# Pointless endings thread **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [January 5, 2007, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pointless-endings-thread/386834 "2007-01-05T17:09:10Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Captain\_Carrot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f0a364/32.png) [@Captain\_Carrot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Carrot)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2007, 5:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pointless-endings-thread/386834/21 "2007-01-06T17:43:47Z")
Oh, crap, I forgot to spoiler that. Could a passing mod fix that, please? (Don’t think I’ve ever said that before…) ---
**Author:** ![stegon66](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ee59a6/32.png) [@stegon66](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/stegon66)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2007, 5:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pointless-endings-thread/386834/22 "2007-01-06T17:53:31Z")
> [@](#): > > The only example I can think of right now is Trees Lounge. The ending to _Trees Lounge_ wasn’t pointless or even all that inscrutable - what it was was perfect. Remember that throughout the film we see an elderly barfly; near the end of the movie Steve Buscemi’s character (a novice barfly himself who is going nowhere fast) learns that the old guy has been taken to the hospital after keeling over at the bar. Buscemi orders a beer and a whiskey and the film ends with him just sitting there with the realization that he himself is on that same path as the oldster. (I haven’t seen the movie in awhile but I believe he actually picks up the whiskey but sits it down before drinking it.) ---
**Author:** ![Red\_Barchetta](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/da6949/32.png) [@Red\_Barchetta](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Red_Barchetta)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2007, 6:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pointless-endings-thread/386834/23 "2007-01-06T18:40:56Z")
[QUOTE=Liberal] K-PAX: The big revelation is that everything exists inside some crazy guy’s head, which effectively invalidates the entire story. Yay. (Apologies to Carnick) Okay, maybe it’s a bit more ambiguous, but not much. [/QUOTE] Well, it’s at least more ambiguous than you credit it as, considering the actual ending is the exact opposite of how you interpreted it (according to the director). ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2007, 7:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pointless-endings-thread/386834/24 "2007-01-06T19:51:13Z")
[_Little Witches._](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0116897/)That’s it?! After all that buildup, the Demon just pops out of the well in the basement, the Evil Teen Witch gets sucked into Hell, and that’s **it?!!** [_The Godfather Part III._](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Godfather_Part_III)In Part I, Carlo gets whacked at the end. Michael was reluctant to order it, but Carlo Betrayed the Family. Tragic necessity. At the end of Part II, Fredo gets whacked. He Betrayed the Family. Tragic necessity. But at the end of Part III, Mary gets whacked because . . . no reason. She just happened to get in the way. Coppola needed a tragic note to end it on and that was the best he could come up with. :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![Campion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/4491bb/32.png) [@Campion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Campion)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2007, 10:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pointless-endings-thread/386834/25 "2007-01-06T22:01:58Z")
_Mildred Pierce_. The novel, not the movie. As I recall, after everything that’s gone on, the ex-husband says to Mildred, Oh, forget about Veda, let’s get drunk!Huh? _That’s_ the ending? Where’s the comeuppance? Where’s the justice? ---
**Author:** ![Carnick](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Carnick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Carnick)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2007, 2:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pointless-endings-thread/386834/26 "2007-01-07T02:00:16Z")
[QUOTE=Merijeek] Not really. It was a battle for which personality got to stay in the head. It was all a big metaphor, but that doesn’t invalidate the entire story. -Joe [/QUOTE] Metaphor, shmetaphor. We’re told that the characters we’ve been following for the past two hours are not real. If the characters aren’t real, why should we be invested? Are we supposed to care about this superfluous crazy person who only serves to bookend the story? We got basically no information on him and we’re told that the entire story exists to serve as a battleground for his sanity. Who cares! ---
**Author:** ![Red\_Barchetta](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/da6949/32.png) [@Red\_Barchetta](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Red_Barchetta)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2007, 2:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pointless-endings-thread/386834/27 "2007-01-07T02:50:49Z")
[QUOTE=Carnick] If the characters aren’t real, why should we be invested? [/QUOTE] Am I the only one who sees the irony here? ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2007, 6:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pointless-endings-thread/386834/28 "2007-01-07T06:54:15Z")
Just saw _Children of Men_. The whole damn thing is pointless. ---
**Author:** ![NDP](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ndp/32/55_2.png) [@NDP](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NDP)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2007, 9:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pointless-endings-thread/386834/29 "2007-01-07T09:44:26Z")
[QUOTE=Bryan Ekers] Just saw _Children of Men_. The whole damn thing is pointless. [/QUOTE] What was pointless about it? At the end, Theo (Clive Owen) redeems himself by surviving long enough to get Kee and the baby out to sea so they can get picked up by The Human Project’s boat (although I do think The Human Project was a rather obvious and heavy-handed metaphor). It would’ve been pointless if, after everything, the baby (and Kee) ended up dying. ---
**Author:** ![Carnick](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Carnick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Carnick)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2007, 11:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pointless-endings-thread/386834/30 "2007-01-07T11:12:09Z")
[QUOTE=Red Barchetta] Am I the only one who sees the irony here? [/QUOTE] Why, your irony detection skills are simply astounding. Well played. ---
**Author:** ![Menocchio](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9de053/32.png) [@Menocchio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Menocchio)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2007, 3:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pointless-endings-thread/386834/31 "2007-01-07T15:28:08Z")
[QUOTE=Carnick] The Machinist: The big revelation is that everything exists inside some crazy guy’s head, which effectively invalidates the entire story. Yay. [/QUOTE] I disagree The revelation isn’t that he is crazy (we know that from practically the first scene, anyone who doesn’t sleep at all for over a year is not all there), but rather _why_ he is crazy and how he resolves it. And unlike in Identity, The protagonist is real. Some of the people and situations he interacts with aren’t, but they’re real to him, and thus meaningful to the audience. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2007, 5:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pointless-endings-thread/386834/32 "2007-01-07T17:22:39Z")
