The Crow (2024) tells the rebooted story of Eric (Bills Skarsgård) and Shelly (FKA Twigs), two soulmates who fall into a passionate Gothic romance that goes tragically wrong. When Both Eric and Shelly are brutally murdered, Eric’s soul is returned to the land of the living to exact revenge. That’s the basic framework of the original Crow comic series and its 1994 film adaptation – but The Crow (2024) adds new fantastical elements to the story that result in quite a different sort of ending than the original film.
How The Crow (2024) Changes The Story
In this version of the story, Eric’s powers of immortality and healing as “The Crow” are bestowed upon him by the spiritual entity Kronos (Sami Bouajila). Eric meets Kronos in an otherworldly crossroads between life and death (which is weirdly designed to look like an abandoned factory or train yard). However, in this version, Eric’s powers come with a catch – one that is revealed in a Second Act twist, when Eric’s body suddenly stops regenerating, and he falls down dead (again) after taking a goon’s shotgun blast point-blank.
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When Eric gets back to the crossroads, Sami informs him that his love for Shelly was why he was given the god-level gift of immortality – to not only get vengeance for their murders but also rescue Shelly’s soul from damnation. However, earlier in the film, Eric discovered that Shelly was once a plaything of crime lord Vincent Roeg (Danny Huston), who used his demonic powers to corrupt Shelly (and others) into doing evil acts – including having Shelly brutally murder an innocent girl. That discovery made Eric waver in his love, and so his immortality was rescinded. Eric realizes too late how badly he’s squandered his gift, and in desperation to save Shelly, he makes a devil’s bargain with Kronos: If his powers are restored, he will complete his mission of vengeance on Earth and wipe out Roeg’s demonic influence. To seal the deal, Eric makes a drastic deal: when his job is done, he will trade his soul for Shelly’s, so that she may be resurrected, while he will take her place in damnation.
Eric’s deal is accepted, and true to his word he returns to the living world and slaughters Victor Roeg’s entire criminal organization. When it comes to the final boss battle with Roeg himself, Eric is nearly defeated by his demonic influence – until he pulls Roeg into the crossroads realm along with him. There, the forces of Hell quickly rise up and drag Roeg down into an inky pool of blackness; a moment later, Shelly rises up out of that same dark pool and is reunited with Eric for all of a second, before her soul is sent back to Earth.
The Crow (2024) Ending Explained
In a somewhat baffling ending, Shelly is revived by paramedics on the floor of her apartment, seemingly hours after her murder. Eric is dead next to her, but in a final scene, it’s revealed that he remains in the crossroads realm with the mystical crows, instead of being dragged down to the dark place.
The ending of The Crow (2024) leaves the door open for possible sequels, as Eric is still a restless spirit stuck between life and death, presumably ready to once again return and punish evil if so instructed.
The Crow Director Defends Its Ending
There’s been some controversy about The Crow’s ending possibly being changed to set up sequels, instead of having a definitive ending like the 1994 version, which reunited Eric and Shelly in the afterlife. For his part, Rupert Sanders claims he made a standalone flick, while still leaving a window open for more to come:
“The movie, I think, stands alone. I personally hate movies where you have to see the sequel. A movie should finish in a way that feels satisfactory to the story, and this movie does,” Sanders told THR.
“Can it continue for a second adventure? Yes,” he admitted. Bill’s Eric is an incredible character, and by the end of the movie, he’s become something new. In a way, it’s the origin story of a character like Batman, and I think Bill’s Dark Knight could very well be around the corner,” Sanders shares. “The exciting idea of him moving between worlds and between life and death is fascinating. So there’s definitely a million versions of what that could be, but right now, my focus was on telling the story of Eric and Shelly and finishing that story in a very finite way.”
The Crow (2024) is now in theaters.
