There were 2 forks in the road at the end there.

Fork 1) The people running the institute were being totally evil. But it was to save the world. Oh what a moral conundrum!

King's choice : oh wait no, they were actually wrong about that. They were just being dumb. As explained by the genius. So all the bad stuff they did was for nothing good and the institute was just evil.

Fork 2) The psychic kids mindmelded into a magic hivemind deity. Wow. This is certainly something amazing and new in the world .

King's choice. : oh wait no, that whole thing immediately faded away after the climax.

Why? Maybe he was hoping for a tv series, which requires no big changes and moral simplicity