Since After Earth is a M. Night Shyamalan film (plus it has characters with names like "Cypher Raige" which sounds rather fake to me), it's very likely there will be a final plot twist. What do you think it will be?
POLL: The 'After Earth' plot twist
- Thread starter Mr. Laser Beam
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Actually this is not "an M. Night Shyamalan film" in the sense you mean, because this time he's not the main writer or the one who conceived the project. The original script was by Gary Whitta, a video-game writer/designer who also wrote the screenplay for The Book of Eli. Shyamalan did a rewrite, followed by a polish by Stephen Gaghan (Traffic, Syriana).
And we know it's not a simulation or a dream, because the film is one part of a multimedia franchise whose backstory "bible" was developed by comics/novel authors Peter David, Bob Greenberger, and Michael Jan Friedman. They didn't create the concept, but they were brought in to build the universe based on the movie's ideas, and the film script was rewritten on the basis of their bible. The three of them are doing a number of tie-ins that expand the film's universe, including several e-books and a prequel comic that are already available, and a novel and in-universe "survival guide" coming out soon (as well as a novelization by PAD).
And we know it's not a simulation or a dream, because the film is one part of a multimedia franchise whose backstory "bible" was developed by comics/novel authors Peter David, Bob Greenberger, and Michael Jan Friedman. They didn't create the concept, but they were brought in to build the universe based on the movie's ideas, and the film script was rewritten on the basis of their bible. The three of them are doing a number of tie-ins that expand the film's universe, including several e-books and a prequel comic that are already available, and a novel and in-universe "survival guide" coming out soon (as well as a novelization by PAD).
Apes.
I'm hopeful about this one. My only problems with Shyamalan's work are with his writing; he can be a superb director (though he is capable of being too self-indulgent). Combine his directing with someone else's script (and a producer strong enough to rein him in) and you could really have something. And the final(ish) draft of this script is by the guy who did Traffic and Syriana, which strikes me as reason for optimism.
The twist will be that it's a so-so movie at best, but still better than anything else that Night has directed for ten years.
I agree.
The twist will be that you thought you were watching Oblivion.
Nova Prime is actually the real Earth, and the planet they think of as "Earth" is actually a completely alien world.
And then they realize that they were Cylons all along.
I really, really hope that Shyamalan's reputation doesn't unfairly doom this film. The reactions in this thread don't give me a lot of confidence, though.
I thought about that, but decided it would be too pathetic.
And if this tale of an 'extended universe' really is true - and if it's CANON
- then it ties the whole thing to our own history, since IIRC it features the present day ancestors of the Raige family.Still, it could be a time loop! Meaning: Kitai and Cypher are swept back in time and crash on prehistoric Earth. I have a theory like that about BSG - both versions.
Also, I think it would be totally hilarious if the Earths of After Earth and Oblivion turn out to be the same.
Is Will Smith into that scientology crap? I had no idea. 
It's a good movie but I didn't like Traffic, Syriana on the other had is one of my favourite movies so I agree, this gives me hope.
So I take it that all of this world-building extended stuff won't be necessary to actually understand what's going on in the film itself?
Or at least to decipher the weird accents?
Or at least to decipher the weird accents?
Does M. Night really do twists in every movie, though? Regardless of him not writing it, I don't remember a twist in Signs (that was just all of the diverging events coming together for a moment), The Happening, Lady in the Water, The Last Airbender...
It's a shame he set the bar so high simply by including an incredible twist in Sixth Sense (not even his first movie) and then had such a mediocre one at the end of The Village (though I liked the earlier twist involving the final creature from the forest) that people can only peg him as a certain type of story teller based on less than half of his output.
It's a shame he set the bar so high simply by including an incredible twist in Sixth Sense (not even his first movie) and then had such a mediocre one at the end of The Village (though I liked the earlier twist involving the final creature from the forest) that people can only peg him as a certain type of story teller based on less than half of his output.
Well, almost. He did two consecutive movies with strong twist endings, The Sixth Sense and Unbreakable. It was that repetition that created the myth that "all Shyamalan films have twist endings," even though you're quite correct that it's not really true.
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