Was Mal Right? - Inception (2010) Discussion

[–] quint88 8 years ago

Nope.

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[–] bsharporflat-50959 8 years ago

She was convinced that she was still dreaming so she killed herself...
At the end of the film, the focus was shifted on the never-ending spinning totem, which points towards the conclusion that Cobb was still dreaming after all of the occurred events...
So Mal woke up from her dream as she prophesied...Cobb was wrong and continued living in his dream...
They could have lived together in their real lives as they'd planned
So in the end, was Mal right?

Yes and no.

The key to understanding the ending is to ignore whether the top is spinning or not and to focus on WHOSE totem the top was.

We are told Cobb found Mal's totem, then just casually decided to make it his own totem. But that's not how totems work. They are extremely individualized and specific. You can't just start using someone else's totem, even your spouse's totem. You can only use your own. Totems identify both whether you are in a dream AND what your identity is.

What was Cobb's original totem? We are never shown or told. That is a bit of trickery and (self-) deception. The top was and will always remain Mal's totem.

Therefore, the person who is really dreaming all that we see is Mal. She wanted her dead husband, Cobb, to be alive so badly, she switched places with him in her dreams. In the dream Cobb is alive and she is dead. But the top reveals who is really dreaming (and who is really dead).

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[–] gstards 8 years ago

The internet is speculating that the ring could be his totem, but the fun thing is, that there's not a single word about the ring in the movie's script.

Nolan, I love you forever!

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[–] bsharporflat-50959 8 years ago

The internet is speculating that the ring could be his totem, but the fun thing is, that there's not a single word about the ring in the movie's script.

Yep.

But it is made explicitly clear that the top is Mal's totem.

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[–] gstards 8 years ago

Yes. The top can also be seen as the symbol of Cobb's attachment to dead Mal. All along the film he uses it, like his own totem, because he's still very attached to his dead wife (you can see that he never used it when she was still alive, except the moment when he infected her mind by inception), and only towards the very end of the film he left it on the table and moved himself to his children, because he started to not care about it and left the past in the past.

Nolan, I love you forever!

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[–] bsharporflat-50959 8 years ago

Yes. The top can also be seen as the symbol of Cobb's attachment to dead Mal. All along the film he uses it, like his own totem, because he's still very attached to his dead wife (you can see that he never used it when she was still alive, except the moment when he infected her mind by inception), and only towards the very end of the film he left it on the table and moved himself to his children, because he started to not care about it and left the past in the past.

Fair enough. If this movie is seen as primarily a treatise on love, marriage and familial attachment, looking at the top in that way makes sense. After such a long, bleak film, this constitutes a happy ending.

I tend to see this movie's perspective more individually. For me it is mostly about questions of personal identity and reality. If the spinning top in the ending is important to answering questions, I think the best answer is that we have been seeing a dream of Mal's the whole time. And that is not a happy ending.

Nolan has made some movies with a happy ending. But mostly not. What about this one? Can be seen either way? Up to each audience member?

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[–] vesil_vesalier 8 years ago

In terms of figuring out what reality is, and where it is... I'm not sure there IS an answer, either way. One of my favorite parts of the movie is the one where he goes into the bathroom, splashes water on his face, slaps himself to shake the dream, pulls the totem out of his pocket, and drops it as one of the other characters interrupts him, asking him if he's alright. From that point on, all bets are off, because he never really proved he was in reality from that point on.

But as for the happy ending... Sure it had a happy ending. Cobb goes back to his kids. That's happy, no matter if it was real or not. I don't think it even MATTERS at that point whether or not it is. If Cobb could live for fifty years with his wife, and even grow old in the dream, Cobb gets to be with his kids, watch them grow up, and die, just as if he was in reality itself, assuming he is not.

Not as happy as him being with Mal, but like he said in one of the movie's most touching scenes, they had their time. And he had to let her go.

My thoughts: https://xanderpayne.blogspot.com
My book: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01G6OI7HG

You didn't come here to make the choice, you're here to understand why you made it.

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[–] bsharporflat-50959 8 years ago

But as for the happy ending... Sure it had a happy ending. Cobb goes back to his kids. That's happy, no matter if it was real or not. I don't think it even MATTERS at that point whether or not it is. If Cobb could live for fifty years with his wife, and even grow old in the dream, Cobb gets to be with his kids, watch them grow up, and die, just as if he was in reality itself, assuming he is not.

Not as happy as him being with Mal, but like he said in one of the movie's most touching scenes, they had their time. And he had to let her go.

