Dale’s journey into the faraway tree in From season 3, episode 5’s ending results in one of the show’s most brutal deaths, setting up bigger problems for the trapped residents’ hopes of finally getting out. Following Tabitha’s return in From season 3, episode 3’s ending, she attends a meeting in episode 5 in which she relates her experiences of being transported to the lighthouse from the faraway tree, being pushed from the lighthouse, and ending up in the real world in Maine. Since this is the first known time that someone has escaped the town, Dale stubbornly repeats this strategy.

Ignoring warnings about the faraway tree’s unpredictable destinations, Dale boasts about wanting to take action, leave town, and get help for From’s trapped characters. However, after stepping through the portal, From season 3, episode 5’s ending reveals that the faraway tree sent Dale into the concrete wall of the motel’s pool. Only surface parts of Dale’s face and body protruded from the concrete, with Dale being horrifyingly crushed to death and suffocated in the wall as the town looked on. Providing a brutal revelation for the others, this is the first recorded time the tree’s destination has immediately killed someone.

Dale’s Pool Death May Be A Warning From The Town To Not Trust The Faraway Trees

The Residents Can’t Control Where The Faraway Tree Sends Them

Considering the faraway tree previously sent Boyd to a well, Sara to the church, Julie to the root cellar, and, later, Tabitha to the lighthouse in From season 2’s finale, Dale’s destination is the most brutal yet. The faraway trees have previously been used as a portal to get the characters out of desperate situations with the creatures surrounding them, or a means to be transported to a location connected to the town’s dark history, such as Tabitha finding the lighthouse to rescue From’s “Anghkooey” children. Dale’s journey through the tree, however, was simply in pursuit of getting out of the town.

Dale’s fate may be the evil forces’ way of saying that the trees don’t work that way. The residents can’t bend them to their will, and passage through them is dictated by what the town’s forces want from the person who passes through them. The town seems to have been intent on sending Boyd to the well and Tabitha to From’s lighthouse portal for its own purposes, but it didn’t accept Dale’s desire to go home. Therefore, fatally sending Dale into the pool’s concrete wall where everyone could see him would provide a dark warning about using the faraway trees.

Dale’s Death Kills The Group’s Biggest Source Of Hope After Tabitha’s Fromville Return

The Faraway Trees Aren’t A Reliable Way To Find Their Way Home

Though From’s characters have often surmised that “hope” is the greatest weapon the forces have against the trapped residents, the town is also very quick to smash it. Tabitha successfully returning to the real world through the lighthouse portal gave the residents a glimmer of hope that it was possible to get out. This hope led Dale to climb into the faraway tree and almost instantly die upon being transported inside the pool’s wall, so now they’re all back to square one.

Tabitha & Jade may still be able to find out the true nature of the faraway tree by discovering the meaning of the numbers in the hanging bottles.

It seems that killing this hope for the residents was the town’s way of sowing further division among them and having them seek alternate, more dangerous methods of finding freedom. Proving that they can’t simply enter the faraway tree to find their way back home, season 3 will seemingly set Boyd back on his mission to capture one of From’s mysterious monsters and question it for answers. Additionally, they’ll have to rely on what Victor remembers about Christopher’s tragic massacre and From’s deeper dark history.

New episodes of From season 3 release Sundays on MGM+.