What a lovely, lovely day! After years of anticipation and discussion, George Miller’s follow-up to Mad Max: Fury Road is finally here. Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga is now in theaters and it acts as a perfect compliment to that 2015 masterpiece, giving the character of Furiosa an intense backstory while also building out the world of the Wasteland.
Spoilers of the Week: July 1st
And while there’s nothing wildly surprising in the film, especially since we know what happens immediately after, we do love the ending a lot and figured you might want to dive into it a bit after seeing the film. Major spoilers follow.
All of Furiosa leads up to the character (Anya Taylor-Joy) finally getting face to face with Dementus (Chris Hemsworth), the maniacal warlord primarily responsible for ruining her life by kidnapping her and killing her mother. The showdown happens, Furiosa is victorious, but we then see multiple versions of the exact conclusion. It’s Miller’s wink at legend and storytelling. An acknowledgment that what’s real and what’s told are not always the same, especially in mythology.
What’s fascinating here is that the legends of how Furiosa defeated Dementus are way less exciting than the truth. What Furiosa actually did to Dementus wasn’t simple and straightforward. It was brutal. It was, in fact, epic, and proves that her legend is merely a fraction of her reality. She’s a mythical creature but in real life, she’s even better.
So what happens? Well, all throughout the movie, we see that Furiosa carries a seed with her. It’s a seed given to her by her mother as a reminder of her home. It’s her most prized possession because it’s not only from her home, it also represents the possibility of renewal.
The seed doesn’t factor into the final fight but it becomes crucial right after. Instead of just killing Dementus, we see that Furiosa somehow figures out a way to use his body as the soil to give life to the seed. He becomes part of its roots, forever stuck in agony, as the seed slowly sucks the life out of him and transforms into a beautiful fruit tree. Basically, Dementus becomes the basis for Furiosa’s rebirth. It’s an inexplicable, but brutal and fascinating fate for Hemsworth’s character. One ripe—pun intended—with meaning.
Furiosa then picks a piece of fruit, brings it to Immortal Joe’s wives, and leads them to a War Rig where, in Mad Max: Fury Road, we’ll see them attempt to escape. The film goes right up until to the next movie. Then, in the end credits, it even shows a little Fury Road highlight reel just as a reminder.
So Furiosa ends with the character becoming a Wasteland legend and linking up perfectly with the next film. In terms of endings, it doesn’t get much better than that.
What did you think of Furiosa’s ending? Did you see it a different way? Let us know below.
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