【Babygirl (2024)】

Warning: major spoilers for Hell Fest lie ahead.

Hell Fest.It's a cheap Halloweenknockoff set in a Six Flags commercial,Babygirl (2024) but with a surprisingly clever ending.

This past weekend, Hell Fest kicked off the October slasher box office with more of a whimper than a scream. Receiving mostly negative reviews, the tale of a traveling horror carnival turned terrifying torture chamber lefttheaters less than packed.

Consequently, the hugely forgettable villain of this "been there, done that" flop won't be joining the varsity league of cinematic masked killers anytime soon.

But his creepy part in a memorable ending could snag the film a footnote in horror history... if only because people can't stop fighting about it.

Some viewers loved it.

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Others really hated it.

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And, plenty just didn't get it.

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So, what divisive conclusion made Hell Festand its villain—"The Other"—worth talking about? Here's a recap.

Following a gruesome fight to the finish against two badass final girls (Amy Forsyth and Reign Edwards), our hooded killer slips away from the park and into the night, narrowly avoiding capture.

The Other then enters a cozy suburban home, still donning his off-brand Freddy Krueger look. Once inside, he opens up a large wardrobe, revealing half a dozen other Halloween masks and knick-knacks—presumably keep sakes from past killings. Without showing his face to camera, The Other removes his current mask and places a photo strip of two of his Hell Festvictims into the wardrobe.

Moments later, he walks into a quiet living room where a little blonde girl is asleep on the couch. The Other's outline ominously hovers in the door frame, seemingly threatening the sleeping child. His face still does not show.

As you watch, you brace yourself for a last horrifying murder when, suddenly, the girl pops up off the couch and runs towards her presumed attacker. "Daddy! Did you bring me something?" she gleefully screams.

The anonymous man hands his daughter a toy from the carnival (one he took from a guy he beat to death with a mallet, by the way), gives her a big hug, and the credits roll.

Confused? Understandable. This bizarre exchange ties back to a specific bit of dialogue early in the film's setup that is pretty easy to miss. When the main characters first enter the park, they discuss the undetectable monsters who "walk among us" in a joking context. (It's adequately creepy, but hardly screams major thematic point.)

The ending is a startling depiction of such a monster, a seemingly normal man with an ordinary life... who just so happens to hire a babysitter one night of the year so he can murder local teenagers.

Overall, the father and daughter reunion ending is a considerable departure from the rest of the film—and that's good or bad depending on your horror preferences.

If you're seeing Hell Fest for the slashervibes, this won't do much for you. But if you are a lover of true crime accounts and crippling paranoia, this ending might get you to appreciate the film's story more than you expected.

By grounding 90 minutes of cartoony murder in a contrasting moment of realism and humanity, Hell Fest forces its viewers to consider the monsters they may actually encounter off screen.

IRL terrorizers aren't accompanied by ominous music and they don't wear Party City masks. Instead, they regularly glide through life, quietly waiting to strike, appearing like anyone else. They may have lovely homes, affordable cars, adorable kids, even subscriptions to Audible. You simply can't know their hidden danger until it's too late.

All in all, Hell Festlikely won't give you a newfound phobia of theme parks and masked strangers. But it does have a pretty decent shot at scaring you off of public spaces and strangers in general... because what you might not find frightening at first could turn out to be a total hell fest.

Hell Festis in theaters now.