Ramble: Jenny's Favorite and Least Favorite Plot Twists of All Time
Alternate upload for those having difficulty watching on youtube! Working to resolve copyright issues there but y'all can watch this in the meantime
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Have you played the Owl Creek Bridge Game? Assume every piece of fiction contains the twist in “Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge”, and try to identify the moment when it happened.
The Remember Me twist is not good BUT a 10/10 cinema experience for an unsuspecting, 14 year old me. Me and everyone else in the theater were LOSING IT
"What is the narrative purpose of Robert Pattinson dying in 9/11" is a question that only Jenny is brave enough to ask
I know this video's from a long time ago and it doesn't matter anymore, but I wanted to leave an alternate take on the ending of The Mist, because I really like that ending as a reader of cosmic horror :) The theme of the story is how we cope with the irrational, right? We have all these examples: Brent, the skeptic who absolutely refuses to acknowledge the possibility of the supernatural; Mrs. Carmody, the zealot who's certain this is all God's plan; and David, who is smarter, more rational, and better under stress than anyone else, and accepts the strangeness of the situation and tries to deal with it as logically as he can - a classic "thinker" archetype. Throughout the story we see David chide other people's coping mechanisms as irrational (which they are) and dangerous (which they are). (In the novella we see that he also has an irrational and dangerous coping mechanism - he's weirdly horny the whole time, which is helping him vent his stress. Thanks Stephen) We're encouraged to think of the protagonist's view as the only valid one. As things get worse everyone else's coping mechanisms fall apart, seemingly proving him right. Brent leaves, presumably to be killed, because he refuses to believe there are monsters. Mrs. Carmody is ready to kill anyone and everyone. So it seems like David and "team rational"" have no rational choice but to leave. Finally, out of gas, David makes one more calm, considered, rational choice. But this time the folly of it is instantly revealed. His rationality, his intelligence, was every bit as worthless as Brent's blinders or Mrs. Carmody's zeal. We're made to understand that in the face of the unnatural and the horrific, there's no right answer, no matter how sane it may seem in the moment. Then you can think back on all his other choices and realize that they were probably wrong, too - maybe he could have made it home if they'd run right away. Maybe they should have left with Brent, or fought Mrs. Carmody. All he ever did was rational, so everything he did might have been wrong. Being insane might have been better, or worse, or the same. That's a classic theme in cosmic horror and I think it's really well done in The Mist if you're into that kind of thing.
I like this take. I’ve also seen the argument that the ending actually proves the eldritch nature of what they are dealing with. They religious zealots want to make a sacrifice, and that the moment in the car actually is the main character making the sacrifice that finally satisfies the Lovecraftian beings intruding on our reality. That even though the Army shows up right afterwards, linear time and causality isn’t quite the same when dealing with such forces. The Army was five minutes away and winning the war only because the sacrifice was made; if he hadn’t killed his child the Army would never actually have shown up and they all would have died in the car.
"What if it was Earth the whole time?" "Not that...but something like that."
Ok I had never even heard of the Rober Pattenson/Princess Belle 9/11 movie and the way my jaw dropped when you brought up the world trade center lmao like what a genuinely crazy twist
Just saw on YouTube/WDW Pro that the former Galactic Cruiser building is now being converted into office space for Imaginering.
The best Twilight Zone twist is when she's on Earth that's too hot because it's getting closer to the sun and then the twist is that she's actually on Earth that's too COLD because it's getting FARTHER from the sun and also she has a fever. 7 year old me was flabbergasted.
The director of Transcendence was the cinematographer of early Nolan movies (Memento, Dark Knight Trilogy, Inception) so I think you are on the money about him being influenced by Nolan! I don’t think he did any other movies.
The Prestige has a great twist.
I've seen so many people insist that the end of The Mist is actually great and poignant and perfect that I was starting to think maybe I was crazy so thank you for the vindication.
I dont know if anyone watched Agatha All along, but I have a new least favorite twist. The Twist that Agatha made up the ballad in order to be a serial killer and billy created the witches road with his magic. I think this twist is dumb because I liked the witches road and the song, I added the song to all of my playlists, then we got to the last two episodes and now when I listen to the song I am reminded of the montage of agatha tricking and murdering countless women for power, (in a way that goes unpunished and unaddressed through the narrative)
I loved that but thought the resolution of her becoming a ghost and teaming up with Billy was pretty weak in comparison to that reveal.
For the barbossa twist, you can actually see it coming When they go to tia dalmas the monkey immediately runs into the next room and looks sad while sitting next to a pair of barbossas boots, clearly still on his corpse as hes yet to be ressurected, and jack then holds up and looks at barbossas hat (as hes just lost his own and spends the rest of the film trying to find a replacement). Its Very well set up that hed return later
Gotta disagree about The Mist, the theme is about not losing hope.
You were ranting about Depp's character in the AI movie being creepy at his wife and all I can think is "just like a man"
I think it's funny that Jenny missed at least two "It was Earth all along" twists from the Twilight Zone. :P
The Good Place has my favorite twist. You should watch it! <3
Yes that was such a good twist!! I didn't see it coming at all but I feel like you could potentially figure it out. Or like idk if there are specific hints at what the twist exactly is, but it's just kind of a logical conclusion to come to based on the characters and the events of the story imo
Ok but the alternate Jurassic World twist would have been genuinely pretty cool.
new fave vid
A little weird to see a plot twist video without “I am your father” mentioned, but to be fair it’s a pretty obvious choice that doesn’t need to be mentioned
It’s so known that people forget it was a twist. The Sixth Sense kind of became that too but I’m glad she covered that one. Both are really good twists
Two seconds in I realized you were wearing a Paragon Park hat. Live in MA and grew up 5 miles away. Going to have to do a deep dive to see if there is a vlog/vid about it.
