From: 5 Theories About the Season 4 Finale (And Who Will Die)

From Season 4 is a big turning point for the series. The show is more popular than it’s ever been, and we now know that Season 5 will be the end, making Season 4 a crucial penultimate chapter of the story. While some viewers may have criticisms about the pace of the fourth season, it’s hard to deny that some major developments have taken place, starting with the emergence of a main villain, “The Man In Yellow” (Douglas E. Hughes), who is currently disguised as town newcomer Sophia (Julia Doyle).

This fourth season has also dropped a lot more clues about From’s larger lore and backstory than fans think. As the Season 4 Finale arrives this week, it’s time to look back at the seasonal predictions we made after the premiere and discuss which theories about the finale still seem viable – including the big question of who could die.

5. Other Townspeople Made Deals with TMIY

In Season 4 Episode 9, “The Calm Before”, It’s revealed that one of the background members of Colony House, Clara (Katerina Bakolias), previously made a deal with TMIY, who came to her as one of the “voices” that we’ve seen people in the town tricked by before (Sara, Elgin). TMIY was ready to activate Clara as a sleeper agent when needed – and we don’t think that she is the only one.

THEORY: From has made its emotional conflicts as important as its survival-horror conflicts. The townspeople (and their leaders) are constantly fighting a battle just to stay sane and unified in the bizarre supernatural world they’re trapped in, and the theory is that more than a few of them made ‘deals with the devil’ to cope along the way. This would be key, as Boyd (Harold Perrineau), Donna (Elizabeth Saunders), and other leaders may discover that TMIY has already corrupted a portion of their flock, and that the line between the righteous and corrupted splits the town into warring factions.

4. Tabitha & Jade Need to Complete The Sacrifice

Since discovering that they are reincarnations of former townspeople Miranda Kavanaugh and Christopher, Tabitha Matthews (Catalina Sandino) and Jade Herrera (David Alpay) have been on a mission to recover more of their respective memories and unlock the true purpose that keeps bringing them back to “Fromville.” In Season 4, Jade took the big step of taking mushrooms and having an entire revelatory trip that provided some big clues, while Tabitha learned key insights from her encounter with some killer dolls at the lakeside settlement, and continued visits from the creepy “Ghoulish Children.” Now Jade and Tabitha have taken the drastic step of freeing the bones of the seven sacrificed kids from their underground tomb. However, given everything we learned in Season 4, this seems like one of the biggest twists From is throwing at us.

THEORY: One of the biggest theories about From Season 4, heading into the finale, is that Tabitha and Jade have made a monumental error in judgment. They think that digging up the bones and setting the spirits of the sacrificed children free will end the curse keeping the townspeople trapped; a lot of fans have pieced clues together and concluded that it’s quite the opposite: Tabitha and Jade will learn that they have always been on the hook to complete the sacrifice, as promised, if they ever hope to end the cycle of being trapped in Fromville. It would explain why TMIY was so fond of Tabitha and didn’t harm her when they met: she and Jade are the ones meant to finish the dark ritual.

3. Ethan or Victor is the 8th Child

A lot of From viewers are pretty good at math. Over the course of four seasons, they’ve put 2 and 2 together and realised that it doesn’t equal 4. The all-important talismans Boyd found, which keep the monsters at bay every night, are inscribed with a picture where there are 8 symbols surrounding two images of the same stick-figure, which has night and day carved on either side of it. While the exact meaning isn’t known, the 8 images seem to correlate with the sacrificial ritual that turned the townspeople into horrific monsters. But when viewers totalled things up, they found something interesting: the “Ghoulish Children” that Tabitha sees all over town only total 7 in number. One child was never sacrificed.

THEORY: The horrible truth that Tabitha and Jade are trying to avoid is that they still owe one more child’s life to whatever devil or evil entity the townspeople originally made a pact with. That is really why they are trapped in a repeating cycle of having to return to Fromville. And it’s not just any child that needs to die: Jade and Tabitha must sacrifice the reincarnation of that same child who survived the original sacrifice.

During From Seasons 3 and 4, Miranda’s story offers some big clues that Victor was the one she was supposed to sacrifice, but didn’t. If Miranda was a reincarnation of one of the original townspeople, it stands to reason that in her original life, she and her husband only sacrificed one of their children (the elder daughter) but spared the other (a younger son). Now one of those reincarnated sons is on the hook for the sacrifice – whether it’s Miranda’s son, Victor (Scott McCord), or Tabitha’s son, Ethan (Simon Webster). And in the Season 4 Finale, one of them may have to finally pay the price.

2. The Final Sacrifice Will Tear The Town Apart

All season long, TMIY has been sowing seeds of dissent amongst the town’s inhabitants, either through direct/indirect manipulation or outright coercion. The story arc that’s been put in frame is that TMIY is working toward the end goal of getting the townspeople of Fromville tearing at each other’s throats. Every scary moment or monster attack in Season 4 has had the secondary goal of stoking fear in the townspeople, to make them question whether they are safe in the town, under Boyd’s leadership.

THEORY: TMIY is playing a long game, and the Season 4 finale will see it come to fruition. Jade and Tabitha will learn the truth about their purpose (the final sacrifice), and that it’s either Victor or Ethan who must die. But while they will almost certainly defy that bloody obligation, the rest of the townspeople are not likely to be so noble. Jade’s mushroom trip revealed that his past selves had all been murdered by the townspeople once his connection to the sacrificed children became public; now Sophia is the snake in the proverbial garden, who can easily create conflict by telling the townspeople they will be free if the last child is sacrificed. Suddenly, the town will no longer be a safe haven, and some of our main characters will have to flee into the woods.

1. TMIY is the Original Lost Boy

The appearance of The Man in Yellow during the Season 3 finale sparked a whole lot of new questions about From‘s backstory and lore. One of the biggest unanswered questions has been who TMIY actually is, and if his origin provides a significant twist on what we think is going on. As the Season 4 Finale arrives, there are a lot of fans who think the answers about the TMIY have been staring us in the face for a while now.

THEORY: There’s a major theory right now that the Season 4 finale will reveal that TMIY is actually the original lost boy of Fromville – the child who wasn’t sacrificed alongside the seven others. Based on other clues, it’s surmised that when the original townspeople killed each other (or were killed) over the botched pact with a demon (or devil), it was the lost boy (son of the original Tabitha/Miranda) who was left alone in Fromville. Over time, that boy (grown into a man) was corrupted by the evil of the place and transformed into an entity (TMIY) who possesses the power of the “storyteller,” who is controlling and/or manifesting whatever happens in the town, often drawing upon the fears of the townspeople. Therefore, the only challenge to that power is the repeating cycle, in which a different “lost boy” (like Victor or Ethan) potentially takes on the power of the “storyteller” and can end TMIY’s existence for good.

The Boy in White (TBIW) is the last bit of “innocence” from that original lost boy, and the pure and corrupted halves battle to influence the townspeople into either completing the sacrifice or ending the ritual for good. A lot of fans predict Season 4 will end with TMIY dropping those hard truth bombs and setting up the final battle by pitting the townspeople who want the sacrifice against those unwilling to pay such a dark price in the hopes of going home.

From can be streamed exclusively on MGM+. Discuss the Season 4 Finale with us on the ComicBook Forum!

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