Ava Paige in Maze Runner: Who She Is and Who Plays Her

Ava Paige is a character tied to WCKD, the organization behind the maze, and she is played by Patricia Clarkson in all three Maze Runner films, each directed by Wes Ball. She is credited as Ava Paige in each of them.

Clarkson is billed seventh in The Maze Runner (2014), eighth in Maze Runner: The Scorch Trials (2015) and tenth in Maze Runner: The Death Cure (2018). Her billing slips a little as the ensemble grows, while the character matters more to the plot as the trilogy goes on.

If you are new to the series, think of her as the head of a company who only comes into view once you start asking who runs the place. For the wider cast around her, see our guide to the maze runner characters and the full maze runner cast. For the organization itself, read about WICKED in the Maze Runner films, which the films spell WCKD.

Ava Paige is connected most clearly to Thomas as his enemy, to Teresa through WCKD, and to Janson as the person who ends her story. The films frame her conflict with Thomas through what he vows to do about her, not through a personal bond between them.

Thomas. After the raid on the Right Arm camp in The Scorch Trials, Thomas resolves to hunt down Paige and free the captives. For him she stands for the organization that built the maze and now holds Minho, so the vow to kill her is aimed at WCKD as much as at one woman. See Thomas in Maze Runner.

Teresa. Teresa gives away the Right Arm camp's location to WCKD in The Scorch Trials and is working with WCKD by The Death Cure, where she is a key figure in whether the plan to get inside can work. Her loyalty to the organization runs through the story. See Teresa in Maze Runner.

Janson. Janson first appears as the man who welcomes the Gladers into the facility with a protective story. In The Death Cure he kills Paige, and he is then killed by the Cranks that Thomas lets loose.

Minho and the Immunes. Minho is a WCKD captive in The Death Cure, held while WCKD searches for a cure among young people who are immune to the Flare. See Minho in Maze Runner.

In my opinion, the three moments that define Ava Paige are the reveal that she is alive, the vow that follows, and her death, and it could be argued that the first of these is the one that matters most.

The reveal in The Scorch Trials. The film asks you to trust Janson's protective story for a while, and then Thomas learns the facility is WCKD's and that Paige is alive. For a viewer who thought the first film closed the book on the experiment, this is the point where the franchise turns from escape to pursuit. Perhaps that shift is why her name sticks more than her screen time suggests.

Thomas's vow. After the raid on the Right Arm camp, he promises to kill her and bring the captives home. It is a short beat, but it gives the third film its direction, and it makes Paige the destination of a long journey rather than a character who simply turns up.

Her death in The Death Cure. It shares a film with Lawrence's rebel attack on the city wall, Newt's infection and the search for Minho, so it has a lot of competing storylines around it. That being said, the film pairs it with Janson's own death at the hands of the Cranks, which gives the sequence a neat symmetry that I think suits a character defined by an organization rather than by a personal feud.

So, if you want to see her at her most important, watch The Scorch Trials first. Her fate in The Death Cure only lands once you have seen how Thomas came to want her found.