# After Earth - Is there a big twist ending? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [June 1, 2013, 2:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/after-earth-is-there-a-big-twist-ending/659861 "2013-06-01T14:01:55Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Smeghead](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f1d935/32.png) [@Smeghead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smeghead)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2013, 5:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/after-earth-is-there-a-big-twist-ending/659861/41 "2013-06-03T17:21:45Z")
I was completely suckered by the Sixth Sense. In my defense, however, I had no idea there was even going to BE a twist. I knew almost nothing about the movie going into it. And I hate scary movies in general, so I wasn’t really focused on piecing together clues and whatnot. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Bredin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/96bed5/32.png) [@John\_Bredin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Bredin)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2013, 5:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/after-earth-is-there-a-big-twist-ending/659861/42 "2013-06-03T17:35:39Z")
> [@Jophiel](#): > > Just to clarify, I meant another MNS movie beyond those **Justin\_Bailey** listed, not that I only know of Lady in the Water. The “people trapped in the elevator” movie, which I thought was pretty good but can’t remember the name. 😛 ---
**Author:** ![Justin\_Bailey](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/justin_bailey/32/8792_2.png) [@Justin\_Bailey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Justin_Bailey)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2013, 5:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/after-earth-is-there-a-big-twist-ending/659861/43 "2013-06-03T17:36:55Z")
> [@John\_Bredin](#): > > The “people trapped in the elevator” movie, which I thought was pretty good but can’t remember the name. 😛 **Devil** , but it’s not actually an MNS movie. He only produced it. ---
**Author:** ![leahcim](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/b4bc9f/32.png) [@leahcim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/leahcim)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2013, 5:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/after-earth-is-there-a-big-twist-ending/659861/44 "2013-06-03T17:59:51Z")
> [@Bob Ducca](#): > > First off, I’m not going to be one of these people that claim that they weren’t fooled by The Sixth Sense… It reminds me of how the number of people that claim they were at Martin Luther King’s march on Washington far outnumbers the actual number of people that were there. I was surprised by the twist, and loved it. Or like people complaining on video game fora that the game was too easy and the maker is pandering to noobs. It’s the perfect situation for inserting a stealth brag. > [@](#): > > I remember that the Nicole Kidman movie, _The Others_, came out not long after The Sixth Sense and though it has a similar twist, people weren’t nearly as surprised by it because they were already en guarde for that kind of ending. Well, as of right now, I’m adding “The Others” to my “well known enough that I don’t have to spoiler out” list. 🙂 The Others was a little different in that the plot was set up at the start to give a reason why the mother and kids were so isolated. Even if you didn’t get the twist, you always knew that the house was a weird place. Sixth sense had Malcolm going on what looks like a date with his wife, and appearing in a bunch of public places – a lot more deliberate misdirection about the normalcy of his life. ---
**Author:** ![Drunky\_Smurf](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/drunky_smurf/32/449_2.png) [@Drunky\_Smurf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Drunky_Smurf)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2013, 6:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/after-earth-is-there-a-big-twist-ending/659861/45 "2013-06-03T18:10:21Z")
> [@ftg](#): > > And of course there are those of us who are surprised that anyone thinks _The Sixth Sense_ has a twist ending. It was pretty obvious what was going on from the get-go. > > One person’s twist is another person’s “about time it finally dawned on him”. Wasn’t he listening to a word of what the kid said in the hospital bed? Sheesh. This. I can’t believe anyone didn’t get it by halfway through. > [@Amateur\_Barbarian](#): > > Every one of the 500,000 people who were in the stadium when Mark McGwire hit his 70th home run would disagree. What are you talking about? ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2013, 6:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/after-earth-is-there-a-big-twist-ending/659861/46 "2013-06-03T18:12:03Z")
> [@Justin\_Bailey](#): > > **Devil** , but it’s not actually an MNS movie. He only produced it. IMDB says the Writer’s Guild gave him a script credit. ---
**Author:** ![Poysyn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/f4b2a3/32.png) [@Poysyn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Poysyn)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2013, 6:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/after-earth-is-there-a-big-twist-ending/659861/47 "2013-06-03T18:45:37Z")
> [@Smeghead](#): > > I was completely suckered by the Sixth Sense. In my defense, however, I had no idea there was even going to BE a twist. \ I am in this boat too. I have no problems admitting it. ---
**Author:** ![typoink](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ecb155/32.png) [@typoink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/typoink)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2013, 7:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/after-earth-is-there-a-big-twist-ending/659861/48 "2013-06-03T19:27:09Z")
> [@Push\_You\_Down](#): > > It’s similar to how people often claim they saw the Keyser Soze twist coming early on in Usual Suspects… yes, there are clues, but people treat it like it was “soooo obvious.” I went in to Usual Suspects knowing there WAS a twist, but nothing else. I thought the eventual reveal was so telegraphed that I was genuinely surprised when it WAS the twist – I thought it was intentional misdirection. Maybe if I hadn’t heard that it had a big twist, it woulda snuck up on me. ---
