Plot twist
Encyclopedia
A plot twist is a change in the expected direction or outcome of the plot of a film
, television series, video game, novel
, comic or other fictional work. It is a common practice in narration used to keep the interest of an audience, usually surprising them with a revelation. Some "twists" are foreshadowed
and can thus be predicted by many viewers/readers, whereas others are a complete shock.
When a plot twist happens near the end of a story, especially if it changes one's view of the preceding events, it is known as a twist ending.
Revealing the existence of a plot twist often spoils
a movie, since the majority of the movie generally builds up to the plot twist.
A device used to undermine the expectations of the audience is the false protagonist
. It involves presenting a character at the start of the film as the main character, but then disposing of this character, usually killing them. It is a red herring.
genre with multiple twists was the Arabian Nights tale "The Three Apples". It begins with a fisherman discovering a locked chest. The first twist occurs when the chest is broken open and the dead body is found inside. The initial search for the murderer fails, and a twist occurs when two men appear, separately claiming to be the murderer. A complex chain of events finally reveal the murderer to be the investigator's own slave.
that causes the audience
to reevaluate the narrative or characters.
, or discovery, is the protagonist's sudden recognition of their own or another character's true identity or nature. Through this technique, previously unforeseen character information is revealed. A notable example of anagnorisis occurs in Oedipus Rex: Oedipus
kills his father and marries his mother in ignorance, learning the truth only toward the climax of the play. The earliest use of this device as a twist ending in a murder mystery
was in "The Three Apples", a medieval Arabian Nights tale, where the protagonist Ja'far ibn Yahya
discovers by chance a key item towards the end of the story that reveals the culprit behind the murder to be his own slave all along. The most well-known cinematic
use of this technique was in The Empire Strikes Back
, where Luke Skywalker
famously learns that his father is actually the evil Darth Vader
. Another film to use it is the 2001 film The Others
, in which a mother is convinced that her house is being haunted. At the end of the film, she learns that she and her children are really the ghosts. Similarly, in M. Night Shyamalan
's The Sixth Sense
, a main character who believes he is alive, helping a boy to communicate with dead people, discovers that he is really dead. A memorable episode of The Twilight Zone
was the episode "Five Characters in Search of an Exit
", in which the protagonists horrifically discover at the climax, that they were discarded toys in a donation bin
. Another example is in Fight Club
, when Edward Norton
's character realizes that Tyler Durden (Brad Pitt
) is his own split personality. Sometimes the audience may discover that the true identity of a character is in fact unknown, as in Layer Cake
or the assassin in The Day of the Jackal
.
Flashback
, or analepsis, is a sudden, vivid reversion to a past event. It is used to surprise the reader with previously unknown information that provides the answer to a mystery, places a character in a different light, or reveals the reason for a previously inexplicable action. The Alfred Hitchcock
film Marnie
employed this type of twist ending. Sometimes this is combined with the above category, as the flashback may reveal the true identity of one of the characters, or that the protagonist is related to one of the villain's past victims, as Sergio Leone
did with Charles Bronson
's character in "Once Upon a Time in the West
" or Frederick Forsyth
's "The Odessa File
".
An unreliable narrator
twists the ending by revealing, almost always at the end of the narrative, that the narrator has manipulated or fabricated the preceding story, thus forcing the reader to question their prior assumptions about the text. This motif is often used within noir fiction and films
, notably in the film The Usual Suspects
. An unreliable narrator motif was employed by Agatha Christie in The Murder of Roger Ackroyd
, a novel that generated much controversy due to critics' contention that it was unfair to trick the reader in such a manipulative manner. Another example of unreliable narration is a character who has been revealed to be insane and thus causes the audience to question the previous narrative; notable examples of this are in the Terry Gilliam
film Brazil
,David Fincher
's Fight Club, and the second episode of Alfred Hitchcock Presents
, "Premonition".
Peripeteia
is a sudden reversal of the protagonist's fortune, whether for good or ill, that emerges naturally from the character's circumstances. Unlike the deus ex machina device, peripeteia must be logical within the frame of the story. An example of a reversal for ill would be Agamemnon
's sudden murder at the hands of his wife Clytemnestra
in Aeschylus
' The Oresteia
or the inescapable situation Kate Hudson
's character finds herself in at the end of The Skeleton Key
. This type of ending was a common twist ending utilised by The Twilight Zone
, most effectively in the episode "Time Enough at Last
" where Burgess Meredith
's character is robbed of all his hope by a simple but devastating accident with his glasses. A positive reversal of fortune would be Nicholas Van Orton's suicide attempt after mistakenly believing himself to have accidentally killed his brother, only to land safely in the midst of his own birthday party, in the film The Game
. Another example is the Oscar-nominated Indian film Lagaan
, where Aamir Khan
's character is thought to have been caught out of the last ball
to lose the game, only to realize that the fielder
was outside the boundary
line and it was actually a six, causing his team to win the game.
Deus ex machina
is a Latin term meaning "god out of the machine." It refers to an unexpected, artificial or improbable character, device or event introduced suddenly in a work of fiction to resolve a situation or untangle a plot. In Ancient Greek theater
, the "deus ex machina" ('ἀπὸ μηχανῆς θεός') was the character of a Greek god literally brought onto the stage via a crane (μηχανῆς—mechanes), after which a seemingly insoluble problem is brought to a satisfactory resolution by the god's will. In its modern, figurative sense, the "deus ex machina" brings about an ending to a narrative through unexpected (generally happy) resolution to what appears to be a problem that cannot be overcome (see Mel Brooks
' History of the World, Part I
). This device is often used to end a bleak story on a more positive note.
Poetic justice
is a literary device in which virtue
is ultimately rewarded or vice
punished in such a way that the reward or punishment has a logical connection to the deed. In modern literature, this device is often used to create an ironic
twist of fate in which the villain gets caught up in his/her own trap. For example, in C. S. Lewis
' The Horse and His Boy
, Prince Rabadash climbs upon a mounting block during the battle in Archenland. Upon jumping down while shouting "The bolt of Tash
falls from above," his hauberk
catches on a hook and leaves him hanging there, humiliated and trapped.
