Camila Morrone in 'Something Very Bad Is Going to Happen.' Courtesy of Netflix Logo text [This story contains major spoilers from the finale of Something Very Bad Is Going to Happen.]
You might think that Something Very Bad Is Going to Happen is a takedown of romance. It’s not.
“I think it’s a hopeful story,” creator Haley Z. Boston tells The Hollywood Reporter. “From an emotional standpoint, the show is really a breakup story.”
The first-time series creator, whose unique take on a wedding-gone-wrong lured Stranger Things creators the Duffer Brothers to executive produce her new Netflix thriller, was inspired to make Something Very Bad Is Going to Happen by her own fear of marrying the wrong person. She found herself weighing her romantic future against what she called an impossible standard set by her parents and their enduring 40-year marriage, so she wrote a show about a bride named Rachel (played by Camila Morrone) who must survive a curse that has been placed on her family: Marry your soulmate, or violently bleed to death.
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“The way to stop the curse is to believe the person you are marrying is your soulmate, which is easier said than done,” acknowledges Boston, who says she conceived the show initially without explicit curse rules, but made changes for the sake of making binge-worthy television. “Of course, you can’t fake belief. So ultimately, it’s a representation of doubt and the antidote is belief, and that’s the journey Rachel goes on.”
In the end, Rachel’s groom, Nicky (played by Adam DiMarco), reveals his true self, prompting Rachel to realize he is not, in fact, her soulmate. The curse is then passed onto his family — with Death coming for those (played by Jennifer Jason Leigh and Gus Birney) who didn’t marry their true soulmates — and Rachel dies a bloody death. She is then resurrected as a “witness” who must live eternally and watch the curse befall future generations.
Below in her chat with THR, Boston unpacks that layered ending, says she’s open to following Rachel along for another ride and shares what it was like filming that finale wedding scene: “I still think we could have had more blood. It’s never enough.”
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I read that you cracked this bloody ending first and then went backward. Did you go through a lot of iterations of what this curse was going to be, and that it would materialize as blood coming out of all bodily orifices?
The day that I came up with the idea, the first image I thought of was a bride bleeding to death from every orifice up on the altar. I don’t know why, but that was it. I knew that’s how I wanted everyone to die. I just found it very evocative and fun.
Then the idea of a curse came pretty late, actually. I did not pitch the show with that intention. It was meant to be much more esoteric, where there’s no explanation and it’s just that people start bleeding to death. I think adding something as concrete as a curse with defined rules ended up feeling like it was going to be more satisfying, and would give the audience a little more to hold onto prior to the finale. I probably could have gotten away with the other idea in a movie. But in TV, you have to answer some questions and seed things in.
So the curse then became a helpful narrative tool. I started by mapping out Rachel’s emotional journey, and knowing that her arc was going to be one where she goes from doubt to faith. Once I had that figured out, I wanted the curse to be a one-to-one, so that it wasn’t just horror for horror’s sake, but that it was connected to her emotional journey. That’s why the way to stop the curse is to believe the person is your soulmate, which is easier said than done. Of course, you can’t fake belief. So ultimately, it’s a representation of doubt and the antidote is belief, and that’s the journey Rachel goes on.
Why did you decide to resurrect her in the end, as this new immortal witness?
Well Rachel is full of doubt. She’s seeking certainty. As a character, that’s what she wants. That’s why she’s eavesdropping. That’s why she follows a scary sound in the middle of the night. She needs to know. And what she realizes is that the opposite of doubt is not certainty: It’s belief. She gets up there and takes a leap of faith, and that’s all you can do. You don’t know if any decision you make is going to be the right one until you make it.
So she makes a decision, and it’s triumphant. And then, of course, Nicky is on a separate path, and he ruins that. And in the course of them having their argument, she loses her faith and realizes that he doesn’t see her, and that’s ultimately what she needed to believe that he was her soulmate. So now she’s back to having to make a decision and she decides to choose herself. She is not going to sacrifice herself for him or this family.
From an emotional standpoint, the show is really a breakup story. Rachel’s death was a representation of the death of the relationship — the death of that version of herself. In order to move on and drive out of there free, she needed to be reborn and given a second chance, because he took away her chance. That was the reason behind wanting her to leave. I think it’s a hopeful story. You might think this is a takedown of romance, but it’s not.
The other family members stay dead, though, right?
Yes. They’re dead. They made the sin of marrying someone who they didn’t believe was their soulmate. The death of the soul.
The Cunningham family (left to right): Jeff Wilbusch as Jules, Sawyer Fraser as Jude, Karla Crome as Nell, Jennifer Jason Leigh as Victoria, Gus Birney as Portia, Ted Levine as Boris and Adam DiMarco as Nicky. Courtesy of Netflix Rachel and Nicky’s final conversation is quiet, compared to their explosive argument before her death. Did you go through a lot of options for their final interaction?
I thought a lot about their last interaction. They say so much in that fight. I think the fight scenes are cathartic because there’s a lot that’s not been said throughout the whole season between them, and they finally get to say the most honest things to each other. Nicky is redeemable in the first half of the episode — but when he forces this second wedding on her, that’s not great. So at this point, he’s betrayed her, and there’s kind of nothing left to say.
I definitely wanted them to interact again. I wanted him to know that she was alive and that he lost. It’s a twisted version of a post-breakup scene where you’re trying to get your stuff back, and there’s all this distance between you, and she’s just like, “I have nothing left to say to you.”
The season ends with Rachel driving away, now as this immortal witness to the ongoing curse. Where is she going? Could we follow her for a season two?
The series was conceived as a limited [series]. I like that there’s an open-endedness for Rachel, and that there’s hope for her. She is immortal now and tied to this curse still, so I think Rachel probably would try to stop the curse somehow. Or if not, then she would be a better witness than her witness was, and she would warn people a little more and maybe stop them all from getting locked into this.
But the show is so personal to me and based on my own fear [about marrying the wrong person], so I think if I if I were to continue, I would need to figure out what the next big fear is. I think we’re done with the wedding thing. I think it’s another existential fear.
But it sounds like you could be interested in keeping Rachel in a season two, if you find that idea?
Perhaps!
What was it like filming that bloody finale wedding? Was that the craziest thing you’ve ever filmed, and how did you movie magic all that blood?
Yes, absolutely. It was insane. I think we shot the wedding, and all the blood, in four days. It was the last thing we shot, of course, because we ruined all the sets. I really wanted to use as much practical blood as possible. It just looks more real. We had tubes on everyone’s face and active blood. The floors were covered in blood, which was a problem during production because people were slipping, and it was really sticky. So we ended up having to do a bunch in VFX, but it was the highlight of making the show. It was surreal. I still think we could have had more blood. It’s never enough. But it was very exciting to see.
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Something Very Bad Is Going to Happen is now streaming all episodes on Netflix.
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