I can conditionally agree.

For most people, the revelation that your entire life is a dream isn't a happy ending. But for these sort of characters who spend half their lives in dreams anyway, I guess spending eternity in a "good" dream does constitute a happy ending. Better than spending your life crawling on a carpet, crashing off a bridge, getting tossed about in a hotel or snow avalanche or whatever else might have been.

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[–] Diver9006 8 years ago

Remember too, when Cobb is in Mombasa and the chemist takes them downstairs.

Eames: They come here every day to sleep?
Elderly Bald Man [towards Cobb] No. They come here to be woken up. The dream has become their reality. Who are you to say otherwise, son?

The point of that short conversation was to point out that "reality", like pain, occurs only in the mind. Whether or not that reality is "real" or in a dream state, it is reality none the less to the person experiencing it.

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[–] noonoolala 8 years ago

@bsharporflat-50959 wow that's actually crazy, good theory
However i noticed, the film never mentions that the 'top' was Mal's totem, Cobb only says that it was very precious to her, it belonged to her. i guess Cobb made the first move to secure it as his own totem, since it reminded him of Mal...i could be wrong...but the thing is, the film never mentioned it being her totem

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[–] bsharporflat-50959 8 years ago

@bsharporflat-50959 wow that's actually crazy, good theory
However i noticed, the film never mentions that the 'top' was Mal's totem, Cobb only says that it was very precious to her, it belonged to her. i guess Cobb made the first move to secure it as his own totem, since it reminded him of Mal...i could be wrong...but the thing is, the film never mentioned it being her totem

I appreciate you giving my theory some thought.

I'll recheck also but I find it to be made very clear that the top was Mal's totem. She was a "dream thief" so she would need a totem. Are we really supposed to think this simple item with a unique feel and motion was precious to her for no particular reason..but that she also had ANOTHER, unnamed, unshown object which served as her totem?

I see no purpose to writing the story like that. Especially by Christopher Nolan who tends to write puzzle-box movies where every element has a place in the puzzle.

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[–] vesil_vesalier 8 years ago

The top was definitely Mal's totem. If you recall, the primary reason things went awry was because she "hid something, deep in her subconscious", which caused her to accept Limbo as her reality. Cobb had to find it, and when he did, he made the top spin, cancelling out Mal's attempt at staying in the dream world.

If the totem is your item to convince yourself you're not dreaming, and you deliberately sever yourself from it, that CAUSES you to forget you're not dreaming. That is exactly what Mal did. The unfortunate part is that Cobb's attempt to fix the situation didn't fix anything. It actually made things worse.

I wonder what would have happened if he killed her in Limbo, before finding the totem. Would she still have trouble accepting reality? Of course it would be hard to kill her and then explain it to her once she woke, I guess.

Anyway. That's my take on it.

My thoughts: https://xanderpayne.blogspot.com
My book: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01G6OI7HG

You didn't come here to make the choice, you're here to understand why you made it.

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[–] bsharporflat-50959 8 years ago

The top was definitely Mal's totem. If you recall, the primary reason things went awry was because she "hid something, deep in her subconscious", which caused her to accept Limbo as her reality. Cobb had to find it, and when he did, he made the top spin, cancelling out Mal's attempt at staying in the dream world.

If the totem is your item to convince yourself you're not dreaming, and you deliberately sever yourself from it, that CAUSES you to forget you're not dreaming. That is exactly what Mal did. The unfortunate part is that Cobb's attempt to fix the situation didn't fix anything. It actually made things worse.

All good and true observations.

It's just that after that, Cobb supposedly decides to adopt Mal's totem as his own, without any indication that he previously had one of his own, no little ceremony where he replaces one with the other or anything like that. Only one totem is ever shown. Something doesn't add up there.

Two dreamers need two totems. One totem says one dreamer. And, as you say, the top was definitely Mal's totem. She is the dreamer whose dreams we have been following, even if she doesn't know who she really is in the dream.

(which is quite Memento-ish)

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[–] vesil_vesalier 8 years ago

What if the practice of using a totem came AFTER his mistake in Limbo? At a point in the film he explains that he wanted to explore the aspects of a dream within a dream, suggesting that perhaps he was one of (if not the) first to even go as deep as Limbo. Like he said when asked about Inception, the reason he knew how to do it was because he'd done it before... To everyone else, the idea was impossible (or at least very damn unlikely).

Is it possible before this happened he didn't use a totem? Because until you start going that far into the manipulation of the dream state you don't need one, necessarily?