Chekhov's gun
refers to a situation in which a character or plot element is introduced early in the narrative, then not referenced again until much later. Often the usefulness of the item is not immediately apparent until it suddenly attains pivotal significance. A similar mechanism is the "plant," a preparatory device that repeats throughout the story. During the resolution, the true significance of the plant is revealed. An example of this would be the geologist's hammer
in The Shawshank Redemption
, which the character Andy Dufresne (Tim Robbins
) acquires early on in the movie. At the end, it is revealed that Dufresne has for the progression of the entire film, spanning over 19 years, secretly been using the hammer to tunnel an escape route out of the prison. Another example is seen in M. Night Shyamalan
's The Sixth Sense
, where the significance of an early scene becomes apparent at the end, necessitating a different interpretation of all that has happened in between; in this case, it is not a physical device but an action which is pivotal to the outcome. Both Chekhov's gun and plants are used as elements of foreshadowing
. Villains in Scooby-Doo, Where Are You!
were often Chekhov's guns—they would be introduced early on as "innocuous secondary characters", then ignored until they turned out to be the one in the scary costume driving people away to get at a hidden fortune. Citizen Kane
introduced "Rosebud" early in the film both as a minor prop and as the major plot focus only to reveal what "Rosebud" really meant in the last scene. This is also shown in the film Seven Pounds
when Will Smith
's character calls the police at the beginning of the film to report his suicide.
A red herring
is a false clue intended to lead investigators toward an incorrect solution. This device usually appears in detective novels
and mystery fiction
. The red herring is a type of misdirection
, a device intended to distract the protagonist
, and by extension the reader, away from the correct answer or from the site of pertinent clues or action. An example would be the way such information is used in the film Saw
(2004). The Indian murder mystery film Gupt: The Hidden Truth
cast many veteran actors who had usually played villainous roles in previous Indian films as red herrings in this film to deceive the audience into suspecting them. In the bestselling novel, The Da Vinci Code
, the misdeeds of a key character named "Bishop Aringarosa" draw attention away from the true master villain. "Aringarosa" literarily means "Red Herring." A red herring can also be used as a form of false foreshadowing
.
A cliffhanger
is an abrupt ending that leaves the main characters in a precarious or difficult situation, creating a strong feeling of suspense that provokes the reader to ask, "What will happen next?" Cliffhangers often frustrate the reader, since they offer no resolution at all; however, the device does have the advantage of creating the Zeigarnik effect (unfinished or interrupted tasks are better remembered). A cliffhanger is often employed at the end of an installment of serialized novels
, movies
, or in most cases, TV series. In The Dark Tower
, Stephen King
uses cliffhangers between most of the books; especially in the end of The Dark Tower III: The Waste Lands. A literal cliffhanger can be seen at the end of The Italian Job
.
In medias res
(Latin
, "into the middle of things") is a literary technique in which narrative proceeds from the middle of the story rather than its beginning. Information such as characterization, setting, and motive is revealed through a series of flashbacks. This technique creates a twist when the cause for the inciting incident is not revealed until the climax. This technique is used within the film The Prestige
in which the opening scenes show one of the main characters drowning and the other being imprisoned. Subsequent scenes reveal the events leading up to these situations through a series of flashbacks. In Monsters
, a similar beginning proves to be a flashforward as it is the linear conclusion of the events that then follow; this is not apparent till the end. In medias res is often used to provide a narrative hook
.
Nonlinear narrative narration works by revealing plot and character in non-chronological order. This technique requires the reader to attempt to piece together the timeline in order to fully understand the story. A twist ending can occur as the result of information which is held until the climax and which places characters or events in a different perspective. Some of the earliest known uses of non-linear story telling occur in The Odyssey, a work that is largely told in flashback via the narrator Odysseus
. The nonlinear approach has been used in works such as the films Mulholland Drive
, Sin City
, and Pulp Fiction
, the television show Lost
(especially in many episodes in the later seasons), and the book Catch-22
.
Reverse chronology
works by revealing the plot in reverse order, i.e., from final event to initial event. Unlike traditional chronological storylines, which progress through causes before reaching a final effect, reverse chronological storylines reveal the final effect before tracing the causes leading up to it; therefore, the initial cause represents a "twist ending." Examples employing this technique include the films Irréversible
and Memento, the play Betrayal
by Harold Pinter
, and Martin Amis
' Time's Arrow
.
Film
A film, also called a movie or motion picture, is a series of still or moving images. It is produced by recording photographic images with cameras, or by creating images using animation techniques or visual effects...
, television series, video game, novel
Novel
A novel is a book of long narrative in literary prose. The genre has historical roots both in the fields of the medieval and early modern romance and in the tradition of the novella. The latter supplied the present generic term in the late 18th century....
, comic or other fictional work. It is a common practice in narration used to keep the interest of an audience, usually surprising them with a revelation. Some "twists" are foreshadowed
Foreshadowing
Foreshadowing or adumbrating is a literary device in which an author indistinctly suggests certain plot developments that might come later in the story.-Repetitive designation and Chekhov's gun:...
and can thus be predicted by many viewers/readers, whereas others are a complete shock.
When a plot twist happens near the end of a story, especially if it changes one's view of the preceding events, it is known as a twist ending.
Revealing the existence of a plot twist often spoils
Spoiler (media)
Spoiler is slang for any element of any summary or description of any piece of fiction that reveals any plot element which will give away the outcome of a dramatic episode within the work of fiction, or the conclusion of the entire work. It can also be used to refer to any piece of information...
a movie, since the majority of the movie generally builds up to the plot twist.
A device used to undermine the expectations of the audience is the false protagonist
False protagonist
In fiction, a false protagonist is a literary technique, often used to make the plot more jarring or more memorable by fooling the audience's preconceptions, that constructs a character who the audience assumes is the protagonist but is later revealed not to be...
. It involves presenting a character at the start of the film as the main character, but then disposing of this character, usually killing them. It is a red herring.