**Author:** ![Odesio](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/odesio/32/20003_2.png) [@Odesio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Odesio)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2013, 7:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/after-earth-is-there-a-big-twist-ending/659861/49 "2013-06-03T19:30:59Z")
> [@Poysyn](#): > > I am in this boat too. I have no problems admitting it. As was I. I even attributed some of the odd behavior to being just the way dialogue and situations are contrived in motion pictures. i.e. When Dr. Crowe firsts meets Cole it’s outside without the mother being there. It seemed odd to me that this would be how they were introduced to one another but I just let it go as one of those silly things that happens in movies. And one of the reasons I thought The Sixth Sense was such a great movie was because the clues were there. When the twist was revealed it was something you could look back at and say, “Ah, ha! That makes sense!” ---
**Author:** ![tullsterx](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e9bcb4/32.png) [@tullsterx](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tullsterx)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2013, 7:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/after-earth-is-there-a-big-twist-ending/659861/50 "2013-06-03T19:38:21Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > So everyone says now. > > At the time, I never met a single person who saw it coming. I didn’t see it coming and other people I’ve seen the movie with didn’t see it coming. That’s really all I can say. And thank-god! ---
**Author:** ![pancakes3](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ba9def/32.png) [@pancakes3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pancakes3)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2013, 7:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/after-earth-is-there-a-big-twist-ending/659861/51 "2013-06-03T19:58:21Z")
> [@Justin\_Bailey](#): > > Shamalan has directed ten films and only three have twist endings. It’s almost unfair to pigeonhole him that way, but understandable when you realize that… > > **- The Sixth Sense,** his breakthrough had a twist > **- Unbreakable,** his followup to the breakthrough had a twist > **- Signs,** his next movie, didn’t have a twist but everyone thinks it did. > **- The Village,** his next movie after that had a major twist that makes little sense in the grand scheme of things. > > No movie he’s made since has had a twist. a) i would consider the revelation that water was acidic to Aliens to be a twist. A horrible, illogical, sad excuse for a twist but a twist nonetheless. There wasn’t a watershed moment where the action directly affected the outcome. Casey taking whacks at aliens didn’t drive them away, the water did. Kind of. It was either a twist or a horrific nonsequitor that mercifully ended a terrible film. The acidy water may have been deus ex machina but it’s so contrarian that I have to reconcile that it was his attempt at a twist rather than pulling the screenwriting equivalent of ripping the n64 cartridge out of the system and going home. b) The village’s twist had everything to do with the grand scheme. It went from supernatural thriller to (twist) deep seeded conspiracy to (twist) minor cult. c) Otherwise, I kind of agree that the twist isn’t as prevalent as it’s made out to be. The Happening’s “twist” is more of a reveal. However, it still stands that between 1999-2004 came 4 movies consecutively each with massive twist endings. It’s how Copala and Scorsese are “mafia” directors even if not every movie is a mafia movie. ---
**Author:** ![Ferret\_Herder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e47774/32.png) [@Ferret\_Herder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ferret_Herder)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2013, 9:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/after-earth-is-there-a-big-twist-ending/659861/52 "2013-06-03T21:19:50Z")
> [@Odesio](#): > > As was I. I even attributed some of the odd behavior to being just the way dialogue and situations are contrived in motion pictures. i.e. When Dr. Crowe firsts meets Cole it’s outside without the mother being there. It seemed odd to me that this would be how they were introduced to one another but I just let it go as one of those silly things that happens in movies. > > And one of the reasons I thought The Sixth Sense was such a great movie was because the clues were there. When the twist was revealed it was something you could look back at and say, “Ah, ha! That makes sense!” It makes sense as a filmmaking conceit - as a “let’s play this trick on the audience” setup, and I think it was well-done in that respect. (I also do not recall anything about a plot twist and was caught off-guard by the reveal.) However, it is fucking unbelievable and outlandish in context of the film. We have to believe that this married child psychologist manages to have a “life” that passes for what he could accept as a real one, a merely recently-cold relationship with his wife, and that he speaks directly and interactively with no one except one little boy. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2013, 10:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/after-earth-is-there-a-big-twist-ending/659861/53 "2013-06-03T22:42:43Z")
> [@Ferret\_Herder](#): > > However, it is fucking unbelievable and outlandish in context of the film. We have to believe that this married child psychologist manages to have a “life” that passes for what he could accept as a real one, a merely recently-cold relationship with his wife, and that he speaks directly and interactively with no one except one little boy. It’s not as ridiculous as it sounds (leaving aside the whole idea of ghosts). Think of being dead as like being in a dream. Bizarre things are happening around you and to you but you just accept them without question. It’s not until you wake up that you wonder why you didn’t think it was unusual that everyone at work was naked, your wife had turned into a kangaroo, and Barack Obama lived next door - these things all just seemed normal in your dream. Same thing with Malcolm Crowe. It was very unusual that nobody other than one little boy was talking to him. And he normally would have noticed this and wondered why it was happening. But he wasn’t in his normal state - he was dead. And part of being dead was that he didn’t think about how unusual his situation was. ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2013, 11:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/after-earth-is-there-a-big-twist-ending/659861/54 "2013-06-03T23:21:24Z")
