Weapons has a somewhat happy ending; the villain is defeated, the children survive, and even though life will never be same, it’s allowed to continue. However, there’s something you’ve missed (spoilers to follow… obviously).
“This is a true story,” a young girl says in the opening narration of the new horror movie, explaining how 17 children woke up at 2:17am, left their homes, and never came back – and the case was never solved, with many suspecting the truth was covered up.
By the end, there’s a pretty simple answer behind what happened to them: “Aunt Gladys” (Amy Maddigan), a witch ostensibly related to Alex (Cary Christopher), put the children under her spell in a desperate bid to rejuvenate herself and stave off death.
Not only does it not work, but her penance calls for much more than a pound of flesh: she’s literally ripped apart by the kids after Alex sets them on her. That last part is really important, and it could explain why Weapons ends on a slightly ambiguous note.
Why the ending of Weapons is darker than you think
At the end of Weapons, the narrator reveals that Alex moved out of Maybrook to live with another (much nicer) aunt and his parents were institutionalized. Meanwhile, the kids under Aunt Gladys’ spell were left catatonic, with only some of them regaining the ability to speak years after they were freed.
Josh Brolin’s Archer was also briefly hypnotized by Gladys, but he went back to normal immediately after she died. So, why wouldn’t that happen to the kids too? Shouldn’t they have just snapped out of it?
Unlike Archer, who was manipulated by Gladys with unseen means, the kids were specifically controlled by Gladys’ ritual. She’d prick her finger on a thorn, take something from someone’s possession (a lock of hair, a piece of clothing – anything, really), wrap it around one of her sticks, and ring her bell. This is how she summoned them to the house.
As we see in another scene with Benedict Wong’s Marcus, when she snaps the twig, it turns her victim(s) into rage-fuelled… weapons, hurtling towards anyone Gladys wants to hurt.
This is how Alex targets Gladys: he pricks his finger, wraps her hair around the stick, and snaps it, unleashing the children from their basement-dwelling stupor and sending them on a bloody collision course with his “aunt.”
Herein lies the theory: by performing the spell and seizing control of the children, would they remain under Alex’s spell after Gladys’ death? Did he simply usurp her position of influence? Does he need to die in order for them to be truly free?
Think about it. The kids start talking again years after Alex moves away – could it be that the combination of time and distance loosened his unwitting grip over the 17 “Maybrook missing”?
You could argue that they were held under Gladys’ control for a substantial period, and if she was draining their life force for all of that time, it makes sense that they wouldn’t be completely fine (much like Alex’s mom and dad). But what if the ritual accidentally gave him control of all of Gladys’ living victims, and he’s none the wiser?
Speaking to Vanity Fair, director Zach Cregger couldn’t provide any answers about Gladys or her abilities. “I don’t know the answer, but I love that I don’t know the answer. I don’t need to know the answer. I just need to know that it’s all possible,” he said.
What do you think? Do you think there’s another explanation for the ending of Weapons?
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