WARNING: The following contains spoilers for We Summon the Darkness, available on digital and VOD.
We Summon the Darkness reveals its hand midway through the film that the coven we think is going about killing heavy metal rockers in '80s America aren't really Satanists. Alexis (Alexandra Daddario), Val (Maddie Hasson) and Bev (Amy Forsyth) are actually agents of the Daughters of the Dawn, a church belonging to a televangelist, Pastor Butler (Johnny Knoxville).
They're faking these gothic murders to get fearful people to join the church and seek salvation, thus enriching their coffers so Butler's family can live lavish lifestyles. When Bev discovers the truth, however, she turns on the girls -- especially Alexis, Butler's daughter -- which leads to a violent finale as she tries to help free a couple of metalheads the radicals drugged after a show.
ENTER THE PASTOR
Kovacs (Logan Miller) is bleeding out after Alexis cuts him and he tries to get help. Mark (Keean Johnson) is busy fighting Alexis off upstairs for the car keys while Bev and Val are tussling down in the basement. But as Kovacs makes his way to the driveway, he encounters Butler, but can't tell who it is, and he hands over the gun because the man promises to help him. However, Butler immediately shoots him and heads inside, realizing there's a cop car outside.
When the pastor gets in, he finds other victims the girls killed: a sheriff, Butler's coke-snorting ex-wife and another rocker Ivan (Austin Swift). Trying to think of a plan, he has some cookies and water before heading upstairs to help Alexis. He finds Mark strangling her and puts a bullet in the kid, before consoling his daughter. Alexis was merely trying to help her dad out with the killings but while she thinks she's safe, he switches it up and strangles her himself. Butler reveals he'll put a PR spin on this and ultimately, Alexis is helping out the church as a lamb who lost her way and the perfect sacrifice.
BEV CUTS LOOSE
While this occurs, Bev and the psychotic Val are locked in a brutal basement fight in the darkness. Alexis had set the manor's sound system to "Heaven Is a Place on Earth" by Belinda Carlisle, which invigorates Val as she's definitely the most violent of this cult. She doesn't care about killing for the church, she simply enjoys bloodshed and torture, but this ironic song and Val's constant belittling inspires Bev not to hold back anymore.
As Val tries to crush her throat with a weed whacker, Bev -- knowing Val is a glam-metal and hairspray lover -- waits for her to get close enough, and lights her hair on fire. Val's entire head goes up in flames, allowing Bev time to get to Alexis' room and knock Butler out before he kills his daughter. Alexis tries to fake being manipulated, which leads to her and Bev scrapping, but an infuriated Bev tosses Alexis out the window. Luckily, Mark's alive and Bev takes him to the car to get away from this house of horror.
HELL ON EARTH
As they drive off in Alexis' jeep, though, Alexis stumbles into the driveway. Bev doesn't show any sympathy, however, as she floors it.The impact isn't shown but the final shot of the film before she and Mark leave a convenience store shows blood and guts on the bumper and bonnet, so clearly they ran the villain over. Interestingly enough, as Bev buys supplies with tithes she stole from Butler's tool shed, she sees the pastor on-air spinning the incident to local news.
He's working a PR angle about Alexis becoming lost to the devil, so essentially he's still won. Bev has no interest in exposing him or going back to kill him, however, as she just wants to escape this hell on Earth. She realizes religion and pastors like Butler will always find a way and people will forever be sheep, susceptible to this kind of mental manipulation. She leaves with Mark, who's depressed he lost his two best friends but relieved he still has his life.
Starring Alexandra Daddario, Maddie Hasson, Amy Forsyth, Keean Johnson, Logan Miller, Austin Swift and Johnny Knoxville, We Summon the Darkness is now available on digital and VOD.