Midsommar ending explained: the May Queen, the fire and Dani's smile
Spoilers ahead: this article discusses the ending.
Midsommar ending explained: Dani is crowned May Queen, chooses her boyfriend Christian as the final sacrifice, and watches him burn inside a wooden temple. As the building collapses, her sobbing turns into a slow smile.
Ari Aster's second feature was released by A24 in the US on July 3, 2019. Aster has called it a breakup movie in the clothes of a folk horror film, and the ending is the breakup's last scene. Whether that smile is a victory or a surrender is the question most viewers leave with.
Midsommar ending explained: what happens
Dani wins the maypole dance and is crowned May Queen of the Hårga commune. Christian, drugged and seduced into a fertility ritual, is found naked and terrified, then paralysed with another drug.
The elders explain that the festival requires nine human sacrifices to purge the community of evil. As May Queen, Dani must choose the last one: Christian or a randomly chosen member of the commune. She chooses Christian. He is sewn into the hollowed-out body of a bear and placed in a yellow temple with the other victims.
The temple is set alight. As the volunteers inside scream, the commune mirrors their cries. Dani weeps, and then, as the structure falls, she begins to smile.
Who the nine sacrifices are
The pattern is laid out across the film, and the ending completes it.
- Four outsiders brought by Pelle and Ingemar: Mark, Josh, Simon and Connie
- The two elders who leapt from the cliff in the ättestupa ceremony
- Two commune volunteers, Ingemar and Ulf
- Christian, chosen by Dani as the ninth
What Dani's smile means
Aster has said the ending is designed to play as a happy ending, and has called it a kind of perverse wish-fulfilment fantasy for Dani. She arrives in Sweden grieving the murder-suicide that killed her parents and sister, attached to a boyfriend who wants out. By the end she has a family that mirrors her feelings back to her, literally wailing with her when she breaks down, and she cuts off the man who failed her.
Aster has also said Dani moves from one codependent relationship to another. The commune has been grooming her: it chose her, drugged her, and staged Christian's betrayal so she would see it. The smile can be freedom and capture at once, and the film holds both readings.
How Ari Aster frames the ending
Aster has said he only found a way into the project once he built it around a couple near the end of their relationship. Interviewers at Looper and Den of Geek report that he wrote it while going through a breakup himself, which explains why the climax feels cathartic rather than purely horrifying.
His original cut runs 171 minutes, and A24 asked him to trim it for wide release. The longer version adds scenes that deepen the tension between Dani and Christian, though the ending itself plays out the same way.
Clues that point to the ending
The opening shot is a painted tapestry that lays out the story in advance, including the trip to Sweden and the fire. Murals in the commune show a love ritual like the one performed on Christian. Florence Pugh's performance tracks the change: early on she apologises for her grief, and in the final scenes she lets it out with an entire community joining in.
Questions people ask
Why does Dani choose Christian in Midsommar?
She has just seen him in the fertility ritual, and he has failed her throughout their relationship. The commune also arranged events so she would choose him.
Why is Christian put inside a bear?
He is sewn into a bear's body as part of the purification sacrifice and burned with the other victims in the temple.
Is Midsommar's ending happy?
Ari Aster has said it is designed to play as a happy ending for Dani, though many viewers read her smile as a sign the cult has absorbed her.