Keep in mind also that almost any film character could look remote, detached and even mentally ill if we judge them ONLY on their actions and interactions we see in the film. What makes Sixth Sense work, and could be used to “deconstruct” any film performance, is the imagined matrix of other actions, events, etc. we envision around the characters. How many film characters do we actually see using a toilet? Does that mean the ones we don’t know… must be robots? Ditto for eating, sleeping, having sex… we see these things, in context, but not for every character. So there was nothing odd about how we saw Malcolm except in retrospect. ETA: Too bad MNS only had the one brilliant idea. ---
**Author:** ![Munch](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/munch/32/5281_2.png) [@Munch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Munch)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2013, 2:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/after-earth-is-there-a-big-twist-ending/659861/55 "2013-06-04T14:32:55Z")
> [@Amateur\_Barbarian](#): > > ETA: Too bad MNS only had the one brilliant idea. Two - I don’t think Unbreakable gets enough credit. ---
**Author:** ![muldoonthief](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/muldoonthief/32/3188_2.png) [@muldoonthief](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/muldoonthief)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2013, 2:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/after-earth-is-there-a-big-twist-ending/659861/56 "2013-06-04T14:43:36Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > It’s not as ridiculous as it sounds (leaving aside the whole idea of ghosts). Think of being dead as like being in a dream. Bizarre things are happening around you and to you but you just accept them without question. It’s not until you wake up that you wonder why you didn’t think it was unusual that everyone at work was naked, your wife had turned into a kangaroo, and Barack Obama lived next door - these things all just seemed normal in your dream. > > Same thing with Malcolm Crowe. It was very unusual that nobody other than one little boy was talking to him. And he normally would have noticed this and wondered why it was happening. But he wasn’t in his normal state - he was dead. And part of being dead was that he didn’t think about how unusual his situation was. It’s pretty well established in the movie that the dead people Cole sees aren’t behaving rationally. He even says “They don’t see each other. They only see what they want to see. They don’t know they’re dead.” If you accept that, then you have to accept that Malcolm doesn’t notice all the inconsistencies in his own existence. ---
**Author:** ![Diceman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Diceman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diceman)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2013, 4:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/after-earth-is-there-a-big-twist-ending/659861/57 "2013-06-04T16:31:51Z")
> [@typoink](#): > > I went in to Usual Suspects knowing there WAS a twist, but nothing else. I thought the eventual reveal was so telegraphed that I was genuinely surprised when it WAS the twist – I thought it was intentional misdirection. Maybe if I hadn’t heard that it had a big twist, it woulda snuck up on me. That’s the problem. If you know there’s a twist ending, then the twist has already been ruined for you, because you’ll be looking for the twist the whole time. I saw _The Usual suspects_ years after it came out, but nobody had ever told me about the twist ending, so I was completely floored by it. ---
**Author:** ![leahcim](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/b4bc9f/32.png) [@leahcim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/leahcim)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2013, 4:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/after-earth-is-there-a-big-twist-ending/659861/58 "2013-06-04T16:55:04Z")
> [@Munch](#): > > Two - I don’t think Unbreakable gets enough credit. I agree with that, in part. I think the idea of some schmo being a superhero and not knowing it was a pretty good one – and entirely plausible if you consider how rarely people get into situations where superpowers would become apparent. I think the “comic book mysticism” was just dumb, though, and a sign of the start of MNS’s descent into dumbnitudery. ---
**Author:** ![Jophiel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jophiel/32/66_2.png) [@Jophiel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jophiel)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2013, 7:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/after-earth-is-there-a-big-twist-ending/659861/59 "2013-06-04T19:42:54Z")
I remember when The Sixth Sense came out on video, Blockbuster was running a series of radio ads called something like “Ten Second Movies”. They had one for The Sixth Sense that went: “What’s wrong with you kid?” “People say I’m sick” “Why” “I see dead people” “But you can see me” “…” It boggled me that someone thought spoiling the movie was a good way to sell movie rentals. Of course, you know… Blockbuster. How are they doing these days? ---
**Author:** ![TreacherousCretin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/treacherouscretin/32/476_2.png) [@TreacherousCretin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TreacherousCretin)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2013, 9:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/after-earth-is-there-a-big-twist-ending/659861/60 "2013-06-04T21:11:13Z")
For whatever it might be worth: I saw _No Way Out_ early in its release, and was floored by the ending. Saw it again soon after with my wife- she too was gobsmacked. In the 26 years since, I’ve never met anyone who hadn’t “seen it coming a mile away.” And I believe them. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/after-earth-is-there-a-big-twist-ending/659861.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/after-earth-is-there-a-big-twist-ending/659861.md?page=4)