Example of a plot twist
An early example of the murder mysteryCrime fiction
Crime fiction is the literary genre that fictionalizes crimes, their detection, criminals and their motives. It is usually distinguished from mainstream fiction and other genres such as science fiction or historical fiction, but boundaries can be, and indeed are, blurred...
genre with multiple twists was the Arabian Nights tale "The Three Apples". It begins with a fisherman discovering a locked chest. The first twist occurs when the chest is broken open and the dead body is found inside. The initial search for the murderer fails, and a twist occurs when two men appear, separately claiming to be the murderer. A complex chain of events finally reveal the murderer to be the investigator's own slave.
Twist ending
A twist ending is a plot twist occurring near or at the conclusion of a story, an unexpected conclusion to a work of fictionFiction
Fiction is the form of any narrative or informative work that deals, in part or in whole, with information or events that are not factual, but rather, imaginary—that is, invented by the author. Although fiction describes a major branch of literary work, it may also refer to theatrical,...
that causes the audience
Audience
An audience is a group of people who participate in a show or encounter a work of art, literature , theatre, music or academics in any medium...
to reevaluate the narrative or characters.
Literary devices
AnagnorisisAnagnorisis
Anagnorisis is a moment in a play or other work when a character makes a critical discovery. Anagnorisis originally meant recognition in its Greek context, not only of a person but also of what that person stood for...
, or discovery, is the protagonist's sudden recognition of their own or another character's true identity or nature. Through this technique, previously unforeseen character information is revealed. A notable example of anagnorisis occurs in Oedipus Rex: Oedipus
Oedipus
Oedipus was a mythical Greek king of Thebes. He fulfilled a prophecy that said he would kill his father and marry his mother, and thus brought disaster on his city and family...
kills his father and marries his mother in ignorance, learning the truth only toward the climax of the play. The earliest use of this device as a twist ending in a murder mystery
Crime fiction
Crime fiction is the literary genre that fictionalizes crimes, their detection, criminals and their motives. It is usually distinguished from mainstream fiction and other genres such as science fiction or historical fiction, but boundaries can be, and indeed are, blurred...
was in "The Three Apples", a medieval Arabian Nights tale, where the protagonist Ja'far ibn Yahya
Ja'far ibn Yahya
Ja'far bin Yahya Barmaki, Jafar al-Barmaki was the son of a Persian Vizier of the Arab Abbasid Caliph, Harun al-Rashid, from whom he inherited that position. He was a member of the influential Barmakids family...
discovers by chance a key item towards the end of the story that reveals the culprit behind the murder to be his own slave all along. The most well-known cinematic
Film
A film, also called a movie or motion picture, is a series of still or moving images. It is produced by recording photographic images with cameras, or by creating images using animation techniques or visual effects...
use of this technique was in The Empire Strikes Back
Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back
Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back is a 1980 American epic space opera film directed by Irvin Kershner. The screenplay, based on a story by George Lucas, was written by Leigh Brackett and Lawrence Kasdan...
, where Luke Skywalker
Luke Skywalker
Luke Skywalker is a fictional character and the main protagonist of the original film trilogy of the Star Wars franchise, where he is portrayed by Mark Hamill. He is introduced in Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope, in which he is forced to leave home, and finds himself apprenticed to the Jedi master...
famously learns that his father is actually the evil Darth Vader
Darth Vader
Darth Vader is a central character in the Star Wars saga, appearing as one of the main antagonists in the original trilogy and as the main protagonist in the prequel trilogy....
. Another film to use it is the 2001 film The Others
The Others (2001 film)
The Others is a 2001 psychological horror film by the Spanish-Chilean director Alejandro Amenábar, starring Nicole Kidman. It is inspired partly by the novella The Turn of the Screw....
, in which a mother is convinced that her house is being haunted. At the end of the film, she learns that she and her children are really the ghosts. Similarly, in M. Night Shyamalan
M. Night Shyamalan
Manoj Nelliyattu Shyamalan,known professionally as M. Night Shyamalan, is an Indian-born American screenwriter, film director, and producer known for making movies with contemporary supernatural plots that climax with a twist ending. He is also known for filming his movies in and around...
's The Sixth Sense
The Sixth Sense
The Sixth Sense is a 1999 American psychological thriller film written and directed by M. Night Shyamalan. The film tells the story of Cole Sear , a troubled, isolated boy who is able to see and talk to the dead, and an equally troubled child psychologist who tries to help him...
, a main character who believes he is alive, helping a boy to communicate with dead people, discovers that he is really dead. A memorable episode of The Twilight Zone
The Twilight Zone
The Twilight Zone is an American television anthology series created by Rod Serling. Each episode is a mixture of self-contained drama, psychological thriller, fantasy, science fiction, suspense, or horror, often concluding with a macabre or unexpected twist...
was the episode "Five Characters in Search of an Exit
Five Characters in Search of an Exit
"Five Characters in Search of an Exit" is an episode of the television series The Twilight Zone.-Synopsis:A uniformed Army major wakes up to find himself trapped inside in a large metal cylinder, where he meets a clown, who introduces him to the others, a hobo, ballet dancer, and a bagpiper. None...
", in which the protagonists horrifically discover at the climax, that they were discarded toys in a donation bin
Clothing bin
A clothing bin is a container in which clothing is placed to be donated to charity organizations or for recycling in other ways. They are typically provided by the charities themselves or by local authorities....
. Another example is in Fight Club
Fight Club (film)
Fight Club is a 1999 American film based on the 1996 novel of the same name by Chuck Palahniuk. The film was directed by David Fincher and stars Edward Norton, Brad Pitt and Helena Bonham Carter. Norton plays the unnamed protagonist, an "everyman" who is discontented with his white-collar job...
, when Edward Norton
Edward Norton
Edward Harrison Norton is an American actor, screenwriter, film director and producer. In 1996, his supporting role in the courtroom drama Primal Fear garnered him a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor...
's character realizes that Tyler Durden (Brad Pitt
Brad Pitt
William Bradley "Brad" Pitt is an American actor and film producer. Pitt has received two Academy Award nominations and four Golden Globe Award nominations, winning one...
