10 More Horror Characters We All Foolishly Thought Had Got Away

8. Sarah Carter (The Descent)

Final Destination 3 ending
Pathé Distribution

While many alternate endings don't drastically change the conclusion of the story, The Descent is one of those cases where it absolutely, definitely does.

In the version of Neil Marshall's low-budget horror hit that American audiences saw, protagonist Sarah Carter escapes the monster-infested cave her and her friends were trapped in, and drives away. She's then jump-scared by a hallucination of her dead friend and the screen cuts to black, but considering that the point of this ending was to provide Stateside audiences with a glimmer of hope, it was fair to assume that Sarah had survived. The Descent Part 2 even confirms this, but the less said about that movie, the better.

It's the extended UK ending that qualifies the movie for this list however, with British moviegoers in 2005 being treated to an extra scene that confirms Sarah definitely didn't get away. This finale cuts back to the cave after that Juno jump-scare, revealing that Sarah's "escape" was merely a hallucination.

While Part 2 would essentially canonize the more hopeful American ending, the darker, more definitive UK cut is how The Descent was always supposed to end.

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Contributor

Danny has been with WhatCulture for almost nine years, and is currently Doctor Who Editor and WhoCulture Channel Manager, overseeing all of WhatCulture's Whoniverse coverage. He has been writing and video editing for 10+ years, and first got a taste for content creation after making his own Doctor Who trailers and uploading them to YouTube (they're admittedly a bit rusty by today's standards). If you need someone to recite every Doctor Who episode in order or to tell you about the making of 1988's Remembrance of the Daleks, Danny is the person to ask.