Spoiler Warning: This article contains major spoilers for all eight episodes of Netflix’s Something Very Bad Is Going to Happen.
At the end of Something Very Bad Is Going to Happen, a wedding turns into a massacre. Members of the Cunningham family suddenly begin bleeding to death, leaving viewers struggling to understand who survives and why.
But one detail makes the ending especially disturbing.
Boris Cunningham survives. His wife, Victoria, dies.
They have spent years together, raised a family, and shared the same marriage. Yet the supernatural curse treats them differently.
Why did Nicky’s father survive the wedding curse while his wife died? And why did Jules survive despite constantly arguing with Nell?
The answer reveals the series’ most unsettling idea about marriage: two people can spend their lives together without believing in the same love story.
Why Did Nicky’s Father Survive the Wedding Curse?
Boris Cunningham survives because he genuinely believes his wife, Victoria, is his soulmate.
That is the decisive factor.
The curse does not judge whether Boris has been a perfect husband, whether his marriage has been happy, or whether Victoria feels the same way.
It judges his own belief.
When Rachel fails to marry Nicky before sundown, the curse spreads into the Cunningham bloodline. Married members of that family who do not truly believe their spouses are their soulmates face a horrifying death.
Boris meets the curse’s requirement. He believes Victoria is the person he was meant to marry.
Victoria does not share that certainty.
As a result, Boris survives while she dies.
This is not merely a supernatural technicality. It exposes the emotional imbalance at the center of their marriage.
Why Did Victoria Die If Boris Loved Her?
Victoria’s death is one of the finale’s cruelest revelations.
Throughout the series, the Cunningham family presents an image of established wealth, tradition, and stability. Boris and Victoria appear to occupy the center of that world.
Their marriage is part of the family’s identity.
But appearances do not determine survival.
The series reveals that Victoria has been unfaithful to Boris, a discovery that deeply unsettles Nicky’s understanding of marriage.
Her infidelity alone is not presented as an automatic supernatural death sentence. The essential issue is her lack of genuine belief that Boris is her soulmate.
That distinction matters.
The curse is not simply punishing people for cheating. It is exposing the gap between the relationships people maintain and the relationships they truly believe in.
Boris’s love is sincere enough to save him.
Victoria’s uncertainty is fatal.
The same marriage produces two opposite outcomes.
The horror is not that Boris loved the wrong woman. It is that his certainty could never guarantee hers.
Why Did Jules Survive Even Though He and Nell Constantly Fight?
Jules Cunningham offers the opposite kind of surprise.
Throughout the series, Jules and Nell argue frequently. Their relationship appears strained, argumentative, and far removed from the idealized romance that people associate with soulmates.
Yet Jules survives the massacre.
Why?
Because he genuinely believes Nell is his soulmate.
Series creator Haley Z. Boston has explained that their arguments conceal an important strength: they are unusually honest with each other.
They do not pretend their relationship is perfect.
They confront each other, disagree openly, and continue choosing their marriage.
This creates a revealing contrast with Boris and Victoria.
Boris and Victoria’s marriage looks more conventional from the outside, but the two partners do not share the same certainty.
Jules and Nell’s relationship looks troubled, yet Jules’s belief remains intact.
The series deliberately challenges the assumption that frequent arguments mean a marriage is failing.
Sometimes conflict reflects an unwillingness to hide the truth.
And sometimes a peaceful-looking relationship survives because its deepest disagreements remain unspoken.
Why Did Nell Survive the Curse?
Nell’s survival follows a different rule.
Although she is married to Jules, she is not a blood descendant of the Cunningham family.
The curse spreads through the affected bloodline. Marrying into that family does not automatically make someone part of its inherited supernatural condition.
Jules is subject to the curse because he belongs to the Cunningham bloodline.
Nell is not subject to that same test.
This means her survival cannot be used to prove that she believes Jules is her soulmate.
The curse never judges her under the same rules.
That makes their relationship especially interesting.
We know Jules believes in Nell.
But Nell’s survival does not provide supernatural confirmation that she feels exactly the same way.
The audience is left to evaluate her feelings through her behavior rather than the curse’s verdict.
Why Did Nicky Survive While Rachel Died?
Nicky’s survival adds another layer to the tragedy.
At the altar, Nicky initially refuses to marry Rachel.
He has learned troubling information about his parents’ marriage, and his faith in the institution of marriage has collapsed.
He also does not fully believe Rachel’s warnings about the curse.
His refusal causes the curse to spread into his family’s bloodline.
When the deaths begin, Nicky desperately tries to repair the situation by completing the marriage ceremony.
But the damage is already done.
Rachel no longer believes Nicky is her soulmate.
The man she trusted has dismissed her greatest fear at the moment when she most needed him to understand.
Although they eventually marry, Rachel dies because she no longer possesses the belief required to survive.
Nicky, meanwhile, believes Rachel is his soulmate and survives.
Once again, the same relationship produces two different outcomes.
This is the pattern connecting Boris, Victoria, Nicky, and Rachel.
Love can exist on both sides of a relationship without producing the same certainty on both sides.
Why Did Portia Die?
Portia’s death confirms that the curse does not target only older marriages or couples with obvious problems.