) is his own split personality. Sometimes the audience may discover that the true identity of a character is in fact unknown, as in Layer Cake
Layer Cake (film)
Layer Cake is a 2004 British crime thriller produced and directed by Matthew Vaughn, in his directorial debut. It is based on the novel Layer Cake by J. J...
or the assassin in The Day of the Jackal
The Day of the Jackal
The Day of the Jackal is a thriller novel by English writer Frederick Forsyth, about a professional assassin who is contracted by the OAS, a French terrorist group of the early 1960s, to kill Charles de Gaulle, the President of France....
.
Flashback
Flashback (narrative)
Flashback is an interjected scene that takes the narrative back in time from the current point the story has reached. Flashbacks are often used to recount events that happened before the story’s primary sequence of events or to fill in crucial backstory...
, or analepsis, is a sudden, vivid reversion to a past event. It is used to surprise the reader with previously unknown information that provides the answer to a mystery, places a character in a different light, or reveals the reason for a previously inexplicable action. The Alfred Hitchcock
Alfred Hitchcock
Sir Alfred Joseph Hitchcock, KBE was a British film director and producer. He pioneered many techniques in the suspense and psychological thriller genres. After a successful career in British cinema in both silent films and early talkies, Hitchcock moved to Hollywood...
film Marnie
Marnie (film)
Marnie is a 1964 psychological thriller directed by Alfred Hitchcock and based on the novel of the same name by Winston Graham. The film stars Tippi Hedren and Sean Connery. The original film score was composed by Bernard Herrmann.-Plot:...
employed this type of twist ending. Sometimes this is combined with the above category, as the flashback may reveal the true identity of one of the characters, or that the protagonist is related to one of the villain's past victims, as Sergio Leone
Sergio Leone
Sergio Leone was an Italian film director, producer and screenwriter most associated with the "Spaghetti Western" genre.Leone's film-making style includes juxtaposing extreme close-up shots with lengthy long shots...
did with Charles Bronson
Charles Bronson
Charles Bronson , born Charles Dennis Buchinsky was an American actor, best-known for such films as Once Upon a Time in the West, The Magnificent Seven, The Dirty Dozen, The Great Escape, Rider on the Rain, The Mechanic, and the popular Death Wish series...
's character in "Once Upon a Time in the West
Once Upon a Time in the West
Once Upon a Time in the West is a 1968 Italian epic spaghetti western film directed by Sergio Leone for Paramount Pictures. It stars Henry Fonda cast against type as the villain, Charles Bronson as his nemesis, Jason Robards as a bandit, and Claudia Cardinale as a newly widowed homesteader with a...
" or Frederick Forsyth
Frederick Forsyth
Frederick Forsyth, CBE is an English author and occasional political commentator. He is best known for thrillers such as The Day of the Jackal, The Odessa File, The Fourth Protocol, The Dogs of War, The Devil's Alternative, The Fist of God, Icon, The Veteran, Avenger, The Afghan and The Cobra.-...
's "The Odessa File
The Odessa File
The Odessa File is a thriller by Frederick Forsyth, first published in 1972, about the adventures of a young German reporter attempting to discover the location of a former SS concentration-camp commander....
".
An unreliable narrator
Unreliable narrator
An unreliable narrator is a narrator, whether in literature, film, or theatre, whose credibility has been seriously compromised. The term was coined in 1961 by Wayne C. Booth in The Rhetoric of Fiction. This narrative mode is one that can be developed by an author for a number of reasons, usually...
twists the ending by revealing, almost always at the end of the narrative, that the narrator has manipulated or fabricated the preceding story, thus forcing the reader to question their prior assumptions about the text. This motif is often used within noir fiction and films
Film noir
Film noir is a cinematic term used primarily to describe stylish Hollywood crime dramas, particularly those that emphasize cynical attitudes and sexual motivations. Hollywood's classic film noir period is generally regarded as extending from the early 1940s to the late 1950s...
, notably in the film The Usual Suspects
The Usual Suspects
The Usual Suspects is a 1995 American neo-noir film written by Christopher McQuarrie and directed by Bryan Singer. It stars Stephen Baldwin, Gabriel Byrne, Benicio del Toro, Chazz Palminteri, Kevin Pollak, Kevin Spacey and Pete Postlethwaite....
. An unreliable narrator motif was employed by Agatha Christie in The Murder of Roger Ackroyd
The Murder of Roger Ackroyd
The Murder of Roger Ackroyd is a work of detective fiction by Agatha Christie, first published in the UK by William Collins & Sons in June 1926 and in the United States by Dodd, Mead and Company on the 19th of the same month. It features Hercule Poirot as the lead detective...
, a novel that generated much controversy due to critics' contention that it was unfair to trick the reader in such a manipulative manner. Another example of unreliable narration is a character who has been revealed to be insane and thus causes the audience to question the previous narrative; notable examples of this are in the Terry Gilliam
Terry Gilliam
Terrence Vance "Terry" Gilliam is an American-born British screenwriter, film director, animator, actor and member of the Monty Python comedy troupe. Gilliam is also known for directing several films, including Brazil , The Adventures of Baron Munchausen , The Fisher King , and 12 Monkeys...
film Brazil
Brazil (film)
Brazil is a 1985 British science fiction fantasy/black comedy film directed by Terry Gilliam. It was written by Gilliam, Charles McKeown, and Tom Stoppard and stars Jonathan Pryce. The film also features Robert De Niro, Kim Greist, Michael Palin, Katherine Helmond, Bob Hoskins, and Ian Holm...
,David Fincher
David Fincher
David Andrew Leo Fincher is an American film and music video director. Known for his dark and stylish thrillers, such as Seven , The Game , Fight Club , Panic Room , and Zodiac , Fincher received Academy Award nominations for Best Director for his 2008 film The Curious Case of Benjamin Button and...
