Digital Theatre [dtheatre.com] - Explaining Planet of the Apes' Ending

Posted by 100% AMERICAN (hellskitchen_@hotmail.com) on August 2, 2001 2:48 PM

I think we are delving too far into this topic. Tim dropped the ball, but he'll be back in all his glory.

How about a thread on "Knockaroundguys" or that Deuces movies with Dorf and Damon, it looks pretty darn decent. D'oh!

Forums..

Posted by Jack (jack@dtheatre.com) on August 2, 2001 3:41 PM

Hopefully over the weekend I'll have some Forums launched, so you can start your own threads if you want.

RE: Forums..

Posted by 100% AMERICAN (hellskitchen_@hotmail.com) on August 2, 2001 5:52 PM

Jack:

Your the greatest.

RE: RE: Forums..

Posted by Jack (jack@dtheatre.com) on August 3, 2001 12:15 PM

I can't help it.

Well geez...

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 30, 2001 12:29 AM

I haven't seen this movie, but what I can say is that everyone here has just contributed greatly (some more than others) to helping Tim Burton, the Studio Execs, and the writers figure out what to do if there ever is a pre/sequel... whilst not receiving 1 thin dime.

Heck, someone whose really creative will write the script from this forum, go to hollywood and cash in...

Cheers,

Homer

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 10, 2001 8:15 PM

ok people its simple, just like the origional movie "they were on earth all along"!!!! here we go, if you remember on the space station they mention that the apes are being GENETICALLY altered, this is during the year 2029. The space station was not taken over by the evolving apes after it crash landed on some strang planet, in a sence seeding the new planet with apes, it crashed on earth years into the future. Sometime after 2029 the apes continued to evolve untill they were able to take over the plant. In the origional movie we were lead to believe the humans destroyed the planet. but in fact after the apes take over they eventually destroy the earth just as the humans did in the first movie. The Gen Thade statue you see is an ancestor of the Thade in the movie. (remember Thades dad, before he died, telling him the truth about humans and the gun that has been in the family for a long time). When he is going back in time the last date you see is in the late 2100's not 2029. Now I no that only leaves a 100+ years for the apes to evolve and take over the world but remember that the evolution process was faster because of human DNA altering.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 12, 2001 11:49 AM

The truth is...the whole damn movie doesn't make the slightest bit of sense and the ending is inexplainable. No matter what explenation you give about the ending there is always some flaw to it, and if it isn't cleared up in the sequel i'm going to be very pissed off. I've been so frustrated on trying to figure out the ending that I've been thinking about the movie constantly, and I realized that the ending isn't the only thing that doesn't make sense. The whole damn movie doesn't make sense! When the space station crashed on the planet, all the monkeys escaped, and from what i heard, they evolved into the supermonkeys that whalberg had a war against.

Now heres the clincher: WHY THE HELL WOULD THAT HAPPEN?????? WOULDN'T THEY JUST EVOLVE INTO HUMANS?????

think about that one for a while...

The truth is, whoever wrote the script is an idiot. He shouldn't have made it so damn hard to figure out. I actually thought the ending was pretty cool, other then the fact that i didn't understand it.

However, they should have given the viewer some hints and leads, so that during the end the viewer's not saying: "WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT ALL ABOUT???"

Anyways, theres my two cents, and if you really think about that ending, you will find that no theory works. Hopefully the sequel will come out soon.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 21, 2001 1:32 PM

This isn;t a valid point at all. Read a book on evolution - try Richard Dawkins. If evolution happened again from apes, the chances of humans emerging again would be billions to one. Evolution is a random process.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 21, 2001 2:18 PM

OK .... Burton was desperate to put us off the scent, so he puts two moons up there. He keeps saying, "This isn;t Earth, guys". So we hear the planet is uncharted and uninhabited. But this is all a ruse so we don;t guess the twist, that they have gone BACK in time and are unwittingly changing Earth's history/ evolution. The inconsistencies ARE explicable - we have to accept that the Earth had two moons millions of years ago - the moon is a shard of Earth chucked up there, maybe they collided and merged. We also have to posit that the ship went back so far, it was before significant life on Earth - their log says the planet is uninhabited. And it has to be so many eons ago that the Solar System has moved hundreds of lightyears in the Galaxy. The ship's computer therefore wouldn't recognise where it was - all our constellations were completely different millions of years ago. So, this now has symmetry - the original film's twist is that this planet is Earth's FUTURE, the new film's twist is that the planet is Earth's PAST. The problem is the horses ... how did they get there?????!!!!! Let's face it, they are in the film because apes in black armour look cool on horses.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on September 19, 2001 2:36 AM

I think that is the best explanation yet, albeit a little far fetched. I still don't understand how Thade's statue would be in future earth if he was disgraced in the past at the Oberon fight? And the inscription says that he saved the planet, so maybe it's an alternate reality when Pericles didn't land and the apes won the war?

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on September 18, 2001 9:29 AM

I can't understand why the only way to evolve is turning into humans.

Posted by lboogie_20 (lboogie_20@excite.com) on August 13, 2001 5:12 PM

If you think about why he ended the movie like that he's actually pretty smart. When the sequel comes out it will probably make more money than the first movie because people are going to want explanations. I know I do.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 12, 2001 6:45 PM

that's just plain inconsistent... in the movie, the video diaries Leo was watching say that the space station crashed on an uncharted planet... also if the statue was "thade's ancestor" how come the apes de-evolutionized from making a monument and driving cars to riding horses and living in an ape city...

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 21, 2001 1:29 PM

This would explain why there are horses on this "new" planet, when there would presumably not have been on the space station. However, Burton goes out of his way to differentiate the planet - it has two moons for example. Learn to spell, by the way.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 15, 2002 3:38 PM

Yeah, there are two moons...

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 28, 2001 7:44 AM

No-one seems to have thought of the possibility that the ending shows that the original films are happening at the same time as the new film. When he gets back to earth it is after the rebellion of the apes in the 3rd film.

I would guess that the engineered chimps were on earth as well as in the space station so it could just be a tenuous link to link the new film into the three old ones.

Graeme

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 29, 2001 9:58 PM

I agree with the ending you propose. You are a genius !!!!!!!!!!!

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 30, 2001 2:34 AM

Then why are there two moons on the ape planet?

The Flaw in your theory

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on September 2, 2001 12:25 AM

The fact that the apes worship Seamus throws off your theory. And the movie explicitly explained that Seamus led the revolt and that Thade is a descendent of Seamus.

Here is what happened. Thade managed to remove the pod from the pond with the aid of humans who can swim.

He remembered his father's words about human technology and innovation was superior to ape brute strength. Furthermore, he was powerless in his own time due the revolutionn that united ape and human.

Therefore, he went back in time using a pod. He studied aboard the crashed space stations to learn how to fly the ship. He used genetic engineering to mutate apes and eventually take over the earth from the past.

He also rewrote history to avoid future insurrections of sympathetic apes and humans.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on November 23, 2001 8:19 PM

hey man screw you, this movie sucked ass

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 10, 2001 9:02 PM

Scenario A

1. PotA is not Earth. The multiple moons imply this point. The horses could have come from the mother ship that crashed.

2. Pericles enters worm hole, 2500AD, Day X

3. Mark enters worm hole, and arrives in 2500AD, Day X-3

4. Mother Ship enters worm hole, and arrives hundreds to thousands of years earlier. Oral history usually doesn’t last thousands of years, so I would prefer to think of this as many hundreds of years. Rapid evolution is an aspect of “suspension of disblief”, but I am willing to go with it.

5. Mark goes back in time to 2100AD to find Thade Lincoln

6. Thade goes back to 1900AD with an army, and armed with knowledge obtained from the ship. Knowledge allows him to capture or kill humans (another point where disbelief needs to be suspended). Evolution (cultural and otherwise) follows a similar pattern to our own history (yet one more point where a suspension of disbelief is needed). Thade is a political and cultural hero.

Scenario B

1. PotA is earth. Multiple moons may have existed at one time, and splintered due to collisions with large meteors. Horses are then not difficult to explain. Gravity, temperature, oxygen levels, etc, also not hard to explain.

2. Pericles enters worm hole, enters pre-historic earth. Year is 50000BC, Day X

3. Mark enters worm hole, and also arrives in the past 50000BC, Day X-3. The chronometer reading is an artifact of the electromagnetic storm, and does not represent the actual year.

4. Mother ship enters worm hole, and enters 50000BC, minus 500 years. This allows oral history to be maintained, and for rapid evolution to occur with Semos the ape and progeny.

5. Mark travels –forward- in time to 2000AD, and sees Thade Lincoln. Thade had been left alive, learned from the ship, and had a gun. Came to take over the PotA. Once again, a suspension of disbelief is necessary if one is to believe that innovativeness and culture evolved in exactly the same way as it did with humans, allowing a Washington DC analog to exist with black and white squad cars (almost too much to buy).

Scenario C

1. PotA is earth. Multiple moons may have existed at one time, and splintered due to collisions with large meteors. Horses are then not difficult to explain. Gravity, temperature, oxygen levels, etc, also not hard to explain.

2. Pericles enters wormhole and lands on earth 2500AD, Day X

3. Mark enters wormhole, and lands on earth 2500AD, Day X-3

4. Mothership enters wormhold, and enters earth 50000BC. Explains lack of humans and help when they landed. Allows Apes to evolve for a very significant period. Still rapid evolution, but more believable than with other scenarios. Problem is that oral history must last this long.

5. Mark returns through worm hole to 2000AD, to find Thade Lincoln.

6. Thade returns through beta or gamma shuttle (or rescued delta shuttle) to workhole, and to earth in 1850AD. He had learned advanced technology through the ship, and was able to take over the planet (use of poisons, viruses, etc) as a result. He takes back many of his companions, and eventually populate the planet. Technolgy and culture had a certain momentum, so it is not terribly unbelievable that the squad cars and DC exist in similar form.

Not one of the scenarios are perfectly reasonable. They all have holes, albeit not impossible ones.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 12, 2001 4:11 PM

that is the stupidest sh*t i ever heard !

Explaining Planet of the Apes' Ending

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on September 3, 2001 4:14 PM

are you talking about the one that just came to theatres or the original?

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on November 23, 2001 8:29 PM

you the dumbest c*nt ive ever seen

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on December 15, 2001 5:04 AM

Exactly. These are the three possibilities.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 20, 2001 2:56 AM

OK lets look at the evidence -
1) POTA cant be earth, even Burton himself said it wasnt

2) The planet at the end definately is earth

Heres my attempt at an explanation

At the end of the film, notice the slave trader pocketing a book from the chimps shuttle, possibly 'how to fly for monkeys'! Now on the wreck of the space station there are still more pods. Thade escapes and the humans and apes (now living in 'harmony') excavate the space station and retrieve more intact technology of weapons and pods. Now either thade or an ancestor takes an army through the wormhole to earth, landing at around 2000. Using weapons technology from the 2029 space craft he takes over earth and this explains the exact similarities between POTA2 and america (black & white cars etc.)

POTA - pods

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 22, 2001 3:29 AM

Thade could not possibly have taken a working pod from the the Oberon. Surely it would have dawned on the captain and his crew when they crashlanded on this uninhabited and uncharted planet to use any working pods to send for help. I think that the Oberon did send yet another chimp for help when they crashlanded and this chimp returned after Leo had left thus giving Thade his escape route where he lands back on Earth. God knows how those electromagnetic storms work!!

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 27, 2001 9:16 AM

Nice try but where does he get his army from the apes don't trust him any more.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 20, 2001 3:06 AM

Why has nobody pointed out the sheesy unnecceary lines in the film 'get your hands off me you damn dirty human' and 'damn them, damn them all to hell' Burton repeatedly said he was not making a remake, so what was that all about? Was he trying to turn it into a comedy?

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on November 7, 2001 3:56 PM

I guess they wanted to satisfy the action-hungry movie goers out there...
One thing's sure: Tim is on my blacklist now.
The thought of me actually expecting this movie to be better than the original disgustes me.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on October 27, 2002 3:39 PM

i was initial very confused at the end of the movie too. I felt ripped off cause i was expecting a happy ending but i like the shock ending much better. You have to actually try to figure it out and there isnt really any right answer. we are so use to having a the loose ends all figured out by the end of the movie but that is why this ending is such genius. I have never actually gone an researched on the web trying to make sense of a movie. I want to see the original now.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on March 3, 2003 6:00 AM

the problem with the explanation on this site is the following. If thade had gone back in time then humans would not have travelled to space and so Mark Wahlberg would never have been able to do everything he did.Thus, thade would not have gone back to earth.indeed, the planets inhabitants would not exist at all-a self perpetuating paradoxical temporal circle.

Posted by Natefunky (yo yo .com) on August 10, 2001 8:18 AM

Heres a question.........
If the ship that crash landed on the planet, was his he left to go in to the storm....wouldn't he reach the planet of the apes before the other ship seeing as he went into the storm before his big ship?????????

PLEASE REPLY!!!

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 10, 2001 3:26 PM

Wahlberg went through a storm that sent him thousands of years into the future. The other ship did not. When Wahlberg got there, the apes that were on the big air force ship eventually took over, but it was two thousand years earlier. so apes had been ruling for a long time.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 27, 2001 8:30 AM

No you have to rememeber that these sort of things are unpredictable and not controlloed by anybody so it is possible that the ship was sent back 100 years while the delta pod was sent back just a few years

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on September 3, 2001 6:04 AM

yeah BUT the other monkey ship got lost, he forgot his road atlas ya see

Posted by pellis214 (No Email) on August 12, 2001 3:49 PM

The station was just following the rough course of the two scout ships. The course variation through the magnetic cloud (read "wormhole") was enough that they experienced no time travel, just space travel.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 2, 2001 6:02 PM

The simple explanation for that ending is, it sucked.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 2, 2001 7:50 PM

What a ridiculous and convoluted explanation of an equally ridiculous ending to a terribly plotted and logic lacking film. How about our hero risking his life for a chimp and then crashing his ship TWICE while his chimp manages to safely land in a crowd of people???

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 2, 2001 10:09 PM

Did you actually watch the movie? The hero wasn't getting his chimp, he was using the chimp as an excuse to go out and check out the storm himself.

Note the video postcard "have they let you fly yet or are you still training monkeys?"