There is a lot to unpack
It’s been a long long time since I watched or read V for Vendetta but in the comic I’m pretty sure Valerie’s journal entries weren’t just real, they were either what kept V going when V was in a similar prison/torture situation, or (depending on your reading) they were actually written *by V*, back before they were V. Either way it’s a really fucked up thing to do to Evey, but I think the fucked-up-ed-ness is meant to be the point (in my recollection anyway. Now I wanna read the comic again.) Also, thanks Jenny for saving me from ever having to watch Transcendence, it sounds awful!
yeah in retrospect it's so weird that the trans V read is so much more palpable in the ALAN MOORE COMIC than the movie by the Wachowski sister
Oh Jenny, Soylent Green had nothing to do with aliens. This was a future Earth with a massive food shortage. The Soylent Corporation made these little food cracker things of various colors for the masses. When a new color was promoted, Green, it was discovered by our hero that they were recycling dead people to be made into the Green variety.
I think she was talking about the Twilight Zone episode To Serve Man, since that was in the Twilight Zone section, and the two twists got conflated a little. I could be wrong but that was how I read it.
I loved Remember Me. Also, the biggest problem with all the Star Wars movies is that the original material isn’t strong. The movies are entertaining but Lucas couldn’t give his interesting story the depth it needed, making problems for all following movies.
wasn't there a Saw series video in the works at some point? I'd love to see Jenny do a longer take on Saw
Not to hyperfocus on the Star Wars bit because I’ve consumed all of your other SW related content but I completely agree with your take on the “Rey is a Palpatine” twist. It could’ve been done well, but because they didn’t do enough to actually explore the thematic implications and emotional journey of that kind of revelation, it just comes across as stupid in a way that’s not enjoyable. They shortchanged her character arc for a twist that was shocking but not compelling. I would’ve loved a Rey Palpatine tempted and haunted by a ghost or sith holocron of her evil grandpa.
When Jenny started explaining Liar Game, it made me wonder if she'd like the Kaiji series. It's the only series I've enjoyed about life-or-death gambles. Possibly because Kaiji is just such an adorable, relatable character. It's also a series that somehow really manages to avoid being too bleak, perhaps because Kaiji is someone who just can't let himself give up on humanity, so we never get too inundated with misanthropy.
The Remember Me twist is genuinely SO darkly funny that it's the only reason anyone probably remembers it.
The Lego movie's twist of the queen actually being good is similar to the transcendence one she mentions.
Wasn't the scary movie thing a parody of the usual suspects?
She said that lol
I hate V for Vendetta. As soon as the twist was revealed, the movie lost me. Just makes no sense lol
The other thing that bothered me about the ending of the mist was how it undermined some earlier stuff anti-military theming in the movie. They say at one point that the mist/monsters got released on earth because of military experiments so it’s this criticism of military power/hubris and then the ending frames the military as the hero that saves everyone woo! And it’s like all you’re doing is cleaning up your own mess, which could be the point I guess, but I feel like the ending doesn’t really get that across
I really thought Agatha Christie (any) would have made it somewhere on this list ❤️
Was not expecting Liar Game to come up here. The J-Drama (TV show) was on Crunchyroll a long time ago, I loved it so much. It sold me on J-Drama as a whole and send me down a rabbit hole I never got out of.
for people late to the video, list of movies talked about: 5:16 Saw 8:27 The Sixth Sense 10:16 Goosebumps The Ghost Next Door 11:15 Liar Game 2 13:35 The Usual Suspects/Scary Movie 14:34 Pirates of the Caribbean 2 15:16 Westworld Season 1 17:31 Remember Me (also discusses ending of unspecified Nicholas Sparks movie) 23:13 Twilight Zone/Soylent Green/Planet of the Apes 32:10 Star Wars: Rise of Skywalker 37:00 Now you see me 1&2 (there might be something between this and the Dark Knight Rises, I skipped forward to avoid Now You See Me spoilers) 38:40 The Dark Knight Rises 39:25 V for Vendetta 40:52 Solo: a Star Wars Story 42:59 Fantastic Beasts movies 44:46 Jurassic World 47:51 Don't Worry Darling 53:33 The Mist/Twilight Zone 1:00:36 Transcendence 1:15:15 future projects
THANK YOU! I so wanted to watch this but didn't want to be spoiled on things I hadn't seen.
Omg! I didnt know about the original plot twist to JurassicWorld. I really wish they had done that. That wouldve been something new.
I can't believe Jenny hated the twist that Harry Potter hates magic in Now You SEE Me 2.
As a Christian person the Easter plays are amazing and mystifying — The utter lack of reverence is baffling
So true about the Mist. Sad endings and themes that serve to say nothing but life sucks sometimes are beyond pointless and condescending.
First time I experienced this was DeathNote
I’m sure it has been observed here but the twist in goosebumps here sounds identical to that of the film The Others and also a High Jackman film whose name escapes me.
I’m a little surprised to see how many people are saying that the characters at the end of The Mist are being punished for making the “right” decision/making rational decisions. They committed mass suicide?? maybe the real moral of the story is to never give up hope. did you ever think of that (/joking) (mostly)
I had read the novella The Mist in the early 90s and was psyched to see the movie. At the end of the novella the small band of still-rational survivors are driving through the mist and see a truly colossal mist monster, the ground shaking as it walks. The future is very uncertain as the story fades. The movie ending is shockingly different and I agree with Jenny that it’s a very poor twist. It doesn’t serve the storytelling at all — it seems in fact to undermine it. “If you keep your head in a disaster, you’ll make horrifying miscalculations.” Well, ok I guess. Sign me up for Team Crazy Lady? In my opinion the real reason it was done was to inject “powerful drama, gravitas” — it was a bit tawdry of Darabont to do that.
yeah, Stephen King's novella actually inspired two other notable works that are wildly different from the film but arguably hit its themes (fear of the US government/humanity's survival against lovecraftian aliens, and the terror of the unknown and the paranoia it inspires, respectively) much better than the movie. We know them as the Half-Life and Silent Hill video game franchises.
I thought the twist to "The Mist" was that the evil woman who wanted to sacrifice his kid to make the mist go away was right. When he kills his kid, the mist goes away. This makes the twist less random, but doesn't change the miserableness of the twist.
I think that twist only works if you believe that human sacrifice does. My suggestion would be that the military force we see advancing on the Maine town is what ended the mist, not the fact that he shot his son. 🤔
What about “The Game”???
You just lost it.
Jenny! You gotta watch Lost.
