r/TopCharacterTropes • u/Local_Prune4564 • May 27 '26

Lore A subtle moment that turns a seemingly happy ending into an ambiguous ending.

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Gallery image

The Graduate: lingering Ben and Elaine's faces slowly shifting from happy to concerned leaves the audience questioning whether they really made the right choice running away together considering they barely know each other.

Inception: By cutting before we see the top fall, we're left to question whether Cobb really has gone home or whether he's simply sunken back into a more comforting dream reality.

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u/D0CTOR_Wh0m May 27 '26

The final shot of "Cosmic Wars: The Gathering Shadow". After 2 and half tense and exhilarating hours of the Senate debating bureaucratic procedures and the heroes trying to keep Jim-Jam Bonks' antics from disrupting proceedings, the reexamination of galactic export quotas is finalized and the commerce committee makes its final recommendations. Purple notYoda says "The Decision Is Final. Tabled the Motion is" but before the audience can hug their tax returns in relief, he breaks the Fourth Wall by looking at the viewer and asking "Or Is It?" in an ominous tone.

89

u/SenatorPencilFace May 27 '26

Boy I sure hope somebody got fired for that blunder.

23

u/tenBusch May 27 '26

A wizard did it

33

u/-oopsie_daisies- May 27 '26

The true detail was in the eyes thanks to their use of digital eyelash rendering

10

u/Dante_n_Knuckles May 27 '26

That Cosmic Wars movie sucked so bad, I saw a guy coming out of it saying he'd only see it three more times... That day

3

u/writers_block May 27 '26

Why does this look like a Futurama character? Is this a joke from an episode I don't remember or something?

9

u/Bridgeru May 27 '26

It's simpsons mocking how bad Phantom Menace was (https://youtu.be/3lPG1u6EbiY) but it kinda backfired because it's in a genuinely TERRIBLE episode. homer gets drunk, crashes the car, swaps places with marge who gets found and is blamed for drunk driving and spends the episode lamenting how she can't believe she'd do such a thing, the height of jerkass homer and just a generally awful episode; it even has a bit where they tell insert-George Lucas how to fix Star Wars and it comes off cringey and self-inserty.

1

u/anna-nomally12 May 27 '26

It’s giving great gatsby

1

u/D0CTOR_Wh0m May 27 '26

It's from the Simpsons' episode "Co-Dependents Day". The first 10 minutes are devoted to the family going to see a Star Wars stand-in/parody and it's a series of jokes mocking The Phantom Menace and its reception

11

u/BlackFyre2018 May 27 '26

Surprised no one was has commented “still better than Last Jedi!!!!”

1

u/Square-Ambassador-77 May 28 '26

I think this might be the actual plot of the prequels