Note the argument with the captain "we don't have time to send a monkey, let me go"

The monkey is an excuse, he even leaves it behind when it's all over.

RE: RE: RE: Explaining Planet of the Apes' Ending

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 3, 2001 6:21 AM

So what your saying is, the hero's commander was right...only chimps should fly dangeropus missions because they are the only ones who can land them.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on September 2, 2001 4:48 PM

replying to the guy who clearly thinks he has uncovered a mystery by working out that the chimp was the excuse for marky to fly. ARE YOU A COMPLETE MORON?! Is this really the only point of the film that you feel requires explanation? those of us who are not descendants of damn dirty apes had already worked this out for ourselves, i guess man kind is safe. thanks for trying, gimp!

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on September 5, 2001 1:09 PM

Well aren't you the brave one? It's pretty easy to call someone a moron when you hide behind your keyboard right..jackass?

Believe me, you're FAR STUPIDER than the original poster was. far, far stupider.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 2, 2001 10:04 PM

Not only does he pocket a piece of junk..but there's still pods left in the ship (there's still at least one in the hangar when last we see the ship)..pods which a monkey can fly (better than marky mark I'd say)..you've got a time bubble storm thing...an extra pod...a monkey pilot hanging out doing nothing...a smart general with a vendetta...

It's cheese and very very sequel, but it's not illogical...all the pieces are there.

Posted by AXEMAN (bigturnerfish@hotmail.com) on August 3, 2001 5:51 AM

The simple fact that we are discussing the subject is proof that the ending was a success. Stir up controversy and get people talking. That sounds like free publicity to me. The bottom line is that you can make sense of anything if you stretch the facts far enough. The ending was put there for shock value, and shock value only. Kudos Mr. Burton you crazy MoFo, you just got me to donate 5min of my time to promote your film.

Ewing 3:16

RE: RE: RE: Explaining Planet of the Apes' Ending

Posted by allknowing (you'llneverfindme.com) on August 3, 2001 6:13 AM

i would have to agree with axeman,
I liked the movie hated the ending,
but the more poeple b*tch about it the more who are going to go see it to find out "what the deal is"
the sequel is almost assured now,
hell with the "choose your own adventure"
ending, there could be a series of sequels
dammit Tim, you are a genius,

Posted by FredHater (fred_hater@hotmail.com) on August 3, 2001 6:46 AM

That movie S-U-C-K-E-D!

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 3, 2001 7:27 AM

The planet of the apes is earth...

marky crashes on pre-prehistoric earth in the beginning, battles the apes but neglects to kill thade. Then, it gets tricky here, he travels into the future - relative to the pre-historic time he's just left, yet backward in time relative to the space-age he originally came from (hence the ship computer still counting backward) and he crash lands on the same planet, earth, whose future has been altered since thade just led the apes to victory once again, only this time they've discovered technology...
Makes sense, if they were strong enough to conquer us once, why wouldn't they do it again?

i'm not claiming the ending isn't open for interpretation, that's the genius of the movie, which, to my dismay, most people here consider it's worst point. I don't think the apes mastered space-travel as the article suggests, that's not apparent in the ending shot...we see modern technology, cars, lights, etc. but not space ships. It's more shocking if it appears to be 2001 rather than 2100.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 4, 2001 6:07 AM

That would make the most sense IF Marky marks chronometer had not been moving FORWARD before his first crash landing.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 6, 2001 4:29 PM

This is a very good explanation, however I was led to believe that they were not on earth due to the abnormally high number of moons orbiting around the planet of the apes. Unless pre-historic earth has 2 moons, they were on another planet. Don't get me wrong, I think it would have made more sense for the planet to be earth as well, but we are led to believe it is an entirely different planet.

Posted by pellis214 (No Email) on August 12, 2001 3:52 PM

Wasn't there an interview or "making of..." special where Burton or Wahlberg say straight out that this time it's not Earth?

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 7, 2001 9:20 AM

I agree that the apes did learn technology. They probably learned it from the humans being humans have the genuis to learn and develope new technology.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 8, 2001 3:22 PM

It was not Earth he crashed on the first time. If it was, why were there two moons?

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 10, 2001 7:44 PM

About the two moon thing... maybe the whole movie takes place in an alternate dimention where earth has two moons just like "the hobbit" isn't suposed to be earth's past.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 10, 2001 11:22 PM

Didn't anybody see 2010? At the end of that movie the earth has two moons.

Posted by pellis214 (No Email) on August 12, 2001 3:55 PM

WRONG!! Watch the movie with your eyes open. Or better yet, read the book. Remember reading? The multiplying monoliths on Jupiter turned it into a small sun. As a result, at the end of 2010 we saw 2 SUNS in the sky and Earth no longer had a night.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 24, 2001 12:57 AM

I like that

Posted by allknowing (you'llneverfindme.com) on August 3, 2001 9:39 AM

here's a thought....
1= where did the horses come from?
2= where did the people come from??
humans I mean..
were they all decendants from the space ship??
if it was pre-historic earth then are they implying that "we" come from otuer space??
and lastly...
assuming the apes controlled earth, assuming they had evolved in to what the ending implies, and assuming they had technology....why was it the same as "ours",
same cop cars, motor cycles, the Mall in D.C., clothing,...would they really develope the same...now yes I understand that the apes could have taken over control from us..
but, the apes that Marky was training were not as evolved as the ones he ends up fighting,
too many questions?

RE: RE: RE: Explaining Planet of the Apes' Ending

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 3, 2001 10:23 AM

Are you guys serious?!
Let me get this straight...You can sit through a 2 hour movie about talking monkeys...but you complain about the end being a bit "unbelievable?"

Burton doesn't even know what the end means. Quit trying to figure it out, because you can't. Why does the monkey land the pod while Marky crashes twice? It's called a plot device dumbass! If he doesn't crash, then there is no movie. If the chimp doesn't land, Marky can't leave. It's as simple as that.

I know it's not Citizen Kane...But what the F*%k did you expect?

I live in Hollywood, work in features, went to film school, and in the end it all comes down to one thing...
You've got to know the difference between a movie and a film.
"Apes" is a movie, and a very successful one. Mission accomplished.

I'm sick and tired of it not being "Hip" or "Cool" to like a movie anymore.

If you couldn't tell what this movie was going to be like before you went to see it...then you have the forsight of a damn dirty ape.

-duke

RE: RE: RE: Explaining Planet of the Apes' Ending

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 3, 2001 11:00 AM

I agree! You know movies are just a form of entertainment. Had talking apes really existed then I'm sure they would be speaking out about how absurd of a movie this was. Since that isn't the case why are we (as people in the real world) disecting the believeability or confusion this movie might generate. IT'S A MOVIE! When I first saw the preview for this movie my first thoughts were "hey! that looks entertaining!" and after the movie thought "hey! that was entertaining!" I wasn't expecting Othello or some type of "Traffic" type movie. I was expecting to see some good action and make-up along with a story that would leave me entertained. Why is their a need to be "that guy" (or gal) who wants to be smarter that Tim Burton and preach to the masses about how ridiculous the movie was? If they are so great it's never to late to go back to school and film school to share your talents with the world.

Posted by pellis214 (No Email) on August 12, 2001 4:04 PM

Nobody's saying movies have to all be art house crap. Nobody's saying they have to be absolutely believable. That's called "willing suspension of disbelief." The problem is that a movie has to be logical within it's own boundaries. Spacecraft? No problem. Time travel? No problem. Genetically engineered monkeys evolving, dominating humans and creating a human-like society? No problem. However, a pilot who flies forward in time to an alien world, then flies back in time to Earth and then finds Earth subjugated by those same apes he left behind? Big problem. If the end had been bizare or controversial, then okay. But this just made no sense...not even within the internal logic of the movie. Unless you're a huge fan of Carrot Top or certain Mel Brooks films, you expect the movie - no matter how wild or out there - to follow a certain built-in logic. An example of a movie that had an ending that made people talk and wonder what was real was Memento (About a man who lost his short-term memory and was searching for his wife's killer.)

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 21, 2001 2:00 PM

Yes, thank you for this intelligent contribution. Even if it's a movie, it's two hours of my life and must EARN its ending no matter how rubbish it may be. Creating a "twist" which is entirely unpredictable is just cheating the audience - a twist like Sixth Sense's or The Usual Suspects feels valid because we might have guessed, the clues were all there.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 7, 2001 2:12 PM

Anybody who thinks movies are "simply" entertainment deserves exactly the kind of movies we've been getting this summer.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 8, 2001 11:56 AM

duke, lighten up. so you are saying that if a movie has fantastical elements, it does not have to make sense? sorry, wrong answer. That is the reason so many movies fail.

So the movie is about talking apes. No problem. You set up a premise and the audience buys it or doesn't. But once you set up your premise you can't just put anything on film and say "hey it's just a movie". That is the difference between a good movie and crap. The ending makes no sense and comes out of nowhere. The ending of the original movie is a total shocker, but it violates nothing in the film's existing logic and works well. This ending did not. People who think like you do are why we get stuff like "Tomb Raider".

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 10, 2001 1:30 PM

Are you aware of the idea of cognative dissonace? It is simply the fact that the human mind cannot tolerate conflicting information or disconnected ideas. We naturaly try to explain such "cognative dissonace" any way we can. It is not logical that Burton would conciously create a movie that has no possible explaination and I think we will find this explaination in a sequal, which I think is highly probable in light of box office returns. I would argue that there is an explaination out there and refuse to belive any reputable film maker, such as Burton, would make what you call a "movie," without a real explaination

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 14, 2001 12:02 PM

What are you a fuking psychiatrist? The ending didn't make sense and it will be explained in the sequel. ITS NOT THAT COMPLICATED, SO DON'T BABBLE ON ABOUT BULLSH1T PSYCHOLOGY TERMS THAT NO ONE CARES ABOUT, GET A LIFE!

RE: duke's rantings

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 10, 2001 7:23 PM

Duke,
The original Planet of The apes had the very same fantastical elements as the new one and i think the original made sense.
...also may i add that i don't think there was quite enough time for all this evolution to take place.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 27, 2001 8:49 AM

well i hope you don't make any films yourself because your just talking crap all films need to have plot that everyone can follow. Lets look at back to the future this was slightly confusing when he kept going backwards and forwards but everyone understood it because it was well explained and there were no loose ends. When they return to their own time and find biff is a billionaire doc gives a simple explanation telling us that a different future had been created. Jurassic park is another good example the ideas were well explained making the film plausable.

RE: RE: RE: Explaining Planet of the Apes' Ending

Posted by allknowing (you'llneverfindme.com) on August 3, 2001 11:46 AM

listen "duke" dick
whatever..
I'm a film student too..
and one thing I've noticed about film students is that they tend to be arrogant pricks..case in point
its not a movie, it not a film, thats the medium in which the story is told,
what it is.. is entertainment..
discussing the story is entertaining..
what is wrong with "film" dicks like you, is that you feel you are above the movie-goer,
when you should be on the same level with them.
and with that in mind...
when you normally end a "story"
you usually try to wrap up the plot,
in this case it is left totally open for interpretation,
now you wanna' say that "we" are or aren't hip or cool
who cares, people like what they want to like..
if you can't handle that then don't add your opinion to a dicussion that you very obviously are incapable of having..
think about this..
good stories end up being detroyed in movies, that is what hollywood does, and in their arrogance they assume that "we" will eat it up,
where in reality(I use that term lightly) we want something to discuss, to over-anaylize, tear apart and taste to see if we like it...
so if you want to believe that there is a difference between a Movie and a Film then go ahead, you'll just continue to miss the point forever

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 8, 2001 8:04 AM

yea duke calm down let people use their imaginations

Posted by PAYAMA (fivecarhome@home.com) on August 8, 2001 6:15 AM

could be that the ending is a poke at human self importance ?
there is quite a bit of tongue in cheek humor in this film...

given the same chance
even apes could come up with our brand of society...
remember humans are just
below monkeys on the evolutionary chain ...
just a thought....

Posted by PAYAMA (fivecarhome@home.com) on August 8, 2001 11:59 PM

Ape Lincoln Memorial

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on September 5, 2001 8:17 PM

Ape-rham Lincoln
Memorial

Posted by djgmoney (The DJ's House) on August 6, 2001 6:27 AM

I don't think that the Planet Marky Mark landed on was Earth. If you may have noticed, when he left the Planet at the end of the Movie, there were quite a few moons in the distance....call me crazy, but I DON"t think that was earth.

I do agree, that is was strange that the entire space station crashed...would have been nice to get an explanition to that one. But is is a given that the people on that planet were the decendants of the Crew of the station. That is how The Generals father had the weapon in his room.

All in all, this was a film for entertainment. I think it gave the viwer what they paid for...Marky Mark, great special effects and we all left the theather thinking about what just happened and would we be willing to cough up another $7.50 to see it or a sequal again.

Posted by billbordendt (doesntwork@noway.how) on August 3, 2001 11:17 AM

Lets get serious people; this ending has only one meaning--Tim planned to make a sequal. It's got PotA II written all over it. As to the how or why, even Tim wouldn't know that until final script approval; which, God willing, will never happen. Everyone drops the ball once in a while; with any luck, Tim will recover and go back to dirceting the great films we all love him for.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 12, 2001 7:09 PM

... no sequel... tim burton will not make a movie with apes wearing human clothing, driving human cars, in a 21st century human environment through out the whole film.... how cheesy will that film look like... the movie ends like it does... if there is a sequel tim burton will not do it cause it will be too stupid... remember "Batman Forever"

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 27, 2001 9:01 AM

I agree a sequal can be the only explanation. Lets face it starwars had a few loose ends but they were tied up when the following movies came out and look how big that trilogy was sorry is. But even if there isn't a sequel everyone whos seen it have got there moneys worth because there still talking about it and enjoying argueing there points on forums like this.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on October 26, 2001 5:22 PM

Actually i dare to defy that Tim had a sequel in mind!
The way he ended the movie suggests that he wont. I daresay it's impossible to give a reasonable explanation and I think Tim knows so.
The main reason for the ending is actually in the book (by Pierre Boulle). in the book the narrator finds out what had happened on the planet (not earth) AND THEN goes back to earth, just to find it ruled by apes. Logical- NO. But thats the book. Actually I think it's worth praise for Tim to dare use this ending. And likewise he is not this "great genius" who made it up - he just barrowed it from the book.

