The Death Cure: A Satisfying Conclusion to the Maze Runner Series

Book Review: The Death Cure by James Dashner

What a great conclusion to the Maze Runner series was The Death Cure!

I bought The Death Cure after watching The Maze Runner and The Scorch Trials movies. After being disoriented by reading The Death Cure, because it didn't seem to connect with what I saw in the movies, I began reading the series from scratch. I'm glad I did, because while the movies track generally with the books, the movies diverge from the books in some significant ways and the books are - as is generally true when comparing movies with their original books - much better.

As interesting and compelling as The Maze Runner and The Scorch Trials were, The Death Cure didn't proceed or end in the way I expected it to. And yet, it ended in a totally satisfying way. Well, there was the way Dashner dealt with Newt, which I didn't find satisfying. And I would like what happened to Teresa to have been different. But Thomas's end was very satisfying, as was Minho's. And what happened to Rat Man was equally satisfying. I thank Dashner for that.

The movie version of The Death Cure is supposed to release in February 2017. I have read some speculation of how it will treat the characters considering the departures the other movies took from their original books, and I have my own theories. I believe the screenwriters will bring the movie arc back to its original plot as the others did, even if it departs from it in other ways. But there will be a significant departure that I won't conjecture on here. It relates back to the relationship between Thomas and Brenda and something significant that occurred near the end of The Scorcher Trials movie.

Ah, but this is a book review. Back on topic. The story line moves into a more zombie-esk extreme tale in this last book of the trilogy, which brings Thomas, Minho, Newt, and the other survivors to Denver. I'm not a fan of zombie stories. But the ending of the story more than makes up for this strange diversion from the tale.

On the whole, The Death Cure fits in nicely with the other two parts of the series, and if you enjoyed them you will enjoy this final piece of the puzzle. I look forward to seeing the movie when it comes out in 2017 and seeing how the filmmakers bring that version to conclusion. I hope it is as successful as the book.

As a fan of The Maze Runner and The Scorch Trials, I can highly recommend The Death Cure. Enjoy!

By the way, I thought the fourth book, The Kill Order, was another sequel. It isn't. It's actually a prequel to the series, and I'm reading it now. I'll review it, too, once I finish it.