How Edge of Tomorrow almost ended

If you haven't seen the Tom Cruise/Emily Blunt sci-fi blockbuster Edge of Tomorrow yet then stop whatever you're doing, even if you're reading this mid-surgery, and go see it while you still can.

It's easily the freshest and most consistently thrilling film of the summer and the fact that it hasn't been a bigger hit is a travesty. Anyway, before we get all weird and angry again, just go see it, no excuses.

If you've already had the pleasure then read on, without the fear of spoilers.

As you know, the film has a slightly controversial happy ending which is somewhat at odds to what's come before. But given that the film had been so much fun before then, it didn't bother us too much. But originally, things were going to end on a much darker note.

Those inquisitive chaps at Film School Rejects had a chance to speak to screenwriter Christopher McQuarrie who revealed what the original scripted ending would have been. Here you go:

When Tom loses the power, and they go to Paris, and Tom is preparing the team as they go into Paris where he's telling them the rules of the movie, he tells the team everything the audience knows. Basically, he told them: 'Kill as many Mimics as you want, but do not kill an Alpha. If you kill an alpha we'll be right back here having this conversation, and we won't even know it. The enemy will know we're coming and they'll kill us all.' When they get to Paris there's the classic horror movie scene where one of them gets separated from the group, and he gets attacked by an Alpha and kills it. As he kills it, you see the Omega reset the day and you see the point-of-view of the villain. We cut to the plane and hear the same speech all over again. This time when he gets to the line, 'You can bet they'll have a plan to kill us all,' the ship gets hit. As the audience, you realise the enemy knows they're coming. The problem was you were so exhausted by the time you got to that point.

So why didn't it make the cut? Well the script started out with a much darker tone before lighter moments were added, ones that, we might add, went down a treat with us. The film's unexpectedly successful comic flair would have then been at odds with this darker ending. McQuarrie also added:

We really struggled to deliver what the movie needed to be emotionally. I know the ending was somewhat controversial, with some people who didn’t like it. I think the only way to make those people happy would to end the movie in a way that wasn’t happy. We weren’t interested in doing that. It needed to end in a way that wasn’t harsh.

You can read more about the conversation with McQuarrie here.