You can find the story of Pierre Boulle retold on the following URL:
http://planetoapes.tripod.com/reviews/bookplot.html

Read it. You may be surprised!

Posted by Tinman (Tinman_80033a@yahoo.com) on August 3, 2001 11:58 AM

while the given explanations are all plausible, WHO CARES!!! BRING ON THE SEQUAL!!!

Posted by allknowing (you'llneverfindme.com) on August 3, 2001 12:12 PM

yeah baby, yeah
thats what I'm talkin' about

RE: RE: RE: Explaining Planet of the Apes' Ending

Posted by AXEMAN (bigturnerfish@hotmail.com) on August 3, 2001 1:14 PM

%100 American,

Are you able to get in contact with Joey Mullen?

RE: RE: RE: Explaining Planet of the Apes' Ending

Posted by FredHater (fred_hater@hotmail.com) on August 3, 2001 2:24 PM

Whats your deal with Joey Mullen? Are you pissed he didn't give you a reach-around?

RE: RE: RE: Explaining Planet of the Apes' Ending

Posted by _UserName_ (No Email) on August 4, 2001 5:27 AM

bah.. i'm tired of sequels or remakes. half the movies this year have a 2 at the end of their title. don't you people want something original instead of more of the same?

Posted by SkorrySod (jlemast@columbus.rr.com) on August 3, 2001 8:09 PM

There's no mystery here, Burton simply wanted an ending with a similar ironic twist as the original. And yes, this does open the possibility of a sequal. What disappoints me is the lack of reason for him to fly to Washington, DC. An Air Force pilot would head to an Air Force base, not the nation's capitol. I can think of no reason for him to go there other than to see the altered Lincoln Memorial, and he didn't know it had been altered when he approached. Regretably, I must conclude that Tim sold out with this ending. Very disappointing.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 4, 2001 8:16 AM

Marky just wanted to check out Ape Lincoln...

RE: RE: RE: Explaining Planet of the Apes' Ending

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 5, 2001 12:08 AM

Okay. This is what happened. Earth evolved to the point where Marky Mark was traveling through space and was training monkeys. If you remember the monkeys were genetically altered to be able to understand how to perform their advanced functions. The monkey went into the pod and into the storm. He disappeared. Marky Mark went after the monkey. The storm was actually a time warp. It did not have a specific time frame. When someone went through the storm it randomally put them in the past. Marky mark disappeared as well and the Air force mother ship went after him as well. Get this. The mothership crashlanded before Marky Mark and the monkey. They crash landed on a barren prehistoric planet, thousands of years before Marky Mark did. The planet was Earth. Since the monkeys on the ship were genetically altered, through time they broke away from the humans and after time evolved to the point were they were dominant. The humans on the ship multiplied and through time they were forced to take to the jungles to hide from the physically superior monkeys now evolved to apes. Marky Mark crash landed on prehistoric earth thousands of years after the mothership crashlanded because the storm randomally put him at that time. He got captured, escaped and so on until the monkey in the pod arrived randomally at that time of the final battle scene. Marky Mark failed to kill the leader of the ape army and got into the pod that the trained monkey flew in on at the time of the battle scene. He thought he was leaving this backwards planet and went back into the time warp which put him back on earth in the future. when he crash landed on earth, it was ruled by apes because the leader of the ape army in prehistoric earth managed to survive and say you should of killed me! He then either killed off the humans or enslaved them again. It would have been easy for him to do because they outnumbered the humans and were physically stronger anyway. That is what happened.

RE: RE: RE: Explaining Planet of the Apes' Ending

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 6, 2001 9:35 AM

No offense, but the point about the moons above is right on. In no time during earth's past has there ever been more than one moon. Therefore, the prehistoric planet he landed on was not earth.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 10, 2001 8:57 PM

hi, i would like to say tat wut u said in this explanation had a flaw. u said tat the apes outnumbered the humans, but remember the time during the dinner at the senators house, one of the apes said tat the humans outnumbered them 4 to 1 and they must find sum way to solve ta prob cause it can b a threat to the apes. mite not make a big difference in ur explanation but i jus wanted to point tat out.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on September 2, 2001 5:06 PM

where to begin? this is quite a tough one, but the question of are you a complete fool should suffice. we did not need a synopsis of the plot of the film, as we have already seen it, that is why we are here! you offered no information about any part of the film that a trained monkey could not have regurgitated after watching the film! don't try and hang out with the big boys bozo.!

Posted by pellis214 (No Email) on August 12, 2001 4:10 PM

That's pretty good...except that Wahlberg was going back in time, not forward when he left the ape planet. Also, was I the only one who saw multiple moons around the planet? That wasn't Earth. Time Burton could have avoided all this crap if he'd just changed that 3 second shot of the clock to going forward and changed a few voiceovers.

RE: RE: RE: Explaining Planet of the Apes' Ending

Posted by rainyday (not available) on August 5, 2001 10:51 AM

what the hell is "a random shemp"? and why does "it" ask and answer "its" own questions?!?!

and hasn't "knowitall" ever heard the definition of assume? it makes an "ass out of u and u" in this case!

RE: RE: RE: Explaining Planet of the Apes' Ending

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 5, 2001 2:26 PM

I'm just curious what the 3 or 4 alternate endings were like.... ah, there's nothing quite like DVD fodder.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 23, 2001 1:48 PM

hello

RE: RE: RE: Explaining Planet of the Apes' Ending

Posted by allknowing (you'llneverfindme.com) on August 6, 2001 6:14 AM

odd couple,
a classic,
and I assume you knew that

Posted by QWERTYUIOP (poop) on August 6, 2001 6:08 PM

Ok, time to explain how the movie ACTUALLY portrays these happenings, in everyone's favorite, contradictory form! Yay!

A.) Had you actually looked at the clock thingy during the time warp, you would have seen that Marky Mark went to the FUTURE into the Planet of the Apes, and then went BACK to the PAST as he returned to Earth.

B.) Now, my geography's a little hazy, but as I recall, Earth only has and only had one moon, and was never really near Saturn, either.

However, I agree with your account of the random warping and that he landed after the mothership, which supplied the populations of humans and apes.

This being said, Marky Mark , being the dumba-- that he is, left Thade with a pod in which he could travel, allowing Thade to travel into the storm and eventually to Earth centuries before Marky returned. Thade had some time to kill between their two arrivals, so he kinda used his strength and leadership to take over the Earth in the name of the apes.

Either that, or Burton just lost his marbles in thinking a twist without reason was a good idea. Pray to Jebus he regains his senses and comes back with more of a Burtonesque genius in his next film.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 10, 2001 1:40 PM

That makes sense but how did monkeys evolve into the more human like form in only "hundreds of years"

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 10, 2001 3:47 PM

they said it was thousands, not hundreds, of years since the mothership landed.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 10, 2001 7:35 PM

evolution like that takes millions of years for a chimp to look like a gorilla

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on September 2, 2001 5:13 PM

it's not reality it's fantasy - try and use your imagination you space cadet!!!!! also just a quite point it doesn't take a genius to work out that the mother ship had crash landed thousands of years before Marky as it was a relic by the time he reached it and the apes tell us it had been there for thousands of years!

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on July 4, 2002 4:59 AM

good explanation but one thing you and other people are missing is how thade got out of the sell marky mark put him. it was bullet proog and could only be opened by marky mark

Posted by pellis214 (No Email) on August 12, 2001 4:13 PM

I think the most likely explanation was that either Burton or the "suits" at the studio thought that it would be cool to have a twist at the end of the movie just like the original and, for whatever reason, gave no thought to making it fit into the rest of the story. Kind of like the heavy rain at the end of that crappy movie version of Dune. No sense whatsoever, but a great visual.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 10, 2001 1:36 PM

Andrews Air Force Base is right out side Washington DC, although it seems he was trying to land at national (Ronald Regan) Airport

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 6, 2001 6:48 AM

Hey,

You're all discussing the issue based on a simple sense of "timeline"...
Open your minds... Read some comic books!!!!

What if time and reality are not in a straight line??

What if the Washington ruled by Apes is part of "another" Earth?? Not "ours"

Why do we HUMANS have to be so selfish?

That's it: an alternate version of our world/universe.

The magnetic storm sent him to the "right time", but "wrong space".

It's not that new ("Howard the Duck" anyone?)

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 6, 2001 10:15 AM

I agree perfectly with what the guy before me said about an alternate earth. It is all about the theory of parrallel universes and time paradoxes...here's an example:

A time traveler bulids a time machine that will let him travel back in time and then retun back. No lets say that he decieds to kill his own mother (or father)...and that there is no mystical force holding him back from performing this deed. Because the time traveler killed his own mother, that would mean that the time traveler would have never been born. However...because the time traveler was never born, his mother lives and has a child ( which is of cousre the time traveler ). The time traveler of course kills the mother...and this keeps on going on ( and is known as a parodox cause it can't be solved ). This is one reason why it is believed time travel is not possible. However, lets say that the time traveler returns to the present, if it is possible to do this, then there may be the possibility of parrallel universes. Now if the time travelller returns... no one would knows of the existance of the time traveler at all ( becasue the mother was murdured ). But this universe is actually a parrallel universe of the universe where the time traveler left and never returned...

maybe you are getting lost, but the point is that there are parallel universe...and that our universe that we live in may be a "fake" universe of the "real" universe in which apes are the intelligent life and that these two universes have the exact same history.

Of cousrse this does not explain for the "choas theory" which is that even the slightest change in the past will cause extremely varied results. Lets say I go into the past and kill a mosquito. But it turs out that that mosquito carried a deadly diese and infected a major scientest that invented somthing like a nuclear bomb...everythign would be way different.

Another problem with what I said is that in the movie...the clock in marky's pod went forward in time...not back...and my explination is that Marky travel back in time. However, i still believe that Marky originally traveled back in time regardless of what the clcok said. I believe that the clock changed not because the time changed but because of electromagnetic disturbalnces originating from the space storm. I believe this because if the time displayed in the pod changed, then why didn't Marky get old and die inside of the ship... The clock is not consistinant with this. Therefore...it may be that instead of traveling forward in time to another planenet...Marky acutalls travels back in time to prehistoric Earth! I could go on and on...but i'm going to stop. If you feel intereseted in this stuff you can look on the internent for "time paradoxes".

eric

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 10, 2001 2:01 PM

Intresting stuff, one comment: Marky Mark traveled either a great distance in time or space or maybe his travels where through a differant demention of space or time (see string theory). But if his travels agree (at least in part) with our laws of physics the only way to travel such great distances or travel in time would be by going faster that the speed of light or by finding a worm hole. If he was traveling at faster than the speed of light, he would not grow older but everything else would age. But for some reason, the clock on the ship seems to reflect not Marky Mark's time but that of the rest of the universe, thus 10 seconds to Mark was thousands of years to the rest of the universe as seen on the clock. This doesn't make sense, aside from the fact that it is physicaly impossible to travel at the speed of light (Mass becomes infinate). Worm holes are a phyisical possibility (see steven hawking's website) where space and time are bent. Imagine a string layed out straight is time or space and you are somewhere on the string. If you bend the string so it crosses, you could jump from one place in time or space to another time in the future or past or a great distace. This could only occur with a huge gravitational force such as a black hole or (maybe) an electromagnetic storm which could bend space time. Therefore, if we assume mark went through a worm hole, we cannot say if he went in the futre or past or if he just traveled a great distance in the present

Posted by pellis214 (No Email) on August 12, 2001 4:28 PM

You're very literate, but you are making the mistake of twisting the events on screen to fit your own theory. That's a no-no. I've read quit a lot of SF and time travel's one of my favorites, so try this on for size: Keeping with what happened on screen being the basis for any theory, Wahlberg DID go forward in time. It's quite easy to explain his not aging as his being outside the time stream. Spacecraft can track location and the passing of time by the surrounding stars. That's what was happening. Wahlberg's ship was tracking the stellar motion, thus the fast-scrolling clock.

The Ending Explained!

Posted by lingerboy (No Email) on August 6, 2001 10:20 AM

POTA is Earth
MM went through wormhole from 2029 to Earth 2500
The space station went through the worm hole and landed on earth in 500 AD
The ape Semos leads some sort of revolt and the apes are able to over power the humans on the space station.
The apes evolve for the next 2000 years to the point that they are at in 2500 when MM arrives. Remember, they have the benefit of all of the evolution that had taken place up to 2029, so they have now evolved another 2000 years (what would be the equivalent of 4029 w/o time travel). That is why they are so intelligent.
At end MM went back through wormhole from 2500 to Earth 2100
Thade followed MM into worm hole and went back to 2050
When Thade lands on Earth, he finds intelligent apes, b/c they have evolved differently due to the Space Station crash in 500AD.
Thade becomes a Celebrity (he is from the future) and rises as a political/religious leader of the intelligent apes.
Thade achieves equal rights for super apes.

The only thing that doesn’t fit for me is the three moons. Why would there be three moons around the Earth in 2500? Maybe there is a major natural catastrophe between 2100 (MMs return to Earth) and 2500. Maybe a meteor hits earth and creates 3 moons and wipes out most of the population.

If you are saying POTA is not Earth, then explain horses, the older gun that Thade's dad had, the remarkably similar conditions (water, air, gravity, plant life, etc.). If Thade came from a non-Earth POTA and populated the Earth with apes from his breeding, then he must have got to earth way before MM got back there. So I'll assume you are thinking hundreds of years earlier, say 1600AD. Then if he so radically altered the history of mankind, why do they have Washington DC (looking almost as it does today), police cars, helicopters, etc. Not likely since none of this stuff was on your non-Earth POTA.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 6, 2001 10:48 AM

as I said before...parallael universes are where everything is the same except one thing...or another things involes the chaos theory making everthing completely different... the ending of this movie was obvoiulsy a result of a parrallel universe.

There are two things I don't understand about the movie...

1.) All the apes talk about thir creator, Samus, and when he lands, they say...oh I always believed that the second coming of samus would occur ( sorof like Jesus ). WHAT SECOND COMMING OF SAMUS!!! I don't that samus went to the planet at the time of the spacehip crash and after the the battle...i think that samus just came to the planent after the battle...I believe this because the maydae call said that the apes got intelligent as a result of the elecromagenetic storm...and samus wasn't intelligent...so he probably wasn't with the space ship with the space crew when it crashed...