Most of the more iconic twilights zones feel like I saw the Simpsons' version first, or something similar. Weird to think about culture like that, experienced backwards through parody. Love it all though. With The Mist, I really don't remember anything about it except the ending, which says something I guess. It does have that similar gut wrench to real world twists where life-altering tragedy happens out of the blue without rhyme or reason or foreshadowing. Hereditary did almost too good a job of this with THAT scene. Love horror, but I'd have a hard time revisiting that. Shyamalan is great. Old is a masterpiece. Just a really fun watch. Pure, concentrated 'Wait... what?'
i always loved "the scary door" from futurama! i didnt even realize what it was parodying until i was a bit older
If anyone wants a great plot twist I cannot recommend knives out enough. I got the twist spoiled and it was still super good bc the clues were there but they weren’t super super obvious.
Just to let you know the porg talking turned out great and was in fact very funny! Does it have a name, aside from “Porg” ?
Love the Country bear Tsum Tsum!
I loved this!! Your opinions and explanations of the films are so funny
Where are the youtube links guys?
Check out the video below this one. This one is an alternate upload for people who couldn't access it on youtube.
Super random but are you still doing an Efteling video??
Not sure if this has been mentioned yet (I actually love Remember Me 🙈), the clues are that there’s a scene that takes place in 1991 with the towers visible in the background, and then the rest of the film takes place ‘10 years later’. In one of the first scenes set in 2001, a teacher mentions ‘recent terror attacks’ which made me when I first saw it in the cinema (and other moviegoers maybe?) think ah ok so this is after 9/11
Not to “um actually” but I’m pretty sure Soylent Green is people is its own book (and movie adaptation) unrelated to the twilight zone, in which it’s not aliens but rather about an evil corporation’s solution to overpopulation and climate change. I feel kind of like a jerk for correcting you but I just watched the movie recently and think it actually does work thematically as a twist there. I think the twilight zone episode was the one with “To Serve Man” as a pun (or am I misremembering a Simpsons joke?) and your criticism definitely applies to that.
My dad and I used to watch twilight zone episodes and my favorite one was the episode "to serve man". The ending twist in that one was great.
There was a twilight zone about a nerdy anti-social book worm who got caught up in some kind of cataclysm and ended up at a library all by himself, no one to ever come between him and his books, oh so happy, and he accidentally breaks his glasses at the end...
There was time now…. (Breaks down sobbing)
Roger Ebert used the term 'Idiot Plot', it's useful, it means 'a plot that would resolve itself in five minutes if the characters would stop behaving like idiots'. Writers have what might be an interesting premise but they can't figure out a way to make the obligatory Syd Field outline happen, so they just withhold information from the main characters, or the audience, that any idiot would have discovered fairly quickly, which allows them to drag it out with something that feels like suspense, and/or what seems like a big twist near the end. Then you think about it later and it's just annoying.
It's really odd, I've seen Transcendence, but we were well into the plot synopsis before I remembered that I had. Then I was trying like hell to remember any of it before being reminded. Could not. I remembered the big facility with all the solar panels, but not why it was there. The whole film just went in one ear and out the other.
THANK YOU on The Mist ending. For some reason everyone I've talked to and everything I've read online is people saying how good the ending is and I absolutely hated it. Good to see someone else agrees.
It comes out of absolutely nowhere. Nothing builds up to it at all.
The transcendence twist made me secondhand mad. Like I didn’t even watch the movie but just the idea of getting to the end at that being the ending pissed me off a little lol.
Probably not the first to say that Westworld goes downhill after season 1. Season 2 has some very interesting stuff, and I'm glad I watched it, but they start to bite off a little more than they can chew plot-wise. I think the show was strongest when they didn't try to be super technical and explain everything; it was the characters that were interesting, and I loved the feeling of identifying with and rooting for the hosts one minute, then finding them abhorrent and uncanny the next minute. Basically the latter seasons are plot driven in a way that is insulting to the audience, and compels the characters to make incoherent choices, especially in season 3. Season 4 just didn't make sense. I often tell people to watch 1 because it's great, 2 because it's got some great moments, then skate because there are many other shows and films that adress the topic that are more worth your time (like the 70s AI thriller Demon Seed).
i love the ramble videos so much ! I like that the main channel videos r captioned tho my years of no earplugs at concerts catching up to me.....
Transcendence does look like a Nolan movie - good catch, it was directed by Wally Pfister who was previously the DP for Nolan's films.
Unrelated, but congrats on making the New York Times!
The Goosebumps twist sounds a lot like The Others with Nicole Kidman. One of my favorite twists.
Yeah I wondered if The Others would make the list, such a great movie
Hearing about the twist in Transcendence, my conclusion was less "oh the AI was good all along" and more "Oh, so he was always an evil douchebag."
How I thought everyone liked The Mist! To me the ending is saying like, have hope, don’t just give up because you can’t see past this moment
The Goosebumps the Ghost Next Door, twist you talk about is also the same one in The Others. I wonder if The Others copied R L Stine
I immediately thought this 😭 I love The Others! Such a great twist, such a great movie
Happy to be a new Patreon Jenny! Love your content and so excited to watch all the stuff you post on here. Thanks for making it so affordable, your ramblings help me focus as I do house chores 💪
A sad, late answer to your question about Westworld: (And this is coming from a massive fan of both the old movie and the new series) You MIGHT consider season 2 if you want some more of the story, if you want to see some interesting sets and more backstory. It's not as good as S1, but's not terrible. Everything after S2 is terrible and can be ignored and forgotten ... and SHOULD be ignored and forgotten.
I loved the samurai stuff, it was such a relief to be in a new setting, and that standalone episode where the native character becomes sentient. I can't forgive season 3's treatment of Maeve, I didn't believe any of it. And the Man in Black stuff goes from confusing to incoherent by the end of the show.
I understand WHY they do the "actually THIS character is related to THIS character" twist in prequels but it drives me nuts every time. It usually means nothing to anyone in the fiction of the world but since it's important to the audience, they have to do a whole musical swell and pause. Doubly annoying when they retroactively try to make it a "sacred bloodline" thing instead of it just being: these normal people stepped up and did heroic things
Serenity (2019). Recommended watching if you enjoyed this video. Go in as blind as you can.
