Original Ending vs Alternate Ending

[MartyS (Gromit)]

well we can't all be as intelligent as you amanda. But then, if I were legend I would probably have slowly set up a boat when it was day time with everything I ever needed, and then sail the seven seas and live the life of a pirate until I should want for nothing.

There aren't any darkseeker sharks are there?

If all the land was taken over by dark seekers it would be a long time out at sea, oh no, WATERWORLD, NOOOOOOOOO!!!!!

As for darkseeker sharks, a virus that attacks mammals would be unlikely to affect fish, but he did say it was mutating so who knows.

So we should probably be more worried about darkseeker dolphins?

And whales, hmmm, a pale killer sperm whale, where have I heard of that before............

One thing though, they would have no place to hide during the day to avoid the sun, so I guess they wouldn't be a problem after all.

Underwater caves with air pockets?

Yes, that would work for dolphins.  Of course being a Hollywood film we could say that sea water blocks UV, even though it doesn't, science isn't all that reliable in films.  Now, imagine the sound the darkseeker dolphins would make.

[scottrkrv]

I prefer the alternate ending, I like how you see the pictures of other zombies on the wall, and you realize that (to the zombies) he looks like a freaking serial killer. 

I guess that's what I was trying to say, but you said it better   I think that was explored more in the book...but maybe I'm misremembering.  The zombies had their own society and Neville was knocking them off.  You feel for him because he's "human" until you realize that they have families they're defending and they're people like his neighbor and his best friend, etc. that he's killing because he hasn't "evolved" thusly.

So, he's really the killer zombie afterall.

That's the problem with this version, they made the dark seekers too animalistic for the alternate ending to make sense.

In The Omega Man they showed them as organized and intelligent (and could talk instead of 100 decibel roars).

This has happened in several remakes now, I blame CGI, it's too easy to make the mutated humans into impossible super creatures.

And compare this to the "original" "Last Man on Earth" with Vincent Price. He was an obvious zombie/vampirer hunter, and his "victims" were far more "human."

(and the backstory was more ambigiuous).

[scottrkrv]

[It's like the "zombies" in 28 Days Later aren't really zombies, they have the "Rage" virus.

You know that is a meaningful as saying  ham is less filling than turkey, right?

[Hamdingers]

The alternate ending fits the movie much better, but as is typical of focus groups, they preferred the more "explodey" ending, predictable really

another great example of this is the "Unhappy ending" (warning, 22 minutes long, and some idiot marked it as "mature" even though it wasnt) of the remake of Little Shop of Horrors, the movie would have been much stronger with that ending

[GoldieLucks]

Both endings sucked for the simple reason that the whole last act sucked. 

The theatrical ending is abominably stupid, but it fits better with the third act.  It posits that all the dark seekers are barely sentient killing machines, heedless of their own safety in pursuit of their objective.  Since this is how they've been portrayed since after Sam's death, it makes sense by the movie's own internal logic.

The alternate ending tries to implement a much cooler idea.  It posits that the dark seekers have rudimentary culture, can form personal bonds, and can resove situations in a peaceful manner under the right circumstances.  This is much closer to the book and is a much more interesting way to treat them, but that pesky third act is in its way--Alpha Male rigged that trap in the second act, sure, but since Sam's death, the dark seekers have still been portrayed as barely sentient killing machines.  The only reason they're in the basement at all is that they've hurled themselves against Neville's defenses with no regard for their own safety or the safety of their fellows.  If they'd behaved in an more intelligent fashion throughout the film, and gotten into the basement through some sort of clever gambit, this ending would have been great.  But, since it appears to belong to a whole different movie, it turns out even worse than the awful theatrical ending.

Ah, that sheds light, thank you.  This might explain why the semi-intelligent zombie (alternate ending) stood hissing at Neville for what seemed like 10 minutes, despite having rescued his girl and no challenge from Neville whatsoever.  At first I thought, 'what's with all the yelling? He's more than made his point.'  By round 4 of this one-sided screaming match, I had been pulled completely out of the movie.

