Donnie Darko fans have a chilling theory about the film that makes rewatching even more disturbing
Donnie Darko may have been dead for the entire film, according to one completely mind-bending analysis of the film.
Starring Jake Gyllenhaal, Drew Barrymore, Seth Rogen and Patrick Swayze, 2001's Donnie Darko is considered to be one of the greatest cult films of all time.
After sleepwalking his way out of a mysterious jet engine crashing into his bedroom, Donnie (Gyllenhaal) is repeatedly visited by a man in a rabbit costume who warns him that the world will end in 28 days, 6 hours, 42 minutes, and 12 seconds.
Fast-forward to the end of the film, and Donnie is transported back in time to the fatal morning of the jet engine crash; only this time he decides against getting out of bed and chooses to be crushed to death instead.
Advert
It's certainly a lot to unpack, which is why Donnie Darko fans have spent the following 25 years debating its meaning.
The main consensus is that Donnie and everyone he knows spend the majority of the film inside an unstable 'tangent' universe, which will destroy reality itself if not corrected.
By the end of the film, Donnie chooses to collapse the universe by travelling back to his bedroom on the evening of 2 October alongside a jet engine from a crash which would've killed his mother and sister.
By choosing to die, Donnie erases the events of the tangent universe and saves his loved ones from their alternate fate.
While the time-travel theory remains the most popular analysis of the film, it's not the only one, as a Redditor once posed a different theory that will completely alter your viewing of the film: the idea that Donnie was dead all along.
What if Donnie was actually dead throughout the entire events of Donnie Darko?
Posted on the popular r/FanTheories subreddit, the poster detailed an alternate take on the film, writing: "When people die, sometimes they are too heavily linked to Earth by something they wanted to experience more than anything but weren't able to, and so sometimes they're given a chance to relive their final days to try and experience what they're missing."
The Redditor then poses that, for Donnie, the thing tying him to Earth is his desire to experience true love.
After surviving the initial crash, Donnie is then given an opportunity to 'accomplish what he is missing' in order to see if it brings him peace of mind.
After travelling into the alternate timeline, Frank, dressed in the rabbit costume, acts as a 'conduit' for Donnie to achieve his earthly desires, which includes forming a romantic relationship and losing his virginity to new girl Gretchen.
As time passes, Donnie is then faced with the dilemma of whether or not to return to his fate or remain in the alternate timeline. It is only after he witnesses the tragedies which unfold in the new timeline - Gretchen's death, Frank's death and the deaths of his mother and sister in the plane crash - that he is convinced to accept his fate.
The film then ends by showing the next day in the original timeline, with everyone waking up to learn about Donnie's fate and having a strange sense of familiarity when seeing each other.
Read the whole theory below:
The theory has since struck a chord with readers over the years, with several Redditors saying the theory is one of the best ways of making sense of the movie.
"I literally just finished it, and was so confused that, after wikipedia, the first place I came was here to make SOME meaning of it," one person wrote, adding: "Not only does this make sense, it makes sense of the movie. I feel like this is actually what happened, it makes so much sense.
"Think this nicely captures the subtext of this movie well done," penned a second, while a third added: "This is the best theory I've ever read for Donnie Darko."
Looks like it's time for a rewatch this Halloween...
Topics: Entertainment, Film, Reddit, Nostalgia
Brenna Cooper