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The Ending of Peacock's Satanic Panic Series Hysteria! Explained
All eight episodes of Hysteria! are now streaming exclusively on Peacock.
**Spoiler Warning! The following contains major spoilers for the Hysteria! finale!**
When USA Insider spoke with the cast and creators behind Hysteria!, members of the press did not yet have access to the show's final two episodes. As such, we could only ask for non-spoiler teases from co-creator, showrunner, and executive producer. Matthew Scott Kane, who promised "a finale that is going to be pretty explosive — both physically and emotionally."
"These characters go right to the edge and then over the edge," added fellow co-creator and executive producer David A. Goodman. "Our goals [for the last two episodes] was, ‘What’s the surprise? Give us some surprises in action horror, but also, most importantly, in character. Where some of our characters go in those last episodes is really scary and really exciting."
With all eight episodes of the new Satanic Panic series now streaming exclusively on Peacock, let's see just how crazy the final episode really is.
What happens at the end of Peacock's Satanic Panic series, Hysteria!?
In a last-ditch effort to shift the blame for Ryan Hudson's death away from herself and her daughter, Tracy Whitehead (Anna Camp) stages a very public exorcism for Linda Campbell (Julie Bowen) at the local church. With everyone in Happy Hollow watching, Tracy hopes to get Linda to point an accusatory finger at her own son, Dylan (Emjay Anthony), whose ill-advised plan to form a faux Satanic cult in the hopes of winning the affections of his high school crush stoked the flames of fear throughout the town. He's a bit of a horny idiot, sure, but Dylan is no killer.
"I always approach these women… they don’t think they’re doing anything wrong," Camp explains. "They don’t think that they’re crazy, they don’t think that they’re kooky. Tracy’s a little self-effacing, she knows that the town thinks she’s a little nutty. But at the end of the day, she knows she’s doing God’s work and doing the best she can to protect her daughter, which is what she wants more than anything in the world. She will go to very great lengths to do so. In Tracy’s mind, she is a very kind, loving, God-fearing woman and everybody should listen to what she has to say because she’s right."
Ms. Whitehead's master plan goes slightly awry, however, once Jordy (Chiara Aurelia) and Spud (Kezii Curtis) realize what's going on and call Tracy out on her lies and hypocrisy. This almost seems to work, but the townsfolk quickly revert to their angry mob mentality and all hell breaks loose. Their mad scramble to seize Dylan leads to a candle holder being knocked over, which sets the house of worship aflame.
Gene (Nolan North) shouts Tracy away from his wife, and Dylan brings his mother out of her strange, potentially demonic, fugue state through the magic of a son's love. Tracy tries to go down with the ship, but Jordy drags her out, stating, "You don't get to die a martyr." As she's dragged out of the burning church, Tracy gets a glimpse of Satan at the altar. Happy Hollow's religious zealot in chief still gets her martyr wish when she's arrested by Officer Olsen (Allison Scagliotti). This sparks outrage from the crowd, which can't believe the "hero" who "saved" them from the occult danger is being dragged away in handcuffs.
While all of that is going on, Chief Dandridge (Bruce Campbell) makes his way to the reprogramming HQ, where he's able to arrest The Reverend, aka Beaumont Hicks (Garret Dillahunt), for Ryan's death and assuage Faith's guilt surrounding the whole sordid affair. Before carting The Reverend away to jail, the Chief asks an important question: What's with those creepy masks? The Reverend explains that the design is based on that of a dove, a precursor of redemption in the Bible. This explanation doesn't make the masks any less creepy, as cast member Nikki Hahn (Faith Whitehead) discovered shooting the pilot.
"Coming from filming the pilot, working with the masked men and doing all those stunts and running … it really does put you in the mindset, because I don’t have to pretend that there’s a masked man there," she says. "He’s actually there and it’s actually scary and my body really does go into fight or flight mode. So having that experience from filming was something I could pull from."
For her part in encouraging the formation of a Satanic cult and nearly killing one of her best friends, Judith (Jessica Treska) is sent to live with her father in California. It's basically what she's always wanted: to get out of Happy Hollow and do more with her life. "There’s a lot of potential for her," Treska says. "You can see, she’s thinking of it already. In that moment, she’s thinking of all the leather-studded possibilities out in L.A. I’m sure she would continue whatever antics she did in Happy Hollow in L.A., just on a bigger scale. I think she’d have a lot more runway there."
With the dust having settled, Dylan, Jordy, and Spud decompress in Dylan's basement bedroom, their friendship repaired. Spud explains the story of the Halifax Slasher, a supposed killer created out of mass hysteria. Despite the fact that the trio has been vindicated, they'll still be known as the band that killed someone, started a cult, and burned down a church. In other words, Dethkrunch has some pretty rad lore, "something labels might be interested in," posits Jordy.
In the final scene, Gene and a Linda (now back to normal) decide to get some much-needed rest. All seems right with the world... until a snarling demon — or perhaps the Devil Himself — peers into the bedroom.
How to watch Hysteria!
All eight episodes of Hysteria! are now streaming exclusively on Peacock. Episodes will also air weekly, every Thursday night at 10:30 p.m. ET on USA Network.
Jordan Vogt-Roberts (The Kings of Summer, Kong: Skull Island) directed Episodes 1 and 8. He also serves as an executive producer alongside co-creators Matthew Scott Kane and David A. Goodman; Chris Bender (The Last Voyage of The Demeter); Jake Weiner (Mulan); and Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves co-directors John Francis Daley and Jonathan Goldstein.
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