“Edge of Tomorrow” may not have found the huge summer audience that its producers were hoping for, but the Tom Cruise and Emily Blunt-led sci-fi action movie already has a dedicated group of fans, now eagerly debating the film’s ending.
SPOILERS AHEAD
As you know if you’ve seen “Edge of Tomorrow” (and you should if you haven’t), Cage and Rita take J-squad along with them on a last-ditch assault on the Omega, which is hiding deep under the Louvre. In short, everyone dies, including Cage, but not before getting covered in Omega blood and regaining his reset ability.
Cage wakes up, of course, but he’s in the helicopter — where we first met him. He’s gone further back than ever before, and the Omega has stayed dead. Huh?
Watching the every end of “Edge of Tomorrow,” I more or less accepted the ending at face value, acknowledging that it didn’t necessarily make sense but also that I didn’t really care. The movie is awesome.
But redditor HanzoSteel has posted an explanation for the ending. HanzoSteel points to the timing of the final assault on the Omega at the Louvre as the key to making any sense of it.
The first thing to remember is that Cage has left the “Wake up, maggot” loop behind him. There is nothing tying him back to that sequence of events, which started when the Alpha bleeds on him at the beach. Cage and Rita lead the assault the night before the beach invasion, and when he’s re-covered in mimic blood, it’s earlier than it had been the previous time.
Since his first loopable death takes places earlier, his wake-up point is earlier too.
So that takes care of the starting point. Getting bled on earlier means that the day resets to an earlier time. But why is the Omega still dead at the start of the new day? While it’s never spelled out in the film, the best explanation is that Cage stole the power from the Omega, which died and no longer gets to restart with everyone else.
But wouldn’t that mean Rita and the rest of J-squad don’t get to come back either? Yeah, it’s not a perfect solution, but it’s probably the best we’re going to get. Director Doug Liman started filming “Edge of Tomorrow” without a finished script, so it’s safe to say we’re lucky to have the great film we do.
What did you think of the ending of “Edge of Tomorrow”? Do you have a better explanation for the confusing end? Let us know in the comments below.
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