Character Relationship Map: Open Grave

Characters

• John (played by Sharlto Copley) — protagonist

  John awakens without memories in a pit of corpses and is temporarily accepted under an assumed identity. He helps investigate the house and surrounding area, then recovers his medical identity and lea...

• Nathan (played by Joseph Morgan) — protagonist

  Nathan is one of the amnesiac occupants and gradually recovers his skills and memories while exploring the surrounding area. He discovers a chained woman and child, later remembers the scheduled milit...

• Lukas (played by Thomas Kretschmann) — supporting

  Lukas is the German member of the group and initially distrusts John after finding a photograph that excludes him. As his infection worsens, he discovers recordings of the medical experiments, attacks...

• Sharon (played by Erin Richards) — supporting

  Sharon is an American member of the medical team and one of John’s closest companions. She explores the area with him, uses a shotgun to drive off Lukas, and later regains her memories. After being mo...

• Michael (played by Max Wrottesley) — supporting

  Michael is one of the occupants of the house and is connected romantically with Brown Eyes. After hearing screams, he finds a badly injured man trapped in barbed wire and attempts to help him, but the...

Canonical Relationships

Family, romantic, and professional connections based on plot evidence.

• Lukas → Michael (Professional Medical Teammates) — Their connection comes from the shared medical mission.

  The final explanation identifies Lukas and Michael as members of John's medical team.

• Nathan → Lukas (Professional Medical Teammates) — They share a professional connection through the vaccine project.

  Nathan and Lukas are both identified as members of John's medical team.

• Sharon → Lukas (Professional Medical Teammates) — Their shared professional past contrasts with their later violence.

  The recovered footage and final explanation establish that Sharon and Lukas belonged to the same medical team.

• Sharon → Nathan (Professional Medical Teammates) — They worked within the same plague-research operation.

  The revelation identifies Sharon and Nathan as members of John's medical team.

• John → Michael (Professional Medical Teammate) — Michael was connected to John's medical mission before the memory loss.

  The later revelation identifies Michael among the people who formed John's medical team.

• John → Nathan (Professional Medical Teammate) — Nathan was part of John's plague-research group.

  The final revelation states that Nathan, Sharon, Lukas, and the others were John's medical team.

• John → Lukas (Professional Medical Colleagues) — Their professional relationship is distorted by experimentation and mistrust.

  The video footage shows John conducting medical experiments on Lukas, and the later revelation identifies Lukas as part of John's medical team.

• John → Sharon (Professional Medical Teammate) — They previously worked together as medical researchers.

  The recovered documents and photographs reveal that John and Sharon were members of the same medical team working against the plague.

Story Dynamics

Alliances, conflicts, and narrative interactions that evolve throughout the story.

• Nathan → Michael (Alliance Group Allies) — They belong to the same survivor and research group.

  Nathan and Michael are both occupants of the house and members of the group trying to investigate their surroundings.

Story Analysis

A memory-stricken doctor reconstructs his role in a plague disaster while repeatedly confronting death, guilt, and survival.

Plot Progression

1. A Pit Without Memories — John awakens among corpses and escapes with help from a mute woman. He reaches a house where several other occupants also lack their identities.
2. Signs Around the House — The group finds identity cards, a troubling calendar date, and corpses chained to trees. A photograph raises suspicion that John does not belong with them.
3. The Infection Revealed — Deaths, violent pursuers, and attacks expose the danger surrounding the house. Lukas then discovers footage showing John's medical experiments.
4. A Doctor Remembers — John escapes, finds medical documents and vaccines, and recovers his identity as a doctor researching the plague. Lukas's infection turns their former professional connection into a fatal confrontatio...
5. The False Rescue — The infected assault the house as Sharon records the truth in a letter. Helicopters eliminate the attackers, but the arriving soldiers kill Nathan and force John and Sharon to flee.
6. The Pit Again — Sharon dies after giving John the letter. John chooses to appear dead by taking the vaccine and returns to the pit, where he later escapes without understanding the letter's importance.