10 Best Sci-Fi Movie Endings Of All Time

Fifty-two years since its initial release, the ending to the original Planet of the Apes is still one of the most iconic plot twists of all time, and rightly so.

After discovering the grisly fates of the rest of his crew, Taylor (Charlton Heston) finds artefacts of a long-gone, technologically advanced human society. Despite being warned that if he keeps looking for answers, he might not like what he finds, Taylor goes to the coast and discovers the remains of the Statue of Liberty buried in the sand.

Realising he's not on an alien planet at all, but is in fact back home on earth after a nuclear war, Charlton Heston delivers one of the most melodramatic monologues in science fiction.

The slow pan as Taylor rides his horse along the beach, first only glimpsing the spikes of the statue's crown and then eventually revealing all was mind-blowing at the time. It should come as no surprise then that the screenplay was penned by the creator of The Twilight Zone, Rod Serling, whose twist endings made him the M. Knight Shyamalan of his day.