Sorry if this is super unrelated to the topic but I have a little PSA. After hearing about the intense heat wave that Jenny’s part of the country is experiencing, I hope that not just her, but everyone in California, Arizona, South Texas and Nevada is safe! The part of the country that I live in had some weather issues going on last year, but this honestly sounds more troubling to me and I wish you guys the best!
Would you consider the Vader being Luke’s father twist type 1 or type 2? Obviously there were breadcrumbs—Vader meaning “father” in German being the most obvious—but I also feel like in its time it was considered completely unpredictable. I’ll never know how out there it was because by the time I watched Star Wars I was an adult and had heard the twist a million times.
13 Sentinels: Aigis Rim, 9 Doors 9 Hours 9 People, and Virtue's Last Reward are videogames that all execute twists that I won't spoil here, but are some of my favorites of all time because they subvert basic assumptions about setting. I think that's what the Twilight Zone "it WASN'T Earth all along!" trope was trying to do, the difference being: these actually serve to make the plot more interesting and they actually change and affect the narrative.
Also there was a movie called "Serenity" I'm surprised wasn't in here (not the Firefly movie) that has one of THE MOST needless, bonkers twists that actually fits into one of these categories. I won't say which, but you will be shocked which one it turns out to be.
My favorite plot twist (that wasn’t really a plot twist): I started watching Disturbia knowing absolutely nothing about it and fully expected it to be a fun romantic comedy. Lmao at that.
Nah Jenny you crazy for The Mist one - Not Kaylee
I can’t wait for the FNAF video!!
Nice video! I think your Disney 100th anniversary video is down (at least I cannot access it here)
On a relevant topic, the Stephen King story The Mist doesn't have that terrible ending. I was a new dad watching that movie and it really turned me off from horror and suspense for a long time.
Thank you Jenny, I think the off the cuff stuff is such an important part of what makes your patreon so awesome. Soo I'm going to go off the cuff, I want so bad to put the black Bomberman on the black Yoshi and then . . .idk imagine how cool it would look! Haha It was an intrusive thought Everytime I looked back there. I love your videos and watch them more than most things . . .not in a crazy way, but in an "I don't want to watch any of this crap I guess i'll watch the hallmark channel/dear evan hansen/spiders/ readthroughs, whatever, ive watched the beastly video too many times. I just want you to know that you are my favorite and I am happy you keep doing it. Also pretty sure I said this B4 but Over the garden wall was amazing and it's a shame he didn't get the full run of episodes he had planned, still an A+
I wonder how many abrupt twist endings are the result of a bad rewrite
In a post Lost/post Shyamalan world the type 1 has become much harder to keep under wraps.
The 80s Twilight Zone has some great ones! It's easy to find on Youtube, I highly recommend "The Shadow Man" from ep 10 and "I Of Newton" from ep 12
Its okay that your rearranged the plush between fnaf video filming because they are obviously alive and moved on their own.
I hate Rey Palpatine too so, though inevitable that would be one of the worst twists, hearing about it enraged me again. Ugh Jj Abrams/Chris Terrio.
I think Jenny is misrembering Planet of the Apes. It wasn't about him one day returning to Earth and that being foiled, they talk at the start of the film about how they'll never go home again and that even if they did it wouldn't be home anymore due to the time difference. It *was* the folly of man, as it proves Taylor's worst cynicism and the beliefs of Dr Zaius, the villain, to be correct.
Yeah, I mentioned this in another comment, but Taylor's whole character arc is pointed towards that. Through his interactions with the apes, he moves further away from his cynicism at the beginning of the movie and comes to believe in mankind's goodness again. Then the last image of the film completely shatters him.
I've been watching your Youtube videos for a while. I didnt even KNOW you had a Patreon. Settling in for some hot takes
"Everyone THOUGHT I was an evil creepy robot, but I was ACTUALLY a wonderful human genius the whole time" sounds exactly like the sort of role JD would love to play >.>
Transcendence is weirdly precisent of the type of ppl AI tech bros envision themselves to be. Except instead of improving agriculture it's stripping the budget for basic necessities bc Grok said libraries were gay or something
I think you are confusing Soylent Green, a Charlton Heston movie, with To Serve Man, a Twilight Zone episode.
I'd really like to know whether the end of Soylent Green was a surprise at the time. By the time I saw it, decades later, everybody knew the twist by word of mouth. It seems like it was set up really well. It's an excellent movie.
nothing will ever top caterpie creep amv
Regarding the Indominus twist (~45 minutes), I remember there being an absolute brick of a fanfic titled 'It's not the Raptor DNA' where someone took 'what if the Indo had human DNA, and what if that DNA was Hammond's' and ran with it. It was quite good.
I love the ending of the Mist lol. It was bold and shocking. There was no other reason to do it. I don’t think there is a lesson to extract from it.
I'm so glad you mentioned the Ghost Next Door because it's one of my favorites, I think it might actually have made me cry when I was little because the end is so sad. But I do have to point out...the ghost isn't in *their* house...the ghost is...next door!!! lol I really love that book, one of my top 5 goosebumps books for sure, maybe my favorite. They died in a fire, and they keep having recurring fire nightmare dreams. They try to mislead you by being like oh, it seems like nobody can SEE this girl, she must be a ghost!! But no, he was the ghost all along. Sad.
also regarding the saw twist, you buy it so much because john kramer has literally been in the bathroom the whole time!!!!
I think that idea that the Planet of the Apes isn't about the folly of man. It's been sort of ruined by the prequel series(where it was about a virus). But, for a 1960s audience, they definitely knew what happened. We nuked each other into oblivion.
There's a sequel where the remaining humans live in a cave underground and worship an unexploded nuclear bomb. Also, they're mutants
I had a full on argument with a friend over the ending of "The Mist". It just completely ruined the entire movie for me. As for Twilight zone episodes, I always personally liked the Twist to "Midnight Sun". It's rude, but I still like it. :p
I would say it's pretty grim, rather than rude, but I also like it.
I remember when I was getting into more adult video games (coming off of nintendo family friendly n64 games), I played Bioshock and was absolutely flabberghasted at the end by the reveal that you never really had agency for most of the game. it truly shook me to my core and is a fondly remembered twist I never saw coming
i got so excited when you intro'd Transcendence I saw the trailer once in theatres and never forgot it but also never watched it cuz it looked bad lol
Transcendent was on a very similar wavelength as that Lucy movie with Scarlet Johansson where she uses all of her brain (or whatever it was called)
I think it was called Lucy. I always mix it up with Limitless, but that's starring Bradley Cooper. Both involve that "we only use 10% of our brain" myth.
