10 Sci-Fi Movies That Almost Had Way Better Endings

10. The Butterfly Effect

This twisty time-travelling flick starring then-rising star Ashton Kutcher suffered for opening alongside Richard Kelly’s undeniably superior Donnie Darko. Both are moody meditations on the passage of time with some faux-deep points to make about philosophy, morality, and existence, man, but only the latter flick managed to conjure the necessary cult appeal to be remembered as a flawed but clever classic decades later.

The Butterfly Effect unfortunately veered into more melodramatic and arguably exploitative territory than Kelly’s flick, dwelling on some brutally dark subplots without having the serious approach needed to ground such intensely downbeat material. Despite this, the sci-fi thriller could nonetheless have redeemed itself with a truly shocking ending, as outlined by the director in the years since.

In the cut we saw, Kutcher’s tortured protagonist eventually decides his intervention to save a friend from childhood abuse only lead to further trauma and he heads back in time to ensure they never meet. Compare this with the insane original ending, wherein he realizes his entire life has only had a net negative effect on those around him—so he decides to time travel back to his tenure in his mother’s womb, where he strangles himself with an umbilical cord.

Possible the world’s most intense case of a moody loner wishing they were never born.