The Ring and The Woman in Black: Intentional Malevolence and Irrationality in Horror

A Story Analysis a la Zombie March

The 2002 horror flick, The Ring, was adapted from the 1998 Japanese original, Ringu. While the two can be compared - and often the latter wins out over the former - in this analysis, I'm going to be comparing The Ring (and The Ring Two) to The Woman in Black (2012), another movie which features an extremely similar plot. In particular, we're going to focus on the theme of intentional malevolence and the irrationality of the monsters in these stories.

Please note that the following has spoilers for both The Ring, The Ring Two, and The Woman in Black. If you haven't watched the movies and want to experience them for yourself, go ahead and do that before reading this article. 

Horror writing topics: story structure, monster design, intentional evil, irrational evil, metaphor. Last updated June 4, 2025.

Brief Summaries

The Ring is a story about a single mother (Rachel) whose line of work ultimately leads her to take on the case of her niece, who died under strange circumstances after watching a videotape that conjures the vengeful ghost of a young girl. The Woman in Black has a similar setup: because of his line of work, a single father (Arthur) ends up in a small village and must investigate the case of a woman whose vengeful ghost haunts the townsfolk and kills their children. 

Having watched the video herself - and learning that her son has watched it, too - Rachel has to race against time to stop the ghost before it can kill them. Meanwhile, being trapped in the house with the ghost - and learning that his investigation is leading to even more children's deaths - Arthur must find a way to stop the ghost. In both movies, the "key" to figuring out how to stop the ghost is learning about their history - who they were in life, and what happened to make them linger in such malevolence.

In the case of The Ring, the ghost is Samara, a young girl who was thrown down a well by her adoptive mother when her mental powers became too frightening. It's implied that those powers were amplified through her rage, and thus the video was created, and her climbing-out-of-the-television M.O. along with it. Rachel, who feels terrible for her (as a mother) decides that the only way to stop Samara is to find her body, hidden in the well, and give her the proper attention and burial any child deserves. With the help of her estranged ex Noah, she manages to do this before her 7-day deadline is up, and since she finds herself still alive, along with her son, she believes Samara's ghost has been appeased. That is - until Noah ends up killed by Samara. 

In the case of The Woman in Black, the ghost is Jennet, an unwed mother who had to give her son up for adoption due to pressure from her family. To add salt to the wound, her sister becomes her son's adoptive mother, raising him as her own son and keeping the two apart. Arthur learns that her son died in the marsh, and his body remains there. Jennet blames her sister for letting him die. Feeling sorry for the ghost (as a father), he decides that the only way to stop Jennet is to find the body of her son and give him a proper burial, so that he may rest beside his mother's body. With the help of a villager, he manages to do this, and things quiet down. He believes Jennet has been appeased. That is - until his son and nanny meet him at the train station, and Jennet lures little Joseph onto the train tracks. 

Side note: It's interesting to consider the idea of a proper burial in the 'resting' of a restless ghost, since this is the plan of action that both sets of protagonists end up opting for. What does this tell us about how important burial rites are to us as societies? Why do we view our burial customs as a tool through which souls are properly laid to rest? Or, said differently, why do we assume that those who did not have a proper burial or whose bodies were disposed of or hidden will become restless souls, wreaking havoc on the living?

Still from The Woman in Black

 

Parental Anxiety and Empathy 

Both stories explore the relationship between parent and child. In particular, there's an emphasis on the bond between a mother and her child. In The Ring, Rachel struggles with the guilt stemming from her inability to be a more reliable and nurturing parent to her son, Aiden. Aiden's estranged father and our secondary lead in the movie, Noah, also struggles with the guilt stemming from his abandonment of his son. Both mother and father fear that they are bad parents, and their relationship with Aiden is strained, despite loving him. In The Woman in Black, it is implied that Arthur is trying to be a good father despite still grieving the recent loss of his wife, but that his job places him in situations where Arthur has to be away from his son, Joseph, for long periods of time.

All the parents in these two movies, regardless of their anxiety around parenthood that, in some form, was unplanned and for which they were extremely unprepared, do everything in their power to keep their children safe. When the ghosts in the respective stories are introduced, and pose a threat to their children (or other children), they go to extreme lengths to save them. This parental empathy provides these main characters with the motivation to not only initiate the plot, but also the drive to push through and bring things to an end, one way or another, and save themselves and their children. 