[QUOTE=NDP] What was pointless about it? [/QUOTE] But the entire premise was nonsensical, even granting the science-fictiony element. It was as though Britain turned into Nazi Germany just for the heck of it. The motivation of just about _everybody_ is unclear. Anyway, I’m thinking about starting a thread about this specific film, to tear it apart at length. ---
**Author:** ![smiling\_bandit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9a140/32.png) [@smiling\_bandit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/smiling_bandit)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2007, 5:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pointless-endings-thread/386834/33 "2007-01-07T17:33:58Z")
I’m willing to let the occaissional Das Boot like movie go, since such things, sadly, do happen in real life. Sometimes, things just suck and you die. The problem is that you only need such a movie once a decade - and it’s particularly appropriate for a war movie. Most of the time, movie writers use such endings as a copout, because it isn’t a plausible or likely ending. ---
**Author:** ![Loach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/loach/32/350_2.png) [@Loach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loach)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2007, 5:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pointless-endings-thread/386834/34 "2007-01-07T17:55:21Z")
[QUOTE=smiling bandit] I’m willing to let the occaissional Das Boot like movie go, since such things, sadly, do happen in real life. Sometimes, things just suck and you die. The problem is that you only need such a movie once a decade - and it’s particularly appropriate for a war movie. Most of the time, movie writers use such endings as a copout, because it isn’t a plausible or likely ending. [/QUOTE] I think it was more than that. In Das Boot the boat is destroyed and the Captain dies. It is pointless. Just like the bravery and sacrifice of the men was pointless since they were fighting for Hitler’s Germany. In a war that was unwinable for a government that was unworthy of their sacrifice. ---
**Author:** ![Dunderman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ecb155/32.png) [@Dunderman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dunderman)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2007, 6:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pointless-endings-thread/386834/35 "2007-01-07T18:15:19Z")
[QUOTE=Ethilrist] **Blade Runner,** maybe? They brought Deckard in to kill all the replicants, so he did, but the greater issue was whether or not they’d go wacky and kill everybody even if they had implanted memories, so they implanted some in Rachel, and the movie ended with Deckard and Rachel flying off to San Francisco to live happily ever after. Or not. Maybe. Who knows what the future holds? [/QUOTE] That was the tacked-on crappy ending. Check out the director’s cut; the ending (and therefore the movie as a whole) is much better and very Dickian. ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2007, 6:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pointless-endings-thread/386834/36 "2007-01-07T18:59:08Z")
[QUOTE=Captain\_C] I mean, it just… ends. What was the point of that?! Not saying it wasn’t funny, but it was pointless. Same deal with _Blazing Saddles_. [/QUOTE] Say what? They save the town of Rock Ridge and shoot the bad guy. ---
**Author:** ![Loach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/loach/32/350_2.png) [@Loach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loach)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2007, 7:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pointless-endings-thread/386834/37 "2007-01-07T19:34:12Z")
[QUOTE=carnivorousplant] Say what? They save the town of Rock Ridge and shoot the bad guy. [/QUOTE] Then ride into the sunset. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2007, 9:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pointless-endings-thread/386834/38 "2007-01-07T21:00:09Z")
[QUOTE=Priceguy] That was the tacked-on crappy ending. Check out the director’s cut; the ending (and therefore the movie as a whole) is much better and very Dickian. [/QUOTE] Actually, the director’s cut snips the so-called happy ending and doesn’t replace it with anything, leaving the movie with no ending at all, which irritates me.Director’s cut - Deckard and Rachel get into elevator, door closes, the end. _Where are they going?_ I preferred the original version immensely because it, well, made sense and the ending isn’t even “tacked-on” in the sense that it’s totally unexpected or out of step with the rest of the film. It is, in fact, perfectly foreshadowed by an earlier conversation between Deckard and Rachel. Frankly, it bugs me that when I periodically catch the thing on TV, they’re using the weaker, truncated director’s cut. The whole recut thing strikes me as just an ongoing effort to wring some additional dough out of fans who hope _this_ version will be perfect, until the _next_ version comes out which is even perfecter. Ridley Scott is just following Gerorge Lucas’s lead. ---
**Author:** ![Dunderman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ecb155/32.png) [@Dunderman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dunderman)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2007, 10:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pointless-endings-thread/386834/39 "2007-01-07T22:18:24Z")
[QUOTE=Bryan Ekers] Actually, the director’s cut snips the so-called happy ending and doesn’t replace it with anything, leaving the movie with no ending at all, which irritates me.Director’s cut - Deckard and Rachel get into elevator, door closes, the end. _Where are they going?_ [/QUOTE] Did you miss the significance of the origami unicorn? The director’s cut contains a shot cut from the theatrical version, where Deckard plays the piano and thinks briefly about a unicorn. In the final scene, he finds the unicorn Gaff probably planted there, and remembers Gaff’s line “It’s too bad she won’t live! But then again who does?” implying that Deckard himself is a replicant. But even if he isn’t, I like this scene’s accentuation that we are all, basically, in the same boat as the replicants. ---
**Author:** ![JohnT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnt/32/15048_2.png) [@JohnT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnT)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2007, 10:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pointless-endings-thread/386834/40 "2007-01-07T22:38:28Z")
The X-Files. Turns out that Mulder’s sister was not kidnapped by aliens but was “merely” killed. All the alien stuff Mulder apparently made up because of psychological trauma. :rolleyes: X 2^10^10^10 [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pointless-endings-thread/386834.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pointless-endings-thread/386834.md?page=3)