The means don't justify the end... it's the other way around! Welcome to WatchMojo, and today we’re counting down our picks for the most notable movies that were totally ruined thanks to their unnecessarily bleak and dour endings. A major spoiler warning is in effect.
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00:00Your turn. Truth or dare.
00:03Welcome to WatchMojo.
00:05And today we're counting down our picks for the most notable movies that were totally ruined
00:09thanks to their unnecessarily bleak and dour endings.
00:12A major spoiler warning is in effect.
00:15I can't decide what's worse, stealing my story or ruining the ending.
00:22Number 30. Man of Steel.
00:30Zack Snyder loves him some dark superhero movies.
00:35And while that worked for something like Watchmen, in which the source material is
00:39inherently moody, it didn't quite work for Superman.
00:42In the very controversial ending to this reboot,
00:45Superman kills Zod as he attacks an innocent family in the train station.
00:49The decision to have the iconic hero commit murder was highly divisive,
00:53especially among diehard fans and those involved with the comics.
00:57It was a big creative swing, and we have to commend that.
00:59But many felt that the overt violence betrayed the tone and character of Superman.
01:04No matter how violent or how cruel, it's for the greater good.
01:11Number 29. Knowing.
01:13All we can say is what we've been repeating all morning.
01:16Get to any kind of underground shelter.
01:18An apocalyptic thriller starring Nicolas Cage, Knowing follows John Kessler,
01:23an astrophysics professor who learns that a massive solar flare is primed to hit Earth.
01:28Well, um, that's exactly what happens.
01:30This is one of those rare disaster movies in which the entire world ends,
01:35as the planet is slammed by the solar flare and everyone dies.
01:38Well, everyone except a number of children who are taken away by alien creatures and
01:42brought to an Eden-like planet, supposedly to save the human race.
01:46But this only raises more questions, not to mention some dour implications.
01:51Just imagine the state of their sanity as they grow up without parents and learn all
01:55these truths about Armageddon, alien life, and what seems like forced repopulation.
02:00Where's Caleb?
02:03Caleb's safe.
02:04Number 28. Sunshine.
02:06At the end of time, a moment will come when just one man remains,
02:15and the moment will pass.
02:17The sun is failing, and we gotta kickstart that sucker to prevent the apocalypse.
02:21What a fascinating subject for a movie.
02:23Too bad Sunshine ruined it by randomly turning into a mediocre slasher movie in the third act.
02:28The crazed Captain Pinbacker hunts down the crew and kills some of them,
02:32supposedly for defying God's plan.
02:35He's even covered in horrible burns.
02:37Remind you of anyone?
02:39It was a weird shift, turning Sunshine from a philosophical space drama into a violent horror
02:44flick.
02:44It's not a shift that many were expecting.
02:47Or wanting.
02:48Don't fight.
02:51Don't fight.
02:59Number 27. Would You Rather.
03:01But RSVP by 8 o'clock tonight if you do decide to join us.
03:06A fun idea for a horror film, Would You Rather follows Iris,
03:10a young woman trying to save her brother Raleigh from cancer.
03:13She's introduced to Shepard Lambric,
03:15a disturbed philanthropist who offers to pay for Raleigh's treatments
03:18if Iris wins a twisted game of Would You Rather.
03:21Iris wins, after much blood and depravity of course,
03:24and is rewarded with both money and a bone marrow donor for Raleigh.
03:28But upon returning home, she finds that her despondent brother has just taken his own life.
03:34We know horror movies don't often have happy endings, but this is just needlessly cruel.
03:39Number 26. Mother.
03:41What do they want?
03:42I don't know. They've come here to see me.
03:45Darren Aronofsky is a subversive filmmaker, and he certainly proves that with Mother.
03:50On the surface, it's about a woman who grows increasingly anxious about the
03:53sheer number of guests invading her house.
03:55But it's really an allegory about God, Eden, and Mother Earth.
03:59And it does not have pleasant things to say about humanity.
04:02The guests eventually turn into a ravenous cult devoted to Mother's husband,
04:06nearly beating Mother to death and causing her to burn the house down.
04:10And that is to say nothing of the horror they inflict on her newborn son.
04:14It's all shown in very graphic detail, and it has proven way too much for many viewers.
04:20Can you hear that?
04:22No!
04:25Number 25. Spring Breakers.
04:28I want us all to fall in love.
04:31Let's cause some trouble now.