2.) I also don't understand why the Marky left the planent!
He had everthing going for him... a hot blonde girl tht is really on to him ( and not to mention a really hot ape girl ). He also has the respect of all the humans on the planent, and also the respect of the apes (remember that the black ape just under command of the General Thades didn't obey Thade's order to kill Marky). After the battle, everyone loved him...and many even worshiped him as a god...WHY THE HELL DID HE LEAVE. Also, the dumass said that he wanted to go home...WHAT HOME YOU IDIOT! His home was the space station crew...its not like he has another life and friends on earth...they would of forgotten about him when he left to work in the space station. When Marky recieved the mayde he said that "his friends did all this for me"...His fellow crew members where his friends...and he lost them...they were his home, not earth. He also doesn't understand anything about space travel and has no gaurantee that he will return to the correct time. He should have stayed with the apes and humans and be their extremely wise leader who rebuilds society. And another thing that makes me think that Marky is a complete dumbass...he didn't have sex with the sexy blonde. He could of also had sex with both the blonde and the ape at the same time if he wanted to. Even so...why didn't he take the blonde girl with him on the ship to have sex with? I'm really comfused.

Eric

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 10, 2001 2:18 PM

How about this: after the big ship crash landed and the apes took over, Samos the leader used one of the pods to leave the planet at go back into the worm hole. The apes say he will "return" and it would all fit together if he returned in the same way he left, on a space ship. Therefore, this adds a whole new demension. Where did Samos go after he left? To earth? If this is the case we have the possibiltiy that Samos lead the apes on earth in the past or helped to evolve their race. Now with a viable ape race on earth, thanks to Samos, Thade could come back later in the past (Maybe Lincoln's time, as Thade is dressed in the memorial in the 19th century outfit) and lead the apes to complete dominance. This leaves the possibility to at least two prequel movies, cha-ching!

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 10, 2001 10:11 PM

hmmm...u got a really good point. in fact, from the point u gave made me think of another confusing question. remember that wen marky checked out the mayday wen he arrived at climus wit the others, the lady in the screen said the apes got very intelligent and one called himself simos, obviously meaning tat the apes could talk. so simos or sum other ape travelled bak in time to earth. so my point is if the apes new how to operate the ship and stuff, why didnt their technology grow since they can also learn like the humans. so if the apes were as intelligent as we think, how com they were still in the medival period of their time instead of having advance technology after those hundreds or thousands of years??

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 27, 2001 9:10 AM

basically eric you just wanted to see the blonde get her kit off and i have to say your comments about the "sexy monkey" are very disturbing and i suggest you go back to perving over Lara Croft.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on September 4, 2001 5:46 PM

You're an ape!

-sexy blonde

Posted by pellis214 (No Email) on August 12, 2001 4:34 PM

Maybe you should go have some sex to clear up your confusion.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 6, 2001 11:05 AM

POTA is NOT Earth, even Burton insists that this is not the case.
The gun came from the mothership. The horses could've come from the mothership. (Remember the sign that says "Live Animals"- who says they were only apes. OR the horses could've been indiginous to the planet-the horses are a minor issue to me.
This whole story takes place on another "M" class planet (borrowing from Star Trek ;-) and Thade uses Davidson's original pod to get to Earth, and arrives hundreds of years in advance- not necessarily too far back, after all, it only took several decades for Ceasar to train other Apes to speak, etc. in the original POTA series...
Besides, this is a work of FICTION, so we can suspend some disbelief here for the sake of good entertainment...

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 24, 2001 8:36 PM

This is my take, thou i believe that the genius in the film is that how many different ways it can be interpretted.

PotA is Earth. Leo crash lands in a future Earth, as the ships clock suggests. The rescuing mothership lands on a past Earth (approx 500AD) as they pickup their own 'may day' signal along with other past transmissions such as Hitlers olympic games speech thing. The year is about 2500 and the apes evolved from the genetically altered ones on the ship.

In the end, Leo goes back in time to 2100 but discovers the world to be ruled by apes which have technology due to the human innovation.

Now for this world to de-evolutionalise (is that even a word? hehe) there must have been a war (like the original) or maybe a great natural disaster. Maybe a meteor shower hit the earth: thereby explaining the extra moons as meteors being trapped in Earths orbit, and maybe Earth got knocked into a different orbit around the sun, hence Saturn as the neighbouring planet. Many humans are wiped in the disaster with the few survivors. The apes also survive and begin a civilisation. Kind of like the deal with the neanderthal, a more dominate species; in this case the apes, limiting a lesser species - humans - and would possibly lead to extinction of humans.

At least this explains to me howcome Leo lands on a barren planet of the future yet returns to a ape controlled present.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on May 26, 2002 9:12 PM

Your explanation makes some sense, but if Thade landed on earth in 2050, and they wanted to memoralize him, why would they replace Abe Lincoln's statue. Thade would need to arrive on earth before the statue of Abe Licoln was built in order to have his statue in the place of Lincolns

Posted by 100% AMERICAN (hellskitchen_@hotmail.com) on August 6, 2001 10:37 AM

wow, this thread really brought out the dorks:

I thought I was bad.

Posted by pellis214 (No Email) on August 12, 2001 4:33 PM

The ape planet was not Earth. Too many moons. Not to mention the log that Wahlberg fournd. The horses were probably embryos on the space station or it was a case of parallel evolution. The gun is even easier. Did you notice that it was the exact same model that Wahlberg retrieved from the lake? It was one that belonged to the station crew and was kept by one of the apes.

Posted by pellis214 (No Email) on August 12, 2001 4:15 PM

Another possibility, but explain the General Thade statue. It was obviously put there to be representative of the same Thade in the movie. So how does the same guy on another planet become an ape hero on Earth?

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 6, 2001 10:48 AM

1)Thade knows that the apes were once "Slaves" to men, as told to him by his dying father.
2)Thade knows about the "spaceship" Davidson crashlanded in.
3)Whoever goes through the "time" storm first, arrives last- and not only that, but the time between travelers entrance is lengthened before arrival-point in case: Chimp enters storm first, then Davidson seconds later,then the Mothership, several days/weeks later. On POTA, Mothership lands first, Davidson second, but hundreds to thousands of years later, and Chimp lands 3-4 days after Davidson. Presumably it works the same in reverse...if Thade entered the storm after Davidson, even just days after, then he would land on Earth decades or hundreds of years before Davidson did.

If in keeping with the events of the original sequels... just like Cornelius and Zera found Taylor's original ship in the lake, so could Thade find Davidson's ship in the "swamp" and use it to travel back to Earth, where he could free the apes who were "slave" to their human captors and hence have the most appropriate monument built to his honor.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 6, 2001 10:58 AM

i like the point you made about how the first one going into the protal comes out last...That would also mean that if thade went into the storm last...he would then exit out first...way before the spaceship and be able to change human history in his vision. ( that is of course assumnig that the time of most of the movie is in earth's distant future.

Another thing is I'd like to mention is that thade doesn't necessarilly half to get the pod out from under the water...and probably can't because apes are araid of water. (he probably could do it however by forces slave humans to retrive it...but then ofcousre, as I said before, Thade has no respect of the human and ape population (ie the black ape didn't obey his order ) ). Even if it was recovered...it may have been damaged by water...or maybe not because the little handheld device wasn't damaged... anyways... there was an extra pod inside of the crahed spaceship that wasn't used...(you need to look closely for this one)...and he could have used that to return way way back in time to change hisotry. Or you could just believe my old theory about the parrallel universes...

eric

PS...god dammit...I type to much...this is my third responses already!! ( ericrfontaine@hotmail.com ) ... yup...the three responses with eric at the end were mine!

RE: RE: RE: Explaining Planet of the Apes' Ending

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 6, 2001 11:33 AM

this is eric again...one more idea this time

Many people believe that time travel into the past is not possible because time paradoxes could occur, resulting in parrallel universes which to many people seem highly unlkely.. However...many people think that time travel is only possible by going into the future...and Einstiend said that if space travelers go near the speed of light, then they will go through time at a faster pace than normal people. So assuming that only forward time travel is possible...here is my new timeline:

1. Humans on earth evolve and develop civilizatoin

2. sometime between the present date (2001) and the time the movie began (2023 or something) humans developed space travel and starting doing the ape space station thingie.

3. Samus gets lost in the electromagenteic storm

4. Marcy gets lost in the elecromagnetic storm.

5. After perfroming tests...the space station gets lost in the elecromagenectic storm.

6. Earth is destroyed by possibly volcanic problemes (remeber the lava) or maybe a metor hits (which may result in many moons, which are chuncks of earth that are knoeced into earth's orbit by teh metorer). Most species such as the jugle species survive the impact, but of course apes and humans do not.

( now we assume that what goes into the stom last comes out first )

7. becasue the ship went in the stom last, it comes out first and crahses onto Earth's future. The monkeys on the ship become more intelligetn as a result of elecromagnetic radiation from the storm.

8. The apes become the dominanat species and the humans are the weaker ones being hunted as slaves. The apes also deveolped a basic civiliazaton and culture in this future earth.

9. Marcy crashes into earth and does his stuff...this is where most of the movie occurs.

10. Samus lands on earth (rember he comes out last because he went into the storm first.

11. The dumbass Marcy decides not to have sex with the blonde the ape and decides not to become the respeced leader of earth, and instead leaves earth and enters the storm.

12. General Thades is unable to win back the respect of the people...but somehow escapes earth (either in the pod that chashed into the lake or in one of the extra pods that are left in the crashed space ship). Remeber...greeks goes like alpha, beta, gamma, delta...so that means that there are two extra ships besides the delta and gamma. General Thades then goes into the elecromagentic storm.

13. Because Thades went into the storm last, he comes out first and then lands on earth in an even more distant future and builds ape history ( that for some reason reasembles human history )...mabe this is some quirk. HEY WAIT A MINUTE!..you can forget about the last two spepes because I forgot that Thades possed the gun...which definately gives him the most power...He could become the leader simply becasue he posses the gun and doesn't even half to do any space or tiem traveling....man...i wasted my time...

14. Thades builds up society and for some reason history reoocurs very similarly ( remeber that sayin in history class about history allways repeating itself ). When Thades die...they build a monumnet for him.

15. Marcy comes out of the storm last ( remmber...first in is the last out ) and lands on Earth in an extremely future earth. He lands on the lincolm memorial and is either worshipeed as a god or is sent to jail or excecuted.

15. the losers at holly wood decide to make a sequel in which Marcy frees the human from zoos and makes humans and apes equal again (history keeps on repeating itself)

Man... that was long...i hope you understand

eric

RE: RE: RE: Explaining Planet of the Apes' Ending

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 6, 2001 2:50 PM

Look, eric, write a book and sell it to someone who gives a squat. I think you are the only one left in this thread and no one's going to build you a monument. By the way, It's marKy, not marCy. End of Line.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 10, 2001 10:41 PM

some flaws in ur explanation-u said the jungle animals survived the meteor crash on earth, so how come the horses, which at plain and grassland animals, are still alive in POTA. and second, simos (samus in ur case) was not the lil monkey lost in the ship because the lady in the mayday tat marky checked out at calimus said tat one of the apes from the MOTHERSHIP named himself simos. the apes in the movie jus thought tat pericles (markys monkey friend) was simos becuase it came from the stars, so the 2 monkeys simos and pericles are 2 different monkeys.

WRONG ERIC

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on September 2, 2001 12:35 AM

You forget one simple thing. When Marky Mark or Leo goes through the magnetic field. He travels back in time to the year 2100. Therefore, Thade had to have traveled in time. My guess is that he traveled in time in the 1700's at the boom of our country's history. Except he was equipped with weopans and material to genetically alter the apes.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 6, 2001 9:04 PM

Listen up b*tches....even if thade would have gone back to hearth, he would be the only intelligent chimp in the world. Humans would have put him on a circus freak show or something....even if he had a gun.....i mean.....you know....millions of humasn against one talking ape...it sounds hard to believe...i think thade just f*cked every girl on the planet and had zillions of ape babys that conquered earth

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 10, 2001 2:21 PM

That makes allot of sense. Do you think that the Lincoln Memorial was already built, Thade tore it down and erected himself as a replacement or is thade the "original" memorial?

Posted by The_Baffler (mike@funnyclown.com) on August 6, 2001 9:12 PM

I completely agree with you. I just want to add that Thade enters earth around the civil war time and at that time frees the apes with advanced knowledge of science and DNA which he obtained from the Orbitron. Over many years he advances the apes to take over earth. Walburg enters around present day to earth hundreds of years after Thade and finds Thades ancestor still after him in present day. Walburg goes to the library to read in the history books what Thade has done and so begins the next movie...Walburg must start a revolution using the human slaves of earth and take over the planet...This should lead us into the next movie

Posted by A Bunny in the Evening (movies@mov.com) on August 8, 2001 6:50 AM

Umm... How would Thade have been able to find the spacesihp in the water? Apes can't swim. Do you really think the humans would help him go after their hero?

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 6, 2001 6:17 PM

evolution happens over more than a hundred, a thousand, or even a million years. therefore the leap in the ape's evolution is actually more likely through reproduction. seamos most likely assaulted the woman on the ship sexually or something (remember her screaming on tape) to create this super ape.

thade OBVIOUSLY doesn't just land on earth before marky does, as his entire civilization would not be in our modern world. he would have had to have stayed behind to alter the order of events.

the fact that it's DC and similar to our equivalent of the modern world lends to irony of the scifi genre.

my 2 cents...
...ryan@liftingfaces.com

Posted by johnnyaqua (here) on August 6, 2001 8:18 PM

Tim Burton didn't come up with this ending. I have a script from a draft written in 1996 (Back when it was supposed to be another sequel in the series) I had it in my possession since 1999. Although the story and characters changed (Yes Dr. Zaus was in this one) in the ending Arnold (who was playing the astronaut at that time) fixes his ship and travels back to NY, Crashes at the statue of liberty and lo and behold she now has an ape face. They changed the monument too I may add. And the ending was left up to the sequel to explain.

Posted by rainyday (not available) on August 6, 2001 8:27 PM

Now that ending IS more interesting!

