ending question.
What do you think the ending means when it flashes back to Mike and Reggie in the 70's, then they hear older Mike saying "I'm dying Reg"?
shareThere is quite a few different ways to interpret the ending.
It could have all been a dream and Mike's imagination was so potent that Reggie actually heard echoes of his fantasy.
Or as Mike lay dying, he inhabits his former self or at least warns him. When Mike says "it's just the wind" it just felt like he knew perfectly well that it wasn't. I always thought that it would restart again only with Mike having more knowledge of the tallman.
But I could be wrong.
I think the end of the world just came for that bag of Fritos I had in my pocket...
After the Tall Man took Mike's sentinel, Mike was dying, and began imagining a time and place where all was well, with no problems, no death, no Tall Man. When the reality that he was dying started to sneak in to his fantasy, he dismissed it as "just the wind", choosing s\instead to remain in his fantasy for whatever time he had left.
shareI don't think so. I kind of wonder with all the different dimensions if Mike (while dying) was able to cross his spirit into an earlier dimension and try to warn young Reggie and Young Mike... to come to his help. Which almost led me to believe he might have been able to move them to HIS dimension if he had the energy. Especially since the Tall Man took his "ball/sentinel" through the gate. Which makes me wonder just how MUCH other footage from the original movie we really haven't seen. If Coscarelli had an idea of the true ending from way back in 1979...
I still find it odd... if Jebediah goes through the gate, and comes back changed and the "Tall Man"... both Mike and Reggie have both gone through gates.... have they changed? When did Mike get the ball in his head? Does it go back to the beginning of Phantasm II when he was in the hospital? We're thought to think it was a 'dream'... but did it really happen? By IV Mike becomes VERY introspective... I miss the 'action Mike' (James leGross) from II, but IV was so well done and really brought the story full circle. The original was fresh, II was better in a way, III was a bit silly, but IV... IV felt done 'right'. The scale seemed bigger. And the storyline I really enjoyed too and their characters changed for the better too...
3rd generation American from a long line of Gottscheers... it was Drandul, dude!