From the iconic 1976 original, through its 2002 and 2023 adaptations, the film ‘Carrie’ continues to frighten and fascinate American audiences. Carrie IV: Carrie Got Her Gun (2024) features the same demented teenager with the same religious mother, but this time it imagines what Carrie might do when she is able ‘to use a 3D printer to make … an AR-style weapon.’
Screenwriters took their inspiration from the Clendaniel story:
Federal prosecutors are seeking an 18-year prison sentence for Sarah Beth Clendaniel, 36, who pleaded guilty to trying to blow up power stations around Baltimore to destabilize the government in a white supremacist plot… Clendaniel and a confidential informant [were] trying to obtain a high-powered rifle to shoot through substations in Reisterstown, Perry Hall, White Marsh, and more locations.
“If we could do all these in a day…it would completely destroy this whole city,” Clendaniel said in the recordings.
She told the informant, “It would probably permanently, completely lay [Baltimore] to waste.”
… “No matter where she is, whether she’s incarcerated or not, I do believe god will pour his spirit out on her. His will will be done, and I’m hoping that his will is done in all of our lives in this country,” [her mother] said. …
[If] the plot had not been foiled, it would have caused $75 million in damage to the electrical system and left much of Maryland in the dark.