Everything will be reconnected or rebooted, so we might as well add Jeepers Creepers to the mix, right? The original, starring Justin Long and Darry Jenner, is a good movie regardless of the controversy surrounding writer and director Victor Salva. The next two were much less successful, but still watchable. This reimagining of the story aims to give the franchise somewhere to go and renew interest in the central Big Bad. Jeepers Creepers: Reborn successfully reminded everyone why the Creeper is such a great visual character, but did little to move the franchise forward.
As is usually the case with stories like this, Laine (Sydney Craven) and Chase (Imran Adams) are on their way to an event in the middle of nowhere. He is a lover of conspiracy theories and urban legends. She is not. She is reluctant, but loves Chase and agrees to accompany him on the trip. She doesn’t know he’s going to propose, and he doesn’t know she’s pregnant. A pinned cold open shows an elderly couple driving across the country harassed by the Creeper driving a truck with the license plate BEATNGU. It’s a nod to the opening of the original, but otherwise serves little purpose. The crucial bits come a little later. Here’s everything you need to know about the Jeepers Creepers ending: Reborn, the Crows, and Laine’s connection to the Creeper.
Table of Contents
The end of Jeepers Creepers: Reborn
After winning a faked completion, Laine, Chase, a YouTube celebrity, her film crew, and Stu head to a Creeper-themed escape room in a cemetery and abandoned plantation. Laine displays remarkable ability at the booth and has had some weird visions of herself wearing a bloody symbol surrounded by creepy cultists. She also cuts her hand on one of the guns near the booth. Instead of worrying about that, she moves on with Chase, and things quickly go south. The Creeper kidnaps Laine and starts taking everyone out one by one. The Creeper stabs Laine in the stomach with a knife, and she manages to escape as he leaves to kill the rest of the group.
In the final act, everyone dies except Stu and Chase, who stab the Creeper through the throat with a weather vane after Laine lures him out and gouges out his eyes. The crows, including the albino, begin to swarm everyone and drop Stu off the roof dead. Laine and Chase are rescued, but the Creeper is missing as the crows fly away. As Jeepers Closes Creepers: Reborn, Laine is in the back of a police car, and her eyes go black, and the Creeper is reborn somewhere else.
What’s with the white and black crows?
Very little explanation is given for the crows that show up at opportune times in Jeepers Creepers: Reborn. A strange albino crow acts as a leader of sorts directing traffic and overseeing everything that happens. At the end of the movie, after Chase and Laine gouge out the Creeper’s eyes and presumably kill him, a kill of crows comes and surrounds the monster. Crows symbolize the afterlife and death. Given the Creeper’s twenty-three day obsession with hunting and killing, I’d say the Crows act like housemates. The Creeper has crows like a bat for vampires or a witch and her black cat. The extremely intelligent birds can make worse pets.
Who and what is the sect?
The cult at the center of Jeepers Creepers: Reborn is led by Lady Manila, who also ran the shop that Chase and Laine ran into in the beginning of the movie. Little is known about the group other than the fact that they believe they can aid him by bringing innocents to the Creeper for slaughter. Lady Manila has some loose psychic abilities that allow her to tell that Laine is pregnant. How she can do that and whether it matters is never elaborated.
The cult gets very little screen time and even less explanation. We don’t know how long they worship the creature or what they get out of the deal. All we can know for sure is that people are idiots, and where there is something to exploit, they will profit. For example, they want the Creeper to eat Laine’s baby so he can become immortal. They probably thought they would also become immortal or use his powers to benefit themselves.
The Creeper’s Rules
In the previous films, the Creeper emerged every twenty-three years and was able to wreak havoc for twenty-three days before being forced back into hibernation. During that life cycle, it can regenerate by eating the similar body part of a human. For example, if his hand is injured, he releases it and eats a human hand. This allows him to grow his hand back.
It’s a handy ability that makes him hard to kill. This is important to remember in the final act when he eats Carrie’s (Ocean Navarro) brain. The ramifications of this are intriguing, as he’s always been an intelligent but somewhat limited threat. By eating Carrie’s brain, he may have gained valuable knowledge about how technology works. This was something he had no knowledge of before. This could play a role in future movies, assuming someone wants to see more of the Creeper.
In Jeepers Creepers: Reborn, the rules remain the same except in the final act. When we think Chase and Laine have defeated the Creeper, her eyes turn black and he is reborn in an unknown location after crows carry him away. Whether the crows aid in the Creeper’s removal and rebirth or whether they’re cover for his magic, we don’t know. We also don’t understand why he regenerated elsewhere. It seems that the rules have changed for him, and other movies could explain that.
Why did the Creeper want Laine in Jeepers Creepers: Reborn?
We know that Laine is important because of a connection to the Creeper that is never explained and her unborn baby. As the Creeper consumes unborn babies, it becomes even more powerful and unstoppable than ever before. The end of the film seems to indicate that he will no longer be constrained by the twenty-three year cycle and will be able to walk free and unfettered. Somehow eating unborn babies makes him immortal. No explanation is given if it is specifically Laine’s baby that is needed.
The cult wanted Laine because her unborn child could make the Creeper immortal. However, the Creeper seemed to have different motivations. He took Laine early and tied her up before stabbing her in the stomach. Assuming he wanted to eat her unborn baby, this makes no sense. A clue to what he really wanted is Laine’s throwaway conversation with Chase at the beginning of the movie about love bugs. Love bugs were originally introduced to control insect pests like mosquitoes, but the loving creatures couldn’t take the time to mate to perform their intended tasks. As a result, they spend their two or three day life cycle mating.
The Creeper is all about Laine throughout the movie, despite getting a whole festival of victims. He probably wants to mate with Laine and make future Creeper babies. We don’t know what her connection to the Creeper is. She can sense things about the cult, and the Creeper and her target booth prowess seem to hint at a genetic connection that could potentially be explored in future films. Maybe she’s a descendant of an original cult member or the Creeper family? Halloween 5 made this mistake and barely recovered.
The Creeper is an amazing horror creature. The mythos behind the cyclical monster is compelling. Unfortunately, Jeepers Creepers: Reborn is not and may set the movie back instead of offering possibilities for future stories. Come for the Creeper but don’t expect too much. You can stream it on HULU right now.
As editor-in-chief of Signal Horizon, I enjoy watching and writing about genre entertainment. I grew up on old fashioned slashers, but my real passion is television and all weird and ambiguous stuff. My work can be found here and Travel Weird, where I am the editor-in-chief.
Support us on Patreon for members-only content!