Posted by johnnyaqua (here) on August 6, 2001 11:16 PM

The movie itself looks more intresting also. The apes live in a more advanced society then the apes of the previous movies. They have helecoptors and tv's and cars. There was a lot of campy stuff in it like a billboard that says "Watch the #1 cartoon show the Simions". With Oliver Stone writing it there was a bit more political implications on how the apes took over the world. It might have been good but it could be the sequel.

Posted by rainyday (not available) on August 7, 2001 8:30 AM

are you saying you really have a draft of "the" sequel?

you know, this movie was pretty good...it lacked something..well, several things..but, overall still better than many I've seen this year..and moneywise, it's done very good so far!

Now, if whoever is in charge, will just come back with a good follow-up and this can be done if they would listen to feedback like in these forums to see what the real moviegoers think,
they will be able to "smirk" at the nasty "professional" reviewers and give the ticket buyers a nice surprise.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 7, 2001 2:17 PM

Made too much money NOT to get a sequel green light. It could always be worse, the next one could be directed by John Woo. Not that he's terrible, but it would add 30 minutes to the movie just to accomodate the slow motion shots....

John Woo

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 8, 2001 9:43 AM

Ha ha ha!

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 7, 2001 3:53 PM

People in America have no imagination and insist on being spoon fed all literature and entertainment. I think it was excellent to leave something of this magnitude open to individual interpretation. We need to think a little here and many of us are simply too lazy to do that.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 9, 2001 5:32 AM

AMEN!

Posted by 100% AMERICAN (hellskitchen_@hotmail.com) on August 7, 2001 3:59 PM

Speak for yourself RANDOM SHEMP

Posted by pellis214 (No Email) on August 12, 2001 4:39 PM

"open to interpretation" is not quite the same thing as just plain illogical.

Posted by rainyday (not available) on August 7, 2001 4:47 PM

Well I for one definitely expect to be "spoon fed" at a movie titled "Planet of the Apes"!...I wouldn't expect to take notes and do a 200-page interpretation!...and not because I'm lazy...you have missed the point...sometimes "mindless entertainment" is just what the doctor ordered!

Two cents??? I think I wasted a whole quarter here

Posted by dgauthier (da_gauthier@hotmail.com) on August 7, 2001 9:25 PM

Well, I don't know about all of you... I just got back from the theatre and had hoped that I could find the true "what the hell this damn ending was all about" explanation on the Internet.

Must admit, we as an audience do have some imagination…

What happened as I recall is as follows:
Monkey goes into storm.
Marky goes into storm after monkey.
Spaceship goes into storm after Marky.
(The first in, last out explanation has no logical flaws, and nobody has disputed it so far, so I’ll incorporated it into my theory)

Spaceship on POTA is thousands of years old as a historical, religious monument. Also guarded by outposts and "scare crows" intended to frighten and keep Apes away. We know why... because Thades father (and his fathers, fathers, fathers) knew the origin and the truth of their evolution - and effectively wanted to keep it a secret. We can adopt any philosophical, historical, or racial reasoning Thades bloodline did not want to embrace this history, or why Apes from the crash would have wanted to overthrow their human counterparts. The logged video archive initially states the Apes were smarter than they imagined and very helpful… but something went bad. Who cares what? Are we looking for another subplot, or did Burton just want to get along with the film…

Anyway – This was not earth. Forget comets, meteors, and asteroids. They would wipe out all life, not systematically kill off humans but allow similar primates to flourish like a weed. This was another planet in another time in another future. Parallel universe? Wormhole? Distant galaxy far, far away? Are we really required to know? All we need to know is that if there were more than one moon ever… than POTA is not Earth. “Moons” orbit planets. “Planets” orbit stars. “Comets” orbit either and have a nice tail like anything that moves through space. “Meteors” just move on…. If POTA had more than one moon, then it would still be there hundreds and even thousands of year’s before/after. Moons don’t commute to more interesting planets. The ones in our solar system have been around for millions of years… so lets get over this. POTA was not Earth.

Sign say’s: “Caution Live Animals.” I’d say that the horses and Apes came from here and who knows what else. Apes and a few humans survived the crash… how about a horse or two?

Apes overthrow humans, but don’t kill them all. The Apes were genetically enhanced, and would likely evolve more rapidly over one lifetime than standard evolution would allow people. This is why they became so smart, and in time smarter than their human counterparts. The Apes became dominant, and in a twist, humans had to recede into the rainforest and other wild habitats. Life went on. History was sealed. Humans became slaves.

Suddenly Marky lands and can’t comprehend this new “present day” world. Fights to save his hide and captures the interest and help of a few influential Apes. He requires directions back to the crash site, so he further employs the help of fellow slaves – in turn freeing them and the chase begins…

Thades receives a brief history lesson from his father and receives an artefact (gun) as proof. Now we have motive, and the chase becomes a race against time. The next half hour is a decent chase scene until Marky gets to his old spaceship and finds no hope for himself, but finds he is the hope of those other humans. In a dramatic rise against the evil oppression (Apes) we get a fight scene similar in content to “The Patriot” or “Braveheart.” (Maybe Mel Gibson should have played the part of the space hero).

In the thick of the fight, just before Marky gets it, his faithful monkey lands and confuses and awes everyone. Monkey runs to ship and so does Marky and Thades close behind.

Now here is where I think Burton struggled... We know he deviated from his Arnold ending with the Statue of Liberty in the image of an Ape, so something wasn’t adding up for a clean wrap-up. Marky didn’t care much of his Monkey. He never ran to his rescue and I don’t blame him. I’d have gone for the gun too, then tend to the Monkey after I killed Thades. Either way, he never got it – Thades did, but Marky managed to enclose him in an enclosed area of the ship. Marky leaves the monkey, the blonde bombshell, and the babe Ape behind. For all those who debate “why” and have paid such painful attention to detail, did nobody notice the cramped space, and barely enough seating for one that fit a 60 lbs pound monkey rather comfortably? There was no room!!!

Why did he leave? Why ask why? We all make dumb mistakes, and he realized that in the last 60 seconds of the flick. Thought it was not his time or his place or … just had to tell someone this crazy tale!!!

Gets to Earth (no multiple moons here) only to find out its run by Apes and a statue of “Thades Lincoln” – Hero of the Day steps from the Whitehouse.

Thing is this. All those vehicles… the style of clothing… even the camera the photographer had…they were all dated to the late 1980’s (look again). No cool new futuristic cars or “Star Trek” type clothing. Typical DC pop culture from 10 years ago. So, IF Thades landed a few years before Marky did – then how could so many Apes exist, and how could they just move into our physical culture, assuming our identities without even changing a thing – like say the colour of a uniform?

IF Thades landed hundreds of years before Marky – then history would not have evolved in parallel with present day Earth. I’d like to think that huge Apes would design a police cruiser a bit more ergonomic to their massive size.

So when then? Neither makes sense (go figure). Neither would a parallel universe since nothing on this new Earth, not even the technology was designed with the Ape in mind. Even a parallel universe, while amazingly similar to Earth, would have its technology fit its dominant inhabitants.

I’m not going to propose a theory. I think Burton intends to clear this up in the sequel. But did anyone notice the amazing similarity some Apes had to those disgusting humans?

Great movie with a disappointing ending. Burton got his controversy and his controversy got us to watch the movie in droves. I even want to see it again to see if I got all this right!! But as moviegoers all should know, unwrapped plot-twisted endings will leave us all to our imaginations. (The Sixth Sense, Unbreakable, etc… Need anyone say more?).

Dont dwell on it!!!!!!!!!

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 8, 2001 4:02 AM

Who cares about the three moons!!! You people are dwelling into this. How do we know that prehistoric earth did not have three moons. Were we around at that time to confirm this? maybe two moons got hit by meteors and vanished. maybe the two moons flew of their orbit collided into earth and split the continents to what they look like now. noboby knows. it was not a different planet. It was earth. There is no way one stupid ape can go to earth before Marky Mark and change things with one gun. He would have been gunned down by police the way amadou diallo was. The reason there were apes on the second planet Mark crashed on is because the apes conquered the humans once again. As far as modern day DC not changing and being controlled by apes, it was just to make the movie more interesting. Dont dwell on it.

RE: Dont dwell on it!!!!!!!!!

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 8, 2001 8:09 AM

Moons can't leave their orbit any more than our own Earth can spin out of our Solar System.

If we did have an extra moon and it hit Earth, it would have done more damage than just split the continents - it would have wiped the planet out and left an unquestionable crater and more than enough debris...

Most good movies need enough reality to keep our interest. If it's too fake, we all say "oh, as if!!" and groan.

Show me a 500 lb. Ape that can effortlessly jump 20' high and 40' over to another tree here on Earth. Gravity doesn't change with the ages.

Though I do have to agree not to dwell on it. I think we'll find most of us were wrong when the DVD comes out and we watch the directors commentary. In the meantime, we'll all keep guessing.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 8, 2001 4:14 AM

Your most likely all wrong, and when the sequel comes out, we'll see what really happened.
--out--

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 8, 2001 7:54 AM

They simply repaired the ship that felt in the water :)

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 8, 2001 10:40 AM

This was a fine movie and the ending makes perfect sense.....it is entertainment...

Posted by vandertodd (nonyabizniss@about.com) on August 8, 2001 1:59 PM

my interpretation is as follows:

It is a metaphor. We treat our fellow humans just as badly as the apes treated humans, so what difference does it make which species(or race) runs a planet if you are not of the same species(or race) as the rulers?

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 8, 2001 1:59 PM

This ending doesn't necessarily make sense because it's not intended to. It's actually a tribute to the ending written in Serling's first draft of the 1968 screenplay that was loosely based on Pierre Boules' ending in the novel.

In that first version, Taylor gets back in his undamaged spaceship, leaves the POTA (which was a different planet than earth) and heads back to earth. When he arrives home, he has returned to a world that is ruled by, you guessed it, apes.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 8, 2001 2:11 PM

This ending doesn't necessarily make sense because it's not intended to. It's actually a tribute to the ending written in Serling's first draft of the 1968 screenplay that was loosely based on Pierre Boules' ending in the novel.

In that first version, Taylor gets back in his undamaged spaceship, leaves the POTA (which was a different planet than earth) and heads back to earth. When he arrives home, he has returned to a world that is ruled by, you guessed it, apes.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 8, 2001 10:50 PM

the space station is merely a device to "tip its hat" (or spires) to the orignal Statue of Liberty ending (and to momentarily fool us), The Ape Lincoln ending is metaphor for Apes/Humans White/Black slavery and to give us a surprise (the Liberty ending we already know about) to flip us out and to nod to Pierre Boulle's ending (the astronaut returns to Earth with his new wife and she starts screaming when she looks out the ship window at the soldier, "He is an ape.")

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 12, 2001 5:08 PM

FINALLY somebody in this thread figured it out! This is exactly what the writer of this POTA had in mind, and it fits in perfectly with the whole "sci-fi-ness" of the movie.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 9, 2001 7:22 AM

I think that the hero has in fact travelled back to the past, but not enough.
As you may recall from teh movie, the big spaceship crashed too. The chimps inside it had the technology and knowledge to evolve into whath we saw in the end of the movie.
Surely, they evolved just as we did; and before year 2400 or so, there was some kind of nuclear war between apes and the result of it was the primitive culture showed in the whole movie.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 9, 2001 4:49 PM

Anyone see a connection between the little gorilla that gets caught throwing rocks and the photographerat the Lincoln/Thade Memorial? The photographer has the same look as the little ape, except 20years older.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 9, 2001 7:37 PM

The connection is this: they both wore the same dumbass monkey mask.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 10, 2001 11:18 PM

u kno wut i think...this can be one big dream tat marky is having...OR...this is all in the MATRIX...

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 9, 2001 7:53 PM

Anyone who's read the original novel ("Monkey Planet") can appreciate the simplicity of the story without there being any confusion about the ending: Man crashes on planet where apes have evolved as the dominant species. Man eventually escapes planet to return to Earth only to find apes have evolved to become the doiminant species. Brilliant.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 9, 2001 10:29 PM

I've read this entire thread and no one has mentioned how old the people in the recordings looked. The Captain and the female Doctor looked much older in the recordings. Why, I have no idea but the Captain seemed a little to causious to take his whole ship into a storm that already claimed two of his pods. Maybe they looked for Mark, avoiding the storm all together and thats why they reached the planet before Mark, they never went throught the time dilation.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 10, 2001 9:40 AM

still no one has answered my question...why does MarKy go back to earth? All the humans and the apes think of him as a god and they all like him. He also has a monkey girl that likes him and a blonde girl that likes him. We do remeber the movie that the people sent to him early on int he spaceship...but he still doensn't have any gaurante that he will return at the same time. He should have married the ape girl and the blond girl and stayed on the planent.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 24, 2001 1:44 AM

he wanted to go home...period. Too bad it had to nip him in the butt.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 11, 2001 11:48 AM

The reason whalberg looked older was because he went forward in time in the beggining. Since he was going forward in time, the people in present time saw him as he would have looked in the future, which was where he was.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 10, 2001 8:46 PM

The explenation of the ending in the article does not make much sense. It is impossible for Thade to lead the apes on Earth against the humans. The apes on our planet barely have any intelligence. How could Thade have lead them against humans if he couldn't even communicate with them? Not to mention it would be impossible for a revolt of apes to defeat humans because they wouldn't have had any guns or warfare of any kind. Also, humans on our planet outnumber apes by at the very least 100 to 1, the idea of apes defeating them and ruling the planet is impossible. Even if they did, how would all the unintelligent apes on Earth become so advanced that they know how to drive cars, hold guns, shoot camera's, and build monuments? If you meant in your article that Thade lead the apes on HIS planet against Earth, that doesn't work eather. Davidson created a revolution in there world where humands are treated the same as apes. They wouldn't have fought the humans of Earth. Also, supposedly Thade arrived on Earth in the past. It would be a pretty huge coincidence for him to just stumble upon the storm, and then, out of all the planets in the galaxy happen to find Earth and safely land on it. The fact that this ending is not plausible should eather mean that A: It's not the real ending, or
B: The ending is a a "plothole" itself!

I HAVE THE ANSWER...

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 11, 2001 5:47 AM

Here it is kids, the real gut of the truth of everything. Please respond to this by email as I don't come to this site often. NutByte@aol.com
Anyways, hold on to your hats, here we go...