My thoughts: https://xanderpayne.blogspot.com
My book: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01G6OI7HG

You didn't come here to make the choice, you're here to understand why you made it.

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[–] bsharporflat-50959 8 years ago

What if the practice of using a totem came AFTER his mistake in Limbo?What if the practice of using a totem came AFTER his mistake in Limbo?

Meaning Cobb was the original and only dream agent and all the others came after him and learned the trick of keeping a totem from him?

I don't want to step on your theories, but that one doesn't seem to fit the story as seen on the screen to me.

Also, it begs the question of why Mal would have the top sequestered in Limbo. Are you suggesting Mal invented the idea of totems and that Cobb never had his own? Cobb's only totem ever was the top, appropriated from Mal after her death? That just doesn't feel right to me. I really get the sense that all the dream agents we are introduced to always had their own totems. Making Cobb's lack of his own totem rather suspicious.

For me, the top belonging to Mal is a basic truth upon which all the other mysteries (and untruths) of this movie can be based on. That just feels right to me.

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[–] vesil_vesalier 8 years ago

You're right, that doesn't sound quite right.

Although I have to add the possibility that maybe the top wasn't a totem at all, at least not at first. Maybe it BECAME Cobb's totem, after the incident.

But I agree with you, pretty much on everything you said. Just throwing out ideas.

My thoughts: https://xanderpayne.blogspot.com
My book: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01G6OI7HG

You didn't come here to make the choice, you're here to understand why you made it.

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[–] Diver9006 8 years ago

Are you suggesting Mal invented the idea of totems and that Cobb never had his own?

It is a plausible idea if the whole movie is Mal's dream. Using your theory that Cobb is dead and the whole movie is Mal's dream, then we never truly know if totems were used in the "real" world that Mal is still in. Totems could be an invention of Mal's mind, along with all the other characters in the movie.

I really get the sense that all the dream agents we are introduced to always had their own totems. Making Cobb's lack of his own totem rather suspicious.

If we are actually in Mal's dream, then all the other dream agents are also manifestations of Mal's mind and not "real". If they all have their own totems, it's because Mal gave it to them.

Just food for thought.

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[–] the-author 8 years ago

Therefore, the person who is really dreaming all that we see is Mal. She wanted her dead husband, Cobb, to be alive so badly, she switched places with him in her dreams. In the dream Cobb is alive and she is dead. But the top reveals who is really dreaming (and who is really dead).

Interesting concept. Great inventiveness.

But, if Mal is Dom in the dream...who is the evil Mal?
And why wouldn't Mal be in the end scene?

I like the idea that Dom is in the dream den in Mombasa the whole time. Makes more sense.

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[–] bsharporflat-50959 8 years ago

Interesting concept. Great inventiveness.

But, if Mal is Dom in the dream...who is the evil Mal?

I think Mal has changed her identity in the dream. But it is still her that is dreaming. The "evil Mal" is how she sees herself. Blaming herself for everything, after Dom's death.

Thinking of dreams as "wish fulfillment". After Dom died, Mal blamed herself, wished he was alive and wished that she had died. In her dream that's what happened.

And why wouldn't Mal be in the end scene?

That can be answered in a couple different ways.
1. Because her happy dream included herself being dead but her husband and children being happy together.

2. She is in the final scene. Her totem, the top. Her true sense of identity within a dream, is right there at the end, in the middle of the screen, spinning away.

Notice Dom and the kids are in the background in the final scene. I see this as a symbolic message that the center of everything we see in this movie, the dreamer of all these images, is right there, center stage. The top identifying her as Mal. If the ending did not include the top and focused only on Dom and the kids, I would not have this view. But it is HER top.

I like the idea that Dom is in the dream den in Mombasa the whole time. Makes more sense.

Perhaps. It is a simpler and more direct explanation. But it doesn't explain the top. If this was Dom's dream, there shouldn't be Mal's top at the center of everything. It would be his own totem, to tell us whose dream this is.

I could consider Nolan writing the whole "top" aspect of the story to show how connected Mal and Dom are. Perhaps he never considered that her totem might suggest this is her dream. But not with that ending. The ending makes it clear to me that the top is not peripheral, but central in understanding the true mystery of this story.

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[–] the-author 8 years ago

So, can you explain from your point of view...What was dom explaining about her secret when he talks about her home and the safe and the totem?

(online script -possibly early copy - not exact as the film)

ARIADNE
What's that?
COBB
The house Mal grew up in.
ARIADNE
Will she be in there?
COBB
No. Come on.