The Goosebumps one seems to have a nearly identical plot as the 2001 Nicole Kidman film 'The Others'.
Yes definitely — and “The Others” in turn is heavily inspired by Henry James’ “The Turn of the Screw” (but it’s not an adaptation).
I loved Westworld, and I'm so sad it was a victim of that weird cull the streaming services have been doing. Not everything always panned out, but it was definitely worth my time to watch and a lot of it paid off. Plus just on a visceral level its cool as hell lmao
I think it was so underrated. And I actually liked most of the seasons, even though most watchers only stuck around for season one and some of two
The mist is such an interesting and creepy short story, it definitely felt unsatisfying what they did for the ending! In the original we never find out what happens to those who get in the car, they just drive into the mist, which also makes for a scarier ending rather than an objectively horrific one. The majority of the story (and the majority of Stephen King’s most terrifying books) IS supposed to be about how humans react in horrible ways to extenuating circumstances. Under the Dome is also a very similar story, where the aliens barely matter and the real horror is the terrible people they are trapped with (and the 1000+ page count lol).
Get Out not being in the top twists is a bit surprising. That movie just throws haymakers towards the end with some great foreshadowing only enhanced by multiple views.
I LOVED Get Out when i finally saw it!
actually ive seen the whole show about 10 times (had a real moment with it a couple years ago that kind of hasnt ended) and i do think it holds up the entire way through! s2 is really strong, s3 dips in quality somewhat because it's really just a stepping stone to where they wanted to be in s4 but works in context, and then s4 is really really fun (watched it as it was airing and it turned out to be my favorite season of the show). I think it's worth mentioning that the entire series is a single pre-planned narrative over a very long span of time, so each season is like one arc of the story. It makes the story feel a little slow or some of the directions feel strange in the moment sometimes, but it's because it's all one big story behemoth (that i happen to absolutely love). I also think a lot of people read it as kind of a random, written seat-of-the-pants, puzzle box type show which it really is not, it's intentional at quite a granular level. Definitely recommend checking out the rest if you can find a way to stream it!
Which show? Westworld?
westworld mention 🥰🥰 thank u jenny
This may not be at the same level as these other twists, but it had me fooled. The Karate Kid. I thought Mr. Miyagi was just using Daniel for child labor. Never dawned on me he was actually teaching him karate. I was stunned when he revealed what he had him doing was useful. :o
Speaking of Christopher Nolan, the first twist that came to mind was the reveal in The Prestige of all the drowned duplicates in the basement. (Plus, David Bowie is perfect as Nicola Tesla!)
I love how Jenny's idea of a short video is now "40 to 60 minutes" haha
Been a fan for years and am so happy to be finally joining the patreon! absolutely love this month’s upload; what a fantastic way to start my patreonhood (though I’m of course wishing I’d joined sooner!)
In Don't Worry Darling, I think the reason why the brainwash correction is electroshock therapy as opposed to the alternative that Jenny suggests is because that's part of the 1950s flavored incel fantasy. It's meant to be a punishment for the wives for getting too out of line. It's a terrifying and invasive experience that looms over the wives as a threat. Having corrections happen painlessly while they're asleep denies the husbands that sense of medically-condoned violent control. Power fantasies like the one in the movie are, at their core, all about control
I don't wanna speak for Eryn, but I don't believe they're suggesting that the movie is the writer's (or director's) power fantasy. It's the writer's *interpretation* of an incel's fantasy (or that of any misogynist who feels put upon by modern or progressive gender politics), and how the women in their lives have been confined and tortured by them. The argument that the husbands themselves aren't literally incels is pedantic, since they do absolutely share in the same ideology and self-victimization, regardless of status.
I went to see "The Sixth Sense" with a friend when it first came out, and while we were sitting waiting for the screening to begin he casually mentioned that he'd read it had a big twist at the end! So, yes, I (involuntarily) guessed the twist pretty early on, and resented him for spoiling the movie for me. We're no longer friends.
Bummer! I was also lucky enough to see it when it first came out, and neither I nor my friends were terminally online (I mean, who was, at that time?) and it was my first Shyamalan, so I had no reason to suspect it was anything other than a horror movie. And it works as one, too! To this day, I really don't like approaching movies as puzzles to be solved, I like to live in the world that's presented. But at least with Shyamalan movies from then on, you can't help viewing them with an eye towards the twist.
Fun fact about The Twilight Zone: Occurrence At Owl Creek Ridge - not originally a TZ episode! It was made in France and they bought it for the show. You can see why it appealed.
Isn't it a short story from earlier in the 20C?
I always refer to twists like the one in the mist as a "knife twist." Like this bleak movie has been stabbing me and at the end they twist the knife. It's unnecessary and cruel
Top tier video, only suggestion is you should go in harder on Johnny Depp!
cosign, i’d recommend anyone who’s out of the loop read rayne fisher-quann’s excellent piece from the year of the trial. she includes a lot of links to sources about his notoriously awful treatment of others on sets. i shivered when i heard the movie included paul bettany. want to respect jenny’s wishes so i’ll keep it at that (and if she sees this: i can take this comment down or edit if you need, i know his fans can be prone to harassment)
If anyone wants a recommendation for another good movie twist, check out The Sting with Paul Newman and Robert Redford. Doesn't get mentioned a lot probably due to its age, which is all the more glaring since its the 1973 best picture Oscar winner!
I was completely taken in by The Sting on first viewing. That's one of the *great* movie twists!
If I'd known there was a Patreon I would have been here long before the SW video!
REMEMBER ME TRAUMATISED ME WHEN I WAS 10
My favourite plot twist is finding out Bob is a member of the Patreon during the Ghost of Evermore video.