As you'll remember, Thade is left alone in the sealed room at the end...The same room in which Whalberg was in the beginning of the film with the monkeys in their cages...the same room with the pod shuttles. If you'll remember, the general says to Whalberg after they lose Pericles... "We can't go after him, we can't waste another pod ship" or something to that effect. There are THREE pods. One, Pericles takes. The second, Whalberg takes...the THIRD is left. Whalberg says that the ship is designed to never lose power. So Thade had access to the working pod. He must have somehow figured out how to fly it since they are pretty much self-navigated and found his way to the time portal. He traveled back into time...and from what I hear he lead the civil war, thus the Abe Lincoln statue and the rest is history. Email responses to NutByte@aol.com

RE: I HAVE THE ANSWER...

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 11, 2001 9:10 AM

How about this theory? Spaceman lands on earth in the future and finds that apes are in charge. The space station had crash landed on earth hundreds of years prior to the year 2024. Spaceman leaves the future and goes back in time to the year 2024 or there abouts only to find that apes are now in charge. The explaination for that, is because the space station had gone back in time and the apes evolved and taken over the planet? If the space station hadn't crash landed in the past then the apes wouldn't have been in control when the spaceman returned to his original time. As far as the "multiple moon" problem goes I don't believe that was suppose to have any major role in making the viewer believe that everything was taking place on another planet.. I think it was all happening on Earth...

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 11, 2001 7:28 AM

there's also the spaceship in the lake that the astonaut crashed in... salvaged it makes a bit more sense, but still... weird ase ending

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 11, 2001 1:48 PM

I read the article proposing an understanding of the film's conclusion but I'm 50/50 in its viability. I guess as viewers we HAVE to make sense of what we were watching for almost 2 hours. I tend to not worry so much about 'how' a film works but rather 'what' is its message. My personal thought on the ending was that the storm Leo and Pericles flew into was really a tempoal storm, kind of like a nexus of wormholes all swirling together. I think Leo himself travelled to another parallel timeline and space where apes ruled throughout history on earth. If you try and use his chronometer readings as a basis you'll just keep getting confused. High-tech electronics and 'exotic' electromagnetic phenomena just don't mix! How could you really trust those numbers after his systems were fried like chicken and he (Leo) went into the storm right after Pericles?! It was noble of Leo to try and get back home by flying back into the storm but really, how could he succeed by doing that? The storm scambles your origin point (where you came from) which is your reference to where you want to go (say, earth)and the chances of finding the exact point and the exact time where a craft or person entered and exited the storm has got to be like 10 million to one!

The other observation I noticed was the Thade Memorial in D.C. I don't think that's the same earth Leo left by a long shot specifically because of the Thade statue. In the final fight scene where the humans faced off against their 'ape' oppressors, Thade was eventually trapped inside the carcass of what appeared to be the space station where Leo lauched from in the opening scenes. Thade attempted to appeal to Athar (his right hand 'silverback' gorilla) to help him escape. Athar refused because Thade had injured Semos and made a mockery of their pseudo-religion or legend and in Athar's words,"...betrayed our people!" If that's the case, why would Athar return to the ape population and praise Thade and allow him to go down in some portion of history as a great savior? I figure Athar would say good riddance and die like the scum you are and take personal satisfaction that a self-serving chimp such as Thade was forgotten.

ebell74@home.com

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 11, 2001 3:10 PM

Y'all,
three points:
1. plot terrible
2. acting horrific
3. special effects dissapointing

given the above, who cares what the ending "meant"?
it was an awful movie, one of the worst i've seen in years. even worse than jurassic 3! and thats saying a lot.
the ending made absolutely no sense whatsoever no matter how you try to rationalize it. ultimately, movies should tell stories, and this one failed to provide even that.
i would be very surprised if they managed to pull the cash together to sling together another 2 hours of this worthless garbage.

Explaining Planet of the Apes' Ending

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 11, 2001 6:09 PM

People are speculating like mad, and personally I don't know what to believe. There are so many options and almost all of them have 1 or 2 glitches that say that it can't be that way. Heck, we aren't even 100% sure wether Mark travelled to the past or the future first or in the end! Or if POTA is earth or not! haven't the producers of the movie said anything? Nobody who should know the real answer have spoken yet? Cuz I'm really getting crazy trying to figure this out....

Explaining Planet of the Apes' Ending

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 12, 2001 6:20 AM

There are 2 things I wanna point out. First, when the Oberon approached the storm, they recieved all transmissions sent from the earth through all time. The last thing they recieved, as I recall was their own mayday. I'm not 100% positive on this, but I'm pretty sure this is what happened. But it was the last thing they recieved, not sure what to make of it. BUT, if the strange rules with thing going first in coming out last in the storm somehow applies to these transmission, their mayday call might be the first thing ever sent from the earth. Also I don't think we can trust Marky's clock in his egg ship. As I recall the captain of the Oberon said that all digital clocks stopped, or were messed up or something like that. Which means his clock in his ship can't be trusted. Either it didn't work at all, or might have shown time BC.

not earth

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 13, 2001 2:58 PM

this is for you morons who think that the planet of the apes was actually earth.

the following is from from the storycrafting chaper of
"the planet of the apes: reimagined by tim burton"

"the latest writer to tackle the script is Willaim Broyles Jr., a former journalist......"
".......Broyles had decided not to set his version of PLANET OF THE APES on earth, as was the case in the original film, but on a different planet altogether, called Ashlar, because he wanted to remove the thought that this was a repetition of the first movie."

so there you go, it is NOT EARTH YOU MORONS.

RE: not earth

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 21, 2001 2:30 PM

Moron is a strong word to bandy around and can rebound. Is it not possible that Burton is on a campaign of disinformation - this quote is from before the movie was released - he wants to guard the twist? Ditto red herrings like the 2 moons etc

Posted by JayEss (Nada) on August 12, 2001 4:53 PM

Why hasn't anyone brought up this:
The apes on the ship were chimps, not gorillas, not orangutangs. I think Burton counted on us as humans to have the "they all look alike" menatlity - in fact I believe it's a part of the films message, just as in the original. I really don't think Burton would just throw out a half-a$$ ending just for shock appeal. This guy has a plan, we just have to look for it in ways we wouldn't normally be accustomed to.

BTW, a hint: why would there be horses on a space station? The chimps had a purpose but horses? So if the horses were not from the space station and the planet is not earth (can't get around the multiple moons) then how did the horses get there?

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 13, 2001 11:12 AM

I am not sure about gorillas, but there are young orangutangs on the spacestation, not just chimps.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on September 8, 2001 1:43 PM

About what someone said about Athar never letting Thade out of the glass cell thing:

Athat would let him out so he could be tried and brought to justice. If he didn't, no-one in the city would believe him and live side by side with the humans simply because there was no proof and that the one ape they thought they could trust was Thade. They'd assume that Athar had killed Thade to take control of the army...

If he could get Thade to confess then everything would be peachy. The way I figure it is that Thade kills Athar, Ari, Limbo and Pericles as they broke the cage to capture him for trial (remember he has those blade things he used on those two soldiers in the jungle) and told the army outside (who hadn't seen anything that occured inside the spaceship) that Pericles wasn't Semos and that Athar and the rest were traitors. The only ones that would know would be the humans- and who in the city would believe them?

Therefore Thade would be seen as a hero for destroying the human threat (Leo) and he would still be general. He could wipe out the humans-his original plan-and no one would care. The apes would love him for this and he would be immortalised as the saviour of their world and civilisation from the 'evil humans'

Deimos

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 12, 2001 5:42 PM

ONLY SOLUTION GEN THADE EVOLVED INTO AL SHARPTON

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 12, 2001 11:52 PM

If Tim Burton makes a sequel to PotA, I will be not-too-happy. It doesn't matter if the movie's ending does or does not make sense;

1. If a sequel is made just to say, "Oops, left out this bit of the first one, it'll make sense now," that is not always the sign of a nice filmmaker, am I right?

2. PotA is a classic able to be subject to remakes, but remake a sequel /or/ make a sequel to a remake? I myself almost never like sequels (some people/movies are better at sequels than others) and many others are opposed to sequels as they usually suck.

~

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 13, 2001 2:18 PM

What we need is Patrick Ewing to make an appearence and clear this all up.

not earth (censored)

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 13, 2001 2:59 PM

this is for people who think that the planet of the apes was actually earth.

the following is from from the storycrafting chaper of
"the planet of the apes: reimagined by tim burton"

"the latest writer to tackle the script is Willaim Broyles Jr., a former journalist......"
".......Broyles had decided not to set his version of PLANET OF THE APES on earth, as was the case in the original film, but on a different planet altogether, called Ashlar, because he wanted to remove the thought that this was a repetition of the first movie."

so there you go, it is NOT EARTH.

RE: Get a life

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 13, 2001 5:49 PM

OK Dorks, back to bed

RE: Explaining POTA

Posted by JayEss (Nada) on August 13, 2001 6:04 PM

The space station crashed on the planet. The humans that survived the ape attacks fled to the jungle. Remember, only 20 years or so after being finger-painting chimps they had the ability of speech and reason. This is a remarkable advancement in such a short period of time. Imagine what they could do in 100, 200 years! There is a problem though. The humans are bigger and can procreate faster, posing a potential danger for them in the future.

POTA is not earth. The large apes and horses were brought there by the POTA apes to keep the humans in check. How? Beats me but these were smart apes with a space station filled with technology, knowledge, and a never-ending power source. Forget the argument that they needed a hand-print to get access – they’ve seen the humans do it a thousand times, they know what needs to be done, so they could either keep a couple of severed hands around or they enslaved a human or two. It would not be unreasonable to believe that they could modify a pod. Given the way space travel/time travel works, they could populate POTA relatively (no pun intended) quickly.

So the POTA apes start to bring back apes and horses, initially from the 19th century, around the time of Lincoln. They train these apes and genetically engineer them, though not to the extent that they themselves were engineered – no one wants an ape as smart as they are, only bigger. They also create the Forbidden Zone mythology so the earth-apes do not have access to their “god-like” technology.

As the earth-apes evolve on POTA their culture is based on what apes do best – they mimic what they know, which is 19th century humans. Hence things like a chandelier, organ grinder, slaves, etc. Also note the absence of electricity, motor vehicles, and other later human advances which would surely be known to the POTA apes. As time goes on the POTA apes bring back more earth-apes but now from the 20th century, with artifacts. One of these apes mates with Semos, which starts the Thades bloodline. The Thades descendants are genetically superior so their superiority over the other earth-apes is a given. They have knowledge of the real history of POTA. I know this sounds WHACKED but consider this:

I believe that the name Thades comes from Authedes. Authedes originates from Gnosticism, a religious movement that threatened Christianity early on. The term Gnosticism comes from the Greek word “gnosis”, which means “Revealed Knowledge”!
In Gnosticism, Authedes was a lesser deity to the “original, unknowable” God. Authedes was known to create “emanations” which has been defined as “divine procreation.” Coincidence? Or is Burton even shrewder than given credit for.

How we get from here to Marky Mark landing on the Washington Mall in the 1970’s with Ape Lincoln? Working on it :)

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 13, 2001 7:55 PM

You guys are focusing on the obvious murky plot element and completely missing the REAL Mystery. . .

If the good looking human babe didn't have access to a comb for her hair, WHERE did the LIPSTICK come from? A mere "oversight"? I don't think so. . .

Posted by AustynSN (AustynSN@aol.com) on August 14, 2001 12:26 AM

OK, here's my explanation. If you like it, great. If you don't, fine. It's all entertainment anyways, but I like to solve the mysteries when they are given to me. First of all, My theory involves the "self defense of history" theory. Basically the theory says that time cannot be changed under any circumstances, and that time travelers will always fulfill a destiny, never alter history from what it should be. I present my theory in the form of a timeline. "Pota" is of course the Planet of the apes.

Earth, 2024--The chimp (I can't remember his name) flies in the storm, then Leo flies in the storm.

2054 (rough estimate)--Space station goes through storm.

Pota- about a thousand years before Present ("Present being the day leo lands)-Space station lands. Apes help them at first, then turn on them. They evolve to become dominant, while humans live in forrest.

Pota Present--Leo Davidson lands, see movie, because I don't want to summarize the whole thing here.

Pota Present plus 3 days--Chimp lands. Leo takes off and goes back through storm.

Pota--Present plus a few weeks (est) Thade, living off military rations he had on him, manages to learn how to run the remaining pod. launches and goes into storm.

earth 2058 (or around there. Basically sometime after the Space station left), Thade lands on earth. It was hinted in the movie that even normal apes would be capable of sentience if we knew how to teach them. (This was an important theme in the original book. Kudos and thanks to the fellow who mentioned it before me. For all of you who haven't read it, DO. It's great, and totally different from any of the movies.) Thade spends some time lying low, pretending to be a normal chimp. When nobody's looking, he trains the earth apes with the ideals handed down to him from his ancestors. As he teaches them, he instructs them to teach others, and to listen for his signal, when the worldwide overthrow of the human opressors will start. He does his overthrow, and the grateful apes remodel the lincoln memorial to his likeness. They probably remodel some other stuff. They also learn how to use and repair all the technology the humans have laying around.

Earth, 2192 (random guesstimate) Leo Davison lands on earth, which has now been ruled by apes for quite some time.

Posted by AeonII (oscarrdz@hotmail.com) on August 14, 2001 6:56 PM

Here we go...

Sure...Let's supose POTA is not Earth; Thade flew tru' space and THEN time; Thade helped earth apes AND monkeys and they conquered Planet of the Humans. They destroyed Abey face and put Thade's face in there and now monkey dudes rule the world...Sure.

Now, if so, what would happen to earth's future filled with apes?

All of this POTA-is-not-earth theory is founded in a space station that was created by HUMANS, in a HUMANIZED earth, with monkeys being MINORITY and living in a zoo (remember Marky explaining that to the funky bunch?).

So, if Apes rule earth, there is no HUMANIZED earth, and no SPACE STATION, and no CRASH in a far and away, lonely planet. Then there is no genetically trained apes, no Semos, no Pericles, and no Marky Mark and the Funky Bunch, therefore, there is no Thade going back to earth's past going to train standard apes AND monkeys.

(...still here?)

Ok, let's suppose we all are stupids and we believe POTA is not earth.