INSERT CUT: Mal opens the doll's house. Takes the spinning
top, lies it down in the safe. LOCKS IT AWAY.
COBB
I couldn't make Mal understand that
we needed to break free. To die. So
I started to search our world...
Cobb turns to Mal, but keeps talking to Ariadne...
INSERT CUT: Cobb WANDERS the streets of Limbo...
COBB
Searching for the right place in
her mind...
134.
COBB (CONT'D)
INSERT CUT: Cobb stops outside the VICTORIAN HOUSE, MAL'S
CHILDHOOD HOME, looking up at it. He heads inside...
COBB
And when I found that place, that
secret place where she had shut
away her knowledge years before, I
broke it open...
INSERT CUT: Cobb looks around Mal's childhood bedroom. Comes
to the doll's house...
COBB
I broke into the deepest recess of
her mind, to give her the simplest
little idea.
INSERT CUT: Cobb throws open the safe doors. Sitting on the
shelf of the safe is a spinning top. On its side.
COBB
A truth that she had once known,
but had chosen to forget...
INSERT CUT: Cobb picks up the totem. He SPINS it in the safe.
IT SPINS AND SPINS WITHOUT END. Cobb CLOSES THE DOOR of the
safe...
COBB
That her world was not real.
INSERT CUT: COBB AND MAL ARRIVE AT TRAIN TRACKS CUTTING
THROUGH WASTELAND.
COBB (V.O.)
That death was a necessary escape.

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[–] bsharporflat-50959 8 years ago

So, can you explain from your point of view...What was dom explaining about her secret when he talks about her home and the safe and the totem?

I'll try. And the video clip of the script you posted is found here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4PcCs_goXsE

I see Inception as not just an action movie but also a mystery throughout. Much like Memento this is a mystery which must be solved by working backwards. It CAN be taken at face value, as most people take it- a mystery with an ambiguous solution- does the top drop or not? Is it a dream or is it real?

But, again taking Memento as a template for Nolan's mindset, perhaps he doesn't like ambiguous solutions and has hidden one, firm conclusion within the ambiguity. Totems are used to establish reality but they are also used to establish identity. I think we are misdirected into wondering about "reality" and forgetting the identity part of the equation (again noting that "identity" is the essential mystery in Memento. That question may be intrinsic to Nolan's thinking.)

So, in my view, the real solution to this movie does revolve (pun intended) around identity. We think this is Cobb's story and that he is the narrator and that he is in a dream for most/all of the movie. But the top identifies the identity of the dreamer as Mal, no matter how she tries to disguise herself.

If this can be accepted, then the limbo scene in question makes perfect sense, at least to me. Notice how, early in the scene, Ariadne tells Cobb that "Mal is bursting through your sub-conscious". At some level I think Ariadne is on to her in this dream.

This is Mal's dream. It is entirely constructed by her. It is essentially a truthful re-creation of the past but with Cobb and Mal's roles reversed. They did spend 50 years in Limbo together but it was Cobb who killed himself and she blames herself for that. So she constructs a dream world where he is alive and she is dead. Always when we see Cobb talking it is Mal talking, pretending to be him within a dream. This soothes her conscience a little.

But, deep, deep within in this dream, in limbo, in the doll's house, in the safe, is hidden the one thing which can reveal Mal's self-deception regarding her own identity in the dream. The totem. She wants to keep that hidden, but since she is playing Cobb, this totem keeps forcing itself upon her.

I know this part is confusing but I'll give it a try. Mal HAS to play her Cobb role realistically. She can't fake who he was. So she has to play him with all the guilt he really had. It is confusing. Who is really playing whom here in this dream.

Like Memento, with its multiple, contradictory tattoo clues, there is one clue that cuts to the heart of the matter and gives us that one clear answer. The totem. I think it is not ambiguous. It is the one and only true thing in this movie that we can really rely on and depend on for the truth.

It's not that I can't stand an ambiguous ending. I can and there are many great movies that I enjoy which are ambiguous. But for this one, and from what I know of Nolan, I find a definitive answer to actually be a more subtle and mysterious than ambiguity, if that makes sense.

Well, that's my best shot. I hope it helps make my perspective more clear.

