Warning: Major spoilers ahead for the entire Fear Street Trilogy.
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The full Fear Street Trilogy is now on Netflix and its secrets are exposed! Fear Street Part 1: 1994 introduced us to Shadyside and its 300-year-old curse of gruesome spree killings. Fear Street Part 2: 1978 delved into witchy lore in search of a cure. Fear Street Part 3: 1666 teleported us all back to the very beginning, revealing the true horror at the core of the Sarah Fier story.
After all these twists and turns, your head might be spinning. So we’re breaking down all the questions, secrets, and spoilers of this sensational slasher series, which was inspired by the spooky YA works of R.L. Stine.
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The True Curse of Shadyside
For over 300 years, the horrors of Shadyside were blamed on Sarah Fier and her severed hand, who legend had it had put a curse on the town centuries earlier. But Fear Street Part 3: 1666 reveals it was the Goodes all along. Every few years, the first-born son of the Goodes would choose a Shadysider to sacrifice, like Ruby Lane, Tommy Slater, and Ryan Torres.
In exchange for the blood of slaughtered Shadysiders, Satan would see to it that the Goodes would prosper in Sunnyvale. They became leaders of the community, like Mayor Will Goode and Sheriff Nick Goode.
Why Did the Slashers Come After Sam?
Deena and her friends got it wrong! But not all wrong. In Fear Street Part 1: 1994, the terrorized teens postulated that the resurrected slashers were after Sam because she’d disturbed the bones of Sarah Fier. Specifically, Simon speculated, “Sam bled on the bones and now [Sarah Fier] wants more of her blood.”
The first half is true: It was touching the bones that triggered the rise of the dead Shadyside slayers. But it’s not Sarah who wants Sam dead. Discovering Sarah’s bones—buried in the woods but not beneath the hanging tree—allowed Sam a window into what really happened back in 1666. That makes her a threat to the actual spellcaster cursing Shadyside.
Sarah even tries to help Sam and the gang. When the teens go to rebury the bones—in hopes of putting Sarah’s spirit to rest—Sam experiences another vision of the so-called witch yelling, “It’s you!” She assumes this is a threat, but it’s a warning. Sarah is trying to warn Sam that the slashers are coming specifically for her.
It’s All in the Hand (and Solomon Goode)
Both Sam (in ’94) and Ziggy (in ’78) touched a part of Sarah Fier’s corpse, resulting in a flood of confusing imagery of screams, violence, and anger. Ziggy only touched the severed hand. Sam touched the other remains. It wasn’t until Deena put the bones together again under the hanging tree that Sarah was able to express her full story. Fittingly, Sarah’s body being made whole thrust Deena full-bodied into 1666, where she found herself in the shoes of the accused witch, who was scapegoated by the nefarious Solomon Goode!
Having lost his wife and child, the farmer Goode had his sights set on Sarah Fier to be his new bride. But after witnessing Sarah Fier kissing Hannah Miller in the woods, he knew his suit was pointless. So he robbed the widow in the woods, stole her book on witchcraft, and made the “Simple Exchange” deal with the devil. To get his revenge, Solomon made the first possessed murderer Pastor Cyrus Miller, Hannah’s father. Then he served Sarah up as a sinful scapegoat, which led to her lynching.
“Sheriff Goode? More Like Sheriff Motherf*cking Evil!”
Martin the mall janitor was more right than he realized. Not only did white cop Nick Goode frame this Black Shadysider for the graffiti at the mall crime scene, but he was also the cause of the massacre there, having added ’94’s Skull Mask Killer to the list of Shadyside slashers. Rewatch the opening slaughter sequence in the first film. Goode shows up at the mall in time to fatally shoot Ryan Torres, but not soon enough to save B. Dalton clerk Heather. It’s no coincidence. Like he did in ’78, Nick Goode is painting himself as a hero who prevented further loss of life, when actually he is the reason for the deaths.
In Fear Street Part 2: 1978, Nick is a compassionate counselor at Camp Nightwing who extends a hand to Shadyside misfit Ziggy (who grows up to be C. Berman). Nick confides in Ziggy that he’s unsure if he wants to follow in the footsteps of his recently deceased father, and it seems he means becoming the sheriff like his dad was. In fact, Nick is waffling on his plot to go into the Goode caves and feed the festering demon tumor by adding a name to the slasher wall. Sure, Nick helps round up some campers to skirt them away to safety and he tries to save Ziggy from the ax-wielding Nightwing Killer. But that’s not about being a hero, just looking like one to get what he wants.
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Why Did Sheriff Goode Warn C. Berman?
In ’94, Nick drops off a note to a mysterious house that reads, “It’s happening again.” Fear Street Part 2: 1978 reveals the note went to Camp Nightwing survivor Ziggy/C. Berman, who has become a recluse after witnessing her sister be slain by undead killers. But what did Nick Goode hope to gain from giving her this warning? If you believe that he really did love Ziggy, you might think this is his way of assuring she stays inside and off the resurrected slashers’ radar. A more cynical reading is he’s hoping the one living person who knows the most about the Shadyside Curse will be scared into staying put and out of his way.