Like Victoria, Portia belongs to the Cunningham bloodline and is married without genuinely believing her spouse is her soulmate.
When the curse spreads, she becomes one of its victims.
Her death demonstrates that the supernatural rules operate across the family, regardless of age or status.
The curse does not give someone additional protection because they are young, wealthy, or outwardly successful.
It tests the same internal conviction.
Why Did Jude Survive?
Jude, Jules’s son, survives because he is not married.
However, his survival does not mean he has escaped the curse.
He is part of the Cunningham bloodline, which means the curse now follows him into the future.
The supernatural danger becomes relevant if he eventually decides to marry.
This is one of the finale’s most disturbing implications.
The massacre ends, but the family tragedy does not.
Jude may grow up knowing that an ordinary wedding could become a life-or-death decision.
Rachel, who becomes the new Witness, will be connected to those future marriages.
Can Someone Avoid the Wedding Curse by Never Marrying?
Yes.
The series establishes an important loophole.
A person carrying the curse can avoid its deadly wedding condition by never becoming engaged or never intending to marry.
The curse remains in their bloodline, and they can still pass it to their children.
But they do not have to face the wedding-day deadline themselves.
This changes the meaning of the curse.
It does not simply punish people for failing to find love.
It punishes them when they enter marriage without the required certainty.
The difference is significant.
Someone can live with doubt indefinitely.
The supernatural danger becomes immediate when that person makes marriage a binding choice.
Does the Curse Know Who Your Real Soulmate Is?
Perhaps the most fascinating part of the series is that the curse does not appear to require an objectively perfect relationship.
It requires genuine belief.
Creator Haley Z. Boston has described the curse as an expression of doubt.
That makes the supernatural system more psychological than romantic.
A person does not survive because the universe has independently certified their partner as the one true match.
They survive because they sincerely believe that person is their soulmate.
This explains why Jules survives despite his arguments with Nell.
It also explains why Boris survives even though Victoria does not share his certainty.
And it explains why Rachel cannot simply force herself to believe in Nicky after he has broken her trust.
Belief is not a switch that can be turned on to avoid punishment.
Once genuine certainty disappears, repeating wedding vows cannot automatically restore it.
The Most Disturbing Detail: The Curse Never Judges the Marriage as a Whole
Consider the finale’s surviving and deceased characters.
| Character | Fate | Explanation |
|---|---|---|
| Boris Cunningham | Survives | Believes Victoria is his soulmate |
| Victoria Cunningham | Dies | Does not genuinely believe Boris is her soulmate |
| Jules Cunningham | Survives | Believes Nell is his soulmate |
| Nell | Survives | Not part of the Cunningham bloodline |
| Nicky Cunningham | Survives | Believes Rachel is his soulmate |
| Portia | Dies | Does not believe her spouse is her soulmate |
| Jude | Survives | Unmarried, but inherits the curse |
| Rachel Harkin | Dies, then returns | Loses faith in Nicky and becomes the new Witness |
The pattern reveals something that is easy to overlook.
The curse never evaluates a couple as one emotional unit.
It evaluates the people who carry it individually.
A husband can survive while his wife dies.
A person can believe completely in someone who does not believe completely in them.
A relationship can look imperfect yet contain genuine certainty.
And a relationship that looks ideal can hide fatal doubt.
This is why the finale is more than a collection of shocking deaths.
It is a supernatural demonstration of how little people may know about their partners’ private emotional lives.
Was Boris Lucky, or Was Victoria’s Death the Real Tragedy?
It would be easy to describe Boris as lucky.
He survives a massacre that kills his wife and other members of his family.
But his survival is not necessarily a happy ending.
Boris must live with the knowledge that the woman he considered his soulmate did not feel the same certainty about him.
His love saved his life, but it could not save his marriage.
That is the emotional cruelty of the curse.
It reveals a truth that ordinary life might have allowed him to avoid forever.
The same is true of Nicky.
He survives because he believes Rachel is his soulmate, yet she dies after realizing he does not understand or believe her.
The surviving men are not necessarily the winners.
They are left to confront the limits of their own certainty.
Final Verdict: Why Did Nicky’s Father Survive?
Boris survives because he genuinely believes Victoria is his soulmate. Victoria dies because she does not share that belief.
Jules survives because his argumentative marriage with Nell still contains sincere conviction.
Nicky survives because he believes in Rachel, even after his actions destroy her belief in him.
The finale’s supernatural rules are consistent, but their emotional consequences are devastating.
The curse does not reveal which marriages look happiest. It reveals who truly believes in the person standing beside them.
And perhaps the darkest message of Something Very Bad Is Going to Happen is this:
You can spend your entire life believing you have found your soulmate.
But that belief can never tell you with certainty what is happening inside the other person’s heart.
Related Reading — More Mysteries from Something Very Bad Is Going to Happen
Why Did Rachel Become the Witness? The Ending Explained
Why did Rachel die and return as the Witness? Discover how the wedding curse passed into the Cunningham family and what her transformation really means.
Who Was the Baby in the Van? Episode 1 Mystery Explained
Was the mysterious baby connected to the Witness, or did the opening scene foreshadow Rachel’s traumatic birth? Explore the clues and competing interpretations.