Character Relationship Map: The Devil All the Time

Characters

• Reverend Preston Teagardin (played by Robert Pattinson) — protagonist

  Reverend Preston is a self-righteous preacher who gains Lenora Laferty's trust while Arvin Russell distrusts him. He grooms and sexually assaults Lenora, rejects her after learning she is pregnant, an...

• Willard Russell (played by Bill Skarsgård) — supporting

  Willard is Arvin Russell's father and Charlotte Russell's husband, a traumatized war veteran whose faith becomes increasingly desperate. After Charlotte develops cancer, he prays obsessively and sacri...

• Sandy Henderson (played by Riley Keough) — supporting

  Sandy is Carl Henderson's wife and Deputy Lee Bodecker's sister. With Carl, she lures male hitchhikers into staged sexual encounters so Carl can photograph them before they are murdered. Years later,...

• Carl Henderson (played by Jason Clarke) — supporting

  Carl is a photographer and Sandy Henderson's husband, as well as Deputy Lee Bodecker's brother-in-law. He and Sandy murder male hitchhikers after photographing them during staged encounters. When they...

• Emma (played by Kristin Griffith) — minor

  Emma is Willard Russell's mother and Arvin Russell's grandmother. She once wanted Willard to marry Helen Hatton, later cares for Lenora Laferty, and eventually raises both children after the deaths of...

• Roy Laferty (played by Harry Melling) — supporting

  Roy is a charismatic evangelical preacher who marries Helen Hatton and becomes Lenora Laferty's father. He performs extreme demonstrations of faith, including pouring venomous spiders over himself. Af...

• Helen Hatton (played by Mia Wasikowska) — supporting

  Helen is Roy Laferty's wife and Lenora Laferty's mother. She marries Roy despite Emma's earlier hopes for a different match involving Willard Russell. After Roy's religious delusions intensify, he tak...

Canonical Relationships

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

• Sandy Henderson → Roy Laferty (Power Lure) — Sandy attempts to place Roy inside the couple's predatory trap.

  Sandy encourages Roy to have sex with her as part of the Hendersons' established method for luring male hitchhikers.

• Willard Russell → Helen Hatton (Romantic Proposed Match) — Helen represents a marriage possibility considered by Willard's family.

  Willard's mother Emma wanted him to marry Helen, but Helen instead marries Roy Laferty.

• Helen Hatton → Emma (Family Connection) — Helen entrusts her child to Emma during the crisis.

  Helen leaves her daughter at Emma's home before Roy takes Helen into the woods.

• Carl Henderson → Sandy Henderson (Family Spouse) — Their marriage is intertwined with their criminal partnership.

  Carl and Sandy are presented as a married couple living together and working as serial killers.

• Helen Hatton → Roy Laferty (Family Wife) — Helen and Roy are married and form a troubled family unit.

  Helen marries Roy Laferty in 1950, and they have a daughter together.

• Willard Russell → Emma (Family Son) — Emma is Willard's mother and remains connected to his family.

  The plot identifies Emma as Willard's mother, and she later becomes responsible for the family household after his death.

Story Dynamics

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

• Reverend Preston Teagardin → Roy Laferty (Narrative Ideological Parallel) — Both preachers embody destructive forms of religious power.

  Roy uses extreme religious performance and develops a delusion about resurrection, while Preston presents himself as self-righteous and abuses religio...

• Reverend Preston Teagardin → Helen Hatton (Narrative Religious Successor) — Preston echoes and transforms the film's earlier portrait of corrupted religious authority.

  Preston is introduced as a new, self-righteous reverend in the later Ohio community, following the earlier religious storyline involving Helen's husba...

• Reverend Preston Teagardin → Emma (Conflict Religious Adversary) — Preston's contempt creates hostility between him and Emma's household.

  The plot states that Preston had previously ridiculed Emma, causing resentment toward him.

• Willard Russell → Carl Henderson (Social Acquaintance) — They share an early point of contact within the film's interwoven timeline.

  Willard meets Carl at the same Ohio diner where Carl later encounters Roy while hitchhiking.

• Willard Russell → Roy Laferty (Conflict Religious Contrast) — Their forms of religious belief become contrasting paths through grief and violence.

  Willard relies on intense personal prayer, while Roy publicly demonstrates faith through bizarre sermons and later develops delusions about resurrecti...

• Carl Henderson → Roy Laferty (Conflict Murderer) — Carl treats Roy as another victim of the Hendersons' killing scheme.

  Carl picks up Roy while hitchhiking and kills him after Roy refuses to have sex with Sandy.

Story Analysis

Interwoven lives show how trauma, corrupted faith, and inherited violence shape successive generations.

Plot Progression

1. War Scars and Family Beginnings — Willard returns from the war carrying a violent memory and begins a family life in Ohio. Emma's expectations and Helen's marriage introduce the film's interlocking family histories.
2. Faith Turns Into Violence — Roy's theatrical faith deteriorates into delusion after a spider bite. His attempt to resurrect the dead leads to Helen's murder and his own encounter with the Hendersons.
3. The Prayer Cross — Willard builds a cross and turns prayer into a desperate attempt to control illness. The failure of this ritual ends in Charlotte's death and Willard's suicide.
4. A Preacher's Corruption — Preston presents himself as a righteous religious authority while abusing his position. His grooming and rejection of a pregnant girl expose the danger beneath his public piety.
5. Violence Reaches Its End — The Hendersons' murderous pattern ends during a final roadside encounter, and evidence of their crimes is recovered. The story closes with a solitary departure and an uncertain future.