's Fight Club, and the second episode of Alfred Hitchcock Presents
Alfred Hitchcock Presents
Alfred Hitchcock Presents is an American television anthology series hosted by Alfred Hitchcock. The series featured dramas, thrillers, and mysteries. By the premiere of the show on October 2, 1955, Hitchcock had been directing films for over three decades...
, "Premonition".
Peripeteia
Peripeteia
Peripeteia is a reversal of circumstances, or turning point. The term is primarily used with reference to works of literature. The English form of peripeteia is peripety. Peripety is a sudden reversal dependent on intellect and logic...
is a sudden reversal of the protagonist's fortune, whether for good or ill, that emerges naturally from the character's circumstances. Unlike the deus ex machina device, peripeteia must be logical within the frame of the story. An example of a reversal for ill would be Agamemnon
Agamemnon
In Greek mythology, Agamemnon was the son of King Atreus and Queen Aerope of Mycenae, the brother of Menelaus, the husband of Clytemnestra, and the father of Electra and Orestes. Mythical legends make him the king of Mycenae or Argos, thought to be different names for the same area...
's sudden murder at the hands of his wife Clytemnestra
Clytemnestra
Clytemnestra or Clytaemnestra , in ancient Greek legend, was the wife of Agamemnon, king of the Ancient Greek kingdom of Mycenae or Argos. In the Oresteia by Aeschylus, she was a femme fatale who murdered her husband, Agamemnon – said by Euripides to be her second husband – and the Trojan princess...
in Aeschylus
Aeschylus
Aeschylus was the first of the three ancient Greek tragedians whose work has survived, the others being Sophocles and Euripides, and is often described as the father of tragedy. His name derives from the Greek word aiskhos , meaning "shame"...
' The Oresteia
The Oresteia
The Oresteia is a trilogy of Greek tragedies written by Aeschylus which concerns the end of the curse on the House of Atreus. When originally performed it was accompanied by Proteus, a satyr play that would have been performed following the trilogy; it has not survived...
or the inescapable situation Kate Hudson
Kate Hudson
Kate Garry Hudson is an American actress. She came to prominence in 2001 after winning a Golden Globe and receiving several nominations, including a nomination for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress, for her role in Almost Famous. She then starred in the hit film How to Lose a Guy in 10...
's character finds herself in at the end of The Skeleton Key
The Skeleton Key
The Skeleton Key is a 2005 American supernatural horror film starring Kate Hudson, Gena Rowlands, John Hurt, Peter Sarsgaard, and Joy Bryant. The film focuses on a young hospice nurse who acquires a job at a Terrebonne Parish plantation home, and becomes entangled in a mystery involving the house,...
. This type of ending was a common twist ending utilised by The Twilight Zone
The Twilight Zone
The Twilight Zone is an American television anthology series created by Rod Serling. Each episode is a mixture of self-contained drama, psychological thriller, fantasy, science fiction, suspense, or horror, often concluding with a macabre or unexpected twist...
, most effectively in the episode "Time Enough at Last
Time Enough at Last
"Time Enough at Last" is an episode of the American television anthology series The Twilight Zone. It was adapted from a short story by Lyn Venable , which had been published in the January 1953 edition of the science fiction magazine If: Worlds of Science Fiction...
" where Burgess Meredith
Burgess Meredith
Oliver Burgess Meredith , known professionally as Burgess Meredith, was an American actor in theatre, film, and television, who also worked as a director...
's character is robbed of all his hope by a simple but devastating accident with his glasses. A positive reversal of fortune would be Nicholas Van Orton's suicide attempt after mistakenly believing himself to have accidentally killed his brother, only to land safely in the midst of his own birthday party, in the film The Game
The Game (film)
The Game is a 1997 neo-noir psychological thriller film directed by David Fincher, starring Michael Douglas and Sean Penn, and produced by Polygram. It tells the story of an investment banker who is given a mysterious gift: participation in a game that integrates in strange ways with his life...
. Another example is the Oscar-nominated Indian film Lagaan
Lagaan
Lagaan is a 2001 Bollywood sports film written and directed by Ashutosh Gowariker. Aamir Khan, who was also the producer for the film, stars with Gracy Singh in the lead roles; British actors Rachel Shelley and Paul Blackthorne play the supporting roles...
, where Aamir Khan
Aamir Khan
Aamir Hussain Khan is an Indian film actor, director and producer who has established himself as one of the leading actors of Hindi cinema....
's character is thought to have been caught out of the last ball
Bowling (cricket)
In the sport of cricket, bowling is the action of propelling the ball toward the wicket defended by a batsman. A player skilled at bowling is called a bowler; a bowler who is also a competent batsman is known as an all-rounder...
to lose the game, only to realize that the fielder
Fielding (cricket)
Fielding in the sport of cricket is the action of fielders in collecting the ball after it is struck by the batsman, in such a way as to either limit the number of runs that the batsman scores or get the batsman out by catching the ball in flight or running the batsman out.Cricket fielding position...
was outside the boundary
Boundary (cricket)
Boundary has two distinct meanings in the sport of cricket:# the edge or boundary of the playing field, and# a manner of scoring runs.-Edge of the field:...
line and it was actually a six, causing his team to win the game.
Deus ex machina
Deus ex machina
A deus ex machina is a plot device whereby a seemingly inextricable problem is suddenly and abruptly solved with the contrived and unexpected intervention of some new event, character, ability, or object.-Linguistic considerations:...
is a Latin term meaning "god out of the machine." It refers to an unexpected, artificial or improbable character, device or event introduced suddenly in a work of fiction to resolve a situation or untangle a plot. In Ancient Greek theater
Theatre of Ancient Greece
The theatre of Ancient Greece, or ancient Greek drama, is a theatrical culture that flourished in ancient Greece between c. 550 and c. 220 BC. The city-state of Athens, which became a significant cultural, political and military power during this period, was its centre, where it was...
