Emerald Fennell’s Bold Twist: Unpacking the Dramatic Ending of ‘Wuthering Heights’ Film Adaptation

SPOILER ALERT! If you wish to avoid details about the ending of “Wuthering Heights,” currently showing in theaters, please stop reading now.

Viewers of Emerald Fennell’s visually stunning and thought-provoking adaptation of the classic romance may notice an unexpected conclusion. This reinterpretation focuses intensely on the passionate relationship between Catherine and Heathcliff, leaving out the extended generational consequences that are central to Emily Brontë’s original work.

In doing so, the film shifts from the novel’s expansive family saga to a tragic, self-contained romance, effectively closing the narrative before reaching the book’s subsequent developments.

Brontë’s novel, a hefty read of over 400 pages, spans several decades and delves into not only the tumultuous love between Catherine and Heathcliff but also the struggles of the younger generation dealing with inherited family issues. Fennell’s cinematic version concludes with the death of Catherine, omitting the storylines of the next generation and leaving certain narrative threads unresolved.

“It’s such a dense, complicated piece of work,” Fennell explained in an interview with USA Today. She acknowledged the challenges of adapting the novel, stating, “I had to kill a lot of my own darlings in order to make the story work in two hours.”

Does the Movie Differ from the Book?

It sure does. In Emily Brontë’s novel, Catherine dies shortly after giving birth to her daughter, Cathy — a child who becomes central to the story’s second half. Cathy grows up, marries Heathcliff’s fragile son Linton, and later forms a fraught but ultimately redemptive bond with her cousin Hareton. Their relationship offers the possibility of healing after years of cruelty, culminating in plans to marry as Heathcliff, haunted by Catherine, dies.

Fennell’s film removes that entire thread. Catherine, played by Margot Robbie, suffers from sepsis and appears to miscarry; the child is never born. Heathcliff (Jacob Elordi) arrives too late, cradling her body as memories of their relationship flicker onscreen — a finale that underscores doomed passion rather than generational reckoning.

Will There be a Sequel?

Not likely. Because the film eliminates Cathy altogether, continuing the story would mean inventing an entirely new narrative path — something Fennell doesn’t seem interested in pursuing.

“I think of this as a one-off, and I’m not alone in that when you look at other adaptations,” Fennell says, noting that the 1992 version starring Ralph Fiennes and Juliette Binoche is one of the few to attempt the full sweep of the novel, while the 1939 classic with Laurence Olivier and Merle Oberon also focused largely on the first half.

“There’s a world where this is a miniseries and you really get into deep, deep detail of every single thing that happens,” Fennell says. “But for me, the thing I connected to as a reader was always (Catherine and Heathcliff). I also don’t know if I’d be very good at sequels!”