Yes, 6 out of 10. It's quiet dread built around a videotape and a phone call.
🐱THE SCARE SIGNAL
SCARE SCORE
6 /10
🐱🐱🐱🐱🐱🐱🐱🐱🐱🐱
DREAD LEVEL
High
Expect to look sideways at your television for a few days.
DOG
Dog: fine
fine, no dog dies.
Ruling: Don't watch it alone at night, and treat your television with a little suspicion afterward.
Ring runs ninety-six minutes and is built around one videotape. Whoever watches it gets a strange phone call and seven days to think about it.
The premise, briefly
A journalist investigating a rumor about a videotape that is said to doom its viewers a week after they watch it tracks down a copy and presses play.
How much do you want to know?
🐱
The verdict above is spoiler-free. Everything below, including the ending, stays hidden until you pick a depth.
🐱CUT TO THE CHASE
How it ends
Reiko and Ryūji drain a well, find Sadako's remains, and think the curse is over. It isn't: Sadako's spirit comes out of Ryūji's television and he dies. Reiko learns that copying the tape and showing it to someone else within seven days saves the viewer, and sets off for her father's house with the tape.
The scene you're dreading
Near the end, Ryūji's television turns on by itself and shows the well from the tape. Sadako's spirit staggers out of the well and out of the screen and advances toward him, while Reiko hears his last moments over the phone.
The dog
No dog dies in Ring.
Ring is slow dread built on a rule and a deadline, with one big scene near the end, and knowing that scene is coming takes some of the sting out.
THE SHORT VERSION IS HIDDEN
How it ends, the scene you're dreading, what happens to the dog, and the bottom line. About twenty seconds to read.
What actually happens
A sleepover with a phone call at the end
Two high schoolers, Tomoko and Masami, swap an urban legend at a sleepover about a videotape that curses everyone who watches it to die seven days later, after a strange phone call. Tomoko then admits that she and her friends watched an odd tape the week before and got a call afterward. Masami steps out after a false alarm, Tomoko's television turns itself on, and an unseen figure kills her. Tomoko's aunt Reiko Asakawa, a journalist looking into the legend, attends the funeral and hears that three friends who watched the tape with Tomoko all died at the same moment. She finds an unmarked tape in the resort cabin in Izu where they stayed. It holds unrelated scenes, screeching sounds, and a final shot of a well. Reiko watches it, sees an apparition, and gets a phone call with the same screeching sound.
Reiko takes a copy of the tape to her psychic ex-husband Ryūji Takayama. They hear a puzzling message spoken in a dialect from Ōshima and plan a trip there, but before they leave Reiko catches their son Yōichi watching the tape, after "Tomoko" pressured him into it. On Ōshima they find out who Shizuko Yamamura, the woman on the tape, was. She became notorious after a public demonstration of her psychic ability arranged by Dr. Heihachiro Ikuma, who was also her lover. A vision shows that at the demonstration, Shizuko's little girl Sadako used her mind to kill a journalist who decried her mother's abilities. They fail to find Sadako, and Reiko realizes that Ryūji never got a phone call after watching the tape. They rush back to the cabin.
Draining the well, early congratulations
Under the cabin they find a sealed well, and another vision shows that Dr. Ikuma trapped Sadako inside it. They conclude that she stayed alive in the well and that the curse began when a videotape recorded the rage she projected. They drain the well and find Sadako's remains. Reiko's seven days pass and she is still alive, so they decide the curse is broken. The scene to brace for comes the next day, near the end of the movie: Ryūji's television turns on by itself and shows the well from the tape. Sadako's spirit staggers out of the well, out of the television, and toward Ryūji, and he dies. Reiko tries to phone him and hears it happen. She then works out how to survive: make a copy and let someone else see it before the week is up. To save Yōichi, she sets off for her father's house with the tape.
The ending, explained
Ryūji dies when Sadako's spirit comes out of his television, and Reiko hears it over the phone. The earlier theory turns out to be wrong, because draining the well and finding Sadako's remains did not lift the curse. Reiko works out that the way to survive the curse is to make a copy of the tape and let another person see it within seven days. To save Yōichi, she sets off for her father's house with a copy.
The post-credits ruling
Nobody has confirmed either way whether there is a scene during or after the credits.
✓ Spoiled safelyDog status: fine, no dog dies.
Questions people ask at 1am
Is Ring scary?
Yes, Ring is a 6 out of 10. The dread is high and slow, built on a videotape, a phone call and a seven-day deadline, with very little gore.
How does Ring end?
Sadako's spirit comes out of Ryūji's television and kills him, and Reiko realizes the curse can be passed on by showing a copy of the tape to someone else. She drives to her father's home to show it to him, to save her son Yōichi.
Does the dog die in Ring?
No dog dies in Ring.
Is there a post-credits scene in Ring?
Nobody has confirmed either way whether Ring has a scene during or after the credits.
How do you break the curse in Ring?
In Ring, draining the well and finding Sadako's remains does not break it. The way to survive is to make a copy of the tape and let someone else watch it within seven days.
BLURRED FOR YOUR PROTECTION
The whole plot of Ring is hidden, ending included. It stays that way until you ask.
You don't have to watch a stranger's videotape to find out how it ends. Install Scaredy Cat and it will blur horror before you see it.
