From Season 2 Ending Explained: Is Tabitha Back in the Real World? How?

Created by John Griffin, ‘From’ concludes its second season with even more questions than before, and hardly enough answers. This ends up working in the show’s favor, though, as all the characters, be it Boyd, Tabitha, Jade, or the others, seem to have uncovered new aspects about this supernatural hellscape all by themselves. Taken together, these disparate revelations create a bigger picture that is increasingly making sense, but some questions remain. We still don’t know the history of this town, for instance, and how its core appears to be based on a violent, traumatic past of sacrifice and massacres. As we approach the season finale, titled ‘Once Upon a Time…,’ the veil separating the town’s internal logic from reason seems to be thinning, bit by bit, both for the characters and fans of this horror thriller. SPOILERS AHEAD.

From Season 2 Plot Recap

The second season of ‘From’ begins exactly where the previous season finale left off, with Sheriff Boyd trapped in a well and Tabitha discovering the underground cave system that seemingly houses the nocturnal entities. While Victor arrives just in time to bring her back to safety, Boyd finds some respite when a rope is thrown down the well. Upon climbing up, he is met with an old, enchained man named Martin, who seems to have strange worms flowing through his blood. While Boyd tries to get him out, Martin manages to send the worms into the sheriff’s body instead, and dies almost instantly. Meanwhile, a bus full of strangers arrives in the town minutes before sunset, and to make things infinitely worse, Jim’s house collapses just as he is looking for Tabitha.

A few of the characters get stranded inside the rubble after trying to rescue Jim, but he himself survives, almost miraculously. By the following day, the townsfolk clue the new arrivals in on how the supernatural entities work, and some aren’t that easily convinced. One such man is Randall, who gradually becomes convinced that all of this is part of a larger scam or experiment being run on him and the others by someone. Tabitha, meanwhile, reunites with her family but is still haunted by strange dreams of the ghostly children she saw underground, seemingly trapped in the tunnels. Jade, too, is confronted with vivid visions of the past and fears that he might be a conduit of some sort.

While Boyd is able to make his way back into the town shortly after the Martin incident, it is not before spotting a strange music box in the dungeon. Soon thereafter, the town seemingly gets affected by the curse of the Music Box Monster, who targets people on the basis of nursery rhymes. During one chaotic episode, Boyd’s son, Ellis, gets stabbed, and though Boyd wishes to donate his own blood for the transfusion, the worms appear to have made their way in there as well. To get rid of them, he unleashes the worms on one of the nocturnal creatures, seemingly killing it. However, the problems only get worse as three townsfolk, Julie, Randall, and Marielle, get sent into a comatose state, forcing Boyd to look for a solution. Meanwhile, Tabitha determines that the only way to solve the mystery is through the mysterious lighthouse we have only known from a distance, but upon climbing to the top, she is surprised to find none other than the boy in white.

From Season 2 Ending: How is Tabitha Back in the Real World?

Season 2 of ‘From’ ends on a truly puzzling note as Tabitha is pushed out of the lighthouse, only to find her way back into the real world. After being knocked out due to the fall, she wakes up at St. Anthony Hospital, a seemingly normal place with seemingly normal people, none of whom are aware of who she is or where she is from. The doctors reveal that she was spotted by a pair of hikers on a forest trail, with no one around, much less a lighthouse. This leaves us with two possibilities: either she was transported from the immaterial town into a physical location while falling down, or someone, or something, carried her all the way back to the real world. Given her injuries, though, the former reading seems more likely, and leaves us with only more questions about the nature of the town, the lighthouse, and the boy in white.

Curiously, before pushing Tabitha, the boy in white claims that this is the only way to save everyone, by which he could either be referring to the townsfolk, the trapped children, or other supernatural entities. The boy likely already knew that doing so would bring Tabitha to the real world, which means that she is here for a purpose she doesn’t even understand yet. However, there are clues throughout the narrative that may explain how these mechanisms work. The fact that she wakes up at St. Anthony’s, for instance, isn’t a coincidence, as Saint Anthony is traditionally known as the patron saint of lost belongings and travelers. While it’s easy to take this as a reference to Tabitha herself as a lost soul, the boy in white’s goal might be to help her remember something crucial to understanding the mystery.

