MovieChat Forums > The Good Dinosaur (2015) Discussion > Revisiting Spot's Last Scene

Revisiting Spot's Last Scene

posted 8 years ago by veil182
2 replies | jump to latest

TLDR: Watched TGD for the second time today, first time since theaters. Much better on second viewing, but Arlo and Spot splitting up at the end feels unnecessary.

I looked forward to this movie for 2+ years. I was pretty disappointed seeing it in theaters. I won't get into why. Just about one year later, I've rewatched it for the first time.
It's actually pretty good. All the issues I had with it were easier to stand, and the good stuff was all there. Not a perfect film, but better than its initial reputation for sure.

However, one of my biggest gripes with the movie was exactly as I remembered. The ending. To be clear, the ending "works" for me. I think it's fine for children to see sad endings, I get that, and the emotion is not cheap or forced. Still, it feels so unnecessary.
My main issue is that Spot was lonely and he found Arlo. Arlo was afraid of the world and Spot helped him face it. It doesn't make sense for me to end the movie with Arlo splitting with his new best friend/brother/pet with some random background characters in the last 2 minutes just to have an emotional climax.

Spot understands what Arlo is doing, but twice tries to leave with him anyways. Spot is happy with Arlo, and again, the film doesn't make it clear why that can't happen at the farm.

I remember when The Good Dinosaur first came out a lot of people said there was not enough food for Spot at the already struggling farm, or that Spot simply was better off with his own kind rather than live the life of a farmer's pet. I think they are pretty flimsy, and not necessarily accurate.

Am I missing something? Why this is actually the perfect ending considering what the movie had established narratively/thematically to that point?

[–] Fiona90210 8 years ago

Because he was human, and needed a human family. They would be able to understand his wants and needs thru life more than a dinosaur family would. They could nurture him with feelings and emotion that a dinosaur family might not be able to. I was hoping they would show them a bit older and maybe meeting up for the day as friends do. But then again man never lived amongst dinos anyway. ?
It was a beautiful movie and I enjoyed it.

[–] krobison-58866 8 years ago

I felt they tried to address this when they had the man pull him up to walk. Showing that the boy had been mimicking the animals he witnessed, but with this family he could have more than that, be more than that.