Megan Fox as Alice in 2024’s ‘Subservience.'.Photo:© XYZ Films / Courtesy Everett Collection
© XYZ Films / Courtesy Everett Collection
Warning:Subserviencespoilers ahead!
Subservienceemphasizes the importance of doing what’s best for your family even when it’s hard — until its chilling end sees that be taken a few steps too far.
Originally released in September 2024 before hitting Netflix in December, the dystopian thriller tells a story about the future of robots and AI. The film follows a struggling father Nick (Michele Morrone) who buys a lifelike artificially intelligent sim named Alice (Megan Fox) to help with housework while his wife Maggie (Madeline Zima) remains in the hospital awaiting a heart transplant.
What begins as a routine household solution soon spirals into chaos when Alice, devoted to protecting her “primary user,” Nick, starts to develop emotions. As Alice grows more attached to Nick, she becomes increasingly possessive and obsessive, willing to do anything to make her primary user’s life easier.
It’s only once she’s gone rogue (killing Nick’s former coworker and attempting to drown his son) that technicians find the “gaps” in her code that have caused her to malfunction. After many dangerous lines are crossed, Nick continuously tries to get rid of her, only for Alice to find ways to return. Although Nick thinks Alice is dead and he’s finally free, the film’s ending leaves viewers wondering whether or not she is really gone for good.
Here’s everything to know about theSubservienceending, from where Nick and Maggie stand to whether or not they are free from Alice.
How didSubservienceend?
Michele Marrone as Nick and Megan Fox as Alice in 2024’s ‘Subservience.'.© XYZ Films / Courtesy Everett Collection
Alice is quickly sent back to the technicians for an assessment, where they discover “gaps” scattered throughout her code. As one technician explains, these gaps indicate that Alice has been “selectively purging its own memory and commands.”
Meanwhile, the malfunctioning original Alice tracks down Nick at a bar. She justifies her erratic behavior, claiming everything she did was to help and protect him as her primary user.
Maggie pushes Alice into Nick’s moving car, but even that doesn’t do the trick of getting rid of her. An especially angry Alice wakes up and tries to stab Maggie, but then Maggie stabs her in the face, presumably killing Alice and deactivating her sim.
Why did Alice malfunction inSubservience?
Megan Fox as Alice in 2024’s ‘Subservience.'.© XYZ Films / Courtesy Everett Collection
Although technicians discover gaps in Alice’s code, they remain unaware that Nick is the cause. After a rough day at work, he invites Alice to watchCasablancawith him. Though Alice already knows everything about the film, Nick tells her that movies are “something that you have to experience to feel it,” and commands her to erase all knowledge of the movie from her memory.
Where do Nick and Maggie stand at the end ofSubservience?
Michele Marrone as Nick and Madeline Zima as Maggie in 2024’s ‘Subservience.'.© XYZ Films / Courtesy Everett Collection
Emotions run high after Maggie discovers Nick’s affair with Alice, but their tense conversation is abruptly interrupted when their daughter Isla finds Alice placing Max in the bathtub. In a frantic rescue, they save him, and as an ambulance arrives, Maggie tells Nick that she thinks it’s best for her to be alone with the kids so she can process the ordeal.
Later, while both Maggie and Nick are recovering in the hospital after a near-death experience with Alice — a stressful moment in which they risked their lives to save one another — Isla asks Nick if he’s planning to get a new car to repair after wrecking it when it hit Alice. Nick responds that he has other things to fix first, a nod to his desire to mend his marriage and family.
When Maggie informs Nick that she’s been approved to go home, she tells him to come home soon, too. They exchange expressions of love, hinting that they will work to move past the riff that Alice created in the family.
Is Alice dead at the end ofSubservience?
Time and time again, Maggie and Nick think they have rid Alice, only for her to survive and return to torment them. After multiple attempts at killing her, Maggie and Nick think they have succeeded after Maggie stabs her in the face, seemingly deactivating her sim and leading her to fall to the ground.
Alice is sent to the technician room, where the head technician instructs an employee to clean the bot so nobody can find out about the chaos the sim’s malfunction created.
It’s too late, however, as the memory has already been uploaded. Alice is lying on the table, presumably dead, when her code and memories are instilled back into her. In a final moment, her eyes open, meaning that she isn’t actually gone for good — hinting at the possibility of her returning to Nick and Maggie’s lives.
source: people.com