Though we are initially led to believe that only certain characters, like Ethan, Victor, and Sara, are capable of tapping into the supernatural veins of this town, Tabitha’s eerily specific dream sequences challenge that notion. There is also her direct connection to Jade, as he too hears the children chant “Anghkooey,” as if they are attempting to communicate with the two. It might be that they are summoning some kind of power to send Tabitha to the real world to get help, but it is very likely that no one will believe her words. With that, Tabitha will likely have to play a smart game from here on out, slowly gathering the information she needs while simultaneously figuring out a way back into the town, ironically by choice.

Does Boyd Destroy the Music Box? Is Julie Awake?

After an entire season of being tormented by the music box and its sounds, Boyd eventually makes his way back to the dungeon where he was in the first episode, and this time he doesn’t waste even a moment in destroying the box for good. The manner in which he figures this out, however, is quite far removed from his usual way of operating, and requires a leap of faith. After anguishing over a way back to the dungeon, Boyd realizes at last, during his son’s wedding, that he needs to retrieve the torch he found at the ruins. The clue, as it turns out, is Ellis saying the words “be my light in dark places” to Fatima, which ties into a greater motif about how light seems to beat darkness. The great tower is a lighthouse, after all, and this might be our clue into the actual way to win against the town’s evil.

With Boyd destroying the music box, a spell seems to be lifted from the town, and not just Julie, but also Randall and Marielle are freed from their possessed-like states. While the worst seems to be behind them, we still don’t quite know why these three characters in particular were chosen by the curse. One possible answer, though, can be located in the nature of the curse itself, or more specifically, its connection to the nursery rhyme. The phrase “They Steal, They Break, They Touch” can also loosely be associated with the three, especially in the case of Marielle, a drug addict who stole morphine from the clinic, and Randall, a notoriously aggressive man who ruptures the town’s stability. However, we don’t have a clear answer for how Julie fits into this just yet, and her brief encounter with the entity might just leave her with lasting physical and psychological effects.

Who Are the Children in the Cave? What Happens to Jade?

Towards the end of the season finale, Jade also gets a partial answer to some of the questions that have been haunting him for quite some time. After the spirits seemingly urge him to seek his answers in the caves, Jade makes his way deep underground, only to find the children chained to slabs of rock arranged in a circle, staring up at an opening in the cave’s ceiling. That’s not all, though, as the opening is partially covered by wooden sticks arranged exactly like the eerie symbol we have known all along. In a subversion of expectations, the symbol might not be a symbol at all, but merely the children’s eternal sight being projected into the minds of the townsfolk. While this is indeed a horrific fate for these trapped children, the implications are even more disastrous.

Based on what we know about the history of this town, each successful settlement has been destroyed in a supernaturally induced massacre, in what seems to be a cycle no one can escape. The fact that all of these massacres are anticipated by the sightings of the symbol suggests that the trapped children might have something to do with all of it. It might even be that the children are looking for a host to take over, but the other narrative cues point towards a different possibility. There have been more than a few instances of Jade tapping into memories of his predecessors, even emulating their actions at times, such as when he gains the ability to play the violin. Chances are that Jade is central to the overarching, generational mystery of this town, and is thus connected to the children in much more complex ways, just like Tabitha.

Who is the Monster? Is it Dead or Alive?

While the ending implies that the Music Box Monster has been destroyed, one can never be too sure of the fact that it’s gone for good. In fact, even down to the final moment of the town on screen, we can hear vague sounds of cicadas, which suggests that the entity has only lost its grip over the town, but isn’t done just yet. With no origin story or in-universe explanation, however, we are left with no choice but to simply guess its origins. One theory that ties several narrative threads together is that the cicadas are the manifestation of the worms that were crawling in Boyd’s arm and ultimately led to the death of Smiley the creature. With no living host to sustain them, the worms may have evolved into a more fearsome form, feeding on the town’s sense of dread and terror.

While the cicadas can be linked to the worms, this doesn’t necessarily establish a connection to the Music Box Monster or its abilities. Sara believes that the town, as a collective, is manifesting the fears of the dead, in this case her brother’s fear of cicadas, which suggests that the creature’s strength matches up to the amount of fear it is able to generate. It appears that destroying the music box has certain unexpected side effects, though, as the weather immediately changes from fall to a cold winter. This is fresh territory for all the residents, including Victor, and while it might mean that things are only going to get worse from here on out, at least Boyd and company can claim that they have forced the town to show its true colors.