04:33Don't let the colorful bikinis and neon lights fool you.
04:36Spring Breakers is not a sexy romp.
04:39Quite the opposite, in fact.
04:40Four girls partying in St. Petersburg meet a drug dealer named Alien
04:44and soon fall into his life of crime and hedonism.
04:47Faith quickly grows disillusioned and leaves,
04:49and Cotty later departs after getting injured in a drive-by shooting.
04:53But Brit and Candy fall fully into the lifestyle and turn into vicious murderers
04:57by shooting up a rival gang and killing its leader in cold blood.
05:01Turning heroes into psychotic villains is always a risky proposition,
05:05and some are not convinced that Spring Breakers pulled it off.
05:08It was way more than just having a good time.
05:12We're different people now.
05:14We see things differently.
05:16Number 24. On Her Majesty's Secret Service.
05:19Ladies and gentlemen, the toast is the bride and bridegroom, Mr. and Mrs. James Bond.
05:29While it's now considered one of the best Bond films,
05:32On Her Majesty's Secret Service was met with a muted reception in 1969.
05:37Most of this is due to the absence of Sean Connery,
05:39who was replaced with newcomer George Lazenby.
05:42But many people also found the story too bleak.
05:45It depicts Bond in a far more personal and vulnerable light,
05:48with the secret agent falling in love with a countess named Tracy.
05:51He eventually marries Tracy, but she is killed in a drive-by shooting in the movie's famous ending.
05:57Most fans wanted to watch Bond get the girl and kick some butt,
06:00not cry over his late wife's bloody corpse.
06:03It's all right.
06:06It's quite all right, really. She's having a rest.
06:11We'll be going on soon.
06:13Number 23. Beau Is Afraid.
06:15But if you know where you are, then you must also know where you just were,
06:20and where you just did what you just did, which I saw every second of.
06:25Ari Aster's third major film was highly anticipated, and ended up highly divisive.
06:30The reasons for this are many, including its tragic and exhausting ending.
06:35The titular Beau travels far and wide to attend his mother Mona's funeral,
06:39but in a bizarre twist ending, both we and Beau learn that Mona is actually alive.
06:44Not only that, but she is horribly abusive towards Beau and reveals that the entire odyssey was a
06:50test. Oh, and his father is a literal monster. He then enters a mock trial for supposedly
06:55mistreating his mother, suffering public humiliation and eventually execution.
07:00The ending is full of metaphor and allegory, but come on,
07:03we endured three hours of Beau's misery for this? Talk about a bummer.
07:17Number 22. Last Night in Soho.
07:19They send me to hell, so I send them to theirs.
07:24Edgar Wright made his first foray into horror with Last Night in Soho,
07:28a deconstruction of the swinging 60s and all its glitz and glamour.
07:32Fashion student Ellie is transported back to the 1960s whenever she sleeps,
07:36observing the abused life of a singer named Sandy. As the movie nears its conclusion,
07:41we learn that Sandy developed into a serial killer, murdering the men she had been pimped to
07:45and hiding their corpses under the floor of her bedsit. She then grew into the elderly Miss Collins,
07:51who now rents the place to Ellie. And when Collins confronts Ellie,
07:55the latter defends her brutal life of serial murder. The messy twist
07:59turns the victims into villains and leaves behind a rather muddled message.
08:11Number 21. The Butterfly Effect.
08:14Um, did you remember to bring those home movies that we used to make?
08:20Yeah, they're right here.
08:21This movie is essentially two hours of unending misery. Ashton Kutcher plays Evan,
08:27a young man who tries changing his tragic past by reading a journal and going back in time.
08:32But this proves more difficult than it sounds thanks to, you guessed it, the butterfly effect.
08:36Unfortunately, there's no winning when it comes to the resolution. The theatrical ending is a
08:41happy one, but it doesn't gel with the relentlessly depressing tone of the movie. The director's cut
08:46fixes this, but it makes the movie even more depressing by having baby Evan strangle himself
08:51in the womb. It's almost comically morbid, and some even find it unintentionally goofy.
09:04Number 20. Glass.