Another famous black list script? Passengers. And that also turned out… not great…
Passengers was such a frustrating movie, I think the story had a lot of potential but it was done in such a bizarre way, it completely fell apart I remember reading a book shortly before Passengers came out called Across the Universe that had a pretty much identical premise, and literally the same exact “twist” (they kind of ruined it being a twist by putting it at the beginning of the movie) but was done in a way where it was actually really compelling and caught me off guard. The book wasn’t AMAZING but it does demonstrate that Passengers could’ve worked. And it came first. Sorry for the tangent, this video actually reminded me of Passengers but I wasn’t gonna bother bringing it up until I saw your comment lol
The last scene in Transcendence isn't because he's in the plants (though I guess he also is?); it's because those water droplets are inside a Faraday cage, which can block the radio waves necessary for wireless transmission, so the virus didn't get to those water droplets. Faraday cages are a useful thing to know about in this day and age, where more and more stuff has RFID/NFC things. I don't advocate that everyone builds or gets one for their wallet or anything, but I do want people to know about the option so they at least have keywords to google.
I learned about them watching the criminally cancelled Colony, where resistance fighters use them to shied themselves from alien surveillance. I thought it was so cool but had to confirm it was real because I never learned much about that stuff!
I like the new plush arrangement, but the previous one was livelier
unexpected liar game mention
Jurassic world actually would have made more sense if they had left in the twist about human dna. It would have tied in better with the strange military side plot (lets make a super soldier dinosaur that can follow orders like a person!) and they could have played up the Frankenstein thing. It never made sense that raptor dna would turn the Indominus into a serial killer.
Hey guys I'm new on the patreon. I of course went on a binge of the rambles (I already watched 17 lol) and in several Jenny mentions a barbie video and I was wondering if she dropped it. Sorry if it is rude to ask about abandoned videos (maybe Jenny doesn't like to be reminded of it, in that case sorry Jenny, won't happen again) I just heard about it and was really excited and wanted to know.
I don't think so. It can take several years for her to make a video because she usually works on multiple of them simultaneously.
The newish Jordan Peele Twilight zone is actually really good imo. I might be in the minority thinking that? I just really loved it, and I'm a giant fan of the original twilight zone. My favorite twist in the original twilight zone is just a really simple two person story with an elderly women who has this just beautiful and amazing talk with a stranger. The twist is the elderly women is about to die but is terrified to die, and the stranger is death talking her through her own death. It's seriously such a beautiful story. Edit: lol I wrote this right before you mentioned turns out it was death. I don't like most of them, but I love the old lady one.
so excited to watch the Jordan Peele one since i also love his movies. Oh, and I want to get into the original series as well
also this film has convinced me to show my partner the sixth sense as i think she is the only person alive who doesnt know the twist
the mist ending seems the same as those "you stopped mining before u got all the diamond" memes
JENNY. Last night I had a dream that you were reviewing an Italian dirigible with a carved wooden base that had somehow been aloft for decades. It was called something like the "Herberwerble." Italy adored it, and you poked fun at that, but then when YOU went to Italy you fell in love with it too and said, quote, "I'm a hypocrite!" Then you moved on to the next part of your numbered list, and said, quote, "Heartbreakingly, the Herberwerble is wicked." I assume you were going to detail how it had had some accidents or harmed wildlife or something, but I woke up before I could learn the details. So I figured you would want to know about that.
Oh, yeah, and P.T. Barnum himself, Hugh Jackman, was shown on an Italian talk show where they were discussing the Herblewerble. In Dream Canon, Hugh Jackman was born and raised in Italy, but spoke perfect Australian English. (He and the host expressed mild concern for the Herblewerble because it had to be repaired or something. )
The Ghost Next Door was my introduction to Goosebumps as a kid. Most of the book covers were too scary looking for me to try, but if I remember correctly that one was much tamer.
the mist one reminded me of the twist end to oculus, which in a similar vein inflicts more abject misery and suffering on the main cast for no reason than "IT IS A HORROR FILM SO IT HAS TO END BAD". just annoyed me more than anything tbh
my take on the Mist (as a lover of the movie) is that even what seems like the rational, clear headed move can have tragic results and can even be done impulsively
I would like to know which Cracked “After Hours” character Jenny most identifies with.
Holy smokes what a throwback
Another great ramble! I’d love to know what you thought of Arrival, maybe if you get a chance to swing back around to this topic.
Arrival has one of my favorite twist endings, it both shocked me and also made me cry- I don’t think any other twist has done that to me before! Such a good movie.
Jenny saying she hasn’t watched LOST, then bringing up two separate twists featuring LOST cast members - especially Zep in SAW, who is played by Michael Emerson, who himself was a twist character early on in LOST itself 😂
I think they also pulled away from the idea of a human+raptor hybrid in the second World movie- they make a LOT of parallels between the little girl and raptors within shots and dialog.
Source Code, another nice twist.
Ive always felt that the ending of the mist was just done because the people making the movie wanted to shock book readers. It was such a cheap shock ending.
I want to read the story now, I really enjoy Stephen King's books in general
When I was young, pre-Sixth Sense, the twist meme was The Crying Game.
Or Sleepaway Camp!
As a post Hotel newcomer, I've been consuming Jenny content nonstop since watching. Excited for my first official "new video" release
As a post-Star Wars newcomer, I am still wading through Evermore closure. I didn’t realise there was so much Jenny content here!
literally every time a movie tells you it's 2001 at the start, I'm like okay I see where this is going
I was genuinely surprised when 9/11 didn't come up in The Royal Tenenbaums
hi medium time patron, first time commenter here because I need to say something important: I liked when the Porg talked
Spoiler alert! Jkjk
Man, I hate the twist from Soylent Green. Like, noone seems to care that there's a famine or that people are getting bulldozered to death by the govt, why is the admittedly gross secret that some of the people getting killed are being used to mitigate the famine that much worse?
cannibalism taboo, most likely.
My personal least favorite is the ending of "The Man From Earth". If you're unfamiliar with it, the main character has been alive for 14,000 years without dying and moves every 10 years so people don't realize he's not aging, and the movie is him telling this to all of his closest friends before he moves away. In the end it's revealed that he's actually the oldest of the group's estranged father and as he reveals this, that friend dies of a heart attack (out of shock I'm assuming?). That's it.