Somehow (fixing the pod, OR using the remote control Marky left in the ship OR fixing the buried big-ass ship, or a combo of everything above) Thade flew straight to eart in time AND space or viceversa. Sure, and I'm Bill Gates.

First of all, apes at POTA (where Marky Mark crashes first) were STUPID. They didn't have any technology or techies to develop technology. It would take hundreds of years to develop hi-tech stuff for apes that ,actually, think that a pod is a holly signal from Semos.

Ok, let's say Thade is Einstein incarnated in a monkey body and he got a shoot in the head from allmigthy Semos that converted him in a big damn genius. Sure. What about the tools? electronic supplies to fix the pod?

I know Marky Mark is the stupidest, worst than the funky bunch because he didn't run away with the blonde girl (I'm in love with the girl so don't give any comment about the girl) on his shoulder, but I don't think he is so stupid to leave a pod lurking beneath the water if he knew he could fix it!!!!

Ok, our Super-Thade fixed it. Fuel???!!!

He got fuel from trash, Back to the Future-style. Time Travel???

POTA IS NOT EARTH DOESN'T MAKE ANY SENSE AT ALL

What if POTA is earth?

Read my first comments on this post, same stuff...if apes rule earth, then there is no space station, no time travel, and then there is no genetically trained chimps, no Marky Mark and funky bunch, and no Semos to convert monkeys to his faith. Plus, earth has 1 and only 1 moon.

POTA 2001 doesn't make any sense, any ending you think about, doesn't make sense.

Tim "I-Love-To-Burn-Your-Brains-Big-Time" Burton has to burn his brain big time if he is going to run a sequel on this make-no-sense-at-all film.

Anyway, the movie was cool, and it is burning our brains big time.

Oscar

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 15, 2001 1:13 AM

heres an idea that can help you people figure this out.

the digital/electric storm doesnt directly make you time travel, it just makes your pod go faster.

if you watch the first pota, if you go near the speed of light, then time goes by a lot faster.

the oberon totally avoids the storm.

my conclusion: whoever goes into the storm, goes into the future, no matter what.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 21, 2001 5:23 PM

thats exactoy what I have been saying all along!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

eric (again)

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 15, 2001 9:52 PM

The question, "Where did the horses come from"? You have to assume that POTA evolved similar to earth and that the horses were already there. This also helps explain how the apes took over POTA. After the mother ship crashed and the super apes escaped the humans they started to procreate with the apes already on POTA, and then their children would be smart apes too...

One thing you all forgot

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 21, 2001 10:43 PM

What about the second pod?? When he gets into the storm he sees a flash then another pod appears spinning out of control like its lost all its power, it only takes about 10-20 seconds at the most to dissapere in the storm. This one appears then Mark's pod goes by by, you dont see what happens to the other one. I think that this is one of those, end at the beginning kind of films... it will end at the space station when mark arives home. Dont make me fill in the rest, thats just my Idea!

A point

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 22, 2001 7:11 AM

i'm pretty sure that if somone could explain how the other monkeys and the horses got into pota then the mistery will be solved somhow.

try to think in this direction - semos went back to earth using the pod in the spaceship and brought some animals with him...
or something like that.

semos must have a significant part in helping us solve the mistery...

good luck to everybody

n.s.

RE: Giddy-up!!!!!!!

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 22, 2001 8:55 AM

You guys are forgetting the most important part.

WHERE DID THOSE DARN HORSES COME FROM?????????

Lemme guess..
they used horses on the spaceship too?
Some sort of Space age ridding stable?????

Ha! Ha!

Still a descent movie though!

Lil' Buddy

RE: Giddy-up!!!!!!!

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 23, 2001 8:09 AM

How do 20-30 genetically modified primates take over a sophisticated space station after the crash landing? How do they evolve (enough to defeat the humans) in only the time it takes for the crew to grow (30 years say)old?

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 24, 2001 12:48 AM

May I ask anyone if Walberg and Percules may have went back in time of POTA in the beginning if the movie 2500BC and not the future as the "computer" was reading???

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 26, 2001 7:01 AM

Ok, lets look at the things that are cetain facts:

-- The slave master is seen pocketing something from the ship

-- At the beggining, the 1st POD appears again from the time warp, but is never told who it was in the POD, and that a mayday message was recieved by somone with simian features around then

-- The woman monkey says that the things mark is using is scorcery, and that its wrong. This suggests that they DID have technology but banned it.

-- The POTA planet is NOT earth.

-- When marks monkey turns up at the end, he says "good work. you went home". Why does the monkey class that as home?

-- The ship is still there in the lake, and only tharg and that chick know about it.

-- At the beggnining of the movie, marks monkey fails to land the POD in simulation, but lands it 2 times after that perectly.

-- The apes on the earth at the end of the movie arnt afraid of water. (if they were, they wouldnt be able to get to that tech level themselves)

-- Thargs father says that humans owend the planet long before the apes did, even though the transmission says that humans were nearly wiped out from the get go. Is he talking about movie-ending-earth?

-- Marks monkey is left behind, and he is the only one who knows how to fly a POD.

-- (this one is a theroy) When mark goes all through time, his date counter goes all over the place. Because the POD itself is not advacing in time, the clock should stay still. Unless its gets its time from a central clock on the main ship. Why would you have every clock throughout the ship configured indepenutly? That would mean that the at first he went 100-1000+ years ahead of the crash, and then 100-1000 years before he even left the ship in the second warp. Just a thought.

-Fubar

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 27, 2001 4:21 AM

well i think that the fit bird shagged thade and had sh*t nights. He then went back to the future (which is the past) and left the humans.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 28, 2001 5:25 AM

POTA wasn't earth, as there were no signs of a McDonalds or an Irish pub to be found - the true symbols of a planet earth!!

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 28, 2001 1:13 PM

THADE AND PERICLES COMMANDEER ONE OF THE REMAINING SPACE PODS (THEY WOULD FIT). THEY ARRIVE JUST AFTER THE STATION CRASHES. THADE LEADS THE GENETICALLY ENHANCED APES IN A REVOLT (TAKING THE NAME OF HIS "ANCESTOR"--A PARADOX)AND DEFEATS THE HUMANS.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 28, 2001 3:51 PM

Damn you all!
Damn you all to hell!

Posted by Toref (spam@nothanks.com) on August 28, 2001 3:54 PM

Sent: Wednesday, November 04, 2099 10:23 AM
Subject: FW: Big Secret. (fwd)

Pssssst, this is a secret.

Spread this around to everyone except for Marky Mark.

When Marky Mark returns from space, everybody dress in Ape Suits.

Pass it on.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 29, 2001 5:24 AM

I think, there aren't lot of elements in this film to explain end of this ...

By exemple, try to explain Men far in space at date of 2029, with a big space station and very good technologie ???

In original "Planete of Apes" , the space conquest of humanity aren't so advanced ...

Perhaps, some unknown evenements are arrived before the beginning of the film ...

Wait next episode , if there are a next episode , or try to break your brain ...

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on September 3, 2001 4:50 AM

ha ha ha, nice one. i laughed for about half an hour after reading that

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 29, 2001 3:18 PM

I wasn't exactly taking notes or anything, but wasn't Thade talking about some way of destroying all the humans at some point?
He could have made this and take it to Earth (through the Storm thingy).

He would have taken some apes with him (there could be some apes that still look up to him - there was one ape that disagreed with cruelty to humans, after all), who would have 'mimicked' the humans (which they are good at, as someone pointed out). He may have landed at 1980, explaining the old-style vehicles etc.

Of course, it's a paradox - if the humans were killed they couldn't have built a space station - but we could use the parallel universe theory to cover this up.

So basically:
-Marky Mark leaves PotA
-Thades gathers up his remaining supporters and builds this bomb or whatever
-Thades, or his ancestor or whatever, somehow takes the pod to Earth and uses the bomb, killing everyone
-His supporters come to Earth from PotA (I have no idea how) and learn how to drive the cars etc.

There are lots of holes in this theory, and I actually believe that there is no explanation, but still, it's a possibility.

-FVH3

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 30, 2001 12:32 AM

A billion years later on POTA, they discover space-time travel... a scientist ape travels back and Thade, being a spiteful sh*t, kicks his ass and jumps in his space-time machine, tracks down Marky Mark just to piss him off...

Cheers,

Homer

Ending - Joke?

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 30, 2001 5:14 AM

Maybe this is just the British sense of humour but...

I'm quite happy with the idea that Tim Burton was just taking the piss.
Ok so the ending fits easily with no plot (unless you go wholesale into multiple parallel universe theory).
But honestly, I was in the cinema and just as Marky Mark is climbing the steps of the Lincoln Memorial I though "It would be really funny if it was a statue of an ape".

It's an unlikely ending sure - but it made me laugh. I would like to see some of the alternative endings though.

Fi

What if....

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on August 30, 2001 9:10 AM

One thing that I noticed was that Capt. Mark (whatever) seemed to recognise Thades - maybe? Remember at the begining Thades said "that one looked at me".

Could it be that Capt. Mark recognised Thades from the statue?? It was never mentioned that he did not - only that he wanted to get home. Just a thought to add chaos to confusion.

Cheers...

VB

RE: What if....

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on September 3, 2001 3:16 PM

Hehe:)

well well you all did not think about ONE THING ... the only thing that really makes sense IS that marcy only dreamed that he came back to a earth that is ruled by apes

seriously this is the only thing thats possible and then and ONLY then the movie would be logic :P

he just awakes from his nightmare docks on his space station and earth is ruled by humans :)

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on September 4, 2001 1:54 AM

The movie wasn't logical at all. Would you ever leave the two girls (ape and human) without having done a threesome? I don't think so.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on November 23, 2001 8:56 PM

i agree, thats all i f*cking care about, the rest of the movie stunk ass and i never saw the ending because i fell asleep. That movie was a waste of 2 hours

RANDOM THOUGHTS

Posted by fishflesh (filaydfish@aol.com) on September 4, 2001 10:15 PM

OK I JUST SAW THE MOVIE TONIGHT FOR THE FIRST TIME, AND I JUST SPENT AN HOUR READING THIS PAGE...I AM A SCIENFE FICTION/FANTASY JUNKY AND I WILL HAVE TO THINK ABOUT THIS FOR A FEW DAYS UNTIL I FIND A SATISFIABLE CONCLUSION,AT LEAST IN MY OWN HEAD... BUT HERE ARE A FEW THINGS TO CONSIDER WHICH HAVE NOT YET BEEN MENTIONED ON THIS WHOLE PAGE... FIRST OF ALL DONT FORGET THAT THE MOTHERSHIP WAS WRECKED, THEREFORE THE PEOPLE ON PLANET EARTH WENT TO LOOK FOR THEM, THEY DIDNT JUST FORGET THEM...THIS NEW RESCUE/SEARCH MISSION FROM EARTH WENT IN TO THE SAME ELECTROMAGNETIC STORM AND CAME OUT ON THE POTA, AFTER MARK LEFT...THEY SUFFERED THE SAME FATE AS MARK AND THE ORIGINAL MOTHERSHIP AND CRASHED HORRIBLY (BEING THRUSTED OUT OF THE STORM IMPAIRED THE LANDING GEAR OR PEOPLE) THADE THEN HAS A POD FROM THIS NEW SHIP, OR INFORMATION ON HOW TO BUILD ONE, AND HE CHASES AFTER MARK YEARS LATER BUT STILL GETS TO EARTH YEARS BEFORE HIM, IN TIME TO TAKE OVER BY THE TIME MARK GETS THERE... NOW THERE ARE SOME SERIOUS PROBLEMS TO BE DISCUSSED , MAINLY THE DATE CLOCK ON MARKS SHIP, HERES MY THEORY ON THAT SO FAR.... THIS SHIP WASNT BUILT FOR TIME TRAVEL, HUMANITY DIDNT HAVE TIME TRAVEL , THAT IS WHY THIS STORM IS SUCH AN ANOMALY, SO THIS DATE CLOCK IS JUST MEANT TO TELL THE PILOT WHAT DAY IT IS, AND THEREFORE WAS BUILT TO GO SHOW THE NEXT DATE AFTER ONE DAY PASSES, SO WHETHER OR NOT MARK WAS GOING IN TO THE FUTURE OR THE PAST, DAYS WERE GOING BY AND THEY WERE REGISTERED ON THIS CLOCK BUT ALWAYS REGISTERED AS THE CLOCK MOVING FOWARD AND NEVER BACKWARDS BECAUSE THE CLOCK DOESNT MOVE BACKWARDS, IT WASNT BUILT FOR THAT...AS I SAID IM STILL THINKING ABOUT THIS... ANYONE WITH SOME INTELLIGABLE INPUT FEEL FREE TO EMAIL ME AT THE ADDRESS SHOWN..THX FOR READING EVERYONE... FISCH

RE: RANDOM THOUGHTS

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on September 5, 2001 5:42 AM

Read the comment above and you know the truth...

Real end+ explanation

Posted by akmc2001 (bulkseite@hotmail.com) on September 5, 2001 2:58 PM

Listen up y'all: It's all about when to get into this stupe-ass time-storm. Mark Wahlberg gets into it five minutes before his little ape. and he is on the other Planet (not earth, because it has two moons) in year 2500 or so, but 3 days before the ape. that says, that the Storm turns time and streches it in the opposite way. the station first follows it right away, and crashes at the empty planet, where the gen-manipulated apes mutate to what they are lots of years before the others. But the radio message they send (the "we need Help" sh*t) makes the Station think of what to do at the present time and makes go to the storm a little later and more careful. because they get in a little later, they are at the planet before they themselves sent the message and before there is anybody else. they get back to earth, but land there at the time of the origin of the human race because of the time-warp-stuff.
they free the apes to help them and that's it, with the one difference, that the humans rule over the monkeys and the monkeys are freed by Thade.
Mark whalberg gets back at the right time, because he stayed ther for some more days. Think about it... Peace

(excuse my f*cked up spelling and english, but i'm German and I'm drunk in school everyday)

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on September 7, 2001 5:36 AM

Hi folks,

after I’ve spent at least 2 hours reading this forum from the beginning to the end, it’s perhaps time to give my opinion about what happened at the end of PotA. I won’t say I have the one and only explanation (I think even Tim Burton himself can’t give the REAL explanation, because there is none – unless there already exists a plan for a sequel). But remember Burton considered many different endings (including the Ape Statue of Liberty) and he chose that one we saw: Ape Lincoln (at last I recognized the pretty little pun, wow, that took me a long time!). He did it because of the achievements of the human Lincoln in real life: He freed the black slaves in America. That is of course too much a parallel to General Thade freeing the apes on earth to be just a coincidence. So I don’t think that the idea with a parallel universe works here, even if it was a nice one: General Thade took over the “only” earth that existed.