09:06We so wanted the concluding chapter in M. Night Shyamalan's unbreakable trilogy to live up to
09:11its crossover potential. And while some of the interactions between the superhuman characters
09:16have their moments, fans were largely left scratching their heads following a rather
09:20anticlimactic finale. Subverting the notion that a superhero movie has to lead up to an epic set
09:35piece, Glass instead has its three leads die in unceremonious fashion. Perhaps none more so than
09:42David Dunn, who is literally drowned in a puddle of water. The movie tries to end on an optimistic
09:54note as the existence of superheroes is made public, but we can't help but feel it's undercut
09:59by its underwhelming and rather dour climax. Number 19. 47 Meters Down.
10:14The simple setup of divers having to survive a pack of hungry sharks after their cage plummets
10:19them to the bottom of the ocean has the makings for a brisk creature feature. But unfortunately,
10:2447 Meters Down tries to throw in too many narrative curveballs when it matters most.
10:34After numerous close calls, it seems like sisters Lisa and Kate have finally made it back to the
10:39boat. After a thrilling ascension, it turns out Lisa has been hallucinating and is still at the
10:45bottom of the ocean. Not only that, but she realizes Kate has been killed by the sharks a
10:50while ago. Just as quickly as it took to explain this, Lisa is rescued by the coast guard,
11:08making us question this whole narrative back and forth. Number 18. Serenity. No,
11:14not the movie adaptation of Firefly. This one is way, way worse.
11:20Before being thrown out the window by a ludicrous twist, Serenity does at least have some atmosphere
11:26and intrigue about it. The bulk of the plot sees Matthew McConaughey's fishing boat captain
11:30contemplate murdering his ex-wife's cruel new husband, Frank. But as the walls of his reality
11:36begin to crumble, Baker Dill eventually realizes that he's merely part of a computer simulation
11:41created by his son Patrick in the real world. Baker going through with killing Frank is the
11:59motivation Patrick needs to kill his abusive stepfather in the real world.
12:03Patrick is charged with murder, and we're left asking, what the heck did we just watch?
12:11Patrick!
12:16Number 17. Truth or Dare. Truth or Dare is about as convincing as you would expect from a horror
12:22movie based on the titular game. But the ending still manages to sink to new lows.
12:33The basic premise is this. A group of college kids get roped into playing a supernatural game
12:38of truth or dare, whereby you have to either tell horrible truths, commit dangerous dares,
12:43or die. Because the evil game is twisted, apparently, it leads to their deaths eventually.
12:49But players can extend the time between their turns by inviting other players to join.
12:54Carter was the only one who could stop this. So now the game won't end until all the players are
13:00dead. And your turn's next. Unless you find some new friends to play with.
13:06Rather than roll the dice again, Olivia instead ends the movie by uploading a video whereby she
13:11invites potentially the whole world to play. This feels edgy for edginess' sake.
13:17I'm so sorry, but I have to ask you. Truth or Dare?
13:26Number 16. The Son. This film, tangentially related to Florian Zeller's previous film The
13:32Father, tackles some very serious issues. However, it's been criticized for doing so
13:37through melodrama. At the heart of the story is Peter and his son Nicholas,
13:41the latter of whom struggles greatly with depression. Eventually, Nicholas is placed
13:46in an inpatient treatment facility for his own safety, and makes an impassioned plea for release
13:50towards the end of the film. His parents relent even against doctor wishes, and as soon as they
14:03return home, Nicholas tragically takes his own life. It's far from the most tactful presentation
14:09for sensitive viewers, and the final scene where the film briefly tricks us into thinking Nicholas
14:14survived doesn't help matters. Number 15. The Entity. This horror film supposedly based on
14:31true events distinguishes itself by going further than most in the genre would.
14:36The trouble is, the ending manages to go too far.
14:44After being plagued by a malicious supernatural force, Carla is finally able to prove her sanity
14:52and the existence of the invisible entity. Only, the person with the ability to officially validate
14:58her claims goes into denial. The film ends with Carla moving away with her family,
15:10but not before the Entity greets her by saying,
15:17followed by a weirdly vulgar British slang word. We think you know what it is. It's a decidedly
15:23dour downbeat to end on, with the Entity's colorful language eliciting little more than confusion.
15:29Number 14. The Number 23. Now, here's a movie that makes the wrong call at every turn,
15:36with its twist being at the center of it all.
15:46Jim Carrey stars as Walter Sparrow, a man who becomes obsessed with a book that may hold the
15:51secrets to a murder. Wrapped up in this mystery is The Number 23, which Walter can't help but
15:57see everywhere. At no point is the film less convincing than the third act, wherein Walter
16:13overcomes his amnesia and remembers that he wrote the book and committed the murder.
