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Heretical Ending Explained: Why did Mr. Reed keep Barnes and Paxton captive?

Sakege November 9, 2024

SPOILER WARNING: The following article reveals everything that happens in the Heretic ending, then we pray You have already seen the movie before continuing reading.

Belief is a powerful thing. The question is, what influences us to believe the things we believe? TO new horror movie called Heretic presents a theory that is undoubtedly thought-provoking and will likely prove maddening to some audiences.

He new movie 2024 from writers and directors Scott Beck and Bryan Woods, as well as from latest movie A24stars Hugh Grant as Mr. Reed, who engages visiting Mormon missionaries, Sister Barnes (Sophie Thatcher) and Sister Paxton (Chloe East), in a deadly game of wits as part of an experiment to unlock the mystery of religious faith. What is the conclusion of your experiment and what else can we interpret from what you CinemaBlend’s Heretic review calls one of the best horror movies from 2024? Let’s bow our heads and find out by taking a deeper look at the Heretic end.

Hugh Grant in Heretic — (Image credit: A24)

What happens at the end of Heretic?

The final act of Heretic is set in motion when Sister Barnes, after questioning the outcome of Mr. Reed’s resurrection experiment as just a near-death experience, has her throat slit by the man. He then digs into her arm to find a metallic object which he believes indicates that she is an artificial human being, echoing the “Prophet’s” claim that life is simply a simulation.

However, Paxton explains that the object is a contraceptive and further discredits the Prophet’s resurrection as a magic trick, accomplished by replacing the poisoned woman with another. He then says he believes the changeling’s claim that “none of this was real” was a way of warning the women about Reed’s trick, prompting the man to improvise the details of the simulation to cover his tracks.

After finding the trapdoor with which Reed achieved the illusion, Paxton discovers several other women that Reed has held captive in a basement chamber. There, she correctly infers that this entire occasion has been Reed’s way of explaining to women what he believes is “the only true religion”: control.

Paxton takes the opportunity to stab Reed with a letter opener, but as she tries to flee, he catches up to her and stabs her in the stomach. Before he can make one more fatal move, Barnes seemingly resurrects himself to kill Reed before falling to his ultimate death. After finally leaving the house, Paxton sees a butterfly land on the tip of his finger but, in the next and final shot, it is gone.

Hugh Grant sits in his living room next to a lamp while discussing rhetoric with two Mormon women.

(Image credit: A24)

How Mr. Reed arrives at his conclusion of “one true religion”

One of the reasons why critics praise Heretic as one of the best horror movies A24 however, is Hugh Grant’s deceptively charming performance as Mr. Reed. His ability to guide the audience in a direction before subverting expectations when his character’s true intentions are revealed serves as a perfect representation of the villain’s belief in control as the “only true religion” and his means of proving it.

Until Barnes and Paxton learn of his intentions, almost every move they make is the result of Reed’s own manipulative acts, something he even bluntly directs at them. He continually reminds them that they are free to go while putting a new obstacle in their way and presenting subtle details that eventually lead them to choose the door of “Belief,” which is exactly the door he hoped they would choose, despite of his condemnation. conference on organized religion suggesting otherwise.

Reed’s examination—or, more accurately, indictment—of various religions and their relationship to one another is undoubtedly fascinating, particularly in its analogous approach. Compare the melodic similarities between The Hollies’ “The Air That I Breathe,” Radiohead’s 1992 “Creep,” and Lana Del Rey’s 2017 “Get Free” to the idea that Christianity could largely be seen as a mere iteration of Judaism. what could be seen as an iteration of Islam etc.

As far as Mr. Reed is concerned, religion is nothing more than a man-made organization built upon the influence of pre-existing ideas which appear as truth to people by the power of suggestion. The question is, does the movie believe that?

Chloe East as Sister Paxton climbing a ladder through a dark tunnel in Heretic

(Image credit: A24)

What the butterfly represents

The true message of Heretic It can actually be summed up in its final moment, in which Sister Paxton sees the butterfly appear on the tip of her finger, suggesting that it could be Barnes, who says she would choose to return as a butterfly after death. However, the next shot implies that the butterfly is a figment of Paxton’s imagination, but who’s to say what the true reality is here?

The point of ambiguity Heretic The bottom line is, in the grand scheme of things, there is no right or wrong answer. Some audiences might come away from the film believing that the butterfly is real, or that the butterfly is all in Paxton’s head, or even that it is still dead in Reed’s basement and that its escape is also a fantasy. It all comes down to the individual’s personal interpretation and the same goes for religious faith.

This is reflected in the following quote by Scott Beck from an interview with Eric Eisenberg of CinemaBlend:

Well, in the end, the brand was always to present a broader question that is a memory for the audience. Our ambition with this film is that it serves as a conversation starter. Each one has their own relationship with belief or disbelief, atheism, with being unconditionally religious. And I felt like this movie, if anything, can hold a mirror up to questions like, ‘Why do we believe what we believe?’ How do we arrive at our own convictions? I think the end of the film presents that question in a very ambiguous, but perhaps very open-ended way. There can be three, four, five different interpretations of how you walk away from that movie. And the hope is that your interpretation of that reflects your own contradictions or your own reasoning about why you believe what you believe.

According to the co-writer and co-director’s earlier testimony, Mr. Reed’s seemingly anti-religious tirade should not actually be taken as anti-religious, nor is the film intended to argue in that direction. Heretic It is simply an examination of the complexities of faith in all its forms and, like the butterfly, the choice to believe in it or not is up to you.

Scott Beck and Bryan Woods have had a great career so far – they broke into the mainstream as co-writers in 2018. A quiet placedirecting adam driver in a prehistoric sci-fi adventure with 2023 65and now making one of the best movies A24 lately with Heretic. For the most part, and especially with this latest intriguing release, I’d say they’ve proven themselves to be a horror filmmaking duo worth trusting.