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Ready or Not has now arrived on Netflix in the UK and Ireland, giving more people a chance to watch one of 2019's best horror movies.
The movie follows newlywed bride Grace (an outstanding Samara Weaving) as she endures the worst wedding night ever. Unfortunately, her husband's family decide to hunt her as part of a bizarre long-running 'deal' to secure their enormous wealth.
A large part of its success is down to its outrageous, blood-soaked ending, but it turns out that it could have all ended very differently.
Huge spoilers await, so turn away now if you haven't seen Ready or Not yet.
Ready or Not ending explained
Until her wedding night, Grace doesn't realise that marrying into the Le Domas family means that she has to play a game at midnight. They made their wealth from board games, so it makes sense, kind of.
Grace picks a card from the family's magic box and, unfortunately for her, it turns out to be hide and seek, the one game that has deadly consequences.
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It turns out that generations earlier, Victor Le Domas made a deal with a mysterious fellow called Mr Le Bail. If they took part in this tradition, then Mr Le Bail would help the Le Domas family enjoy enormous wealth. He's basically the Devil.
When it comes to hide and seek, the Le Domas family have to make a sacrifice to Le Bail before dawn, otherwise they face severe consequences.
Despite several attempts to sacrifice her, Grace manages to survive until the sun rises and, initially, it appears that the whole deal was meaningless, a myth. Until every member of the Le Domas family begin exploding in a very bloody fashion.
It's an unexpected, shocking and supremely entertaining climax, especially for Grace's delirious reaction.
That wasn't the original plan, though.
Much like Get Out switched from a darker ending to a crowd-pleasing one, Ready or Not did exactly the same.
"The ending was much different, initially, when we first got the script. A lot darker," executive producer Chad Villella told Bloody Disgusting, adding that it saw Alex, Grace's husband, kill her and the Le Domas family get away with it.
It would have been a serious downer ending, given how much you root for Grace throughout the movie. You certainly wouldn't want to rewatch it knowing that all of her effort to survive was going to be for nothing.
And, weirdly, you've got US President-elect Donald Trump to thank for the ending being changed.
"When we got attached to this script, and when the script was originally written, Obama was president, and when we got involved with [producers Fox] Searchlight it was literally the day after Trump got elected," recalled co-director Matt Bettinelli-Olpin in August 2019.
"And the desire to make something that dark went away. It was like, we're living that shit now. We don't need to go experience it at the movies. Let's have the cathartic version."
Co-director Tyler Gillett added: "It was really clear that one version of the movie has the audience leaving cheering and the other one has the audience leaving like, really feeling the same general terror that we're all experiencing in our daily lives anyway."
Changing the ending wasn't the only smart decision they made, as there was originally a coda without Grace.
We would have seen two people walk into a Le Bail conference with a "whole bunch of rich people", according to Villella. The idea being that it's not only the Le Domas family who made this particular deal with the devil.
But that would have taken away from the brilliant final scene where Grace is met by the police at the mansion who are wondering just what the hell happened.
Her reply is up there with the best final scenes of 2019: "In-laws."
Ready or Not is available to watch now on Netflix and Disney+ in the UK and Ireland.
Movies Editor, Digital Spy Ian has more than 10 years of movies journalism experience as a writer and editor. Starting out as an intern at trade bible Screen International, he was promoted to report and analyse UK box-office results, as well as carving his own niche with horror movies, attending genre festivals around the world. After moving to Digital Spy, initially as a TV writer, he was nominated for New Digital Talent of the Year at the PPA Digital Awards. He became Movies Editor in 2019, in which role he has interviewed 100s of stars, including Chris Hemsworth, Florence Pugh, Keanu Reeves, Idris Elba and Olivia Colman, become a human encyclopedia for Marvel and appeared as an expert guest on BBC News and on-stage at MCM Comic-Con. Where he can, he continues to push his horror agenda – whether his editor likes it or not.
