My interpretation of the ending of Planet of the Apes (1 Viewer)

[Bob_A]

For any of you who have not seen The ***NEW*** Planet of the Apes please do not read further.
What do I think happened?
Spoiler:Well clearly the general was able to go back in time to alter the future...the only question is: how the heck did he do that? I believe that "rogueish" ape (?) who was a slave trader was able to release the General from his captivity (trapped in the crashed Oberon). But while in captivity the general was somehow able to view the video footage tranmitted from the storm cloud...this showed the "evolution" or history of the humans, and it gave the General a vision or model to follow after. Somehow the General was able to transport himself back into time...I believe that he used Mark Wahlberg's crashed "ship" (which must have still been functional), but I also think that the object which the slave trader stole from Periclesis' ship may have aided the General (we aren't sure what is stolen, but something important must have been stolen for the movie to even show it). So with Wahlberg's ship, he goes back into time and helps mold evolution in such a manner that the apes "emulate" what the humans had done while the humans in all likelihood evolve in a fashion similar to the way the apes had evolved before when the humans ruled. And of course, along the way the General was able to convince the apes that he was saving their race from the humans, who would put the apes in zoos if the "normal" course of evolution took it's course.
Now why would the General's plan work? Well, when Whalberg left there was peace and it seemed that the apes would be able to live peacefully with the humans. But with the "advanced" thinking of Whalberg gone for the human race, who did they have to turn to and who did they have to learn from? Who did they have to lead them? No one. Even after Whalberg left the humans were still a primitive race in comparison to the apes and were not as strong nor as smart as the apes...if the apes wanted to dominate at the time, they would dominate...and the General knew this and was able to act to put his race into a dominant position.
So what do you guys think of this interpretation?
[Edited last by Bob_A on August 14, 2001 at 11:10 PM]
[Edited last by Bob_A on August 14, 2001 at 11:40 PM]
[Edited last by Bob_A on August 14, 2001 at 11:42 PM]

 

[Morgan Jolley]

Spoiler:Hmm...only problem is that the ship on the planet had no power, and whose to say they would let the general ape out of the ship to begin with? So I don't see any way that the ending of the film could happen unless the apes developed great technology based on the ship and then another ape with the same name as the general one went back into time and changed Earth's history. I seriously don't understand how the movie could have ended that way, even my theory doesn't sound possible.

 

[Bob_A]

Morgan think about it...
Spoiler:clearly the slave trader ape stole something of importance out of Periclesis' "ship". He was a sneaky "bastard" and why wouldn't he want to release the general? He didn't care squat about the humans, and he certainly looked up to the General (helping the General woudl be a good way to advance his own position right?) . It also is not improbable that he was able to free the General...he had seen Whalberg manipulate things in the ship, and one touch on that pad would open up the "seal" which imprisoned the General. The device which the slave trader stole from Periclesis' ship was probably the tool which helped him and the General repower/repair Whalberg's crashed ship. Once the General could use the ship, he could transport himself back into time (maybe back thousands of years) and attempt to mold things so that the dominating apes would adopt all the human "invention" that was shown on the Oberon screen. The apes initially had a problem with inventing new things...but if they possessed the footage of human history, then they wouldn't have to be inventive...they would only have to copy the humans. So instead of the Lincoln memorial (representing the ending of slavery through Lincoln) there was the memorial for the General (representing the ending of ape slavery through the General).
Make sense?

 

[GaryEA]

Spoiler:Maybe the Thade inscribed on the wall of the monument is an ancestor of the Thade that Leo battled. Either that, or generations of the new ape civilization have revered and immortalized Thade for a battle he actually lost.
Just a thought.
-g
[Edited last by GaryEA on August 15, 2001 at 01:41 AM]

 

[Morgan Jolley]

Hmmm...except..
Spoiler:That pad might require that you have the correct hand, like a fingerprint scanner thing. Also, why would the other apes let the slave trader release the general after the general's family lied to them? Who says the thing he stole from the pod thing was of importance? And how do you repair a several thousand year old ship with no fuel? Repairing it would be a HUGE project, and I don't think the simian government would let them just do it. If they hate humans so much, why would they want to recreate everything the humans did? Also, there weren't many apes around when Licoln existed, which means the apes went back in time, changed evolution, then went forward in time and became political figures, then manipulated everything so it worked out to be like everything is for the humans. That really doesn't make sense. How could the general control time travel? Even Wahlberg couldn't do that. Also, Wahlberg went back to the time he was from, so we would have to assume the apes would go to a similar time period. Overall, I don't see it as being possible, and if they make a sequel, then they would have to explain it well, cuz it doesn't make sense as-is.
I didn't really like the ending, or most of the film even. I went with my friend and he got mad at me when I started pointing out all the flaws of the film because he thought that I was picking apart one of the only good films that came out this summer. I almost laughed at the ending because it seemed silly rather than breath-taking in the "Oh my god!" sense.

