10 Alternate Endings To 2021 Movies You Almost Saw
1. The Dragons Don't Return - Raya & The Last Dragon
Raya and the Last Dragon ends with the evil spirits known as the Druun being vanquished and all the petrified dragons, as well as the recently dead Sisu (Awkwafina), being brought back to life. A happy ending for all, then.
But it almost didn't go this way, as co-director Don Hall explained that they originally debated having all the other dragons remain petrified and Sisu survive as the truly last dragon.
The feeling was that bringing all the stone dragons back could undermine the movie's message about human unity being needed to solve human problems, yet producer Osnat Shurer ultimately fought for a more triumphant and uplifting ending to make the audience's "heart sing." Shurer said:
"What we were digging into psychologically is if we are the solution, why are we bringing the magical mystical creatures back in?... The place where we arrived is a place that's more connected to a more Southeast Asian and South Asian perspective, which is when we found the solution for ourselves that we earned the right to manifest the mystical."
That original ending certainly would've been intriguingly melancholic, but it's easy to see why the filmmakers opted for this more conventionally crowd-pleasing one instead.