‘Salem’s Lot’ 2024 Ending Explained And Movie Recap: Did Ben And Mark Save The Town?

COMMENTS 0

Most Popular

For horror fans, writer Stephen King’s Salem’s Lot and its 1979 TV series adaptation will always have a special place as one of the most influential pieces of modern-day vampire fiction, so naturally, a brand new cinematic entry based on the story seemed like the best way to kick off Spooktober this year. To my utter disappointment, not only did the cinematic adaptation turn out to be extremely generic, rushed, and all over the place, but it was extremely tough to keep track of events, as though the movie  had been hacked to pieces while getting edited. The characters don’t gel with the audience, the dialogue feels less natural and more expository in nature, and even with contemporary CGI advancements, the horror vibe is nowhere near as good as the first TV series. While this adaptation of Salem’s Lot remains faithful to its source material in most cases, sometimes that simply doesn’t serve any purpose when the rest of the movie turns out to be such a dumpster fire. 

Spoilers Ahead


Newcomers to Salem’s Lot

For viewers who are acquainted with the story and have seen the previous adaptations, the very first scene of “Salem’s Lot” will come off as quite odd, as it begins with Richard Straker, a European businessman who is the new owner of Marsten House in the small town of Salem’s Lot, Maine, instructing a local named Royal Snow to bring a particularly important box from the wharf and put into the basement of Marsten House. This scene plays out much later in the novel and gets followed by a series of events that hints something sinister is taking place around the town. However, before you know it, the strange box is carried into the basement by Snow and one of his helpers, and something insidious, resembling the classic Nosferatu, emerges from it in the shadows. 

Ben Mears, a renowned writer, returns to his hometown of Salem’s Lot in 1975, for the first time since he moved away during his childhood, and even before he enters the township, the first thing that catches his attention is Marsten House on the top of the hill. Ben had lost his parents in a car accident all those years ago, so returning to the town was a daunting emotional task for him, but the reason he did it is because he wants to do research on Marsten House. There are creepy local legends about the Victorian-styled villa, which remains isolated from the rest of the town, which could be a perfect recipe for Ben to cook up his next novel. Wary of outsiders, local police constable Parkins stumbles across Ben and, after a brief session of questioning, lets him go. Soaking in a bit of his childhood nostalgia for the town, Ben visits local realtor Larry Crockett’s office to rent Marsten House to stay, only to learn that it has been occupied by Richard Straker and his partner Kurt Barlow, who have set up an antique shop in the town. Crockett’s assistant, the jubilant Susan Norton, suggests Ben take shelter at Eva Miller’s boarding house. Soon enough, Ben’s identity as the popular writer becomes a topic of gossip in the town’s library. Taking a liking to him, Susan invites Ben to meet her in the town’s drive-in movie lot. As Ben and Susan get to know each other better, Ben learns that Susan returned to the town after her father’s demise and wants to move back to Boston, where she completed her academics, as soon as she gets her realtor license, leaving behind this town and all its old-school charm that only drags her down. Ben and Susan fall for each other pretty soon, much to the dismay of her mother, Anne Norton. 

Viewers also meet Mark Petrie, a nerdy schoolboy with a penchant for magic and horror thingamajigs who has recently shifted to the Lot along with his parents. Mark’s new friends, Ralphie and Danny Glick, are in awe as he is quick to respond to the torments of their class bully, Richie Boddin, by subduing him to the ground. School teacher Matt Burke quickly handles the situation, advising Mark to practice restraint and stay out of trouble. 


The Town Becomes Barlow’s Hunting Ground

As Danny and Ralphie return to their home during sundown, taking their leave after dropping Mark at the Petrie residence, Richard Straker comes across the kids and offers them a lift, which the elder brother, Danny, is quick to refuse. However, as the brother duo are forced to take a detour through the woods due to Straker’s presence, Ralphie gets abducted by Straker, who brings the kid to Marsten House as a sacrifice to his master, Kurt Barlow, who turns out to be a master vampire. Danny manages to rush back home but fails to remember anything. The next day, the alcoholic priest, Father Callahan, is approached by Constable Perkins, and their conversation reveals the present degenerated state of the town. 

The townsfolk, unaware of Ralphie’s fate, extensively search for one week to no avail, and Ben gets acquainted with Burke, who helps him to get accustomed to the townsfolk’s insecurity regarding outsiders. Danny gets lured outside his home at night and is assaulted by an unseen presence, after which his health starts deteriorating and he is admitted to the hospital after being diagnosed with pernicious anemia. Danny’s mother, Marjorie, is shocked out of her wits to see her son clawing and drinking blood from vials at the hospital, and moments later, Danny meets his end. Mike Ryerson, the local gravedigger, gets assaulted by an undead Danny during the night, and later, while having a conversation with Burke at the local pub, he seems extremely disoriented. Burke decides to help Mike by letting him stay at his house for the night, but gets a fright after noticing bite marks at Mike’s neck and later sees someone creeping inside Mike’s room through the window. Burke rushed off to Eva’s boarding house to bring Ben and Susan, who was present with him as well, to his house to share his suspicion that Mike has been turned into a vampire. As they find Mike dead, Dr. Cody from the local hospital and Constable Perkins are brought to the scene as well, and Ben remarks about a possible similarity between Danny and Mike’s death—from the loss of blood. Burke starts researching vampires, as even though Ben is not convinced by his arguments, Burke is fairly certain that the town is becoming a hunting ground for nocturnal creatures. 