Side note: Speaking of parenthood that was unplanned and for which they were extremely unprepared, the same situation can be seen on the flip side of the coin, so to speak. With Jennet, her unplanned pregnancy ultimately leads to her vengeful haunting. With Samara's adoptive mother, the realization that Samara has frightening mental powers and is not the child she wanted also ultimately leads to Samara's vengeful haunting. In both cases, there's a character-foil dynamic happening, wherein both protagonist and antagonist is dealing with a form of parenthood they were unprepared for, but only one of them is having some kind of success, while the other has lost everything. An interesting contrast to explore.

In both cases, the mother's failings result in the monster. This is important; just as the parents in these movies are spurred on by this empathy for other parents, and love for their children, so are the vengeful ghosts spurred on by their hatred for those who harmed them, and the jealousy of those who represent what they could never have. While the protagonists are motivated by a clear rationale, which gives them reason to initiate the storyline and push through the obstacles placed before them, the ghosts are instead motivated by an emotional burning, without reason, and take the lives of innocents as a result. 

This pushes them over the edge - it's not simple revenge anymore, it's massacre. 

Still from The Ring.

 

These ghosts, stuck forever in the past, can only see the pain that they endured. To them, time does not pass; all others are the same. Mercy has no place in their existence, anymore. To the protagonists, there is an entire life laid out ahead - especially for their children. Saving this future and protecting their children from harm - at all costs - becomes paramount. After all, are parents not bound by that unspoken rule, that they will do all they can to protect their children? 

Side note: It would be a huge oversight not to address the ways in which both of these stories handle adoption, as it is such a core element in why the ghosts in the stories end up the way that they do, but that is an article for another time. Suffice it to say that both the stories have raised some brows with regards to this particular element, and understanding why goes into social issues regarding adoption, the concept of Otherness, and, to some degree, the ethics of horror.

Still from The Ring.

Intentional Malevolence: Evil by Choice

As do many horror stories, both The Ring and The Woman in Black give their audience a last-minute plot twist, brought about as a final scare to make the fearful experience linger long past the rolling of the credits. From a technical perspective, this isn't something that can be done if the protagonist has successfully neutralized the threat. If we know that Jennet or Samara are no longer a problem, then we, too, can leave the movie feeling satisfied that there's no scary boogeyman. The impact of the story softens. A great horror story - certainly - but it's over now. 

The only way to deliver the final scare is to bring back that which you thought was gone. So, both movies bring back their ghosts. Appeased only momentarily, the ghosts are still unable to move on. Their rage lives on, their hatred still burning, and they cannot move past years' worth of festering evil. But this alone is not enough. After a whole movie's worth of dabbling in the ghost's history, of getting in the way, or trying to stop the ghost - the protagonist, in some form, then has to become the final target of the ghost, in some way. 

In The Ring, Rachel and her son are spared because of her empathy - but mainly, it's revealed in the second movie, because Samara sees them as the perfect surrogates for the life she was robbed of. A loving mother, to a loving son. She needs to possess Aiden - so, naturally, he needs to live - and she needs her new mother - so Rachel gets to live, too. But Noah, who hasn't shown the same kind of care or empathy towards Samara, and who is distant from his own son, isn't spared. As one of the main protagonists of the story, his death amps up that final scare in a way that the death of another extra somewhere else wouldn't. It also gives this final, ominous death more meaning.

In The Woman in Black, despite having the body of her son buried beside her own, Jennet still cannot let go of the pain she feels. This is because nothing can ever bring her son back. She lived the rest of her life after he was born without him, never able to see her child. And now, she lives an eternity without him. Sure, his body is buried next to hers, but his soul isn't with her; it never will be. Jennet still seethes with rage, and her fury turns against Arthur, perhaps for thinking that such an act could ever make up for all she has suffered through. Ultimately, Jennet continues on with her modus operandi. Little Joseph comes to pick up his father - and just like that, Jennet's new target is acquired. Here, too, the father dies, while trying to save his son - who unfortunately also dies with him. 

And so we leave the movies knowing that Samara is still out there, terrorizing whoever watches her video, and Jennet is still out in the marsh, killing innocent children in some kind of twisted revenge.

Still from The Woman in Black.

The important thing here is the implied element of choice. Jennet will "never forgive", despite the effort that Arthur has gone through to try and make amends. Instead of finally resting, Samara feels a new hunger awaken within when she feels Rachel's genuine love for her son. Both these vengeful ghosts arrive at a crossroads in their stories and choose to continue on with their terror, making the evil they inflict even more intentional. 

