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| Below: Do Mary and Noah Get Married? The Truth About His Missing Ring. |
Netflix’s Below gives Mary and Noah’s relationship an unexpected twist when a missing engagement ring threatens to derail their future together. Noah arrives in Snook’s Arm intending to ask Mary to marry him, but a series of bizarre events, a mysterious illness and the disappearance of his grandmother’s ring leave his carefully planned proposal in tatters. Fortunately, the situation turns out to be more complicated than a simple case of misplaced jewellery. While the town struggles with a dangerous sea creature and the chaos surrounding it, Noah must decide whether he can tell Mary how he feels without the one thing he believes he needs to make the moment special.
Mary brings Noah to Snook’s Arm to introduce him to her family, hoping the visit will strengthen their relationship rather than send him running for the nearest boat. She knows her relatives can be difficult, particularly when Calvin and Wade are involved, and she worries that Noah might find her hometown too isolated and her family too chaotic. Unfortunately, the unfolding crisis gives him plenty of reasons to question his surroundings. What Mary does not realise, however, is that Noah has already decided he wants to marry her. His nervousness has nothing to do with disliking her family. He is simply carrying an engagement ring and trying to work out how to propose without turning a family visit into an unforgettable disaster.
The ring belonged to Noah’s grandmother, making it more than an ordinary piece of jewellery. He has been carrying it for weeks, waiting for the right opportunity to ask Mary to marry him. Bringing it to Snook’s Arm seems sensible enough, as he hopes to win her family’s approval before taking their relationship to the next level.
But his romantic plans quickly fall apart when the ring disappears. Initially, Noah assumes he has misplaced it or accidentally dropped it somewhere. As the search becomes less promising, he begins to suspect that somebody has taken it. Naturally, the worst possible moment to lose an engagement ring is when you are surrounded by increasingly alarming events and have absolutely no time to investigate.
Matters become considerably worse when Noah falls seriously ill after consuming contaminated ice. Along with other affected residents, he is taken to the town hall while everyone waits for help from the mainland. His condition deteriorates, and the uncertainty surrounding the illness leaves him wondering whether he will survive.
With the possibility of losing everything hanging over him, Noah finally decides that he would rather tell Mary the truth than leave her without knowing how much she means to him. The missing ring is no longer the most important thing in his life. Compared with the prospect of never seeing Mary again, a proposal without jewellery suddenly seems like a perfectly reasonable compromise.
Noah gives Mary the empty ring box and explains that he had intended to propose to her. Although the ring itself has vanished, his feelings have not changed. Mary is deeply moved by his confession and immediately accepts his proposal.
The couple become engaged despite the frightening circumstances, proving that even a supernatural crisis cannot entirely ruin a romantic moment. It is hardly the picturesque engagement Noah originally imagined, but at least he manages to ask the question before events can interfere again. Mary and Noah do get engaged, and the absence of the ring does not prevent them from committing to a future together.
Thankfully, Noah eventually recovers from the mysterious illness. As the wider conspiracy surrounding Snook’s Arm begins to emerge and the immediate danger becomes more manageable, he and Mary have an opportunity to consider what their engagement means for their lives. Their relationship faces a more ordinary but equally important question: where should they build their future?
They have already put down a deposit on a place in the city, but Noah begins to recognise how deeply Mary remains connected to her family and hometown. Rather than insisting that she leave everything behind for their life together, he acknowledges that Snook’s Arm is where Mary truly belongs.
This does not mean Noah and Mary separate or abandon their plans to marry. Instead, they find a way to remain together while making room for the place that matters most to Mary. The couple are later seen spending time together in town, suggesting that they have reached an understanding about their future.
Noah's music career is developing in the city, so travelling between the two places may become part of their routine. It is not necessarily the simplest arrangement, but relationships are rarely improved by forcing one person to abandon everything they love. After surviving the events in Snook’s Arm, a little travelling probably seems like a fairly manageable inconvenience.
As for Noah’s missing engagement ring, its disappearance has a far stranger explanation than he could have anticipated. The person responsible is Maggie, an outsider connected to Little Pot Rock, whose history is tied to the abandoned settlement and its remaining inhabitants.
She has stayed behind since the community's resettlement roughly two decades earlier, and her interest in Wade grows after he is marked by Mudder, the enormous squid-like creature haunting the waters. Maggie’s father encourages the connection because he wants his daughter to have companionship and a possible future in the isolated settlement. Unfortunately for Noah, this unusual relationship also involves Maggie helping herself to other people's belongings.
While Wade is delirious from the mysterious illness, Maggie visits the house and takes several things that catch her attention. Among them are the Tetley tea box Mary has been looking for and, rather more significantly, Noah’s missing engagement ring. Maggie later brings Wade to Little Pot Rock, where the two develop a connection.
She gives him the ring as a token of their unconventional engagement, apparently seeing it as something meaningful for their own relationship. The gesture might be romantic from her perspective, but it is also a rather questionable way to acquire jewellery. Noah, meanwhile, has been left with an empty box and no idea that his grandmother's ring has become part of somebody else's relationship.
Wade eventually returns to Snook’s Arm after Calvin finds him and brings him home. The ring remains on Wade’s finger, serving as a reminder of his time with Maggie. When Noah recognises it, he confronts Wade and explains that it belongs to him.
Wade initially refuses to hand it over, insisting that Maggie gave it to him. From his perspective, the ring represents a connection he does not want to lose. However, once he understands that it was meant for Mary, he eventually gives it to his sister. The ring finally returns to the person it was intended for, bringing Noah's rather ridiculous jewellery saga to an end.
The journey of the ring adds an unexpectedly comic layer to a story otherwise filled with danger and unsettling mysteries. Noah loses it while planning a proposal, Maggie takes it during her visits, Wade treats it as a symbol of his connection to her, and Mary eventually gets it back.
A sentimental family heirloom somehow becomes caught up in an entirely separate relationship, travelling between people who each attach a different meaning to it. The ring has arguably experienced more relationship drama than its owner, which is impressive considering everything happening around Snook’s Arm. Still, its return reinforces the emotional point of Noah’s proposal: the commitment matters more than the object used to represent it.
Opinion: Below gives Mary and Noah a refreshingly imperfect engagement. Their story avoids the usual idea that a proposal must happen at the right place, with the right ring and under suitably romantic circumstances. Noah loses the jewellery, falls seriously ill and ends up confessing his intentions while trapped in a town hall during a crisis. It is hardly a wedding planner's dream, but it feels more meaningful because he finally stops worrying about getting everything right and tells Mary what he wants. The missing ring also provides a genuinely amusing subplot, especially when Wade decides to keep it because Maggie gave it to him.
Nobody seems particularly interested in asking where the jewellery came from until Noah turns up looking for it. The story does, however, leave room for questions about how Mary and Noah will manage their future between the city and Snook’s Arm. Their engagement is settled, but their long-term plans still require compromise. What do you think: was Noah right to propose without the ring, and would you choose hometown life or the city in Mary's position?