Spoiler Warning
If you just finished Something Wicked This Way Comes and you want to talk about that ending, this one’s for you.
And fair warning, this video is full of spoilers. If you haven’t read the book yet, my spoiler free review is the one to watch first.
Here is the quick answer. Mr. Dark and his carnival are beaten, not with a weapon, but with laughter. Charles Halloway, the tired janitor who thinks he failed as a father, wins by learning that evil starves when you refuse to be afraid of it.
The Setup
Let’s do a quick reminder of where we are.
The carnival has been in Green Town for days. Mr. Dark, the Illustrated Man, covered in tattoos that move, has been tempting the townspeople and collecting them as living pictures on his skin. His friend Mr. Cooger has been ruined by the carousel, which can age or un-age anyone who rides it.
Will Halloway and Jim Nightshade have seen too much, and now the carnival wants them. Will’s father, Charles, has spent the night in the library with old books, working out what the carnival really is.
He has learned one important thing. The carnival feeds on fear, regret, and pain, and it hates joy.
The Bullet Trick
The first big showdown is on the midway, in front of the whole town, and it is a trick.
The carnival invites a volunteer to do a famous bullet trick. Charles Halloway steps up, fifty four years old, with a useless left hand, and Mr. Dark can hardly believe it. A hurt old janitor is volunteering.
Charles calls for a boy to hold the rifle with him. He calls for his son. The whole crowd, at his urging, starts calling Will’s name, and Will walks out of the Mirror Maze like a sleepwalker.
Then Charles quietly swaps the bullets. He has noticed the carnival’s own trick, a fake wax bullet, and he carves a mark on it that looks like a crescent moon. In his head, he decides it is not a moon. It is a smile.
He fires. The Dust Witch, standing at the target, falls dead. Nobody can find a wound. In the book’s own words, it was a smile that killed her. That is the first time we see how this will end.
The Mirror Maze
Now the carnival is in chaos. The lights are going out, the crowd is hurrying home, and the boys are in danger. Charles goes into the Mirror Maze to find Jim.
And the maze is where the carnival is strongest, because it does not use monsters. It uses him. He sees himself growing older and older, a million versions of himself, each more tired and sicker than the last, marching toward him. Despair is the weapon.
Will lights matches to keep the shapes away, and when the matches run low he does the bravest thing in the book. He tells his father that he doesn’t care how old he gets, and that he loves him.
That is the moment Charles understands. He opens his mouth and laughs, as loud as he can. And the mirrors fall, one after another, like ice in a thaw. A laugh, not a rock or a rifle, breaks the maze.
Mr. Dark and the Boy
Jim is found, but he is lying by the carousel, cold and not breathing. Will tries to save him, and just then a frightened boy runs up, crying about a terrible man with tattoos and begging to go home.
Charles Halloway looks at that boy carefully, and he sees something is wrong. He asks the boy’s name, and his age. Nine. Then Charles says he was never that young.
He tears the boy’s shirt, and there are the tattoos, crawling up the little arms. The boy is Mr. Dark, who has used the carousel to turn himself into a child so that he can escape the police and lead Charles into a trap.
Charles does not fight him. He holds him. He treats him kindly, close, and for a long time, and the boy, who cannot stand being near that kind of goodness, begins to die. Charles says evil only has the power we give it, and he gives it nothing. He starves it.
The Freaks Are Free
When Mr. Dark dies, the carnival falls apart.
The tattoos on the small body fade away, one at a time, and they are the faces of the people he had collected. The Skeleton, the Dwarf, the Lava Sipper, the Executioner, even the Lightning Rod Salesman we met on page one. They are released, blinking, free of their chains, and they run in every direction.
The tents collapse. The ropes lash like snakes. The great Freak Tent shudders and falls, and the train is left alone in a field like a toy.
The Skeleton, the last of them, picks up the small body and carries it away over a hill. Where the carnival stood, there are only footprints, and the wind blows even those out.
Laughter Brings Jim Back
But Jim is still cold. Will is crying, and his father slaps him, twice, hard.
Charles tells him that Mr. Dark’s people love tears. The more you weep, the more they drink. So he pulls out a harmonica and starts to play badly. He makes Will hop, shout and sing. Camptown ladies. Oh Susanna.
It is silly, and it is desperate, and slowly, Will starts to laugh. And in the middle of the dance, Jim sneezes. His mouth moves. His eyes open. He joins the dancing before he even knows he was gone.
Will decides not to tell Jim he was dead. It is one of the sweetest scenes in the book, and the logic is clear. Laughter does not just beat evil. It gives life back.
The Carousel
Before they leave, there is one last temptation, and it is quiet.
The three of them climb on the carousel. Will thinks of three turns forward. Jim thinks of four. And Charles thinks of ten turns back, to be young again.
Then each of them sees the trap. One more ride, and one more. And after a while you would be offering rides to your friends, until you were the owner of the carousel, the keeper of the freaks, the new proprietor of the dark carnival.
So Charles smashes the machinery with a wrench, and he hits the control box until it breaks. The town clocks strike twelve.
Then they race to the railroad signal at Green Crossing. Charles feels a pain in his chest, and decides that death is not what counts. What counts is everything that happens before it. All three slap the post at the same moment, and walk into town together.
What It Means
So, what is Bradbury saying?
First, the carnival is not a monster from outside. It lives on what is already in us. Mr. Dark never forces anyone. He offers a wish, and people sign themselves over. That is why laughing at him works.
Second, growing up is not the enemy. The boys want to be older, and Charles wants to be younger, and the book says both wishes will eat you. The three of them walk home as they are, which is the happy ending.
Third, and this is the heart of it, the father and son finally know each other. Will says he never knew his dad, and now he does. Charles answers that they did it together.
And finally, it is not over. Charles tells Will that people like Mr. Dark will come back, in some other shape. They might even be already here. The fight has just begun.
My Verdict on the Ending
I love this ending. It is the rare book that wins with joy and not a weapon, and it earns it, because Charles has to be brave while doubting himself the whole way.
The one thing that might bother you is how fast it moves. The deaths and the tent collapse happen in just a few pages, and some of the sentences are so wild that you need to slow down to see what is happening.
But the final image, three people running home through the dew, is the one I think about every October.
So, what do you think about the carousel scene? Leave a comment and tell me, would you take the ride? If you want more, my books like it video is next.
