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Fans blown away after learning how to figure out the true ending in Inception

Home> Entertainment> Film

Published 13:07 5 Oct 2025 GMT+1

Fans blown away after learning how to figure out the true ending in Inception

You'd have to have keen eyes to spot it

James Moorhouse

James Moorhouse

Inception is one of those films where you're never really sure what's going on, but fortunately, some film experts have now figured out the true ending to Christopher Nolan's classic.

The 2010 sci-fi action film was perhaps always going to be a huge success, given it features the likes of Leonardo DiCaprio, Tom Hardy, Cillian Murphy, and Michael Caine.

For those of you who haven't seen it, the film sees characters 'incept' into the minds of others, with totems then used to establish if the characters are still inside a dream, or back in reality.

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In the case of Joseph Gordon Levitt's character Arthur, it's a loaded die that always lands on the same face in reality, but won't do so in dreams.

Due to the film's lengthy runtime, which requires laser focus, people are always discovering new things about it, including what some have described as a 'major plot hole' regarding DiCaprio's character Cobb and his 'totem'.

Inception is one of the films you've got to lock into (Warner Bros.)
Inception is one of the films you've got to lock into (Warner Bros.)

At the end of Inception, Cobb is reunited with his two young children as he struggles to move on from the death of his wife.

His totem is a spinning top, which will stop spinning in reality.

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The ending of the film cleverly sees the top continue to spin before cutting out, as the audience watches with bated breath to see if he's in reality or back in the land of dreams.

Fortunately, you can also rely on some film buffs and cinephiles to spot the things you didn't, probably because they can dedicate more time to watching the films again and again.

You can watch that moment below:

A few folks on Reddit have suggested that Cobb's totem is, in fact, not the spinning top, which belonged to his wife, but his wedding ring.

In reality, he doesn't wear the ring, but in his dreams, where he is reunited with his beloved, he does.

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And at the end of the film, if you look closely, he isn't wearing the ring, which suggests that what the audience sees is really happening.

One user commented: “Dom's wedding ring is his real totem, whether he knew it or not. When Arthur doesn't let Ariadne hold his die, he makes it very clear that a totem has to be an item that is unique to you.

Some have theorised that the wedding ring is how you can tell which is a dream and which is reality (Warner Bros.)
Some have theorised that the wedding ring is how you can tell which is a dream and which is reality (Warner Bros.)

“The spinning top was Mal's totem. Dom only wore his wedding ring in his dreams because that was the only place he could still be with Mal.”

Another said: “That's what I overlooked the first couple times watching this. Cobb said earlier in the film that everyone has a unique totem to keep them anchored in reality.

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“The spinning top was a misdirect. It was never his totem because that one belonged to his wife. The ring was his totem all along.”

If there's one thing Nolan loves, it's an ambiguous ending, and it's not his only film to leave the audience on a cliffhanger, as his 2014 sci-fi film Interstellar also left viewers wondering what it all means.

The meaning behind Interstellar's ending has been theorised by both fans and a Nobel Prize-winning scientist.

Featured Image Credit: Warner Bros

Topics: Christopher Nolan, Leonardo DiCaprio, Reddit

James Moorhouse
James Moorhouse

James is a NCTJ Gold Standard journalist covering a wide range of topics and news stories for LADbible. After two years in football writing, James switched to covering news with Newsquest in Cumbria, before joining the LAD team in 2025. In his spare time, James is a long-suffering Rochdale fan and loves reading, running and music. Contact him via [email protected]

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@JimmyMoorhouse

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