[bratpop]

See, that's another thing. They're smart enough to train dogs and rig a Will trap, but they smash their heads into walls and stare at you stupidly hissing instead of saying, "Hey, can I have my girlfriend back?" You'd think with the giant mouths, they'd be even BETTER at talking.

[nummy muffin]

See, that's another thing. They're smart enough to train dogs and rig a Will trap, but they smash their heads into walls and stare at you stupidly hissing instead of saying, "Hey, can I have my girlfriend back?" You'd think with the giant mouths, they'd be even BETTER at talking.

Until I read this thread and found out that the zombies had rigged the Will trap, I'd just figured he'd set it himself and forgot about it.  That he was actually going insane.  You're right.  The zombies were portrayed as no smarter than the deer.   

[bratpop]

I suppose it's possible a wizard did it. But even so, they had dogs on leashes, and yet they were too dumb to point at something they wanted.

[nummy muffin]

Or be anywhere close behind the dogs...they could've had him.

[MartyS (Gromit)]

Or be anywhere close behind the dogs...they could've had him.

Yea, that was another thing that didn't make sense, why did he send only the dogs and not a bunch of fellow dark seekers, are we supposed to belive they were afraid to get shot at that point but later on stormed the house without caring?  Or that they only wanted him wounded so they could follow him home?

It seems like they had absolutely no idea what the dark seekers were and just made stuff up as they went along.  Some day I'll have to listen to some of the extra commentary tracks to see what they say.

[Fuzzy Necromancer]

Wow. o.0

*after reading entire thread*

What a train wreck of a film. I think that hollywood generates some kind of negative-intelligence vibes, something that makes people actively seek out the worst, un-logic driven answer to a problem.

[bratpop]

Maybe they had a couple of smart dark seekers and the rest were rock stupid, or some just had special skills like rigging car traps. I mean, they were stupid enough to run to his house and get blown up, except for the alpha DS. He obviously sent them in knowing they were too stupid to figure out there were bombs.

What I want to know is why is this movie so UN-violent when Justice League: New Frontier had people getting their heads blown off and eyes ripped out? I don't think they clearly showed one zompire getting killed or blown up on screen without ambiguity. And despite being about vampires, there was hardly any blood except when Will got ambiguously bit on his shoulder. What the hell? It's like they wanted to make it rated G but couldn't quite cut it.

[nummy muffin]

Now we all know the kiddies love their violence.  And fart jokes.

It's PG-13, so I guess whatever they did worked.  Lame as it was.  But teens = revenue.  Respect the dollar bill.

[bratpop]

I think the PG-13 = money thing is more of a superstition than a fact. Otherwise, why do they release EVERY PG-13 (and R-rated) movie as an unrated DVD? Obviously THAT makes a lot of money. That's the only good example I have of the same movie being released with two ratings. Otherwise, you can't really compare an R rated movie to a PG-13 rated movie because the content and style of movie are generally different.

I mean look, you think if Tank Girl and Barb Wire were PG-13 they would have made one extra cent? Or that The Matrix would have made more? Heck, if they had decent promotion for the Matrix and it was PG-13, I would definately have avoided it because it would look really worthless. At least if it's R you know something has to happen. I learned growing up in the 80s that EVERY kid wants to see R-rated movies. They might not be ABLE to, but it's much more appealing.

[ShadowDog]

Since I'm old enough that I haven't had to worry about film ratings in 20 years, I HAVEN'T worried about film ratings in that long.  The process for determining a rating is so silly I never give it a second's thought.  In fact, until just now I didn't know that the Matrix was rated R.

All of which makes me laugh to think about how much time the studio suits probably spend thinking about film ratings and what dollar impact each rating will give them in terms of street cred (though obviously it has a money impact if teeny boppers can't get in to see it).