depressed and asks to go to the beach. Would she have killed herself there first if not for Naz's company? Then she says she can't be alone tonight. Is that because she fears she will kill herself?

Why It Might Not Be Her:

If you were going to have someone kill you, I don't think you would choose to go out that way.
Again: this one is highly unlikely, but there it is.

The Neighbor

Another prime witness, Andrea's neighbor, is the one who calls the cops. It could be a classic red herring.

Why It Could Be Him:

The neighbor could have had the access to the home, and it would be great misdirection. Also, the way he looks out after Naz breaks the glass is way too calm.

Why It Might Not Be Him:

It seems pretty unlikely, especially since he does call the cops.

The Hearse Guy

At first, the hearse driver was merely creepy in the pilot, but after Chandra meets with him, we know our initial suspicions were there for a reason.

Why It Could Be Him:

His line about smoking to Andrea could be perceived as threatening.
The security footage at the gas station shows both cars leaving at the same time, and it looks like he follows Andrea and Naz out of the gas station.
When Chandra tracks down the hearse driver at his "office" (where he paints the nails of a corpse wile talking to her), he says of Andrea: "I saw her for the destroyer she was and I did not like that." He also talks about how you have to strike first with women like her, calls Naz a plaything of hers, and then quotes the Bible passage about Samson and Delilah. Could he, as a religious fanatic, have killed Andrea in a fervent, religion-motivated murder?

Why It Might Not Be Him:

He could have just gone on his own way after the gas station.

Don Taylor

We meet Andrea's stepfather in episode two, and frankly, he seems very unmoved by her death. He's apparently her only living relative, giving us more of a picture of the slain young woman. He also suspects that the police are calling him for something else bad she may have done, showing his opinion of her isn't very high.

Why It Could Be Him:

We know that Don was the much-younger husband of Andrea's mother Evelyn, and that he got nothing when she died; in fact, Andrea got the brownstone she was murdered in, while Don lives out in Queens. When Stone visits Evelyn's accountant, he says that Andrea told Don he would get Evelyn's money "over her dead body." Oh, and he screams at the CPA at Andrea's funeral about it. That's the most solid motive we have. He has a history of violence, and he threatens Stone when he pokes around at the gym, so he's our most likely candidate at this point.

Why It Might Not Be Him:

Right now, there aren't a lot of solid reasons for why it's not him. Don Taylor, you're our favorite suspect.