Netflix’s ‘Damsel’ Ending Explained – Does Elodie Survive The Dragon?

Millie Bobby Brown’s new dark fantasy film Damsel just dropped on Netflix — and it’s definitely not a fairytale. What happens at the end of Damsel, and does Elodie escape the dragon? Read on to dive into the film’s action-packed conclusion.

From Oscar-nominated director Juan Carlos Fresnadillo, Damsel stars Brown as Elodie, a princess from a poor kingdom who agrees to marry a much wealthier prince to help her people. But things turn sinister when Elodie realizes her new royal family wants to sacrifice her to repay an ancient debt — so she’s thrown into a cave with a fire-breaking dragon.

Elodie must rely on her wit and skills to survive rather than waiting for a knight in shining armor to save her. “She’s a damsel who doesn’t need to be saved,” the Stranger Things star told Netflix’s Tudum. “She saves herself in many ways. It subverts what you expect: You’re expecting the prince to turn around and save her, and… no. Don’t wait for the prince.”

Fresnadillo said that he loved Dan Mazeau’s script for Damsel, which embraced the idea of a fantasy adventure and a princess and dragon story, but turned it “into a place [where] it’s completely upside down.” The Spanish filmmaker told Tudum, “It was a very intense journey that I was so excited to design and to develop. At the core, this is such a beautiful story about a young woman becoming a strong, independent, and empowered adult. Elodie doesn’t have any kind of support. It’s a real survival experience.”

Wright, who portrays the film’s antagonist, Queen Isabelle, spoke to Screen Rant about what it was like playing a villain. “It’s really fun playing a layered character like that; that has nothing to do with you,” she described. “She’s doing it for a really good cause. It’s to uphold this kingdom, so it’s part of tradition that she doesn’t want to break.”

Angela Bassett, Shohreh Aghdashloo, Ray Winstone, Nick Robinson, and Brooke Carter round out the star-studded cast. (Warning: Spoilers ahead for the ending of Damsel on Netflix.)

‘Damsel’ Ending Explained

Damsel premiered on the streaming giant on Friday, March 8. If you’ve already finished the Netflix film, keep reading to explore Damsel’s dramatic ending, including whether Elodie makes it out alive, what happens to her sister, and the fate of the royal family.

Why Does The Dragon Kill Princesses In Damsel?

The dragon targets princesses of Queen Isabelle’s royal family because of what her ancestors did centuries earlier. They invaded the female dragon’s lair and killed her only three children, ending the dragon’s bloodline.

To answer for their sins, the king at the time promised to give the dragon three princesses from his family every generation so the creature wouldn’t destroy the new kingdom. However, the king’s family found a way to fool the dragon by giving her princesses that weren’t related to them. They recruited young girls to marry into the family, then forced them to do a blood ritual that made the dragon believe they were related to Queen Isabelle.

Does Elodie Escape The Dragon In Damsel?

Yes, Elodie learns how to escape the dragon after she finds a map of the cave that another princess had carved on the walls, but it doesn’t reveal how to get out.

Her father and his men descend into the cave to save her, but the dragon finds them. Elodie watches from a distance as the dragon interrogates her father and kills off his men. Knowing that Elodie could hear him, he reveals that he had promised her life in exchange for gold. “Forgive me,” her father says to her before he dies.

Elodie uses her father’s rope to get out of the cave. She takes cover outside from the dragon, who is desperately searching for her. Although she manages to escape, she’s forced to go into the cave again to save her sister, Floria, whom Queen Isabelle sacrificed after Elodie didn’t complete the ritual.

Elodie eventually finds Floria, but her sister’s leg is badly injured from the fall. A bloody fight ensues between Elodie and the dragon, and she uses the dragon’s fire against the creature to wound them. While the beast is hurt and the most vulnerable, she reveals that they both have been fooled; the dragon believed all these years that the princesses she’d been slaying were of the royal family’s blood. Instead, Elodie’s blood and the other damsels were mixed when Queen Isabelle cut them in the hand.

How Does Damsel End?

At the end of Damsel, Elodie crashes another royal wedding where they are trying to recruit the third victim to sacrifice. She tells the other princess to run, and the dragon appears, seeking revenge and killing Queen Isabelle and her family.

In the final scene, Elodie, her stepmother, and Floria are all alive and together again. Elodie tells her her stepmother that they’ll run their kingdom together. They board a ship back home — and as they sail into the sunset — the dragon is flying by their side.

Damsel is streaming on Netflix.