, the "deus ex machina" ('ἀπὸ μηχανῆς θεός') was the character of a Greek god literally brought onto the stage via a crane (μηχανῆς—mechanes), after which a seemingly insoluble problem is brought to a satisfactory resolution by the god's will. In its modern, figurative sense, the "deus ex machina" brings about an ending to a narrative through unexpected (generally happy) resolution to what appears to be a problem that cannot be overcome (see Mel Brooks
Mel Brooks
Mel Brooks is an American film director, screenwriter, composer, lyricist, comedian, actor and producer. He is best known as a creator of broad film farces and comic parodies. He began his career as a stand-up comic and as a writer for the early TV variety show Your Show of Shows...
' History of the World, Part I
History of the World, Part I
History of the World, Part I is a 1981 comedy film written, produced, and directed by Mel Brooks. Brooks also stars in the film, playing five roles: Moses, Comicus the stand-up philosopher, Tomás de Torquemada, King Louis XVI, and Jacques, le garçon de pisse...
). This device is often used to end a bleak story on a more positive note.
Poetic justice
Poetic justice
Poetic justice is a literary device in which virtue is ultimately rewarded or vice punished, often in modern literature by an ironic twist of fate intimately related to the character's own conduct.- Origin of the term :...
is a literary device in which virtue
Virtue
Virtue is moral excellence. A virtue is a positive trait or quality subjectively deemed to be morally excellent and thus is valued as a foundation of principle and good moral being....
is ultimately rewarded or vice
Vice
Vice is a practice or a behavior or habit considered immoral, depraved, or degrading in the associated society. In more minor usage, vice can refer to a fault, a defect, an infirmity, or merely a bad habit. Synonyms for vice include fault, depravity, sin, iniquity, wickedness, and corruption...
punished in such a way that the reward or punishment has a logical connection to the deed. In modern literature, this device is often used to create an ironic
Irony
Irony is a rhetorical device, literary technique, or situation in which there is a sharp incongruity or discordance that goes beyond the simple and evident intention of words or actions...
twist of fate in which the villain gets caught up in his/her own trap. For example, in C. S. Lewis
C. S. Lewis
Clive Staples Lewis , commonly referred to as C. S. Lewis and known to his friends and family as "Jack", was a novelist, academic, medievalist, literary critic, essayist, lay theologian and Christian apologist from Belfast, Ireland...
' The Horse and His Boy
The Horse and His Boy
The Horse and His Boy is a novel by C. S. Lewis. It was published in 1954, making it the fifth of seven books published in Lewis' series The Chronicles of Narnia. The books in this series are sometimes ordered chronologically in relation to the events in the books as opposed to the dates of their...
, Prince Rabadash climbs upon a mounting block during the battle in Archenland. Upon jumping down while shouting "The bolt of Tash
Tash (Narnia)
Tash is a fictional character found in C. S. Lewis' Chronicles of Narnia series. He is an antagonist in the novels The Horse and His Boy and The Last Battle....
falls from above," his hauberk
Hauberk
A hauberk is a shirt of chainmail. The term is usually used to describe a shirt reaching at least to mid-thigh and including sleeves. Haubergeon generally refers to a shorter variant with partial sleeves, but the terms are often used interchangeably.- History :The word hauberk is derived from the...
catches on a hook and leaves him hanging there, humiliated and trapped.
Chekhov's gun
Chekhov's gun
Chekhov's gun is a literary technique whereby an apparently irrelevant element is introduced early in the story whose significance becomes clear later in the narrative. The concept is named after Russian playwright Anton Chekhov, who mentioned several variants of the concept in letters...
refers to a situation in which a character or plot element is introduced early in the narrative, then not referenced again until much later. Often the usefulness of the item is not immediately apparent until it suddenly attains pivotal significance. A similar mechanism is the "plant," a preparatory device that repeats throughout the story. During the resolution, the true significance of the plant is revealed. An example of this would be the geologist's hammer
Geologist's hammer
A geologist's hammer, rock hammer, rock pick or geological pick is a hammer used for splitting and breaking rocks. In field geology, they are used to obtain a fresh surface of a rock in order to determine its composition, nature, mineralogy, history and field estimate of rock strength...
in The Shawshank Redemption
The Shawshank Redemption
The Shawshank Redemption is a 1994 American drama film written and directed by Frank Darabont and starring Tim Robbins and Morgan Freeman....
, which the character Andy Dufresne (Tim Robbins
Tim Robbins
Timothy Francis "Tim" Robbins is an American actor, screenwriter, director, producer, activist and musician. He is the former longtime partner of actress Susan Sarandon...
) acquires early on in the movie. At the end, it is revealed that Dufresne has for the progression of the entire film, spanning over 19 years, secretly been using the hammer to tunnel an escape route out of the prison. Another example is seen in M. Night Shyamalan
M. Night Shyamalan
Manoj Nelliyattu Shyamalan,known professionally as M. Night Shyamalan, is an Indian-born American screenwriter, film director, and producer known for making movies with contemporary supernatural plots that climax with a twist ending. He is also known for filming his movies in and around...
's The Sixth Sense
The Sixth Sense
The Sixth Sense is a 1999 American psychological thriller film written and directed by M. Night Shyamalan. The film tells the story of Cole Sear , a troubled, isolated boy who is able to see and talk to the dead, and an equally troubled child psychologist who tries to help him...
, where the significance of an early scene becomes apparent at the end, necessitating a different interpretation of all that has happened in between; in this case, it is not a physical device but an action which is pivotal to the outcome. Both Chekhov's gun and plants are used as elements of foreshadowing
Foreshadowing
Foreshadowing or adumbrating is a literary device in which an author indistinctly suggests certain plot developments that might come later in the story.-Repetitive designation and Chekhov's gun:...
. Villains in Scooby-Doo, Where Are You!
Scooby-Doo, Where are You!
