Manipulated Living
Rose Darko
Played by Mary McDonnell
Donnie's mother, who chaperones Sparkle Motion to Los Angeles in Kitty Farmer's place and is on the plane when the engine comes off.
Rose is the film's steadiest adult and the one Sparrow's rules use most cruelly: the Artifact is torn from the plane she and Samantha are on. In the Primary Universe she sits on the kerb outside the house, smoking, as Gretchen cycles up. Their exchanged wave - two people who, in this timeline, have never met - is one of the film's last images.
The very last person on screen is not a Darko but a neighbourhood boy. On his commentary track with Jake Gyllenhaal, Richard Kelly says of him: "If anyone asks who I am in this movie, I wasn't Donnie Darko. I was this kid. This was me."
What happens to this character.