“Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life and you will call it fate.”- Carl Jung (Maybe)
A quote that proposes Fate is only a product of your own compulsions and unconscious beliefs.
If you’re into horror movies, right now (August 2024) you can watch a tarot on Netflix.
But if not, no worries, I got you.
The message in this movie is the exact reason I started this series.
This movie is about seven friends renting a cabin to celebrate a birthday.
But while exploring the house they find an ancient Tarot Card Deck and an astrological Divination Cloth. And the main character Haley just so happens to know how to read horoscopes.
You can see where this is going….
Tarot gives us a peek into what it means to fall victim to fate.
They all cozy up by the fire for their readings in the living room. And they start with the Birthday girl, Elise.
She’s a Libra. The details are important with this movie!
Each Character’s Inherent Nature in Tarot (2024)
Haley tells them about their inherent nature and what they should be mindful of according to their horoscope.
The way she does the readings she places twelve tarot cards in a circle to represent the zodiac. Along with one in the middle for the overall outcome.
Elise
During Elise’s reading, Haley pulls the high priestess reversed as the 13th card.
Haley tells Elise that she is investigative by nature. She’s someone who needs to make sense of things.
But since Haley pulled the high priestess reversed, it’s a warning for her to slow down.
Even though she’s climbing the ladder to her “success”. Haley warns Elise that it could cause her to slip up.
The rest of the readings for each friend follow a similar pattern.
Madeline
Madeline is a Pisces. She’s generous, empathetic, and creative.
Haley tells her she sees her creativity paying off. But she then pulls the Hanged man, which in the Tarot means ultimate surrender.
. Which may be hard for her because mercury is in retrograde so technology might fail.
Haley warns her not to panic.
Knowing that Madeline tends to run from her problems Haley advises her to fight the urge to run.
“don’t panic, it will soon be water under the bridge.
Paige
Paige is a Virgo. She’s practical, an overthinker, and a bit of a control freak.
Her tendency is that she wants to find the logic to things.
She pulls the magician as the thirteenth card and warns that a bag of tricks will be deceptive.
Which will prevent her from seeing things clearly. So logic won’t help her much.
Paxton
Paxton is a Taurus. He’s dependable and a solid friend.
But he tends to be bull-headed and makes rash decisions.
Haley pulls the fool in reverse. She warns him not to act on impulse.
Even though he might feel trapped or boxed in. She reminds him to remember when one door closes another one opens.
And also predicts him coming through when you least expect it.
Lucas
He’s a rule breaker, down to earth, and sensitive.
Haley warns him to be careful because she pulls the hermit in reverse.
That he may have poor judgment and he should watch where he’s headed. And be careful because the light could lead him down the wrong track.
Grant
Grant, Haley’s recent ex-bf, is a Leo.
He’s a loyal, generous, natural leader.
But tends to be headstrong, arrogant, and needs to be right.
Haley pulls the devil and tells him that his shadow may get the better of him. He needs to make a sacrifice or he risks losing someone important.
Haley
Haley is an Aquarius. And she pulls out the Death Card.
Letting her friends know that love is going to be the death of her.
The same thing she pulls each time she does her own readings.
The Unconscious Mind Leads them to Their Fate
As the friends head back to campus we the audience start to notice things from the horoscopes coming true.
The Capricorn wins $700 on a scratch-off. So his financial situation is improving.
But if the good predictions start to come true.
What about the not-so-good ones?
Back at her house, the libra hears a suspicious sound in the attic. Due to her investigative nature, she goes to inspect. So she climbs the ladder to the attic.
But, if you remember from her horoscope, the high priestess in reverse warned her to slow down. And her need to make sense of things ultimately leads to her demise.
The six friends are devastated by what happened to Elise.
But on the way home, the rule-breaking Capricorn takes the train home.
At the station, he encounters a mysterious figure and runs through a restricted area.
He was warned to watch where he’s headed because poor judgment could lead him “down the wrong track”.