Scooby-Doo, Where Are You! is the first incarnation of the long-running Hanna-Barbera Saturday morning cartoon Scooby-Doo. It premiered on September 13, 1969 at 10:30 a.m. EST and ran for two seasons on CBS as a half-hour long show. Twenty-five episodes were produced...
were often Chekhov's guns—they would be introduced early on as "innocuous secondary characters", then ignored until they turned out to be the one in the scary costume driving people away to get at a hidden fortune. Citizen Kane
Citizen Kane
Citizen Kane is a 1941 American drama film, directed by and starring Orson Welles. Many critics consider it the greatest American film of all time, especially for its innovative cinematography, music and narrative structure. Citizen Kane was Welles' first feature film...
introduced "Rosebud" early in the film both as a minor prop and as the major plot focus only to reveal what "Rosebud" really meant in the last scene. This is also shown in the film Seven Pounds
Seven Pounds
Seven Pounds is a 2008 film, directed by Gabriele Muccino. Will Smith stars as a man who sets out to change the lives of seven people. Rosario Dawson, Woody Harrelson, and Barry Pepper star. The film was released in theaters in the United States and Canada on December 19, 2008, by Columbia Pictures...
when Will Smith
Will Smith
Willard Christopher "Will" Smith, Jr. , also known by his stage name The Fresh Prince, is an American actor, producer, and rapper. He has enjoyed success in television, film and music. In April 2007, Newsweek called him the most powerful actor in Hollywood...
's character calls the police at the beginning of the film to report his suicide.
A red herring
Red herring
A red herring is a deliberate attempt to divert attention.Red herring may refer to:* Red herring , the informal fallacy of presenting an argument that may in itself be valid, but does not address the issue in question....
is a false clue intended to lead investigators toward an incorrect solution. This device usually appears in detective novels
Detective fiction
Detective fiction is a sub-genre of crime fiction and mystery fiction in which an investigator , either professional or amateur, investigates a crime, often murder.-In ancient literature:...
and mystery fiction
Mystery fiction
Mystery fiction is a loosely-defined term.1.It is often used as a synonym for detective fiction or crime fiction— in other words a novel or short story in which a detective investigates and solves a crime mystery. Sometimes mystery books are nonfiction...
. The red herring is a type of misdirection
Misdirection
Misdirection is a form of deception in which the attention of an audience is focused on one thing in order to distract its attention from another....
, a device intended to distract the protagonist
Protagonist
A protagonist is the main character of a literary, theatrical, cinematic, or musical narrative, around whom the events of the narrative's plot revolve and with whom the audience is intended to most identify...
, and by extension the reader, away from the correct answer or from the site of pertinent clues or action. An example would be the way such information is used in the film Saw
Saw (film)
Saw is a 2004 American independent horror film directed by James Wan. The screenplay, written by Leigh Whannell, is based on a story by Wan and Whannell. The film stars Cary Elwes, Danny Glover, Monica Potter, Michael Emerson, Ken Leung, Whannell and Tobin Bell...
(2004). The Indian murder mystery film Gupt: The Hidden Truth
Gupt: The Hidden Truth
Gupt: The Hidden Truth is a Bollywood suspense thriller movie released in 1997, directed by Rajiv Rai. The film starred Bobby Deol, Manisha Koirala, Kajol, Paresh Rawal, Om Puri and Raj Babbar. It was one of the biggest successes of 1997....
cast many veteran actors who had usually played villainous roles in previous Indian films as red herrings in this film to deceive the audience into suspecting them. In the bestselling novel, The Da Vinci Code
The Da Vinci Code
The Da Vinci Code is a 2003 mystery-detective novel written by Dan Brown. It follows symbologist Robert Langdon and Sophie Neveu as they investigate a murder in Paris's Louvre Museum and discover a battle between the Priory of Sion and Opus Dei over the possibility of Jesus having been married to...
, the misdeeds of a key character named "Bishop Aringarosa" draw attention away from the true master villain. "Aringarosa" literarily means "Red Herring." A red herring can also be used as a form of false foreshadowing
Foreshadowing
Foreshadowing or adumbrating is a literary device in which an author indistinctly suggests certain plot developments that might come later in the story.-Repetitive designation and Chekhov's gun:...
.
A cliffhanger
Cliffhanger
A cliffhanger or cliffhanger ending is a plot device in fiction which features a main character in a precarious or difficult dilemma, or confronted with a shocking revelation at the end of an episode of serialized fiction...
is an abrupt ending that leaves the main characters in a precarious or difficult situation, creating a strong feeling of suspense that provokes the reader to ask, "What will happen next?" Cliffhangers often frustrate the reader, since they offer no resolution at all; however, the device does have the advantage of creating the Zeigarnik effect (unfinished or interrupted tasks are better remembered). A cliffhanger is often employed at the end of an installment of serialized novels
Serial (literature)
In literature, a serial is a publishing format by which a single large work, most often a work of narrative fiction, is presented in contiguous installments—also known as numbers, parts, or fascicles—either issued as separate publications or appearing in sequential issues of a single periodical...
, movies
Serial (film)
Serials, more specifically known as Movie serials, Film serials or Chapter plays, were short subjects originally shown in theaters in conjunction with a feature film. They were related to pulp magazine serialized fiction...
, or in most cases, TV series. In The Dark Tower
The Dark Tower
Dark Tower may refer to:* The Dark Tower , an unfinished novel by C. S. Lewis* Barad-dûr the fortress of Sauron in the fantasy world of J. R. R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings* The Dark Tower , a 1933 comedy by George S...
, Stephen King
Stephen King
Stephen Edwin King is an American author of contemporary horror, suspense, science fiction and fantasy fiction. His books have sold more than 350 million copies and have been adapted into a number of feature films, television movies and comic books...
uses cliffhangers between most of the books; especially in the end of The Dark Tower III: The Waste Lands. A literal cliffhanger can be seen at the end of The Italian Job
The Italian Job
The Italian Job is a 1969 British caper film, written by Troy Kennedy Martin, produced by Michael Deeley and directed by Peter Collinson. Subsequent television showings and releases on video have established it as an institution in the United Kingdom....
.
In medias res
In medias res
In medias res or medias in res is a Latin phrase denoting the literary and artistic narrative technique wherein the relation of a story begins either at the mid-point or at the conclusion, rather than at the beginning In medias res or medias in res (into the middle of things) is a Latin phrase...