Side note: There's another way to understand this - by not ignoring the length of time which has passed, and the ways in which the actions of the ghosts have probably pulled them deeper into the dark side. They may simply be too far gone to ever be good again. This tells us a little bit about the idea of learned criminality or immorality. People who are marginalized from society, or who experience trauma at the hands of others, may have their rage and fear manifest through immoral or criminal acts on their own part, as a way of striking back. In other words: the criminal or the immoral one is understood through the lens of the social experiences they had, rather than the decisions they made. This pulls blame away from the individual and shifts it onto their formative experiences, and those responsible for them. 

This idea of intentional horror is, additionally, a hallmark of most all horror fiction that includes a villain with some amount of intelligence. The implication, if we decide to approach the subject from this perspective, is that these lost souls had somehow, in their living moments, decided that they would come back and punish those who they perceived were responsible for their suffering. It's how Samara made her video tape, and how Jennet came back after committing suicide. It's that the spirits continued to do terrible things to innocent people, regardless of their motivation or how they became who they are when the audience meets them. The decision remains their decision, the choice to commit evil theirs alone.

We can even go so far as to say that both Samara and Jennet are characterized as being rather dark even before their deaths (and, in Jennet's case, even before the death of her son). Samara, with her odd mental powers and creepy behavior, can in some form control living creatures, as evidenced by the deaths of the horses and implied by the suicide of her adoptive mother. She can make things that she thinks of become a reality, but it seems that all Samara thinks of are dark, frightening things. Meanwhile, Jennet was characterized as being mentally unwell (mental illness as evil is another horror trope that bears looking into), and had apparently threatened to kill both herself and her son if he was ever taken away from her. 

With regards to horror, this technique takes away from any sympathy the audience may feel for the villains of the story. The protagonist's arcs take us through what little feeling we are meant to have for these monsters, but usually pulls the rug out from under our feet in the end, letting us know that they are not worthy of our mercy.  

Irrationality in Horror

It's not necessarily that the ghosts in these movies are killing innocents in their furious search for revenge. It's that despite the relatively rational actions of the protagonists, borne out of their empathy for these lost souls and the pain they have lived through, the ghosts still continue to kill. What this shows is the lack of an ability to rationalize with the evil. And what can't be talked down must be confronted and stopped. When you're dealing with something that feels so much more powerful than you could ever be, this is the worst case scenario. 

Blending intentional evil with irrational evil creates a distinctly terrifying experience. Not only is the villain actively deciding to be evil and do terrible things, without hesitation, they're also beyond reason. All that is left - if you want to survive - is roll up your sleeves and face the monster. 

Still from The Ring Two.

This leads us to another element of the irrational in horror storytelling, however. How do you stop a monster you know and understand nothing about? How does Rachel know that finding Samara's body and holding her as a mother will put her to rest? How does Arthur know that finding the body of Jennet's son and burying him beside his mother will release Jennet's soul?

They don't. There's nothing anywhere that says this is the solution. There's no reason to believe that's what these vengeful ghosts need. There's no rationale behind it; the protagonists do this because they cannot think of anything else, and this is what makes the most sense to them. In other words, they're eyeballing it. It is perhaps the pinnacle of arrogant naivete to think that their solution is the solution required.

There are no rules for vanquishing these evil spirits. It's not like a vampire story, where the audience and the protagonist will at some point learn that you can kill the vampire by staking it in the heart, or getting it under the sun, or by dismembering it and burning the body parts. Or a werewolf story, where we're told that a silver bullet is all it takes to take down the wolf-man killing the villagers. 

As if it wasn't terrifying enough to be up against an intentionally evil monster that can't be reasoned with - now you have to figure out a way to stop them when you have zero tools in your arsenal except for your (hopefully sharp) mind.  

Using this method in your horror storytelling allows you to set up the story for a hopeful ending - a false sense of peace, however brief, that lulls the audience into an all's-well-that-ends-well state of mind. And when the protagonist's approach (inevitably) doesn't work, you get to rip the rug out from under your audience's feet and deliver one final good scare, and set up an ending which imprints the story in your audience's mind for some time after they've put your book down or left the movie theater.

If you want to get to a point where you can analyze horror stories, break them down and interpret them through various different perspectives and lenses, this is one of the skills taught through my horror writing course, Zombie March. It's a critical skill for horror writers who want to craft powerful and lingering horror stories, and it's only one of many different techniques and skills taught in the course.

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