How The Mist’s Ending Proves Mrs. Carmody Was Right

The Mist‘s Mrs. Carmody is one of the most hateful villains in horror history, but the movie’s ending suggests she might’ve been right all along. Horror movies often live and die on the strength of their villain, probably more than any other genre. While the most memorable villains are often of the supernatural variety – including the Lovecraftian monsters in The Mist itself – Mrs. Carmody is an example of a horror villain that’s capable of being disgustingly evil, all while being entirely human.

Carmody is so easy to hate with a passion that back when The Mist came out in 2007, there were widespread reports of spontaneous outbursts of clapping and cheering from inside movie theaters across the U.S when she was shot dead. Stephen King has crafted religious zealot villains before, most notably with Margaret White in Carrie, but Mrs. Carmody, played to perfection by Marcia Gay Harden in The Mist movie, is arguably his most easily detestable example of a villain that believes God is on their side.

The thing is though, as much as everyone hates Carmody, it’s quite possible she was onto something. That might sound ridiculous, but a certain way of reading The Mist‘s infamously shocking ending seems to vindicate her fire and brimstone declarations of God’s wrath and what must be done to stop it.

How The Mist’s Ending Proves Mrs. Carmody Was Right

Throughout The Mist, Mrs. Carmody insists that the monsters are essentially the wrath of God, and that to end the terrifying phenomenon, sacrifices must be made. Near the end, she specially says that David’s son Billy and love interest Amanda need to be the sacrifices in question if the mist is to recede. While on the surface, that demand just seems like Carmody targeting those yet to fall under her spell, one interpretation of The Mist‘s final moments suggests she was right all along.

It’s not until a despondent and hopeless David and his car full of fellow survivors resolve to kill themselves instead of be ripped apart by the monsters, followed by David using the last of his remaining bullets to put the others down, that the mist clears. It happens almost out of nowhere, mere moments after both Billy and Amanda have been killed, leaving David to mentally snap and scream his lungs out. At first The Mist‘s ending just seems like a fairly cheap twist, meant to go “gotcha” at the audience, although it’s worth noting that Stephen King liked it. But, it’s quite possible that the mist only began evaporating once Carmody’s chosen sacrifices to God had been made.

About The Author