12 Most Hopeless Horror Movie Endings

The vast majority of stories are frustratingly predictable. There are certain rules and guidelines that creators have to follow in order to satisfy everyone, for example: the hero has to be smart and capable, overcoming their obstacles in an inspiring way, defeat their evil foes and bring about a truly happy ending.

The world of horror often isn't restricted by such rules. Allowing the grittiest parts of our imagination to run wild, it's rare to find an ending in a horror movie that is truly inspiring and filled with the warmth audiences get from most other communities.

From cataclysmic stakes falling the wrong way, to a low-key slasher villain getting the better of a main protagonist, horror films of all shapes and sizes have made a name for themselves in delivering the bleakest conclusions in cinematic history.

Sometimes though horror outdoes itself in delivering the despondency, throwing up an ending that leaves audiences with their jaws on the floor and with an empty feeling in their stomach....

One of the creepiest and most original supernatural horrors, The Autopsy of Jane Doe is deep and dark throughout its runtime and culminates in some truly shocking ways.

The story of an unidentifiable female victim of a mass homicide being rolled into the morgue of father and son, Austin and Tommy Tilden. Olwen Kelly was chosen by Norwegian director André Øvredal to play Jane Doe as opposed to using a puppet or CG, and that decision really helps sell the eeriness of the film's settings and supernatural events.

The Autopsy of Jane Doe reaches a climax when the father and son work out that Jane Doe contains the spirit of a witch killed during the Salem Witch trials. The spirit begins using Tommy's body as a way of healing itself, torturing the older man in such a horrific way that he ends up begging his son to kill him by the end. Austin ends up being startled by another vision from the witch and falls to his death before the authorities arrive on the scene.

The film ends with the witch triumphantly being carted off somewhere else, with the audience's two main characters left dead inside the morgue.