Here is how I think the whole scenario happened:
First, there is to say that PotA is NOT earth. Burton said it himself, and I don’t see any reason why he should put two moons there if the planet was earth. (Well, maybe to confuse us, but this wasn’t necessary, since the end is confusing enough.)

In 2029, Pericles enters the wormhole, Davidson some moments later, and they both arrive in the future on PotA, Davidson some days earlier. The mothership searches for him for several days or even months, and flies into the wormhole last. It crashes on PotA in the future, but some hundred years before Davidson and Pericles arrive, and the crew sends a mayday-message which goes through the wormhole. The message arrives in the past (2029 to be exact) and the mothership receives its own message shortly before it crashes. To explain all this, I will adopt the theory of “who enters the wormhole first will come out last”, which seems possible to me.

Sometime after the crash, the genetically manipulated chimps under the leadership of Semos revolt against the space station crew and take over PotA, which was uninhabited before. The apes create a community, build Ape City and so on until the day Davidson arrives.

Now there’s the film, which tells the story about the human revolt and the big war at the end, Pericles arrives, General Thade is trapped in the crashed space station and Davidson leaves through the wormhole, goes back in time again (let’s say he arrives at about 1980), only to discover that Apes are ruling the earth.

This is because General Thade went into the wormhole as well, and as he did it after Davidson, he comes out before him (at about 1800). Let’s say he used the Alpha-Pod which was left in the mothership; Pericles knew how to navigate it (remember that he only failed in the test at the beginning of the film because Davidson manipulated some data!) and so they came to earth and landed safely without being discovered. General Thade used his leadership to unite the apes against the humans, maybe he even got the help of black slaves and reenslaved them after the white men were defeated, who knows?
The apes took over human civilization, and this is why e.g. Washington D.C. existed. (This doesn’t explain the fact the police cars looked exactly like they look today, but this isn’t really important.) They also erected the Ape Lincoln statue, and so the humans are enslaved by the apes when Davidson returns.

Well, that’s about it. I can’t explain why there are horses on PotA, since there was no use for them on a space station. I think someone who posted “Horses are there because apes in black armour look cool on horses” is right. Same goes for the crashes of Davidson, by the way.

The one big question that is left: If the apes conquered earth, in the 19th century, how could the space station and all that be built? I can’t answer that one, and I guess you have to accept it as a paradox because of the time travelling. This is a blunder that wasn’t meant to be taken into account by the writers. No one knows how time travels work, and think about how silly this topic was dealt with in the Terminator films. Or try to figure out how the story of “12 Monkeys” could work: The answer is, it couldn’t work, but it was a cool film just because of this paradoxes.

So after I made up my mind for two entire days, I think the end of PotA was a brilliant one (although it came a little bit too much out of nowhere), and I don’t hope for a sequel. You just can’t stand up from your seat after you saw the film and say: “I don’t understand the end, it sucked.” ; if you do it, you’re stupid. Of course, you don’t have to like the end, but you have to think about it. There were some weak parts in the film, e.g. the role of Daena. The only thing she did during the whole film was looking attractive (she perfectly succeeded in doing that, I have to admit), she did nothing for the story and could as well have been left out. But as a whole, I really liked the film, the costumes were great and the apes looked fantastic. And it was good enough for a great discussion about the end.

Thanks to all who posted here, there were some great ideas and theories which helped me to see a little bit clearer.
Thanks for reading this (it became too long, I know), and feel free to respond by email (dkiefer@genie.de) or right here in the forum.

Danny

Posted by Jimbobjeff (jimbobjeff_2001@yahoo.co.uk) on September 7, 2001 5:08 PM

how about Leo just coincidentally landed in earth on the set of the planet of the apes 5 sequel??????tribute to tim burton. r.i.p

or leo really crash landed to the original pota but even furhter into the future and somehow the human.ape alliance didn't go to smoothly, or thade escaped from prison and revolted once more. and his chronomaeter buggered up. or it's an alternate dimension as somone above said.

RE:explanation of the clock

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on September 10, 2001 10:05 AM

something to help your theory for the people that beleive that mark traveled back in time to the planet of the apes but do not understand why the clock was going forward: as he began to travel backward in time, the clock would also go backward. however, once it reaches the year 0, it would begin to count in b.c. and the numbers would actually increase at that point as he continued to travel back in time.

RE: RE:explanation of the clock

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on September 20, 2001 4:51 PM

trust me man, its all about the flux capacitor

Posted by juniorjackson (nsmcguffie@thefreeinternet.co.uk) on September 20, 2001 6:05 PM

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.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on September 20, 2001 7:46 PM

i thinnk planet of the apes is a really good movie

Posted by MONKEY (auneem@hotmail.com) on October 27, 2001 9:22 PM

WHEN THE POD WITH THE MONKEY IN IT WAS SENT OUT TO EXPLORE WHAT WAS OUT THERE HE WAS SUCKED IN TO THE BLACK HOLE and WENT BACK IN TIME INSTEAD OF FORWARD IN TIME LIKE MARK WALBERG DID. SO IN GOING BACK IN TIME, WAY BACK BEFORE ANY APES OR HUMANS EXISTED HE CHANGED THE EVOLUTIONARY CHAIN MAKING CHIMPS THE DOMINATE SPECIES. IF YOU WATCH YOU NOTICE WHEN WALBERG GOES BACK TO THE PRESENT APES ARENT RUNNING THE PLANET THEY ARE CHIMPS, monkeys JUST LIKE THE ONE IN THE POD, AAAND THIS IS WHY WHEN WALBERG GOES INTO THE FUTURE THE PLANET IS BEING RUN BY APES.....ITS BECAUSE THEY SENT THE CHIMP OUT, ITS THEIR OWN FAULT, THATS WHY IN THE FUTURE APES ARE THE DOMINATE SPECIES BECAUSE THE MONKEYS HAD EVOLVED. SO THE PEOPLE IN THAT SHIP CHANGED THE WORLD ITS PAST PRESENT AND FUTURE AND THATS WHY AFTER THEY HAD SENT OUT THE MONKEY THEY BEGAN TO GET ALL THOSE IMAGES ON THE SCREEN FROM EARTH BECAUSE AT THAT POINT THE PRESENT HAD BEEN CHANGED.
ALL THIS "YOURE NOT SUPPOSED TO UNDERSTAND THE ENDING" IS BULLsh*t HAHAHAHA, THE ENDING IS BRILIANT! BETTER THAN THE ORIGINAL BECAUSE THIS WAY IT MAKES SENSE, IN THE OLD ONE WE ASSUMED SOMEHOW APES BECAME DOMINATE OVER HUMANS NATURALLY AND I ALWAYS FOUND THAT VERY HARD TO BELIEVE GRANTED TIME TRAVEL IS ALSO HARD TO BELIEVE.

Posted by MONKEY (auneem@hotmail.com) on October 27, 2001 9:36 PM

HMM AFTER READING SOME OF THESE POST I CAME ACROSS SOMETHING ELSE MAYBE THE SHIP ITSELF WITH THE MONKEYS WENT BACK IN TIME KILLING THE HUMANS ON IT LEAVING ONLY THE CHIMPS SO THEREFORE ALTERING THE EVOLUTIONARY CHAIN. i DIDNT NOTICE THE 2 MOONS I HAVE NO IDEA WHAT THAT IS ABOUT.

Posted by MONKEY (auneem@hotmail.com) on October 27, 2001 9:53 PM

OK THIS IS THE REAL DEAL HERE........

MAYBE WALBERG GOES BACK IN TIME LIKE THE CHIMP ONLY THE CHIMP GOES FURTHER BACK IN TIME ALTERS EVOLUTION BECOMES THE GOD THEY IDOLIZED, THEN RETURNS LATER ON LIKE THEY SAID HE WOULD AND MARK WALBERG BY LEAVING THE MONKEY THERE IN THE PAST AFTER HE HAD ARRIVED IN A POD HAVING EVERYONE BELIEVE HE IS GOD OR WHATEVERT NAME THEY GAVE THEIR GOD(CANT REMEMBER THE NAME) CHANGES THE FUTURE OR HIS "PRESENT" CAUSING MONKEYS TO MOVE UP THE EVOLUTIONARY CHAIN. aLSO REMEMBER WHEN HE LEAVES THEY ALL AGREED TO TREAT EACH OTHER EQUALLY; HUMANS, APES, AND MONKEYS. SO THEY ALL EVOLVED AND CO EXISTED BUT AT SOME POINT THINGS CHANGED AND THE MONKEYS REVOLTED THATS WHY IN THE SHIP THINGS AT THE PRESENT WERE CHANGING AND THE CHIMPS WERE REVOLTING.

Posted by MONKEY (auneem@hotmail.com) on October 27, 2001 11:38 PM

damn my head is clouded right now i cant seem to make all the peices fit theres always some contradictory factor that doesnt make sense. I'm sure the answer is somewhere along the lines of what i posted. There has to be the belief that humans at some point were dominant over apes right? and apes somehow evolved to the point where they became the dominant species, could this be because of the environment? the pota environment, maybe pericles was advanced enough to give the edge to apes maybe they werent smarter or more creative then humans but they were smart enough, because they were bumped up a notch by percles traveling back in time, add to that their superior survival skills, notice how they were in the jungle. so as time passed apes developed and evolved then the ship crashed and the humans attemted to take control of the apes and probably did so for a while until eventually apes were physically superior and smart enough to overcome human reasoning. Given the environment they became the dominator and revolted, by then humans had reproduced enough to coexist. so then mark walberg landed and crashed his pod in the lake but not to the point where it wasnt capable of being repaired see nobody ever thought about that, the pod he crashed was left there on that planet. Eventually the apes or humans or someone fixed the pod and sent pericles back into the worm hole sending him back in time to earth where he altered the chain of evolution (this part needs more thought) so when walberg returns he returns to an altered earth? i dont the last part isnt really clear the ape lincoln i think is significant somehow relatung to the freeing of the apes, so i dont know.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on November 4, 2001 6:07 AM

TWO WORDS: PARALEL UNIVERSE... anybody with more questions about planet can e mail me on bcubela@iskon.hr

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on November 5, 2001 3:48 PM

Man for the sequal, they should just forget all of the first movies sh*tty script, and just go with the origonal script of the classic, by sending maybe a *charleton heston* in search of the leo dude, than he goes even farther into the future, and from there, everything is different, the monkeys have evolved even more so they look more human(haha), and humans cant talk. would be a lot better than some queer sequal to that sorry excuse of a remake.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on November 14, 2001 5:35 PM

Just a thought...
The gun that Thade's dad gives him, not one you would find on the spaceshuttle is it? They had better weapons, like the gun Marky Marky takes from his POD...So where'd the (machine gun was it?) come from?

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on November 24, 2001 1:43 PM

Where did he get the gun? ITHINK THE "MOTHERSHIP" CRASH LANDED IN 2029 LOOKIN FOR MARKY MARK. AT THAT TIME SAIMOS GOT THE OTHER MONKEYS TO FORM A REBELLION AGAINST THE HUMANS. THE MONKEYS STARTED TO FIGHT AGAINST THE HUMANS THAT INHABITED EARTH. SINCE THEY WERE GENETICALLY MODIFIED THEY WERE SMART ENOUGH TO USE WEAPONS.

ALSO!
THE THADE WE SEE AT THE END IN THE MEMORIAL COULD BE A GREAT GENERAL THAT WAS ALSO A RELATIVE OF SAIMOS BUT A GREAT GENERAL DURING THE REBELION IN 2029 NOT THE SAME THADE THAT WE THINK OF IN 2400?. BUT THEY MAY BE IN THE SAME FAMILY.

AT THE END OF THE MOVIE THE APES WERE ADVANCED BUT WAIR MARKY MARK HAD EXSCAPED FROM THEY WERE PRIMITIVE AND THAT WAS SUPPOSE TO BE THE FUTURE THE ONLY WAY I CAN EXPLIAN THIS IS THAT THE APES GOT TO SMART FOR THERE OWN GOOD, AND LOST ALL THERE TECHNOLOGY.

Posted by jpolime (jpolime@hotmail.com) on December 29, 2001 8:59 AM

Ok. I think I have the ending figured out. Forget about going back in time because that's highly improbable from a scientific perspective. Also, assume we're always on earth since falling on a planet that so closely resembles earth is also improbable. So, in chronological order... 1. Leo goes into the time warp storm after the monkey 2. nuclear war destroys earth while Leo's crewmates were looking for him-year 2025? (speculation, but it is consistent with the theme of the first Planet of the Apes) 3. the Oberon ship crashes to earth years a few years later to a barren earth 4. In this wild post-nuclear earth, humans from the ship get taken over by the monkeys on the ship; the monkeys further evolve (remember they are genetically altered so that explains how they eventually learn to speak English) 5. Leo comes out of the time warp and lands on earth several thousands years later 6. The monkey lands a few days later (probably caught in the same time warp wave which explains their close proximity in landing around the same time) 7. When Leo leaves in the pod; he goes ahead in time a few hundred more years and once again lands on earth. 8. After Leo left, Thades licked his wounds and eventually won the war with the humans. However, remember that in the film, these apes are not creative. Therefore, all their culture would be derived from images of earth,up to about 2020,bouncing in that time warp storm thing. Remember, those images were stored in the ruined ship's computers. That explains the almost identical scene of present-day Washington D.C. I can explain 2 small conflicts 1) time going backwards in the pod reflects screwed up readings and 2) the 3 moons could easily be some futuristic atmospheric optical illusion. For example,a fata morgana or sun dogs. Remember, this is post-nuclear earth several thousand years in the future. I'm interested if there is a flaw in this argument.

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on July 25, 2002 1:51 PM

How did the horses get there??

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on November 24, 2001 1:00 PM

The thing that amazes me most is that a film with such a poorly written, predictable, and just plain dumb script is even being compared to the original PotA, which at least employed double entendre and other subtleties to make more than a "monkey movie"....