Source Code revisited - major spoilers
Apr. 18th, 2011 11:10 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
alobearMuch like Moon, the more I think about Source Code, the more troubling it becomes - and also much like Moon, I can't seem to stop thinking about it, which is starting to get annoying.
Let's get what I'm calling "the contents of the box" out of the way first. When it was first shown, I knew it contained whatever was left of Colter Stevens' physical body, and I could see that it was far too short to contain a whole person, so I was fully prepared for the reveal when it happened, and it didn't actually bother me that much at the time. But, unfortunately, my brain has kept hold of the image and won't let it go, and it's the kind of image I usually find very distressing and its constant presence is starting to really hack me off.
That aside, there is more to my growing dissatisfaction with the film.
If it had faded out on the final kiss between Stevens and Christina, I'm pretty sure I would have considered it the best film I've seen in ages and left it at that. However, it did not - and, while the "alternate universe rather than time travel" explanation does dispense very neatly with all the usual issues I have with stories where past events are altered, it opens up different issues instead.
So, in Universe A (the original one, as it were), all the people on the train died, Stevens gets switched off, and Goodwin is presumably arrested and court martialed. Pretty much of a downer all round, really.
In the rather more upbeat Universe B (where Stevens averts the explosion and remains to live out a new life), Goodwin continues in her job, knowing that she's somehow helped avert a disaster, Stevens (or rather his consciousness from Universe A) supposedly enjoys a new lease on life with Christina, and all the people on the train survive - except one. Not only is the Universe B Stevens still stuck in his box, awaiting a mission, but poor old Sean Fentriss no longer exists, as Universe A Stevens has stolen his body. Admittedly, Sean would otherwise have died in the train explosion, so I guess you could say he hasn't lost anything, but I still find this conclusion troubling. Christina thinks she's finally got a date from the guy on the train she's been fancying for weeks - but it's not actually him. And what does Stevens know about teaching history? And how is he going to interact with all the other people in Sean's life who know him a lot better than Christina does? Wouldn't he want to go and see his father (which would cause problems when it transpires that Sean Fentriss never served in the military) and wouldn't he also perhaps want to try and release his Universe B consciousness from its box?
At the time, the happy handholding and intention to spend the day hanging out seemed a pleasant way to end things, considering everything he'd had to go through beforehand, but there are so many problems associated with him staying in Sean's body, that they've started to encroach on my satisfaction with the conclusion of the film.
Perhaps it might be time to stop worrying about it and just let it go - if only I could persuade my recalcitrant brain to do so...
In the meantime, I welcome comments from those who've seen it.
Let's get what I'm calling "the contents of the box" out of the way first. When it was first shown, I knew it contained whatever was left of Colter Stevens' physical body, and I could see that it was far too short to contain a whole person, so I was fully prepared for the reveal when it happened, and it didn't actually bother me that much at the time. But, unfortunately, my brain has kept hold of the image and won't let it go, and it's the kind of image I usually find very distressing and its constant presence is starting to really hack me off.
That aside, there is more to my growing dissatisfaction with the film.
If it had faded out on the final kiss between Stevens and Christina, I'm pretty sure I would have considered it the best film I've seen in ages and left it at that. However, it did not - and, while the "alternate universe rather than time travel" explanation does dispense very neatly with all the usual issues I have with stories where past events are altered, it opens up different issues instead.
So, in Universe A (the original one, as it were), all the people on the train died, Stevens gets switched off, and Goodwin is presumably arrested and court martialed. Pretty much of a downer all round, really.
In the rather more upbeat Universe B (where Stevens averts the explosion and remains to live out a new life), Goodwin continues in her job, knowing that she's somehow helped avert a disaster, Stevens (or rather his consciousness from Universe A) supposedly enjoys a new lease on life with Christina, and all the people on the train survive - except one. Not only is the Universe B Stevens still stuck in his box, awaiting a mission, but poor old Sean Fentriss no longer exists, as Universe A Stevens has stolen his body. Admittedly, Sean would otherwise have died in the train explosion, so I guess you could say he hasn't lost anything, but I still find this conclusion troubling. Christina thinks she's finally got a date from the guy on the train she's been fancying for weeks - but it's not actually him. And what does Stevens know about teaching history? And how is he going to interact with all the other people in Sean's life who know him a lot better than Christina does? Wouldn't he want to go and see his father (which would cause problems when it transpires that Sean Fentriss never served in the military) and wouldn't he also perhaps want to try and release his Universe B consciousness from its box?
At the time, the happy handholding and intention to spend the day hanging out seemed a pleasant way to end things, considering everything he'd had to go through beforehand, but there are so many problems associated with him staying in Sean's body, that they've started to encroach on my satisfaction with the conclusion of the film.
Perhaps it might be time to stop worrying about it and just let it go - if only I could persuade my recalcitrant brain to do so...
In the meantime, I welcome comments from those who've seen it.
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no subject
Date: 2011-04-18 06:28 pm (UTC)I wonder if that's what's supposed to have happened, though? I think it's possible to read it as: he did actually make a change to the universe he was in. I'm sure there was a reference to the Source Code being even more powerful than they had thought...
no subject
Date: 2011-04-19 06:30 am (UTC)On one jump, he got Christina off the train before it exploded, but Goodwin looked her up when he got back and said she still died on the train.
no subject
Date: 2011-04-20 05:31 pm (UTC)I'm going to agree with the majority of reviews I've seen and conclude that it doesn't make sense and it's best not to think too hard about it. ;)