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[–] the-author 8 years ago

I like it! I will have to watch it with this perspective. I like it mostly because I never thought of it that way. So then, Mal's father taught her the Passiv dreaming? And this is the reason why Mal's childhood home is there but not Dom's? Maybe Mal likes to imagine that Dom comes home from the dream world, that he didn't jump to his death. There should be more meaning to the mirror scene then? And this is why 'Dom' has such an easy time (at the snow fortress) to shoot Mal; Because only Mal (playing Dom) could know for a fact that Mal was not real.

You got me thinking now. I'm usually very very hard to convince in changing my mind.

By the way, I think I'm the only one who has Memento figured out.

Brief synopsis: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0209144/board/flat/238382148?p=2&d=262245525#262245525

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[–] bsharporflat-50959 8 years ago

So then, Mal's father taught her the Passiv dreaming? And this is the reason why Mal's childhood home is there but not Dom's? Maybe Mal likes to imagine that Dom comes home from the dream world, that he didn't jump to his death. There should be more meaning to the mirror scene then? And this is why 'Dom' has such an easy time (at the snow fortress) to shoot Mal; Because only Mal (playing Dom) could know for a fact that Mal was not real.

You are good! You have some ideas I hadn't ever thought of.

Yes, I think even on my first viewing I wondered why, at the deepest level of dreaming, all the most personal stuff was only Mal's and not Cobb's, like the totem and the doll's house. Ultimately, the pervasiveness of the top and the complete lack of Cobb's own totem anywhere in the dreaming becomes direct and not just circumstantial evidence for who is really dreaming. If Nolan had shown Cobb setting down his own totem and picking up Mal's that would be different. If we'd seen that, I don't think I would ever have considered this to be Mal's dream. But we don't get that and I think it is on purpose.

It's been a long while since I saw Memento, but now I want to rewatch, from the perspective you present. There are some "dream" movies that I think would be ruined if there were no "reality" to it, but with Memento, it might actually be a better movie if it were all fantasy.

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[–] the-author 8 years ago

Now, I'm seeing scenes of Inception in my head.

After the mirror scene, Ari's first mistake was asking a personal question, "Is that what happened to you?"and almost immediately Mal appears and stabs Ari.
So, Mal is protecting her identity. It would seem obvious from the story, that Mal grew up in France not Dom. I mean she is a real French actress and Dom is specifically mentioned as an American. And the theme song is in French!

When Dom says he recognizes the bridge (maybe he saw Last Tango in Paris), it makes him appear to be someone who is not French, rather than saying 'Of course this is real. I've seen it a thousand times.'

And it immediately stirs memories of Dom and Mal on the bridge together, where Mal appears very happy.

Even without rewatching the film, I'm going to support this theory and work on it soon.

The thing with Memento is Nolan said he hid a secret within the film. What could be more devastating than having a loved one murdered? It would be that one willingly deciding to abandon their mate (which Sammy's wife doesn't do either...or is that what Leonard remembers?)
And Teddy says, about the Sammy story, "It gets better every time you tell it."

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[–] bsharporflat-50959 8 years ago

After the mirror scene, Ari's first mistake was asking a personal question, "Is that what happened to you?"and almost immediately Mal appears and stabs Ari.
So, Mal is protecting her identity. It would seem obvious from the story, that Mal grew up in France not Dom. I mean she is a real French actress and Dom is specifically mentioned as an American. And the theme song is in French!

When Dom says he recognizes the bridge (maybe he saw Last Tango in Paris), it makes him appear to be someone who is not French, rather than saying 'Of course this is real. I've seen it a thousand times.'

Thanks for this help. I tend to be a "big picture" perceiver and sometimes miss details that others catch.

The thing with Memento is Nolan said he hid a secret within the film. What could be more devastating than having a loved one murdered? It would be that one willingly deciding to abandon their mate (which Sammy's wife doesn't do either...or is that what Leonard remembers?)

I didn't know Nolan said that. Thank you!

It makes that movie much more enjoyable for me. My biggest Memento complaint always was that we seem to get "the answer" served up to us in the end on a silver platter.

So, combining our ideas, Inception is a mystery superficially about reality but at its heart about identity.

Memento is a mystery superficially about identity but at its heart about reality.

I love that. (and kudos to Nolan for never spilling the beans on either one)

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[–] Diver9006 8 years ago

While the spinning top at the end is something to focus on, another glaring aspect of the final scenes is that Cobb's children have not aged. It is alluded to that Cobb has been away for some time now, yet his children stay the same age in all the other dream sequences. Children at that age grow pretty quickly, yet his remain stagnate. To me, that is the greatest indication that the whole movie is actually a dream. Whether or not it is Cobb's dream or Mal's is an interesting point that I had not thought of before reading this board.

