Midsommar: Explaining that twisted ending

Need to catch your breath after that dark and twisted ending in Midsommar? We’re here to help with a breakdown of what we just saw.

Midsommar shocks audiences to their core. It’s frighteningly beautiful and will have you thinking about it long after walking out of the theater. Up until the final moments, the movie is slow, dark, and also hilarious, mostly thanks to Will Poulter’s character, Mark.

Once it gets to those final scenes, though, everything moves rather quickly. Our eyes rush to keep up. Let’s get a recap and refresher of what we’ve just witnessed, below!

Before we proceed, please note there are massive spoilers ahead if you have not seen the movie in theaters yet. While Midsommar is out wide on July 3, select theaters have been playing the movie since July 1. Proceed at your own risk.

More from Movies

• The story of a French emperor: Here’s where Napoleon will stream after theaters
• The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes honors its origins and far surpasses them
• Thanksgiving movie death toll: Why [SPOILER] is still alive
• No, Thanksgiving is not streaming yet (But here’s where it’ll land)
• Trolls Band Together soundtrack guide: Which songs play in the movie?

As you likely figured out early on in the movie, Dani (Florence Pugh), Christian (Jack Reynor), Josh (William Jackson Harper), and Mark (Will Poulter) were invited to Sweden by Pelle (Vilhelm Blomgren) with intentions of them being sacrificed.

The “celebration” needs a total of 9 sacrifices, some of these are people invited to the festival (like Christian and his friends) and others are brave volunteers from the twisted community aka cult.

This year, Josh, Mark, Connie (Ellora Torchia), and Simon (Archie Madekwe) were the sacrifices, along with two volunteers. That’s a total of six, but don’t forget the movie’s first two deaths (the elders who jumped up the cliff) making the number now 8.

This leaves one more person. And as tradition has it, the final sacrifice is up to the May Queen, which Dani was crowned as for dancing around the maypole the longest. Believing Christian betrayed her by participating in that bizarre sex act we’ll never get out of our heads, Dani chooses him as number 9!

Dani appears remorseful and full of regret at first, but then she smiles. Dani has found a group of people who accept her and share her pain, grief, and happiness — a family always there to support her. And hey, she’s queen, Dani isn’t just accepted, she’s welcomed.

With Christian, Dani always felt like a burden. She didn’t feel welcomed by Christian or his group of friends, but she stuck around because he was all she had left.

Midsommar is now playing in select theaters, releasing wide July 3.