The Undying Unpredictability of Until Dawn

Until Dawn is unpredictable. It's not the kind of movie that those who have played the game can say they know what's coming. That's because it's not really an adaptation of the source material as much as it is a reinvention. It has the same title, a familiar actor or character here or there, and the same general premise. But Until Dawn is a game where death matters, and in Until Dawn the movie, it decidedly doesn't.

To set the scene, the movie follows five friends who travel to a remote mining town. The ringleader is Clover, a girl who has become fearful of death since her mother's passing and is now searching for her missing sister, Melanie. She's travelling with Max, her ex (who is definitely not over it), Nina and her jock boyfriend of the month, Abe, and Megan, the clairvoyant of the group (there's always one).

The friends arrive at Glore Valley, a totally normal place where rainfall doesn't land and no one survives the night. After investigating the abandoned Welcome Centre, they find odd horror movie things, like a room full of missing persons posters, and a guest book with scribbles of the same name over and over again. Most ominous is a giant hourglass that ticks down the hours until dawn, during which progressively more unhinged horrors take place (which is where I warn you that this article contains some graphic descriptions of that violence).

The night goes something like this:

As darkness falls, Clover, Max and Megan head downstairs to investigate the basement. Upstairs, Nina hears alarming noises coming from Abe in the room over. Flipping on the light, she finds her boyfriend has been cleaved in half. The killer, an imposing man wearing a toothy skull mask, raises his axe to her next. Hearing the screams above, Clover, Max, and Megan come running to find Nina face down in the hallway, the pickaxe in her back.

They immediately retreat downstairs, with the Slasher following at a menacingly slow pace. The three find pretty average hiding spots, which befuddles the Slasher for a moment, until Max emerges and attacks with a chair to the head. He receives a knife through the eye for his efforts. Next, Megan is dragged from her hiding place in the closet and has her head smashed until it's one with the floorboards.

Clover makes it outside, but wait… is that Melanie? This moment of confusion has allowed the Slasher to catch up with Clover, and she is promptly impaled.

The hourglass resets…

The next night, the friends realise they've somehow been resurrected. They decide to hightail it out of this place and head for the car. The group drives out of the valley's mysterious bubble and into the surrounding rain. It looks like they're home free. Until Megan feels a drop of rain land on her face… inside the car. Looking up, she sees the rain is melting the roof. Acid. It quickly disintegrates the car's frame and then eats through the screaming passengers inside.

The hourglass resets…

A new night. The group concludes that their resurrection cycle is linked to the hourglass in the room. They need to survive until dawn. They do another sweep of the house, but arriving in the basement, they find that it's changed. A door leading into the depths of the earth has opened up. From down the tunnel, they hear a voice, “Clover, help me.” It belongs to Melanie.

Clover leads the charge down the tunnel, following it until they only have the flashlights of their phones to guide them. They're getting closer to the voice when, without warning, Clover falls down an unseen crevasse. Her fall is broken by something crunchy and slimy. She's landed in a cave filled with pulsing, sticky eggs, ranging from fist-sized to person-sized. A breeding ground for… something."Clover.” It's Melanie's voice again, this time in the room. Clover scrambles to find her sister, putting her foot through several more eggshells as she goes. She comes to one of the largest eggs, the source of the voice.

"I'm stuck".

Back in the tunnel, Clover's friends try to reach her, unaware that the owner of the eggs is coming up behind them: a Wendigo. Max turns just in time to see the Wendigo slash his neck. The others barely have time to scream before the Wendigo's claws are in them as well. Down below, Clover tentatively places a hand to the egg. Something inside presses back. “Melanie?” Two spindly, clawed hands burst free from the egg and grab Clover, drawing her into the eggshell and the jaws of a newborn Wendigo.

The hourglass resets…

Night again. Max is missing. The friends ponder their options. Abe spots something that looks like a campfire at the edge of the woods. Hopeful that it's Max, the group goes to investigate. A short way into the forest, they arrive at the campfire. There are no people in sight, but there is something oddly-shaped and covered in foil roasting on the spit over the fire. Nina leans in closer to inspect it. She uncovers the foil to reveal: Max's head.

Horrified, Nina promptly falls to her knees and hurls… onto the boots of a cleaver-wielding masked man. She looks up in horror and is sliced through the neck. Clover and Megan back away, right into the arms of three more masked, knife-wielding men. Abe flees into the forest with one of the cannibals in hot pursuit. He's making headway until he trips and lands face-first in a bear trap.

The hourglass resets…

On this night, the rain has stopped outside, but a looming fog is pressing in on the valley. The friends split up and forage for weapons around the house to defend themselves before heading out into the fog. They promptly lose sight of each other. Strange figures in the gloom disorient them. Megan calls out for her friends. No reply. She stumbles on something. It's Max and Abe's corpses. They're each holding a knife that's implanted in the other.

Megan hears footsteps approach and then stop suddenly, but can't make out anyone in the fog. The silence thickens. A tense lead-up to a jump scare. Someone taps Megan on the shoulder. She jumps, swinging her axe wildly, and right into Nina's neck. She recoils in horror at her now dead friend. A figure approaches her in the gloom. No, not approaches, runs. Megan stands her ground, closes her eyes, and lobs the axe! The figure goes down. Megan opens her eyes to find she's killed Clover. Apalled at what she's done, Megan turns the axe on herself, ready to restart the night.

The hourglass resets…

Another night. The friends find a secret elevator in the basement. They pile in and travel downward. The elevator's rusty floor collapses, sending Max, Clover, Megan and Nina falling to their deaths. Abe manages to cling to the side of the elevator. Something starts to pull Abe up, and he finds himself in the hands of a Wendigo. It drags him back to its lair and impales him on a meat hook for later.

The hourglass resets…

Another night. The friends lock themselves in the bathroom and barricade the door. A swarm of flesh-eating insects emerges from the pipes and devours them.

The hourglass resets…

Another night. The friends wake up in an interrogation cell overseen by a man named Dr. Hill. He releases a wendigo that is chained to a wall in the room and makes notes of how it kills them.

The hourglass resets…

You get the idea.

Eventually, it becomes clear that the two Until Dawns share one major thing in common: they love creative and absolutely brutal deaths. In the movie, these are varied, switching genres and formats, alternating between horrifying and comedic. It becomes a bit of a game to guess what the movie will throw at you next.

So, if you've made it this far, great job! You've survived until the end of this article. Only some of the scenarios above are real plot points from Until Dawn.

You'll have to see the movie to find out which…