Mark is visited by the undead apparition of his friend, Danny, who hypnotizes him to let him enter his home, but eventually Mark is able to ward him off using a cross and promises to end Danny’s misery. Within a night, Mark becomes an expert in vampire-related stuff after going through his comics and books, and for reasons still unexplained, theorizes Barlow is the master vampire, with Straker being his familiar. The next night, an undead Mike Ryerson attacks Burke at his house, who somehow manages to save himself by revoking his invitation. Dr. Cody finds Mike’s body to be missing from the hospital morgue, and along with Ben and Susan, they meet Burke, who is now adamant about his vampire infestation theory. However, Cody shrugs it off by labeling Burke’s assumptions as superstitious rambling, but agrees to keep a watch over the recently deceased Marjorie Glick to test Burke’s claims. 


The Marsten House: Ground Zero Of Evil Infestation 

By now, both Burke and Mark have deduced Marsten House as the breeding ground of evil through their research, and as Mark ventures inside the basement of the villa during the day, wielding stakes and other vampire killing tools, he meets Burke there. However, Straker, who guards his master during the day, locks the basement, and in the dark depths of shadows, Barlow kills Burke. Before meeting his ghastly end, Burke had managed to let Mark escape, but he ended up getting captured by Straker. However, using Straker’s momentary absence as his opportunity, Mark frees himself and kills Straker by bashing his head in with a fire poker. 

On the other hand, Cody, Ben, and Susan witness Marjorie turning into a vampire after sundown, and before they are able to ward her off, she manages to bite Cody. Strangely enough, using alcohol and an anti-rabies shot, Cody manages to survive the ordeal. Finally realizing that Burke was right all along, they go to his house at night, only to realize he has perished at the hands of the nocturnal monsters as well, as a number of their kind are seen on the roof of Burke’s home. Only now the realization dawns upon them that the town’s mortality rate has recently become alarmingly high, and without anyone noticing, almost the majority of the town has turned vacant. The next day, the trio go to Father Callahan, where Mark visits as well to take Holy Water. The grownups are quite surprised to learn a little kid like Mark had ventured inside Marston House, killed Straker, and managed to get out of the place as well. Mark also reveals Burke’s final fate, and as the team decides to venture inside the villa before sundown, they meet an undead Burke, who dies after Ben puts a wooden stake through his heart. Realizing that the presence of Barlow and his army of undead will end the town in no time, the group of Cody, Mark, Father Callahan, Susan, and Ben decide to bring the surviving townsfolk to the holy ground of the church. 


Were Ben and Mark Able to Save the Town?

Cody informs Constable Perkins about the harrowing truth behind the town’s present condition, but the veteran constable is having none of it as he decides to leave the town instead of facing this kind of menace and suggests Cody do the same. Mark and Susan go to warn Anne about the situation, only to realize that she is Barlow’s new servant, as one of the vampires bites Susan, and Mark rushes her to the church. At the Petrie household, Mark’s parents die at the hands of Barlow, while Father Callahan sacrifices himself to help Mark escape—who takes refuge in his tree house as hordes of vampire kids threaten him throughout the night. As Cody meets Ben at church, she deems Susan is beyond recovery as she rushes outside to join the undead townsfolk. Ben somehow survives the assault of the vampires while trying to save her in vain, and as Perkins’ lifeless body is thrown into the church, it becomes clear that any attempt to escape the town is futile as well. 

The next day, Mark enters Straker’s shop, where he is once again attacked by an undead Danny, but this time Mark manages to put his friend out of his misery using a wooden stake. By now, Salem’s Lot has turned into a ghost town, with not a soul in sight except for Mark, Ben, and Dr. Cody. Ben considers the possibility of staying somewhere safe and getting accustomed to this reality, but Mark and Cody are of the opinion that if they don’t take the fight to Barlow and his vampire army, they will eventually end up joining them as well, and the infestation will end the entire country if they don’t act despite having the chance. The trio are quick to deduce that the vampires have made the trunks of cars stationed in the drive-in lot as their resting place, and as they find Susan, Ben is unable to bring himself to put her out of her misery. As Cody is about to eliminate an undead Susan, Anne, who was protecting the lot, shoots her to death. A huge ruckus ensues as, in the shadow, the vampires hidden inside the car trunks emerge to hunt the only remaining survivors, Mark and Ben. Mark manages to save the day by running over Anne Norton and destroying the theater screen of the drive-in, resulting in the vampires burning after getting exposed to sunlight. 

Mark and Ben find Barlow’s coffin in one of the delivery wagons parked near the lot, but with moments to spare till sundown, they aren’t able to kill the master vampire in time, and Barlow emerges to remove the final hindrances to his absolute control. Ben is attacked by an undead Susan, whom he finally manages to kill by freeing himself of his emotional constraints, and as Barlow remains busy terrorizing Mark, Ben literally sneaks behind the master vampire to drive a stake through his head and heart. However, even with Barlow gone, Salem’s Lot has turned into a breeding ground of evil, where Ben and Mark can no longer stay if they want to survive the next day. The movie comes to an end as Ben drives off from the town, with Mark by his side, heading towards an unknown destination. Whether they get to live a normal life afterwards or the evil undeads catch up to them remains unknown. 


Siddhartha Das
Siddhartha Das
An avid fan and voracious reader of comic book literature, Siddhartha thinks the ideals accentuated in the superhero genre should be taken as lessons in real life also. A sucker for everything horror and different art styles, Siddhartha likes to spend his time reading subjects. He's always eager to learn more about world fauna, history, geography, crime fiction, sports, and cultures. He also wishes to abolish human egocentrism, which can make the world a better place.


 

 

Latest articles