 

[Bob_A]

Morgan,
Spoiler:I don't think the scanner would be so specific...too complex. The other apes wouldn't "let" the slave trader release the General...the slave trader must have done this on his own using stealth. I can almost guarantee that the thing taken from the pod was significant...no reason for them to even show that otherwise. Whalberg's crashed ship may not have been in as bad shape as one would think. It may have had an energy supply which lasted a lifetime (like the Oberon), or the "tool" which the slave trader stole may have been some kind of energy source. The General was the only ape who knew about Whalberg's ship...again using stealth the government wouldn't know. They may have hated humans...but they admired their skill at invention, so imitating them was only to their advantage in order to get advanced technology. The General couldn't control time travel in an absolute sense...but he could set the ship to go to a specific date (he must have set it to go back thousands of years). And the apes didn't need to time travel...it was only the General who time traveled and manipulated the course of history.
Believe me there is always a reasonable way to explain things...but you need to make a few assumptions.

 

[Geoffrey_A]

This theory was put to me by my friend, I find this one more convincing:
Spoiler:It's not Thade himself that goes back, that's just too big a leap. Thade was trapped, the crashed Pod would certainly be beyond slavage to the apes. My friend Kevin suggests this: It wasn't thade, but Thade's great great great (however many greats we need) Grandfather. Remember, in the begning we see that there are 3 pods. 1 for monkey, 1 for wahlberg, and an extra. So, here's the Theory. The Oberon Crashes. Humans and apes work together to survive, the humans discover the apes are far more intelligent than they ever realized (as was said in their log). The Humans are attempting to repair the third Pod so they can be rescued. As the Repairs near completion the apes (influenced perhaps by Thade's namesake relative) begin to fear that should the humans be rescued they will once again enslave the apes. The apes rebel, and Thade's great grandfather steals the repaired pod, returning to earth in time to lead the genetically enhanced apes their in a rebellion. Hence, all the architecture and technology on earth remains the same, but it is now ruled by apes. This theory explains the Thade monument, explains why everything looks the same, explains what happened to that missing 3rd pod, and isn;t nearly as hard to believe as General Thade salvaging the sunk pod. Remember, these apes would probably still be able to pilot the pod, General Thade is of an Ape society so far removed from the crash that all knowledge of it is lost in history, and the only clues to it are in the symbols of their artwork. I personally like this theory a lot more than the Thade became a genius and saved the sunken pod theory.
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Geoff
Now with Kung-Fu grip and realistic facial hair!

 

[Dome Vongvises]

I have the simplest interpretation of them all.
Spoiler:
It's a distinct possibility that Mark Wahlberg could've ended up in an all-together different timeline/dimension. I think the Thade thing was just for shock to the audience. Otherwise, I really can't come up with a good explanation for how Thade figures out a way to go back in time and ruin the progress of humanity.

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"I don't know, Marge. Trying is the first step towards failure." - Homer J. Simpson

 

[Patrick Sun]

How about checking out this thread which covers Tim Burton's failed attempt at re-creating his version of the shock ending from the original POTA?
BTW, my idea: Leo's the test chimp.
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PatCave; HT Pix; Gear; DIY Mains; DIY CC; Sunosub I + II + III; DVDs; Link Removed

 

[Morgan Jolley]

Spoiler:It would have been impossible for Thade to get the station back into space because it has no fuel. It has power, but not fuel. Cars don't run on batteries, they run on fuel, same concept. This is shown when Marky Mark explains how he is going to use what is left of the fuel in the battle. Also, how could he ressurect the ship when half of it is missing? The pods couldn't be set for the date where they would go to in time, so the only way for any apes to get back to Earth before whenever would be by chance and luck.
There is the "Mark doesn't land on Earth in the end" theory, but if so, then what planet could he land on that is in the same place as Earth and looks exactly like it from outer space? When he is returning to Earth, it is made clear that he is returning to EARTH, not the ape planet.
I think that if there is a sequel, it will have some sort of "alternate dimension" or "this planet isn't Earth" thing attached to it. The ending itself is one reason why I didn't like this movie. Maybe I should watch the original and see how they compare.

 

[Dave Morton]

I agree with the alternate universe. Perhaps this is a "sliders" type ending. Also, I think things may have worked out a lot better if Wahlberg knew how to land the space pod. That was twice he screwed it up. Jeez, even a monkey could land it better than him.
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------ Dave ------
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Link Removed

 

[Jodee]

This is MY interpretation:
Spoiler:
We all know that Leo, the chimp, and the ship travelled through a time warp. Although they all all landed within a space of a thousand years togetehr, we don't know exactly WHEN in time they landed. So perhaps all the events that took place in POTA happened, say A MILLION YEARS AGO? By crash-landing on this planet in the far past, Leo causes a race of super-apes to develop. They evolve and develop space travel (which they would have a head-start on based on the crash-landed technology) and colonize earth BEFORE early man develops on earth. So instead of humans, Earth is now populated with apes, who also revere the ancient General Thade as part of their history.
What does everyone think of that?