Aw dang, I love that movie, but I suppose you're right, it's not the strongest twist
as a zoomer im going to be heartbroken if you hate fnaf but also the millennial perspective would be very interesting lol
Same lol. I was pretty much mostly into it when it first came out in 2014 (I was 14 at the time too) and the movie was sooo full of fan service for the first couple games I kinda loved it LMAO. The cherry on top that left me bewildered was hearing the living tombstone FNAF song actually play in the credits in a big theater.
thank you for the fab video!!! ive been a fan for a while and just decided to become a patron! I cant wait to watch the entire ramble backlog!
Ah, I just looked it up, and the reason Transcendence "has the vibe like it's trying to feel like a Christopher Nolan movie" is that it was directed by Wally Pfister, the cinematographer for: Memento, Insomnia, The Prestige, and Batman Begins!
the talking porg was very immersive anyway, i would personally love a twilight zone topic to be part of a future ramble poll!! it was something i was obsessed with when i was younger
I feel so vindicated by your take on the Mist. Everyone always tells me I'm crazy for not liking that twist ending, and I've always hated it. It just feels like a cheap shot.
It definitely felt more like a cheap shot than a twist. I assumed that barring pure sadism as a motive, they were going for a weirdly specific moral tale. Sure, it's not really a message that people living their regular lives need, but maybe they figured just in case of emergencies... "Don't forget a flashlight, some extra water, and not to mercy-kill your family because you never know what will happen!"
To piggyback off the point that by the point of Fantastic Beasts Depp was already washed both as an actor and a star, Colin Farrell was in the midst of reinventing himself as an excellent character actor who picks interesting projects, and had given the best performance in the movie, so subbing him out for Depp was just a big net loss and achieved the exact opposite of the desired effect.
I'm new here from the Stars Wars Hotel and have been going through some of the backlog too. Glad to be here!
I'm a big fan of the Liar Game manga and none of that stuff is there, no saw mask guy or rocking horse twist lol. I do want to watch that movie now tho. Also the Grindelwald twist is one of my favorite shitty twists because it's identical to the end of a Scooby Doo episode.
I saw that in a smallish theater and the audience reaction was one of the funniest I can remember. Disturbed bewilderment
I hope your hotel review has cracked open a wider audience- you certainly deserve one.
The V for Vendetta twist works a lot better in the comic because the film had to really rush through it. V wasn't so much testing her loyalty as recreating the experience that made him into V (namely the notes from Valerie). Interesting way to see his backstory while also setting Evey up as his protege and why she gets the final decision on completing his plan. Honestly it's my favorite section of the comics. Also the detective does LSD when he goes there to investigate V's history which is quality Alan Moore nonsense.
Yeah, came down here to write this. It's poorly expressed in the movie, but V is an anarchist and the idea that he wants loyalty from E-V is ridiculous. It's true that he wants to be able to entrust her with the future, but that's not loyalty. V is an incredibly twisted human being, and the entire thing is fucked up, but that's also *the point*. OTOH, I don't think any of this is actually clear inside the movie, so... eh. I won't say the comics are better (they're just different), but they are worth reading.
I’ll never forget my boyfriends reaction to Rey Palpatine - with him going “the biggest plot twist is that anyone would want to have a kid with Palpatine”
i will say the ending of season 1 of westworld also has a very well executed twist where one narrative that’s seemed to be concurrent with everything else in the show is revealed to have been happening in the past and a character involved is actually just a younger version of a character we already know
Is it called "Remember Me" as a reference to "Never Forget"?
DAWG
Every time Westworld gets brought up, I get reminded that I'm the only person who liked the whole show :(
I liked it a lot --- what I got to see, anyway. Was watching in real time, week by week, up through season 3. Then I took a break and missed season 4, thinking, "hey, it's on HBO, I can circle back and watch it on MAX". When I tried to do that, I only got one episode watched before MAX dropped the whole show from their service so they wouldn't have to keep paying residuals. Cheap bastards. I was pissed! (and still am)
I think you mixed up “Soylent Green” with “To Serve Man.” Soylent Green isn’t about aliens (and isn’t Twilight Zone)
This is what I was going to comment. “to Serve Man” is a classic Twilight Zone twist!
ironically, "water so pure you can drink from it" as the Johnny Depp computer puts it would have probably killed like.....everybody. bodies of water like river and lakes and oceans and streams and ponds HAVE to have things in them that aren't that safe to drink because they are sustaining life. the nitrogen cycle in water involves decaying organic matter in order to feed beneficial bacteria. i don't have a degree yet but i've kept enough fish tanks to know that everything needs to have a balance to sustain life -- and also that drinking water from a fish tank will make you throw up LOL. if the oceans and lakes and stuff didn't have fish in them and other aquatic life, the shore life would be affected and the land animals that rely on fish and water would starve and literally like everything would be affected through every ecosystem. i feel like i sound dramatic cuz im passionate but like that line shot me into outer space. you're not supposed to drink from rivers bc they have all sorts of who knows what from runoff and prolly like brain-eating amoebas. that's the way it's supposed to be 😭😭 so actually it's good she killed him with a virus. there
i remember hating that line so much because as someone who grew up in the woods, "pure" water doesn't mean anything if a raccoon died a mile upstream. there's nothing "impure" about vibrio cholerae bacteria.
If you like plot twists you should check out the anthology show Inside No 9, it's kind of like a British version of The Twilight Zone but with more humour. Every episode has a different cast and setting, and most of them have a really great twist at the end. Highly recommended.
For a specific episode, definitely watch 12 Days of Christine!
LOVE the words in the dictionary read-aloud scene not being read in alphabetical order lol
idk if you'd *like* it, but i at least thing you'd find The Others (2001) interesting!
that's such a good movie!! i enjoyed the twist a lot tbh
Since when was Soylent Green about Aliens?
It's also not a Twilight Zone episode, that whole section was kind of weird.