Nick Goode Damned Sam
Having found Sarah’s secret grave, Sam stumbled unknowingly onto the key to the terrible curse of Shadyside. Did Nick Goode sense this and therefore send a cadre of undead killers after her? Or were they raised as a self-defense reaction from the evil cave blob? Either way, we know Goode knew something was up because of how he reacted when the girls reported the Skull Mask Killer’s hospital spree. He dismissed and gaslit them.
At the end of Part 1, Deena, her brother Josh, and Sam are interrogated about the grisly deaths of their friends Simon and Kate. Goode urges them to reveal how much they know about the supernatural horror at play. They refuse to tell the terrifying truth. But that’s not good enough for him. So he adds “Samantha Fraser” to the wall of the damned, turning the cheerleader into a hissing, homicidal terror who would likely kill Deena and her brother. Just like that, another of Goode’s tracks would be covered by scapegoating a lesbian for his sins.
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Why Did Sarah Choose Deena and Sam?
Ziggy may have touched her hand, but Sarah called out to Deena and Sam. Remember how they first found her body? On the bus, Deena experienced an inexplicable nosebleed… which triggered the car accident, which pitched Sam into the forest… where her nose bled too. Then she found the bones.
The third Fear Street film reveals that Sarah—like Deena and Sam—was a queer woman in love, but was afraid to make that love public because of the vicious homophobia of her community. Essentially, the long dead outcast saw kindred spirits in these spirited young women. She called to them to help bring her story out of the ground and into the light at long last. And maybe even to bring them back together.
Follow the Red Moss
A bloody nose came to mean Sarah Fier’s bones were near. Another symbol of her presence was the red moss found in all three films. It grew all over the ground where Sam stumbled onto her bones. It bloomed below the hanging tree after Ziggy dropped her hand in ’78. It crept up from the caves where that hand was severed by Solomon Goode in 1666, paving a path for Cindy and Alice to escape through the Camp Nightwing outhouse.
The origin of the moss is revealed in 1666. It began not as a sign of blood and horror, but of love. When Sarah first kissed Hannah, the pastor’s daughter was wearing a crown made of the moss. After Sarah sacrificed herself to the hateful, homophobic mob, her friends reburied her in a peaceful place. They chiseled her name on the chains as a marker. Then Hannah laid a red moss crown upon her lover’s head as a final farewell. From this grew the red moss that stained Cindy’s polo shirt and signaled Fier. And in the trilogy’s final act, the red moss becomes the backdrop for a reunited Sam and Deena to enjoy a romantic lunch while paying tribute to Sarah, “The First Shadysider.”
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Cliffhanger: Who Grabbed the Book at the End of Fear Street?
True to Fear Street fashion, the film trilogy ends on a cliffhanger. After we say farewell to the survivors of the latest Shadyside killing spree, we’re whisked once more into the subterranean caves where Nick Goode dropped the book of witchcraft that outlined the “Simple Exchange” with Satan. Then a pair of pale, young hands dart onto the screen, snatching the book away.
This book has passed through many hands. In 1666, it belonged to the widow, a witchy healer who lived on the fringe of the Union community. Solomon Goode knew of the book because he brought his sick wife to the widow in vain hopes of saving her life. After he stole the book, he presumably passed it down generation after generation in the Goode line. But in ’78, Ziggy and the Shadyside counselors see it in the office of Nurse Lane, the mother of Shadyside Killer Ruby Lane. She’d been using it to uncover Sarah Fier’s remains and stop the Shadyside curse. But how did she get it? Presumably Nick needed it to start the ’78 massacre. Did he lose it at camp and then reclaim it later?
Some questions cannot be firmly answered. Among them is who took the book at the end of the trilogy. However, there are a couple of potential culprits. First off, we know there was a chatroom dedicated to Sarah Fier conspiracy theories. Deena’s brother spent a lot of time there talking with QueenofAiranDarkness. At the end of Part 3, he meets this AIM buddy IRL and learns she goes to Shadyside High. She fits the profile, being young, white, and having an established knowledge of Sarah Fier lore.
Of course, it’s possible another Goode is looking to take on the frightful family tradition. Sure, Mayor Will Goode denies having any knowledge of what his older brother was up to, but Josh doesn’t believe that and neither do we. Those might not be Will’s hands, but does he have a progeny or nibling who may be determined to see the Goode name returned to glory? Or might this be a character not even hinted at in this Shadyside trilogy?
A great thing about the Fear Street books is there are plenty of people primed to be play hero, villain, and victim. And Fear Street Trilogy helmer Leigh Janiak has said she’s hoping to extend the story even further. So firmer answers could come if this trilogy proves a hit.
