1. Planet Of The Apes (2001)
Tim Burton’s 2001 reboot/sequel Planet of the Apes boasts one of the worst and most confusing movie endings of all time, so there was really no other film that deserved the top spot more. When astronaut Leo Davidson crash-lands in the far future on a planet inhabited by talking apes, it seems as though the film is following the general story of the 1968 movie of the same name. However, as its story unfolds, it implies that the planet is not actually Earth all along, but instead, another planet colonized by apes and humans after another ship crash-landed there thousands of years prior.
Confused? You should be. It gets worse, though: Davidson discovers a working ship and uses it to travel back to Earth. When he arrives, he realizes that everything is wrong and that human society has been replaced by an ape one, with a statue of General Thade, the film’s villain, in place of the Lincoln Memorial. No further context is given, and the credits roll as Mark Wahlberg’s confused face looks on in horror.
As much as Mark Wahlberg’s perpetual confusion has given us many unintentionally funny movie moments, in this case, it’s entirely justified. The implication of the ending is that Thade traveled to Earth too, and arrived hundreds (or potentially thousands) of years ahead of Leo. He reshaped society in his image, and Leo is now stranded on another planet of apes. Still, this is pure speculation, as the film itself does very little to actually acknowledge how Earth was overrun by simians. Making such a deliberately confusing ending was most likely to set up a sequel, but after such a brainless and unnecessarily confusing movie, who in their right mind would want to see one?
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