The Incredibles does not have a happy ending.
The final scene directly contradicts that statement, seeing as how it’s called “Happy Endings.” But I quite frankly find that disturbing. The entire family just killed countless people, and they’re going on BETTER than before? That’s a bit creepy.
Of course, you may be thinking “You’re a Syndrome fangirl, of course you’d say this.” Well, that’s not the only reason, though. I’ve been noticing things. Things that… just don’t work right. I’ve been finding a lot of Broken Aesops, too. Like this one. Here’s a great message that some innocent kid could’ve gotten from The Incredibles:
“If you aren’t special, don’t even try to be, because you never will be and if you try you will fail.” Huh. What a great, family-friendly message there. It also seems to preach that “two wrongs, in fact, DO make a right, but only if you’re on the right side.” Hmm. I love the movie to death but I don’t like some of the implications.
“But the Incredibles were clearly the protagonists!” you say. “They were the heroes and they prevailed and yay!” Well, they did prevail. But they weren’t heroes.
Do you want me to prove it? Go to the chapter on the DVD entitled “100 Mile Dash” and watch it. Watch how many of Syndrome’s minions die. That’s quite a few… and that’s just Dash. But What Measure Is A Mook anyhow?
Well, think. If you were related to someone who worked for Syndrome, don’t you think it would be really ironic to be told that your relative was killed by someone that’s supposed to save people?
Meanwhile the families of Supers were probably mourning, but it also comes with the territory. Supers die at the hands of villains. It happens. If you didn’t expect it to happen, you really shouldn’t be doing the work, should you? It’s like being a cop. Don’t do it if you don’t expect to get shot at your career.
And, we never actually see anyone dead except Gazerbeam that Syndrome killed. There’s some more food for thought. We see the mooks die onscreen. It happens repeatedly and then they go on like nothing ever happened. Well, something probably just happened to the family. Maybe the poor guy was working for Syndrome because his wife was sick and he needed the money. Huh. Nice going, Incredibles.
Plus, they never look back on the mooks. They don’t even care about the grief they just caused. That’s a pretty villainous trait right there. And, my guess is that even Syndrome’s at least had an Ignored Epiphany… but it’s still an epiphany all the same.
And it’s not like killing Supers is any worse than killing mooks, either. Supers were supposed to be treated like normal people. Mooks are normal people. It’s really the same thing at the end of the day. And in all truth, it was the Supers’ own fault for answering the call. It makes you wonder why they didn’t think twice about it and think that maybe there was some danger in doing something, oh I don’t know, illegal.
And to top it all off, what the Incredibles were doing to the Omnidroid WAS illegal at the time. Supers weren’t supposed to do anything. Someone could’ve sued and then they’d have been going through the entire mess all over again.
I’m not saying what Syndrome did was right, because it wasn’t. I’m just saying that what the Incredibles did was just as bad.
And then there’s the topic of Syndrome himself.
So. Imagine you’re some smart little kid who has this awesome hero, and you want to help the hero… and then he blatantly turns you down, crushing your dreams. I think that’d make anyone at least a little angry. Now, going homicidal is a bit far but it’s also been said by the creators that he probably has something wrong with him. That may have been where he got his Super name from as well. Oh, by the way, his real name, Buddy Pine? It basically means “I cry because I can’t be your friend.”
So, fast-forward fifteen years. He has everything going for him, money, power, and he’s probably the smartest person you’ll ever meet. He’s dead-set on getting revenge for being wronged fifteen years ago. And then he’s about to get it… when it all comes crashing down around him, just like his dreams did fifteen years prior.
The first thing to go is his girlfriend.
This part especially confuses me. Apparently Mirage has never seen Mr. Incredible’s violent mook slaughtering, since she says that Syndrome doesn’t value her life. Mr. Incredible didn’t kill her because she was hot and skinny. Because honestly, where DID that white hair on his clothes come from? Unless Mirage is shedding, I think something’s going on there.
But Mirage doesn’t know that Mr. Incredible only values life if it’s a pretty girl. So she leaves Syndrome anyway. Well, there goes her unlimited credit card money anyway, and there goes Syndrome’s girlfriend.
And then there’s the Omnidroid.
Now, he doesn’t even know yet that his girlfriend’s just completely betrayed him. He’s too busy being knocked out by his own robot. I admit that was bad foresight on his part, but everybody makes mistakes… sometimes of gigantic proportions.
And then the Incredibles come and beat up the Omnidroid, effectively crushing his dream of becoming a hero. But he could always reform and come back as an actual good guy, right? Wrong, apparently. Because even though Syndrome wanted everyone to be equal (possibly because then no one would have to suffer the way he did at the hands of a Super) and only wanted to be a hero, they still squashed his dreams like someone stamping purposely on a defenseless butterfly with its wings torn off.
Now they’ve taken away his girlfriend and crushed his dreams. What could go wrong next in the man’s rapidly worsening life? Well, they could take away everything he’s worked for. And that is exactly what they do.
The chapter entitled “Past vs. Future” begins with six words. “We’ve frozen all of Syndrome’s assets.” That basically means that they’ve taken everything he owns. His money, his island, EVERYTHING is gone. He has nowhere to go. I know that most people would have a complete and utter breakdown if they were in that situation. But he may not have known it yet, either.
Then in a last-ditch effort at revenge, he attempts to steal the Parrs’ son. Never mind that he said he’d “be a good mentor… supportive, encouraging”… although most parents wouldn’t be too thrilled if someone was stealing their kid either, let alone a supervillain. Of course, then the baby catches on fire. There goes his revenge.
During that part, Jack-Jack does several very, VERY insane and scary things that babies generally should NOT do, and he screams as most of us would. Of course, most of us were probably laughing because he screams like an eight-year-old girl but that’s another thing the Incredibles took from him… his dignity.
So, in total, what all has Syndrome lost in the timespan of about a day? He’s lost his girlfriend, everything he owns, his revenge, his dignity, and his dreams are crushed. What more can they take from him?
Well, the Incredibles knew what they had left to take, and that was his life. They took that, too. Now that’s an unnecessary death if I ever saw one.
Now, granted he was at least a little crazy, but I’m pretty sure that if given proper direction, he could’ve gone about being a hero… the right way this time. Or at least he could’ve done something more productive. He was a genius, the likes of which the world had more than likely never seen before. And Mr. Incredible threw a car at him.
After losing everything, he lost his life in the most painful way that most people can imagine: by jet turbine.
Syndrome died alone and unloved. He’d lost everything to these so-called “heroes” who put him through living hell before finally killing him in an excruciatingly painful way.
And that’s what they call a happy ending.
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