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[–] sapphire_dragon-1 8 years ago

The kids do age, the actors in the last scene look much older than the actors in the repeating clips and they wear different clothes albeit similar looking clothes. For me that was the indication he was in reality and why he abandons the spinning top because he sees that while they looked similar these were not the kids that existed in his dreamscape.

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[–] Erland (30) 7 years ago

??? So Mal is alive and Cobb is dead? Then, how did Cobb die?

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[–] SpaceAce2001 (387) 6 years ago

I choose to believe that Cobb wasn’t dreaming but the spinning top is meaningless, earlier on the same level Cobb spun it and it stopped spinning meaning he wasn’t in someone else’s dream but he still could have been in his own dream. The spinning top at the end isn’t a cliff hanger of whether he’s still dreaming or not it means that no matter what Cobb has accepted wherever he is as his reality.

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[–] AndrewGS 8 years ago

She was convinced that she was still dreaming so she killed herself...
At the end of the film, the focus was shifted on the never-ending spinning totem, which points towards the conclusion that Cobb was still dreaming after all of the occurred events...
So Mal woke up from her dream as she prophesied...Cobb was wrong and continued living in his dream...
They could have lived together in their real lives as they'd planned
So in the end, was Mal right?

Well if it's all a dream a lot of the memories and claims in the film could be unreliable but that kind of ends further conversation ...
There's doesn't seem to be a reason for Mal to think the limbo world is real and then that after it the real world is false except that Dom really did give her the idea that the world was false, which he would do if limbo world was false but the claim itself would be false otherwise, so it seems more likely the apparent real world actually was real. I don't know how to incorporate the ending.

Kind of regardless of what was real, Dom controlling his wife through her mind and Mal trying to control him through the framing were both wrong while Dom at the end not caring so much about the reality may be the better approach.

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[–] jrobertfleming 8 years ago

yes

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[–] Diver9006 8 years ago

Just read this (link below) on another thread and, it makes a good argument. Although he doesn't talk about the totem issues or the fact that only Mal's childhood house is in the dreamworld, I think that the "real" truth of the movie may be found somewhere in between bsharporflat's explanation and this one. Either way, it is obvious that this is an amazing movie to spark such theoretical and philosophical discussion over it.

http://halphillips.tumblr.com/post/822919795/inception

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[–] bsharporflat-50959 8 years ago

It is alluded to that Cobb has been away for some time now, yet his children stay the same age in all the other dream sequences. Children at that age grow pretty quickly, yet his remain stagnate. To me, that is the greatest indication that the whole movie is actually a dream.

I agree. I find no plausible way to interpret the ending as signifying reality.

Whether or not it is Cobb's dream or Mal's is an interesting point that I had not thought of before reading this board.

Yes. For me, it turns the basic question of the movie from "reality?" to "identity?". For me this jibes with Nolan's other work.

The main weakness in my theory is (I think) that nobody else seems to have thought of the movie from this perspective. It was intended by Nolan, surely more people would have caught it.

http://halphillips.tumblr.com/post/822919795/inception

This is an interesting theory. Well thought-out. My only complaint is that it is inherently open ended. You can theorize Ariade hacking Cobb's dreams, but then you have to consider the possibility that it is "really" someone else hacking Ariadne's dreams. There is no real end to the speculation.

I like my own theory a bit better (of course) because it has a finality. There is one missing piece to the puzzle, Cobb's totem, which leads to the one final conclusion I like.

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[–] the-author 8 years ago

And in the asylum, he is, of course, inmate #528491.

Nice

but i do still like that 491 stands for the unforgivable sin.
and 528 is some kind of of healing Hz sound.

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[–] Bag_of 8 years ago

If Mal was right then why hasnt she woke cobb up?

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[–] aocch3 8 years ago

Am I the only one that thinks the top was beginning to stop spinning when the film cut to credits? It seems the writer intended to leave us questioning rather it was a dream state or not. I don't think we can infer from the movie the top was definitely left perpetually spinning. Given this fact, I think the entire discussion about whom's dream it was is moot.

My line of thinking is the movie was to make us question our own reality. Based on our understanding of quantum theory it seems likely our reality is nothing more than a creation of our own dream state. How many levels deep may we/you be right now?

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[–] TrapLordRonSwanson 8 years ago

She was right, because Cobb was having an affair with Michael Caine's character. She was cucked by an old man.

Choose life. Choose a job. Choose a career.

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