James Bamford’s Hard Home feels like one of those classic thriller movies where, if the cops can’t solve the crime, you just know the victim’s family will! I don’t know if this gives you the ick or not, but it definitely did to me. So, here, the story is all about this scary predator known as the Diablo Killer. He’s been on a killing spree where he always targets women and leaves behind a gruesome signature move—he cuts out their tongues. That’s his twisted way of getting revenge. There’s this girl named Kelly, and her mother is convinced that she’s been taken and killed by this Diablo killer. But wait! Is that really what happened? Or is there something else going on? Can her mom figure it all out? And what about the killer’s motive? Why does he haunt these women and kill them in such a horrific way? Does he have a dark past driving him to do this? We’ll uncover all these mysteries and see if Kelly’s mother gets her revenge at the end of Hard Home or not!
Spoilers Ahead
Why did Anna want to take revenge against Diablo?
When we first meet Kelly in the film, we see this poor girl on crutches due to her medical condition. That’s why her mother, Anna, and her father, Robert, moved her to a luxurious home equipped with high-tech gadgets. They wanted to make sure she wouldn’t face any problems, and the security was top-notch, which would give Kelly everything she needed. Her parents were very protective; Anna took Kelly’s health very seriously and even planned a medical procedure to cure her mobility issues. And guess what? It worked! But just as Kelly was about to start living a normal life, tragedy struck. One day, as she went to have fun with her friends, she was abducted by the notorious Diablo Killer, and her body was found in the woods. It was devastating news for Anna and Robert. They had done everything to protect their child, and now she was gone. Kelly was about to go to New York for further studies, but that dream was shattered.
Anna couldn’t just let this go. So, she started collecting evidence against the killer from the investigator in the case, Agent Selena. She even started pretending to be an FBI agent by stealing Agent Selena’s badge so that she could get information from other people who might know about Diablo. She knew the police weren’t catching him, and she couldn’t let him roam free. Anna even made a torture chamber in her own house, just like those Diablo used for his victims, planning to tear him apart once she caught him. But there was a big inconsistency she overlooked. There was no cut-out tongue near Kelly’s body. Plus, there were two places where victims were found at the same time. If it was the Diablo Killer, how could he be in two places at once? Anna didn’t care about this. She was waiting for her chance to get revenge!
Who is Diablo?
Diablo was quite infamous for being the awful killer that he was. There were rumors that he always lurked around in the forests and targeted women who were blonde with similar facial features. He would strangle them to death, sometimes even burning them alive. To let everyone know he was responsible for the killing, he would go to the extreme by cutting out his victims’ tongues. He wasn’t remorseful at all—in fact, he took pleasure in it and was happy doing all these terrible things. Diablo never stayed in the same place for long. He would kill three people in one area and then move to the next state to continue his spree. These areas always had something in common: there had to be a family’s private cemetery within 100 meters of the woods. This way, the families would have to visit the graves of their loved ones, constantly reminded that Diablo had killed them. Even if the families weren’t killed directly by Diablo, they still suffered from his twisted games. They went through the same emotional torment as if they were his victims. But why did he hate women so much?
Anna, while searching through public records and studying his psychological pattern, realized the truth when she saw his mother’s and his dog’s graves in a forest. It all made sense then. Actually, Diablo had a very troubled past life. His father was abusive and was possibly the father of Diablo’s mother, Sarah, too. This means Diablo’s mother, Sarah, might have been abused by her own father. Sarah constantly talked about how monstrous Diablo’s father was to her. Diablo couldn’t bear the torment of living in such a negative environment. From a very young age, he showed signs of being a killer. His first act of violence was killing his own dog in an emotional outburst. When his mother started calling him a monster and tortured him mentally every day by telling him he was becoming like his father, Diablo snapped. Diablo, in order to silence her, killed Sarah with his own hands. Maybe he cut out her tongue too. But I don’t think the repeating patten just for revenge; there was something deeper going on. Diablo was mute himself. He couldn’t stand up to either his father or his mother. He always listened to their insults and torture without being able to vocalize his thoughts. This might be why he wanted to silence his victims by cutting out their tongues and making sure they couldn’t express their emotional pain, just like he had had to endure. So maybe he purposefully wanted them to suffer in the same way he did.
Did Anna get her revenge?
One day, during her morning run, Anna was attacked by Diablo. Diablo, always the predator, had no idea what a determined woman like Anna could do for revenge. When he followed her home, Anna was ready. With her high-tech equipment, she kept an eye on his every move. She trapped him in her torture chamber by torturing him with fiery steam and locking him in a cage so he couldn’t escape. She played news reports of his crimes to show him what a monster he was and to make sure he couldn’t find any peace even in his death. She injected harmful substances into him so he wouldn’t have the ability to fight back. She used to inject these substances into herself too for quite some time so that she could build her tolerance. Maybe that’s why when Diablo injected her with the same substance she fought back after some time.
Meanwhile, her husband Robert and neighbor Jiao couldn’t get hold of Anna; they got scared and called agent Selena only to find Anna and Diablo in the midst of a terrifying fight. When Selena tried to stop them and called the police for backup, she got stabbed. Anna couldn’t stand it and took the gun and hit Diablo with the butt of it to make him unconscious. But that wasn’t the end. Driven by a mother’s rage and her monstrous revenge plot, Anna dragged Diablo with ropes in his ankles to take him to the torture chamber. She laid him on a stretcher. When he was struggling for his last breath, she took a knife and cut out his tongue. Then she burned his body. She avenged all the victims who had suffered similar torture at the hands of this predator. She was finally successful! But wait, was he really the killer?
During Hard Home‘s ending, as Diablo’s body was burning, a picture fell from his pocket. It was a childhood photo of him, his mother, Sarah, and another man whose image had been cut out—probably his father. Maybe Diablo wasn’t the one who killed Kelly after all. Perhaps it was his father, another monster. That would explain why Kelly’s tongue wasn’t cut out like the other victims of Diablo. Will Anna find out about Diablo’s father and seek revenge on him too? We don’t know. Even after killing Diablo, Anna wasn’t arrested. In the end, Selena said it was an act of self-defense. But as a mother, killing the wrong man wouldn’t give Anna peace. I believe she will find out about Diablo’s father and take her revenge on him as well.
