Last midnight

SPOILER




There is a trap that opens and hands wrapped in mulch grab her and take her into the earth. A very good idea that I thought looked awkward, as executed.

---

It's up to interpretation. Not just whether it was self-orchestrated (although she knows she is "leaving you alone"). But also whether it is a demise (is she going to another realm, outside of the "world," if so, what is that realm? Or is she ceasing to exist? Does she even know where she's going? Do any of us when we leave?)

Ambiguity is a wonderful technique in art and storytelling. No one has to provide a definitive answer.

SPOILER:

Her 'mother'-who looks like the Witch did before the transformation, comes and takes her into the earth-where she came from (it's interesting in this production that she goes back to where she came from). She tells her mother to 'give [her] claws and a hunch, just away from this bunch, and the gloom and the doom and the boom, crunch!' And then, she's swallowed up.

I think, to answer the question of does she know where she's going, I think she MUST have some idea. I am not 100% convinced she 'dies' in the sense we think of death. (I think given that the Witch and her mother possess supernatural powers, they likely don't experience a human death-they aren't human really, although the Witch possesses human characteristics. But I always saw her as someone who wasn't quite human.)

Updated On: 8/29/12 at 11:14 AM

Wow...I've been reading this board for years but had to subscribe just to comment on this.

Interesting topic...I've always thought that the Witch accepted she was better off as the older, uglier and more powerful incarnation.

Therefore she throws the beans away for a second time to return to her former state and use her returned powers to return to seclusion. Of course this would only really work if she returned for Children Will Listen as the older version but this was never done for practicality. That was how it always plays in my head anyway.