And that’s exactly how his story ends.
How is Fate Really Determined?
The rest of the friends start to realize they are being picked off one by one because they fall victim to their inherent, unconscious ways.
Fate can be the good things, like the fated relationship, or meeting “the one”. And it can be the inherent things, like who your parents are and what circumstances you were born into.
But, it also can be the undesirable things.
Let’s take this out of the context of the fate in the scary movie for a second.
But watching this movie immediately reminded me of a TikTok I saw not that long ago. The creator mentioned how fate is trauma.
So I went to my girl Google and got to work. And I found this article that says,
“Fate is everything you already know. The fated life is one in which you remain stuck in cycles of unconscious karma and inherited patterns of the past. Where time seems to repeat itself over and over again.”
Fate is familiar so it feels safe. But the way this movie is set up makes you wonder how safe the “familiar” really is.
How do we end up on the Dark Side of Fate?
Now the friends are onto what’s happening.
The patterns are raising red flags!
And they speculate it all has to do with those horoscopes Haley read for them.
After talking to the cops, who can’t help them at all, they start searching the internet for answers.
I love new-age horror movies because like, yes please do what we all would actually do. Cause if something weird happens, I’m immediately on Google.
They find an astrologer versed in divination. They show up at her house and she tells them the story of the Tarot cards they found that night.
The cards they used were from an ancient astrologer who once worked for a Count. But the astrologer predicted the Count’s wife wouldn’t survive childbirth.
The Count, unhappy with her predictions, banished her and her daughter. But, the astrologer’s prediction came true, and the Count accused her of witchcraft and ordered her daughter to be killed.
In an act of revenge, the astrologer cursed and bound herself to the Tarot deck and inverted the zodiac.
And Haley had used those cursed cards and the cloth to give each of her friends a reading.
When used for horoscopes, the cards condemn people to the “Dark side of fate”.
Falling Victim to Your Shadow Traits
The mention of the zodiac being inverted leads me to believe that the victims only face the dark side of their fate if they unconsciously let their shadow traits overtake them.
Read Next: 3 Hidden Ways Your Shadow Self Makes You Feel Stuck!
The Libra with the compulsion to make sense of things, investigates the attic.
The Capricorn who tends to be a rule breaker, runs into a restricted area.
The Pisces who tends to run away from her problems, runs when advised to stay.
The Taurus with a tendency to be bullheaded, leaves when his friends tell him not to.
The Virgo who “goes out the way for her friends and wants to find the logic, separates from the group and tries to find the practical way out.
The movie shows us subtlety, that giving into our unconscious automatic tendencies, our shadow behavior, can force us to experience the dark side of our fate.
Once they reach the house, they throw the cards in the living room fire, but the cards don’t burn. The astrologer who shows up to help also meets her fate.
This leaves Haley and Grant to find out how they’re going to make it out.
Haley starts to wonder, what if you can change fate?
Can You Change Fate?
Grant, who was warned he needs to face his demons and make a sacrifice, does so (literally) to save Haley.
As for Haley, she gets the idea to read the Astrologer’s horoscope to condemn her to her fate.
All her cards are reversed, showing us she’s not healing from her pain.
Haley pulls the death card.
The same card that’s shown up in all of Haley’s readings she’s done for herself.
The death card, as in the movie, can represent the end of something.
But, it can also represent a new beginning.
Haley realizes that her belief in fate, that whatever happens, is meant to happen, is what has been keeping her stuck in the same pattern. Pulling the same Tarot spread each time.
She says, “Fate doesn’t have to be a curse, we can choose to let go.”
And the cards burn.
In Grant’s act of sacrifice, he manages to change his dark fate.
Haley believed that love would be the death of her.
And it was, the death of her old belief, and a new beginning in her life.
And Paxton survives because Spider-Man saved him. I dont know.
In the version I released on Patreon, I talked a little about what I think.
Okay love you, and I’m sending love and healing your way! BYE!!
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