16:18The Number 23 takes the well-worn trope of an unreliable protagonist and stretches it
16:30beyond its limits. If it was less concerned with simply being dark, it might have offered
16:35a halfway satisfying solution. Number 13. The Box.
16:40The financially desperate Norma and Arthur are presented with an option by a mysterious man.
16:45If they press a button, they'll receive one million dollars, but a stranger will die.
17:00Rather than lean into the psychological angle of the plot, the movie eventually takes a turn
17:05into the realm of science fiction. In the end, the mysterious man reveals his assistants have
17:10blinded and deafened their son, and offers them another choice. Keep the money and live
17:15with their son's condition, or Arthur can kill Norma and their son's senses will be restored.
17:20We get the latter, but we feel like the movie should have taken option C.
17:24That is, if option C is anything else. Number 12. The Woman in Black.
17:35For what it's worth, The Woman in Black is actually a creepy little haunting film,
17:39with plenty of atmosphere to spare. But we're still not sold on the dour ending.
17:44Throughout the film, lawyer Arthur Kipps handles an estate that turns out to be haunted by the
17:48spirit of a woman who lost her young son. The titular woman in black gets her revenge by
17:53taking the lives of the children in the nearby village. Realizing she's going after his son
18:07Joseph next, Arthur attempts to save him. However, after Joseph wanders onto train tracks,
18:13both he and Arthur are killed. While Arthur is reunited with his deceased wife in the afterlife,
18:34we can't help but wish things had turned out better in the end.
18:37Number 11. The Boy in the Striped Pajamas.
18:41This one is incredibly heavy, so get ready. The film is set in Nazi-occupied Poland,
18:46and follows the friendship between two boys. Bruno is the son of an SS officer,
18:51and Shmuel is a Jewish prisoner at a nearby extermination camp.
19:00The boys' ignorance of the real horrors going on reaches a critical point at the end when
19:05Bruno is mistaken for a prisoner and rounded up with the rest of them.
19:11Bruno, Shmuel, and countless others are tragically executed, and the film ends with
19:17Bruno's family utterly devastated. While the film has garnered mixed reactions, detractors of the
19:23ending have criticized it for being contrived and sympathizing with Nazis. Either way, it's
19:28definitely a gut punch we wish we could forget. Number 10. Secret Window. Certain endings are
19:38so cliche, their inclusion nearly always detracts from the rest of the story.
19:42A tired twist in murder mysteries is revealing the protagonist to be the killer,
19:46usually with multiple personalities thrown in for good measure. In Secret Window,
19:50Johnny Depp plays Mort, a writer who suffers a mental break after learning about his wife's
19:55affair. Throughout the film, Mort is tormented by a person named Shooter,
19:59before the third act reveals the two to be one and the same.
20:08Number 9. Sucker Punch.
20:16Zack Snyder's film is a grim psychological drama about abuse that also loves to drop
20:21its attractive cast in video game scenarios devoid of consequence. Despite being set in
20:26a horrifying mental institute fond of lobotomizing its patients, Baby Doll's
20:30explosive dream sequences are pure escapism. As a result, Sucker Punch's tone is all over the place.
20:37Ultimately, Baby Doll is lobotomized to allow one of the other captives to escape.
20:42It's an ending that may have actually worked had Sucker Punch focused more on the psychological
20:46storyline rather than constantly stopping dead to show glorified music videos.
20:51Number 8. Knock Knock.
20:58Starring Keanu Reeves, Knock Knock's married protagonist engages in a touch of infidelity
21:03before the two determined women torture him as punishment for succumbing to temptation.
21:08For the most part, Knock Knock plays it relatively straight, but the over-the-top
21:12ending jumps right over satire into parody territory,
21:16including a no moment capable of making Anakin Skywalker blush.
21:23After the protagonist accidentally likes his own assault video on Facebook,
21:26the girls gleefully escape to presumably torture another day.
21:31At the very least, the movie that inspired Knock Knock
21:33had the decency to hit the villains with a truck.
21:41Number 7. Paranormal Activity – The Ghost Dimension.
21:44The sixth entry in the franchise, The Ghost Dimension finally answers
21:48a couple of long-standing questions. As it so happens, some things are better left a mystery.
21:53Long story short, a cult needs the blood of a girl named Leela to revive a demon called Toby,
21:58and the villains succeed while killing the rest of the child's family.
