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    "original_url": "https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2026\/09\/25\/movies\/action-film-endings-sad.html?emc=edit_nn_20260926&nl=the-morning&segment_id=227102",
    "parsed_content": "What to Watch70 Movies This Fall\u2018Primetime\u2019\u2018Unabomber\u2019\u2018Never After Dark\u2019\u2018Your Mother Your Mother Your Mother\u2019AdvertisementSKIP ADVERTISEMENTSupported bySKIP ADVERTISEMENTWhat Happened to Hollywood\u2019s Most Reliable Happy Ending?A new study by an independent analyst shows that action films are more likely to end on a sadder note nowadays.Listen \u00b7 6:25 min Share full articleHugh Jackman in \u201cLogan,\u201d a cinematic exemplar of the action film with a bittersweet conclusion.Credit...Ben Rothstein\/Marvel\/Twentieth Century FoxBy Sopan DebSopan Deb had to sacrifice some of his favorite sentences during the editing of this article but he\u2019s generally happy with how it ended.Sept. 25, 2026See more of our coverage in your search results.Encuentra m\u00e1s de nuestra cobertura en los resultados de b\u00fasqueda. Add The New York Times on GoogleAgrega The New York Times en Google If the endings of Hollywood movies \u2014 especially action films \u2014 seem less happy lately, it\u2019s not just you. The data back you up.Action films have subtly changed this century, according to a detailed study, published earlier this month, by the film analyst Stephen Follows that looks at decades of filmmaking. Films with lots of explosions are now increasingly likely to have a bittersweet ending, as opposed to a clean-cut triumph of good over evil.That detail was tucked into a larger study, which was published on Substack by Follows, showing a growing share of unhappier endings in movies of all genres.\u201cAction films used to have the most reliable happy endings in mainstream cinema. In the 1980s and 1990s, three-quarters of them ended happily. Since 2010 it is 56 percent, with the bittersweet share rising from a fifth to more than a third,\u201d Follows writes. \u201cThat single shift accounts for around half of the entire decline in happy endings. So the heroes are still winning, but it\u2019s costing them a whole lot more.\u201dAdvertisementSKIP ADVERTISEMENTSeveral decades back, classic action films like \u201cBloodsport\u201d and \u201cRaiders of the Lost Ark\u201d were the norm: There\u2019s a good guy. There\u2019s a bad guy. There\u2019s some punching or melting faces and \u2014 spoiler alert \u2014 the good guy saves the day. And everyone goes home happy because there\u2019s less badness in the world.ImageJean-Claude Van Damme\u2019s character delivers a finishing blow in \u201cBloodsport.\u201d Action films from that era tended to have more unambiguous endings.Credit...Cannon FilmsNow, it\u2019s different, as Robert Mark Kamen, the screenwriter behind \u201cThe Karate Kid,\u201d \u201cThe Fifth Element,\u201d and \u201cTaken,\u201d among many other films, can attest to. He said the change in how the endings are written for action films is a reflection of the increasing cynicism in society at large.\u201cCynicism has become a large part of the zeitgeist, as opposed to happy endings, because what we see time and again over and over in recent history is there ain\u2019t no happy endings,\u201d Kamen said.Follows used four methods for his analysis. One involved using software that studies facial expressions, scanning the faces of 10,421 leading actors, and comparing them with the most turbulent stretches of the film to see if the character seemed happier or sadder at the end. Another involved examining public databases like IMDb to measure how audiences felt at the ends of films. A third gauged the emotional resonance of a soundtrack\u2019s finale. And the last method analyzed publicly available synopses of films.AdvertisementSKIP ADVERTISEMENTHis takeaway: Movies still generally end happily.