 

[Morgan Jolley]

Impossible:
Spoiler:When travelling through time, Wahlberg's thing indicates that he goes forward in time to the planet of the apes in the beginning, and then backward in time at the end when he returns to Earth.
When I went to see the movie with my friend, his stepmom offered that idea, but I disproved her right in the lobby. I felt kinda bad, but she deserved it at the moment.

 

[Jodee]

Well I guess it would be "impossible" if you actually believed his ship controls. I figured they were pretty meaningless since he was in a time warp and were probably going crazy at random.
They might have gone in the opposite direction on the way out, simply because he was "reversing" the process.
Either way, I don't think it's fair to assume they were correct since this was a completely different world and time was completely different (ie our time/years is based on revolutions around the sun. A different planet would have a different sun and length of years.) Add this into a time warp/storm and I doubt the ship's readings would be accurate.

 

[Morgan Jolley]

You still give me no reason why I should believe the other theory. I think that they want to make a sequel that will have some complex thing happen that will explain it all. Either that or Tim Burton wanted to screw the film up.
Also, why would they show the controls with the date if it didn't have some truth to it? And even if the other planet is in another solar system with a different sun rotation period, that wouldn't affect his systems if they were running off of Earth time. If the planet of the apes has 36 hour days, then every 2 POtA days would be equal to 3 Earth days. Just because he's in a separate area doesn't mean time changes in that sense.
[Edited last by Morgan Jolley on August 15, 2001 at 12:50 PM]

 

[Andres Munoz]

Interpret the ending all you want in your own way (I did the same thing after seeing the movie) but the truth of the matter is that the ending is not supposed to make sense.
A Fox executive said it and even Tim Burton himself said it. They just added that ending for shock value.
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Andres
http://home.earthlink.net/~coolvirus

 

[Morgan Jolley]

If it was added for shock value, it didn't succeed. Most people I know were thinking "what?" and were later made mad by the impossibility of the ending.

 

[Jeff Kleist]

It's the original ending from the book(moved from Paris to DC). In the book they travel to Beteulgeuse and back at near-light speed. Relativity made their trip take a whopping 800 years.
Seems to me this was much the same
Jeff Kleist

 

[Bob_A]

Morgan,
Spoiler: I know it may have been improbable that the General was able to travel back into time...but clearly he was able to do this. Somehow he was able to repower Whalberg's pod. It is also possible that there was still some fuel left in Whalberg's crashed pod...Whalberg didn't have much time to look into things because he was almost instantly apprehended by the apes.
Still many of the things in the movie are arguably improbable, and certainly are not very clear.
But one thing I am almost entirely certain of is that the Planet of the apes is the exact same planet as Earth (which is of course the same as the planet which Whalberg returned to at the end of the movie)...

 

[Seth Paxton]

As I already said in the thread Patrick linked too, my thoughts immediately following were as follows, based explicitly on ALREADY ESTABLISHED concepts from the original series.
Patrick and others have pointed out that you shouldn't need to have seen the original series to figure it out, which I am not debating. However, since these ideas have already been used once before and Burton would know this, my gut feeling says that he was either thinking this way or had NO REASONING AT ALL.
Spoiler:In POTA3 (Escape), the film begins with 3 apes coming back in time to Earth using the CRASHED INTO THE WATER POD...hmmm, they have one of those in the new one too.
They had drug it out, the science ape figured it out enough to get it to take off, and it followed a return route...just before the bomb goes off in POTA2.
The 2 apes have a baby which grows up by POTA4 (Conquest). This son of theirs (the only talking ape once they have died) proceeds to lead the dumber, slave monkeys on a REVOLT. All by himself. And from this, the talking ape civilization is born that we saw in POTA1.
Finally, we did see the FIRST IN, LAST OUT time warp effect which also included a MULTIPLYING effect...just like the recent LOST IN SPACE movie. Another easily borrowed idea. In both LIS and POTAnew we see a ship go into the warp just a bit behind the people lost and it ends up getting through 100's of years ahead of them. Also, we see the chimp go in seconds before Leo and come out DAYS AFTER Leo.
So, Thade woos some supporters to let him out. They yank Leo's ship out of the water and salvage it enough to get it up again, it follows the return path just like the monkey's ship did (we have no reason to think Leo's ship is MORE out of fuel than the monkey's ship was, which Leo went back to Earth on).
Since Thade leaves a week, month or more later than Leo, he comes to Earth some time ahead of him, perhaps 400-500 years. He proceeds to lead the ape revolt, thus creating the ape civ that Leo later returns to.
I've yet to see or hear anything to really counter these ideas. I've heard other interesting versions, but this one has been established in the original series. And in the original series, none of these things were learned till later films (probably since they were making it up as they went, but still...Burton has had the chance to see them all and be familiar with the plotlines). So in both the original and this one, we would not know any of these details, even as we see their effects.