The Midnight Sky ending explained – what happened to Earth? – digitalspy.com

The Midnight Sky ending spoilers follow.

It's the end of the world as we know it in Netflix's big Christmas release The Midnight Sky and George Clooney does not feel fine.

As well as directing, Clooney plays terminally ill scientist Augustine Lofthouse, who faces a race against time to stop Sully (Felicity Jones) and the rest of the crew on the Aether from returning to Earth following a mysterious global catastrophe.

And if that weren't enough of a challenge for Augustine, he also realises he's not alone at the Barbeau Observatory in the Arctic as a child (Caoilinn Springall) has been left behind but can he do anything to save her?

The two storylines come together as The Midnight Sky arrives at an emotional climax which solves one mystery, but leaves another major question about what happened to Earth mostly unanswered.

So we thought we'd delve into what happens, and what's revealed during The Midnight Sky to explain what's happened. Needless to say, major spoilers are ahead.

Philippe AntonelloNetflix

The movie is set in February 2049 and takes place three weeks after "the event", but it's never explicitly stated what this event was.

It's clear that life is over on Earth as an early flashback sees the other scientists leave the observatory to go back to their families to spend their final moments together. "Terminal patient outlives the rest of humanity. Someone should put you in a medical journal," Augustine is told when he decides to stay.

During the early parts of the movie, Augustine is seen monitoring the Air Quality Index of the area around the observatory for the rising radiation levels. It appears that by the time of The Midnight Sky, this radiation has taken over the entire planet, with the poles the last places to be affected.

It's definitely a worldwide event, as when Sully has trouble contacting Earth from Aether, she mentions that she's tried contacting the likes of China, Russia, Australia and India and hasn't received any reply.

The suggestion is that it was an environmental issue that caused the catastrophe. When Augustine does get in touch with Sully later on, he says: "I'm afraid we didn't do a very good job of looking after the place while you were away."

Good Morning, Midnight: SOON TO BE THE MAJOR NETFLIX FILM 'THE MIDNIGHT SKY'

While The Midnight Sky is based on a book called Good Morning, Midnight by Lily Brooks-Dalton, the catastrophic event isn't revealed in that book either, so we can't take any clues or answers from that.

It doesn't seem as though it was a surprise event, as the reason that Aether is in space was to confirm that K-23 (one of Jupiter's moons discovered by Augustine) is suitable for human life. Even with Aether on the way back from K-23, there was set to be a K-23 colony flight on the way there from Earth, as well as supplies.

It's unclear whether this colony flight got to K-23 or not, but anyone left on Earth wasn't going to survive as Augustine tells Sully: "All survivable areas are underground and those are temporary."

Philippe AntonelloNetflix

We don't want to be too bleak because it's Christmas, but we fear the colony flight didn't get to K-23 either as Sully says she "couldn't make contact" with it. Add that to Augustine later telling Sully that "I don't know all the details, I know it was a mistake" (which could refer to that flight) and things don't seem good.

Augustine is terminally ill with an unspecified illness, but Clooney explained in the press notes that he could have been suffering from radiation poisoning. "I wanted to be in the end stages of something, whether it was lung cancer or something caused by the environment," he noted.

All things considered, even though we don't know exactly what happened on Earth, it was definitely something that couldn't be reversed and that human life as we know it couldn't survive from. Merry Christmas!

But what about Iris, the girl that Augustine discovers is left behind at the observatory? Does this mean she's doomed to die alongside Augustine? Well, about that...

Now, this is the other major question of The Midnight Sky that we can actually answer, as all is revealed in the final moments of the movie.

While Augustine is trying to make his way to Lake Hazen weather station to contact Aether, Sully and the rest of the Aether crew are experiencing their own set of challenges. They can't contact Earth, but since they've been away two years, they're unaware this is because of the catastrophic global event.

Philippe AntonelloNetflix

After they're unexpectedly knocked off course, they have to travel through an unmapped area of space to get back to Earth. Bad idea. Shortly after Sully first makes contact with Augustine, the Aether encounters a meteor storm that knocks out their radar and communications.

Sully, Adewole (David Oyelowo) and Maya (Tiffany Boone) go on a spacewalk to fix everything, but it leads to Maya being fatally wounded after they're caught in a second meteor storm. They do manage to get communications back up and before Sully talks to Augustine, they get their first devastating look at Earth.

Augustine tells Sully that there's no safe entry point for them and suggests that they use Earth's gravity to slingshot back towards K-23. (It's a bit like that manoeuvre in The Martian, but they'd be starting a new Earth and not saving Matt Damon.)

After getting a heartbreaking message from his wife that says his sons are sick (sent 10 days earlier), Mitchell (Kyle Chandler) makes the decision to head back to Earth anyway to "keep a promise" to his family. Sanchez (Demin Bichir) decides to join him to take Maya's body back as she would have been the same age as his daughter, who died when she was four.

Philippe AntonelloNetflix

It's left to Sully and Adewole (and their unborn daughter) to head back to K-23, but not before one final message to Augustine. Sully tells him that it was Augustine who got her interested in space as he worked with her mother Jean (Sophie Rundle) who we've seen in flashbacks during the movie.

Sully is actually Iris Sullivan and she is Augustine's daughter who he never met as he was too focused on his work when he was younger. The Iris we've seen on Earth with Augustine is just a figment of his imagination, formed from the only glimpse he got at Iris when she was younger. It's the push he needs to make contact with Aether and save her.

"It's very nice to finally meet you," Augustine tearfully tells Sully, before asking Sully to explain what it's like on K-23. As she does, we see Augustine head outside of the Lake Hazen weather station and imagine what Sully saw, but it's likely just his dying fantasy as he's fulfilled his mission to save his daughter.

The final sequence of The Midnight Sky sees Sully and Adewole head back out to K-23: "I guess it's just us now."

For Clooney, he thinks the ending of the movie is hopeful, rather than downbeat. "If you finish the film without the last five minutes, in many ways, it's a film about regret because of the character that I play," he told Digital Spy and other press.

Philippe AntonelloNetflix

"He gets redemption and I think redemption is a really big, important thing that washes over us and gives us hope... That last moment, what makes that all so hopeful and so interesting is that there's David and Felicity and there's the moment of, 'Oh what are we going to do', but there's also the moment of 'OK, let's get to work'.

"When Felicity stands up and she's clearly pregnant, you get the sense of a continuum, that we're going to be OK. We may not get out of all of this alive, but we'll get out of it intact and I think that's what makes it hopeful."

Jones added: "I think it's a huge moment for her. I think she has a sense deep down of a search for that person and there's a sense that something in her life has become complete.

"It is, I feel, quite a profound moment for her that we see and that's what was such a beautiful part of the film, that dynamic between Augustine and Sully and that discovery of that relationship at the end is so incredibly moving."

The Midnight Sky is available to watch now on Netflix.

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