22:02Since most entries in the series conclude with a win for the bad guys,
22:05The Ghost Dimension's shocking ending happens to be the most predictable outcome possible.
22:09Along with an absence of scares, The Ghost Dimension's theatrical ending
22:13represents a franchise that never should have been running out of steam.
22:18Number 6. The Descent – Part 2.
22:23Following six women who enter a cave occupied by cannibalistic humans,
22:272005's The Descent is a fantastic horror movie with a seemingly happy ending
22:32that winds up being the exact opposite.
22:34Despite obviously lacking the element of surprise key
22:37in making the original film's climax so effective,
22:40the sequel could not resist closing with another switcheroo.
22:43The Descent's protagonist sacrifices themselves to allow another woman to escape the cave.
22:48Unfortunately, a rarely seen minor character shows up to ensure nobody survives.
22:52It's almost as if the film suddenly remembers it needs a crushing ending
22:56and opts for the flimsiest solution possible.
23:03Number 5. Remember Me.
23:08In the hands of the right director and writer,
23:10any subject matter can work.
23:12That being said,
23:14adopting a real-life tragedy to artificially bloat a story's self-importance
23:18is a recipe for disaster.
23:20For approximately 95% of its runtime,
23:23Remember Me is a meandering drama about pretty people grieving over senseless acts of violence.
23:29Then the 9-11 attacks happen while the protagonist is in the World Trade Center.
23:33For some reason,
23:34Remember Me turns one of America's worst moments
23:37into a poorly-timed twist ending that no one asked for.
23:41Number 4. Splice.
23:47Strange, twisted, and often great,
23:49Splice sees a pair of scientists fusing human and animal DNA
23:53to create a female hybrid called Dren.
23:55As Elsa's own DNA is used,
23:57the engineer is basically Dren's mother.
24:00Meanwhile, the other scientist begins to sleep with the hybrid creature.
24:04Following a thoughtful exploration of this unorthodox love triangle,
24:07Splice forgoes atmosphere in favor of a purely insane climax.
24:12After becoming male,
24:13Dren forcibly impregnates Elsa,
24:16who opts to keep the baby for money.
24:18Anything interesting Splice says about genetic engineering
24:21is overshadowed by the overly grotesque third act.
24:24Nobody would blame you if you didn't do this.
24:27Number 3. High Tension.
24:35Starting out as a relatively grounded slasher film about Marie,
24:38a teenager desperate to protect her friend from a deranged serial killer,
24:42High Tension ultimately exposes the protagonist as a psychopath
24:45suffering from dissociative identity disorder.
24:48Framed as Marie recounting her version of events while in a mental institute,
24:52High Tension asks audiences to believe all these violent murders
24:55were committed by a petite teenager rather than a brawny guy.
24:58Even if the ending's inconsistencies can be waved away
25:01as the ravings of an unreliable narrator,
25:03this does not mean logic can be thrown out the window.
25:06Otherwise, everything prior to the twist is rendered irrelevant.
25:10Number 2. The Life of David Gale.
25:13Focusing on a philosophy professor sentenced to death
25:15after being wrongly convicted of murder and assault,
25:18The Life of David Gale's twist ending is hardly to blame for all of the film's problems.
25:23That being said, it definitely does not help.
25:26In an attempt to discredit capital punishment,
25:28David Gale frames himself for the murder of a close personal friend
25:32who actually took their own life,
25:33with a video of the real death surfacing after the protagonist is executed.
25:38Consequently, The Life of David Gale takes the criminal justice system,
25:42Kate Winslet's investigative reporter,
25:44and audiences on a wild and profoundly ill-advised ride.
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26:04Number 1. Pay It Forward.
26:06That's me, that's me, and that's three people.
26:12Seeking to make the world a better place,
26:14a young boy named Trevor creates a pay-it-forward system
26:18where favors are reimbursed by the benefactor helping out three other people.
26:22Despite touching upon serious themes,
26:24Pay It Forward is an uplifting family drama that highlights the good inside most humans,
26:29but the film cannot help delivering one final and unnecessary gut punch.
26:33Trevor shockingly dies while defending a friend from a group of mean kids,
26:38an ending so out of nowhere and blatantly manipulative,
26:41it cheapens the rest of the movie.
26:43Did you still enjoy these films despite their controversial endings?
26:46Let us know in the comments below.
26:49That was intense.
26:51Did you enjoy this video?
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