Fear Street part 2 takes us back to the dark and mysterious Shadyside, but in another time and for another teen massacre that happened at Camp Nightwing in 1978.
Netflix’s Fear Street part 1: 1994 ends on a horrid cliff-hanger where Deena (Kiana Madeira) believes she has saved her girlfriend Sam (Olivia Welch) and killed the witch. Unfortunately, she is soon attacked by a possessed Sam, realizing that the horror never left.
Christine Berman (Gillian Jacobs), who is the only survivor of the Camp Nightwing murders, had warned them that the witch never dies and finds a way. This forces Deena and her brother Josh (Benjamin Flores Jr.) to meet Christine as they try to unravel the mysterious connections behind this dreaded curse and the sinister hauntings that have rocked the town for generations.
She narrates the story of Ziggy Berman (Sadie Sink), in a flashback to the summer of 1978 at Camp Nightwing, where we see Ziggy’s campmates about to hang her on the tree in the forest where Sarah Fier was hung long ago. Sheila (Chiara Aurelia) accuses her of stealing money and of being possessed by Fier. However, a boy named Nick Goode (Ted Sutherland) rescues her.
She visits nurse Mary Lane (Jordana Spiro), who is upset about how her daughter, Ruby — a 16-year old Shadyside high-schooler and choir singer — had killed eight people at a party including herself, and was believed to have been possessed too.
Meanwhile, Cindy (Emily Rudd) and her boyfriend Tommy Slater (McCabe Slye) are busy cleaning up the camp hall when suddenly, nurse Lane appears with a knife in hand and attacks Tommy, exclaiming that his name is on the wall and he is going to die soon.
He overpowers her and in an unconscious state, she is apprehended by cops and taken to the hospital. Everyone thinks that she has gone insane just like her daughter.
Since Tommy is freaking out, Cindy takes him to the infirmary to figure out the reason behind Nurse Mary’s crazy behaviour, and Alice (Ryan Simpkins) and her boyfriend Arnie (Sam Brooks) decide to tag along. They find a book with the witch’s mark and come to know that Sarah Fier had cut her hand off at Satan’s stone in exchange for eternal life, scarring the soil beneath and bringing a curse on Shadyside.
Nurse Mary has also made a map in the book to the witch’s cave and the four campers decide to follow it, reaching the secret hideout. Alice and Cindy stumble upon the witch’s mark and see the wall where the names of all Shadyside killers are written. It is the same wall which we saw in Part 1, where Sam’s name was also etched.
They both are horrified to see Tommy’s name as the last one on the wall and immediately rush out to check on him. Arriving too late, the now possessed Tommy breaks Arnie’s skull into half with an axe.
Utterly terrified, the two girls try to escape as the roof caves in. Tommy comes out of the cave on the other side and heads to the camp. Sheila is pranked by Ziggy and Nick who tumble a bucket of bugs on her and lock her up in the camp bathroom and run away.
Feeling desperate at the thought of what Tommy might do to the campers, Alice and Cindy decide to follow the map in the book to find a way out. Meanwhile, Tommy has already killed a child. The duo sees a strange breathing mass of muscles and blood. As Alice touches it out of curiosity, she sees flashes from the past of all the previous murderers and their preys. Horrified she tries to run, but falls and breaks her ankle.
As soon as Nick and Ziggy find out about the murder, they start mustering kids at the camp. Nick goes out to look for missing children, while Ziggy looks for Sheila who is still trapped in the bathroom. She and Sheila fight and the latter falls unconscious in the scuffle.
Meanwhile, when voices are heard from down at the toilets, it is discovered that they open to the cave, and it is Alice and Cindy crying for help. After finding more children dead, Nick instructs Kurt to put the kids in the bus and take off from there.
As Ziggy and Gary are trying to pull up Alice, Tommy shows up and shaves off his head. Ziggy, in a panic, runs and meets Nick and they both hide in the Science Park. As Tommy pounces on Ziggy, Nick comes in his way and gets wounded as she escapes again.
Alone in the dark, she takes to the hall where Cindy also finds an opening to the cave. Alice’s nose starts bleeding and by the book it means that the witch’s hand is somewhere near. She tries to dig.
Ziggy puts on the stereo with blaring music to distract and befuddle Tommy. He, however, follows her trail and in the tussle that ensues, manages to trap his head in a gunny bag.
As he menacingly moves towards her, Cindy who hears Ziggy scream, stabs Tommy multiple times with a knife. Both sisters hug each other and promise that nothing will pull the two apart ever.
But do they remain together forever? Do Deena and Josh find a way to lift the Shadyside curse?
Fear Street Part 2: 1978 ending explained in detail:
Significance of the hand bone
Alice appears from the cave opening and tells them that she has found Sarah Fier’s lost hand. As per the book, if it is reunited with the body, the curse will be lifted. The three are ecstatic that they could rid the Shadyside of its dark history. The decide to find the body buried under the tree.
As they are talking, Ziggy takes the bone in her hand and her blood falls on it. She immediately sees Sarah Fier in flashes. They have to bury the hand as soon as they can.
Scary noises from the cave emerge and from the breathing mass of muscles and blood emerges a blob that reaches the wall where Tommy’s name is written and breathes life into him as we see his hand twitch. Alice is soon killed by Tommy who rises from the dead. Cindy cuts his head off with axe.
They hear somebody singing and suddenly, all previous killers of Shadyside, appear from the cave, led by Ruby Lane. The two sisters run towards the tree to bury the bone. They dig as the killers approach, eventually hitting a stone which says the witch lives forever. They panic as it looks like there is no way out.
They are encircled by the murderers as Cindy throws the bone where they dug and instructs Ziggy to run. They are after her because she had bled on it. Both the sisters fail to escape the wrath of the killers. As their bodies lay slashed, they complete each other’s last words- “Nothing can break us apart again.”
The twist
Nick finds Ziggy and tries to resuscitate her. Fortunately, she survives and her true identity is revealed. Ziggy is actually Christine Berman. This revelation is a big surprise for both Deena and Josh, as well as the audience.
At this point we also understand why Sheriff Nick never talked about the murders as he worried that the witch might come for her.
She has not seen Nick after that and feels miserable about the fact that the one night her sister believed she could end the curse, she died and for nothing.
The witch is lurking in the town again through those killers and she has realised that there is no end to it. The only chance for Deena and Josh is to run as far away as they can.
The botched plan
Deena and Josh tell Ziggy that they have found the witch’s body. Their friends died for the same reason as her sister and Alice. The witch didn’t want them to find the hand bone and so the carnage followed.
They can still lift the curse if the body can be reunited with it. They ask her if the hand bone is still at the camp. It is a real twist when we watch Deena and Josh digging and finding the elusive bone at the Shadyside Mall where all the murders from Part 1 took place. This confirms that the camp location was later transformed into a mall.
Deena starts bleeding from her nose as she locks Josh in the car and goes to bury the bone. She digs out the sweatshirt where the witch’s body was buried and thinks she has got her. But little does she realize that the blood on her hands has touched the bone. She too sees the witch in flashes and is going to be possessed soon.
In the last scene we see her with a bloodied knife in her hand, looking at her reflection in water. It looks like another time, a time in the past. Her face also seems to change in the reflection. Suddenly somebody calls Sarah Fier’s name out loud and she turns to answer.
Also Read: Fear Street Part 3 1666 ending explained: Origin of Sarah Fier and Witch’s Curse