From: (No Email available)

Date: 2001-09-20 18:05:23

Comment:

Here are two alternatives that explain the end of POTA:
1)When leo returns to earth he is suffering from a delusion that it has been taken over by apes. the sheer outlandish shock of the past week of his life on the planet of the apes (coupled with the guilt of having caused the deaths of his crew mates), has been to much for Leo to cope with. He has returned to the same old washington, populated by humans. Leo's delusion causes him to see the face of his tormentor on the statue of Lincoln and apes instead of human cops.

2) in the book when apes take over the planet, they are only able to use human technology and are not creative enough to progress. So if you believe thade managed to return to earth ( similarly to escape from the planet of the apes) in Leo's salvaged space craft, arriving on earth before Leo. he could have landed in 2029, taken over the planet and defaced the statue of lincoln with his own visage. Leo arrives sometime later, however ape society only uses what it was left with and has not progressed. the film is set only a few decades away and technology has only moved on to space travel to jupiter (its a freak phenomena that the electrical storm moves leo to another galaxy and back). So if ape society has stagnated, then it would look more or less like the world today.