Christopher Nolan’s Interstellar might have been one hell of a ride, but there were many who didn’t like the very straightforward ending of the movie. Nolan has now revealed a much darker ending he had originally in mind. Obviously, spoilers ahead.
How the current version of Interstellar ends: It ends with Matthew McConaughey’s astronaut Cooper entering the wormhole to give Anne Hathaway’s ship a much needed push to reach a hospitable planet. From inside the wormhole, McConaughey sends all of their collected singularity data to Earth, then arrives at a multi-dimensional space seemingly constructed by a mankind of the future. Through this, he is able to contact his daughter Murphy. He gives her all the information she needs to rescue him and they manage to do that right after he’s leaving the wormhole. McConaughey gets to meet his dying elderly daughter one last time, then flies off to meet with Hathaway who has begun to colonize her planet.
Talking to Nerdist with both his screenwriter-brother Jonathan and acclaimed scientist Kip Thorne, Nolan revealed that in an earlier draft, McConaughey’s character wasn’t supposed to be successful. He did enter the wormhole and sent the data, but then just died. No multi-dimensional internet cafe to chat with anyone. No rescue. McConaughey would have been dead and we wouldn’t have known whether A) the data ever reached Earth or B) if Hathaway succeeded in building her colony.
Would that have been a better ending? Not sure. The most heartbreaking scene has Murphy tearing up as he has to leave home. Seeing them finally meet again is a rousing moment, but do we need it? I wasn’t a fan of the five dimensional ‘Tesseract’ space idea, the shelf mystery or the final meeting. I think Cooper should have died, but they should have shown adult Murphy receiving his data. Leave it open whatever they make of it and maybe have adult Murphy look up to the stars, wondering about Cooper – and Hathaway’s Amelia.
What kind of ending would you have preferred?
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