Which Characters Survive In The Death Cure The Maze Runner?

THE DEATH CURE—The Ending Still Gives Me The Neck Hair Syndrome Man. It has been far too long since I finally got to read THE DEATH CURE, the third and final installment of The Maze Runner series by James Dashner. Even though it has been a while, the movie’s ending still makes my chest feel funny in a good/relieved/eerie sort of way. You will find MAJOR SPOILERS below, as we discuss who dies and who makes it in the book and on screen for the core group and a few of the supporting characters. I will also lay out some of the differences between The novel and the movie for a couple of the major players, as the book and movie treat them a little differently.

Let’s start with the major characters that we already know and love within the core group of the movie’s ending. Thomas survives the great plague and gets to proceed to the community where he can start rebuilding with Brenda (who also survives the great plague) in a somewhat positive manner to end his long and arduous arc. Minho also manages to survive the great plague in addition to remaining solid and intact and Minho is one of the clearer survivors. Brenda also survives, which is good for Thomas, and seems to have had ended her long arc of desire for Thomas well. And in terms of how the book dealt with Teresa, she also manages to survive the great plague as well, in addition to having her long and strange relation with Thomas to end in a somewhat positive light as well (complicated and all, but she lives in the end). Newt does not survive the great plague, however. As the book had detailed, the plague causes him to eventually and incurably contract the Flare. In the end, Newt has Thomas kill him (after some difficulty and self-hatred on the part of Newt), and it is perhaps the most heart-wrenching moment of the series. Earlier Gladers such as Chuck, Alby, and Gally all died in earlier books, so do not appear in the movie’s ending.

If you watched the movie adaptation of The Death Cure, then you might recall that the big name characters all survived with the exception of Newt. Brenda, Teresa, Thomas, and Minho all make it through to the new world that the protagonist Thomas isportrayed to be creating for future communities. There are, however, some scenes, characters, and plot points that are cut from the movie in order to allow it to fit within the confines of a standard length feature. Some of these omitted scenes and characters include side characters, parts of subplots, and a few minor characters. There are several of these characters whose fates get altered in different ways between both the novel and the film, and I can get into the details of these characters and their various outcomes next.

For me, the mix of good and bad is what’s been left to simmer with me longest, and I have noted down a lot of those smaller moments which have left an impression on me – a line that Minho has spoken, the look that is exchanged between Thomas and Newt in one particularly heart wrenching moment, Brenda’s pragmatic nature and her quiet warmth towards Thomas. If you’d like me to list out all of the minor characters who have died and/or survived in both the novel and film, then let me know and I shall provide you with a full list. The fate of a few characters will vary between novel and film, and I have a lot to say on the subject of those characters as well.

scrolled back up the page to see who had asked the question. It was someone way up at the top of the page, and by the time I got to read their question, someone else had answered it. I haven’t read the Twilight books since I was in my early 20s, but I do remember that the movie was pretty different from the books. Did the movie kill off a character who was still alive in the books, or did the books kill off a character who was still alive in the movie? I really should re-read these books instead of relying on my hazy memories. I’m sure someone else in this thread has a definitive list.

So, after all of that, the six people who make it in The Death Cure are Thomas, Minho, Brenda, Frypan, Jorge, and Gally. Newt and Teresa do not. Even in the movies, there are some changes, but in the books the list of people who survive is fixed. What happens to the survivors after the story is almost as interesting as the story itself, and that is explored in the later books and in some of the supplementary stories. For the purposes of this trilogy, though, the six mentioned above go to the afterlife promised to them at the end of The Maze Runner.

There are many qualities that each of the surviving members of the group bring to the Safe Haven. Thomas brings leadership and the ability to understand others. Minho brings physical strength, honor and a sense of duty to protect others. Brenda brings reality and a sense of life outside of the newbie-free Safe Haven. Frypan brings optimism to light in the worst of times. Jorge brings wisdom from past experiences to help Safe Haven members in their time of need. Gally brings a knowledge of where they went wrong in the past and a chance to redeem himself. Together, I believe, they have the capability and the tools to start and build a thriving community of their own. The people that died brought the final pieces of the cure and the reason for so much pain for their loss to the new world.