\u201cFor all the talk of prestige gloom, the plainly sad ending is no more common now than it was in the 1980s, and it is rarer than it was in the 2000s,\u201d Follows writes.Follows found, in his expansive study, that overall, there has not been an increase in tragedy to end films, or in portraying successful villains and dead protagonists. And the shift in endings is not attributable to, say, the decline number of romance films being made, he concluded.It\u2019s just that endings are more nuanced, a twinge sadder \u2014 and that is almost entirely because of action films in recent decades, he said.Take the 2017 movie \u201cLogan,\u201d the gritty X-Men spinoff starring Patrick Stewart as Professor X and Hugh Jackman as Wolverine. While the day is saved, it doesn\u2019t end well for the two protagonists.For Kamen, \u201cFifth Element\u201d and the first \u201cKarate Kid\u201d were written with fairly unambiguous happy endings. Now, he says he still writes movies with happy endings but with a caveat: \u201cAt what cost?\u201d The film he says he is currently writing involves the pursuit of the Nazi police officer Klaus Barbie through the eyes of the son of a man that he tortured. As of now, without going into specifics, there is a happy ending \u2014 or as happy an ending as a story like that can have.ImageBruce Willis stars in the movie \u201cThe Fifth Element.\u201d The film\u2019s screenwriter, Robert Mark Kamen, says the happy endings in movies he writes now ask \u201cAt what cost?\u201dCredit...Columbia\/TriStar\u201cI write that stuff and maybe I\u2019m out of step with everything else,\u201d Kamen said, but he said he didn\u2019t really care, using a profanity.AdvertisementSKIP ADVERTISEMENTFollows traced the shift in action films to the 1990s, when villains began to receive more complex back stories. More fleshed-out villains led to more nuanced endings in some films.One example he used was \u201cThe Wizard of Oz,\u201d and its retelling through the eyes of \u201cThe Wicked Witch of the West,\u201d in \u201cWicked,\u201d which jumped from Broadway to film.\u201c\u2018The Wizard of Oz\u2019 is so simple. She\u2019s evil. It\u2019s in her name. No one questioned it,\u201d Follows said in an interview. \u201cWhereas now you\u2019re like, \u2018Well, what made her evil?\u2019\u201dMany Oscar-nominated films of the 2000s were marked by unsparing endings. The prestige television era, which bloomed that decade, played its part too.Roshan Sethi, a filmmaker who has mostly made romantic comedies, recently made his action film debut at the Toronto International Film Festival with \u201cThe Surgeon,\u201d starring Michelle Yeoh and Martin Freeman.AdvertisementSKIP ADVERTISEMENT\u201cWhat happened a little bit was with \u2018Breaking Bad,\u2019 and before that, \u2018The Sopranos,\u2019 there was a real surge in and interest in the antihero and someone who is morally complex and flawed,\u201d Sethi said in an interview.ImagePrestige TV like \u201cBreaking Bad\u201d and its preference for antiheroes like Bryan Cranston\u2019s Walter White may have played a role in bittersweet finish to many films.Credit...Ursula Coyote\/AMCAnother reason for the change is the introduction of cinematic universes, such as Marvel\u2019s. It\u2019s easier to write box-office-breaking follow-up movies if endings are more ambiguous.\u201cA happy ending closes the book through everything,\u201d Follows said. \u201cThat\u2019s part of the problem with writing a sequel is that you created a problem and you fully resolved it.\u201dWithout giving anything away, Sethi\u2019s new film sticks to a traditional good-versus-evil narrative. That wasn\u2019t the case at first. The original ending was more ambivalent and bittersweet, but producers and test audiences pushed him to change it.\u201cI was interested in something that was just really going to be entertaining on a broad level,\u201d Sethi said.AdvertisementSKIP ADVERTISEMENT Get four individual logins in one account.Add three people to your subscription.Savings for the whole family.Switch to All Access FamilyCancel\u00a0anytime.",
    "published_at": "2026-09-25T09:02:22+00:00",
    "author_name": "Sopan Deb",
    "site_name": "The New York Times",
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    "ai_headline": "What Happened to Hollywood\u2019s Most Reliable Happy Ending?",
    "ai_simplified_title": "Action Films Endings Become More Bittersweet",
    "ai_excerpt": "A new study reveals that action films are increasingly ending on a sadder or more bittersweet note, a significant shift from the reliable happy endings of past decades. This trend is attributed to societal cynicism, more complex villains, and the rise of cinematic universes.",
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