(Latin
Latin
Latin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. It, along with most European languages, is a descendant of the ancient Proto-Indo-European language. Although it is considered a dead language, a number of scholars and members of the Christian clergy speak it fluently, and...
, "into the middle of things") is a literary technique in which narrative proceeds from the middle of the story rather than its beginning. Information such as characterization, setting, and motive is revealed through a series of flashbacks. This technique creates a twist when the cause for the inciting incident is not revealed until the climax. This technique is used within the film The Prestige
The Prestige (film)
The Prestige is a 2006 mystery thriller film written, directed and co-produced by Christopher Nolan, with a screenplay adapted from Christopher Priest's 1995 novel of the same name. The story follows Robert Angier and Alfred Borden, rival stage magicians in London at the end of the 19th century...
in which the opening scenes show one of the main characters drowning and the other being imprisoned. Subsequent scenes reveal the events leading up to these situations through a series of flashbacks. In Monsters
Monsters (2010 film)
Monsters is a 2010 British science fiction film, written, shot and directed by Gareth Edwards. Whitney Able and Scoot McNairy star in the lead roles.-Plot:...
, a similar beginning proves to be a flashforward as it is the linear conclusion of the events that then follow; this is not apparent till the end. In medias res is often used to provide a narrative hook
Narrative hook
A narrative hook is a literary technique in the opening of a story that "hooks" the reader's attention so that he or she will keep on reading...
.
Nonlinear narrative narration works by revealing plot and character in non-chronological order. This technique requires the reader to attempt to piece together the timeline in order to fully understand the story. A twist ending can occur as the result of information which is held until the climax and which places characters or events in a different perspective. Some of the earliest known uses of non-linear story telling occur in The Odyssey, a work that is largely told in flashback via the narrator Odysseus
Odysseus
Odysseus or Ulysses was a legendary Greek king of Ithaca and the hero of Homer's epic poem the Odyssey. Odysseus also plays a key role in Homer's Iliad and other works in the Epic Cycle....
. The nonlinear approach has been used in works such as the films Mulholland Drive
Mulholland Drive (film)
Mulholland Drive is a 2001 American neo-noir psychological thriller written and directed by David Lynch, starring Justin Theroux, Naomi Watts, and Laura Harring. The surrealist film was highly acclaimed by many critics and earned Lynch the Prix de la mise en scène at the 2001 Cannes Film Festival...
, Sin City
Sin City (film)
Sin City, also known as Frank Miller's Sin City, is a 2005 crime thriller film written, produced and directed by Frank Miller and Robert Rodriguez...
, and Pulp Fiction
Pulp Fiction (film)
Pulp Fiction is a 1994 American crime film directed by Quentin Tarantino, who co-wrote its screenplay with Roger Avary. The film is known for its rich, eclectic dialogue, ironic mix of humor and violence, nonlinear storyline, and host of cinematic allusions and pop culture references...
, the television show Lost
Lost (TV series)
Lost is an American television series that originally aired on ABC from September 22, 2004 to May 23, 2010, consisting of six seasons. Lost is a drama series that follows the survivors of the crash of a commercial passenger jet flying between Sydney and Los Angeles, on a mysterious tropical island...
(especially in many episodes in the later seasons), and the book Catch-22
Catch-22
Catch-22 is a satirical, historical novel by the American author Joseph Heller. He began writing it in 1953, and the novel was first published in 1961. It is set during World War II in 1943 and is frequently cited as one of the great literary works of the twentieth century...
.
Reverse chronology
Reverse chronology
Reverse chronology is a method of story-telling whereby the plot is revealed in reverse order.In a story employing this technique, the first scene shown is actually the conclusion to the plot...
works by revealing the plot in reverse order, i.e., from final event to initial event. Unlike traditional chronological storylines, which progress through causes before reaching a final effect, reverse chronological storylines reveal the final effect before tracing the causes leading up to it; therefore, the initial cause represents a "twist ending." Examples employing this technique include the films Irréversible
Irréversible
Irréversible is a 2002 French drama film written and directed by Gaspar Noé, starring Monica Bellucci, Vincent Cassel and Albert Dupontel. The film employs a non-linear narrative and follows two men as they try to avenge a brutally raped girlfriend...
and Memento, the play Betrayal
Betrayal (play)
Betrayal is a play written by Harold Pinter in 1978. Critically regarded as one of the English playwright's major dramatic works, it features his characteristically economical dialogue, characters' hidden emotions and veiled motivations, and their self-absorbed competitive one-upmanship,...
by Harold Pinter
Harold Pinter
Harold Pinter, CH, CBE was a Nobel Prize–winning English playwright and screenwriter. One of the most influential modern British dramatists, his writing career spanned more than 50 years. His best-known plays include The Birthday Party , The Homecoming , and Betrayal , each of which he adapted to...
, and Martin Amis
Martin Amis
Martin Louis Amis is a British novelist, the author of many novels including Money and London Fields . He is currently Professor of Creative Writing at the Centre for New Writing at the University of Manchester, but will step down at the end of the 2010/11 academic year...
' Time's Arrow
Time's Arrow (novel)
Time's Arrow: or The Nature of the Offence is a novel by Martin Amis. It was shortlisted for the Booker Prize .- Plot summary :The novel recounts the life of a German Holocaust doctor in a disorienting reverse chronology...
.
See also
- List of plot twists
- Climax (narrative)Climax (narrative)The Climax is the point in the story where the main character's point of view changes, or the most exciting/action filled part of the story. It also known has the main turning point in the story...
- Literary techniqueLiterary techniqueA literary technique is any element or the entirety of elements a writer intentionally uses in the structure of their work...
- MacGuffinMacGuffinA MacGuffin is "a plot element that catches the viewers' attention or drives the plot of a work of fiction". The defining aspect of a MacGuffin is that the major players in the story are willing to do and sacrifice almost anything to obtain it, regardless of what the MacGuffin actually is...
- PeripeteiaPeripeteiaPeripeteia is a reversal of circumstances, or turning point. The term is primarily used with reference to works of literature. The English form of peripeteia is peripety. Peripety is a sudden reversal dependent on intellect and logic...