What about the Martha twist. Lol
Been a while since I saw the original Planet of the Apes, but isn't the implication that humanity destroyed itself in nuclear war? And that's why he says "You blew it up!!".. and then maybe the radioactivity made the Apes mutate? Gotta apply 1960s logic here. 😂
Also I didn't see Solo and hold up, Han Solo now has history with Darth Maul? That makes no sense! 😭 his entire shtick in A New Hope is that he doesn't believe in Jedi or the Force and any of that and is just a cynical materialist. How can he have a history with the Sith? 😅
i just started the video, but i'm one of the newcomers and i gotta say, you don't have to worry about this being "the best video" or whatever. you have SO MANY amazing patreon videos i've actually just watched them since i joined. my tv shows have been abandoned for a while. your patreon is absolutely worth more than netflix at this point already
I always recommend ending Westworld at season 1. It is a masterpiece in my opinion. S2 is so terrible. S3 is interesting but not great. S4 is really cool, they shook things up and setup a huge new plot line and cliffhanger but then they canceled the show. Oh and apparently it’s all been removed from Max so you can’t watch it anyway 🥲
Westworld was diminishing returns and got cancelled before it resolved everything. It has a few great moments but I reckon you jumped off at the right time
Yeah, the only good season was the first one. They kept trying to match the twist of the first season and kept failing.
Transcendence was directed by Wally Pfister, who was Nolan's cinematographer up until TDKR! That's one reason it feels so much like a Nolan movie.
The newer Twilight Zone was pretty hit or miss, but there are some good ones in there. Love an anthology. They’re like Tapas, even if one’s not the best it’s ok, you got options.
Looking forward to the next big horror movie titled "Spooky"
Approximate Timestamps for the movies/shows Jenny discusses (I only listed start times but you can extrapolate the end times based on when the next one starts) for those trying to avoid spoilers. 5:16 Saw 8:27 The Sixth Sense 10:16 Goosebumps The Ghost Next Door 11:15 Liar Game 2 13:35 The Usual Suspects/Scary Movie 14:34 Pirates of the Caribbean 2 15:16 Westworld Season 1 17:31 Remember Me (also discusses ending of unspecified Nicholas Sparks movie) 23:13 Twilight Zone/Soylent Green/Planet of the Apes 32:10 Star Wars: Rise of Skywalker 37:00 Now you see me 1&2 (there might be something between this and the Dark Knight Rises, I skipped forward to avoid Now You See Me spoilers) 38:40 The Dark Knight Rises 39:25 V for Vendetta 40:52 Solo: a Star Wars Story 42:59 Fantastic Beasts movies 44:46 Jurassic World 47:51 Don't Worry Darling 53:33 The Mist/Twilight Zone 1:00:36 Transcendence 1:15:15 future projects
thank you for taking the time to make this
Goosebumps: The Ghost Next Door really messed with my head when I read it in third grade.
Love the Talking Prog! Also, did they seriously call the isotope Johnny Depp gets shot with “bolognium”? I played it twice and it really sounds like it, in which case… “unobtainium,” you’ve lost your crown.
Pretty sure it's Polonium (a real thing) but I like bolognium much better, so I'm gonna call it that from now on.
In the Stephen King novella The Mist is based on the people in the car don't die, and there's a radio transmission implying there's nearby survivors and giving them some vague hope. King's thing with anything Lovecraftian is to dial down the existential dread, like how IT can be defeated by children
IT is defeated by children only after they performed a nameless ritual so abhorrent as to be literally indescribable, which is about as Lovecraftian as it gets.
Sandwich time! 1. I love each of your plushies even more than the one before it, so if they're ever in a circle I won't be able to function. 2. Soylent Green was its own movie. The Twilight Zone episode was To Serve Mankind and the twist was "It's a cookbook!!!" 3. Binge-listening to your content at work keeps me emotionally whole. Because life may throw its curveballs, but at least I'm not trapped in a island with Josh Hutcherson. Thanks!
She wasn't saying Soylent Green was an episode of Twilight Zone. She was grouping Soylent Green, Twilight Zone, and Planet of the Apes as having similar type twists.
Just hearing your few thoughts on star wars makes the sequels feel like such a lost opportunity, it seems simple to try to find a compelling story in what they had set up already lol wish they had any plan at all going in
Hello 10k new patrons lmao
Shes gonna get a whole new storey on her house by the end of the month!
The idea that an AI techbro would save the world is laughable
I feel like in the 2010s every Hollywood writer was buds with a Silicon Valley bro, but now in the 2020s they’ve realized their buds were all dumb jerks.
maybe it could be related to her/maybe she could ride it around were also my first thoughts related to indominus rex/clone girl, thanks jenny
Some timestamps and the names of the films/shows you are talking about would be appreciated. Watching the video is hard if I don't want to spoil myself.
100% with you on the Mist ending. So many people rave about it, but to me it's like a sadistic Monty Python skit ending, where they didn't know how to end the story so they default to absurdity.
In the book you're left up to decide for yourself if they made it out alive or not, which I much prefer. The movie ending is just cruel!
Hi Jenny, does this alternate upload have a plot twist? :)
I’m a new patron too, but I’ve followed you for years!! So happy to be here to support you 🥰🌼
I will never forgive the Rey Palpatine twist 😭
I am happily surprised to see Liar Game on this list (though for anyone thinking of watching, the show and the manga are both better than the movie, and better starting points)
Transcendence was directed by the guy who shot all of Christopher Nolan’s movies before Dunkirk which is why it looks like a pre-Dunkirk Christopher Nolan movie <3
The Don’t Worry Darling would had been better if the women were wanna be trad wives anti feminists who thought living in the 50s was gonna be great
Oh yay, someone else who hates The Mist. Fuck that ending!
The subtitles on this video are great!
I'm hoping to see Aragog again soon, he's the best! (Especially with a pretty hat on like in the church musical video.)
As new patreon and a fellow collector of awesome gaming and geeky things. I respect the collection! My eyes immediately went towards Sonic, then the Bomberman sets. Love it
Long time fan, first time patron! Love your stuff, it's great to see so much more content here!
I was very shocked no mention of Disney twist villains but also I skipped a lot to avoid spoilers so maybe there was 😭
There were not!
Jenny, you potentially missed the actual biggest plot twist of Westworld LOL I recommend you at least finish the first season if you have some time to spare. I imagine that the followup seasons are not going to be as great for you though.
Thank younJenny!
Good video! The story about the civil war era guy being hanged is an adaptation of an 1890s short story by Ambrose Bierce, "An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge".
One of my favorite short stories!
i'm very excited for the bad movie video! i love the long in-depth ones as well but i do really miss the earlier type content so a video like that would be really nice!
The plushies look so good! :)