10 Biggest Downer Endings In Major Movies

Were it not for the last few minutes of 2003's Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines, it doesn't seem unreasonable to assume many of us would barely remember the film at all today.

Director Jonathan Mostow's film is, for the most part, a pretty generic retread of the two James Cameron movies which came before it. We have a succession of large scale yet largely forgettable action sequences, an Arnold Schwarzenegger who's clearly looking a bit too old for it, and Nick Stahl proving to be a rather bland replacement for Edward Furlong as the now adult John Connor.

However, in the final scenes the film takes a surprisingly bold turn, by actually showing the cataclysmic events of Judgement Day, as referenced in the 1984 original, then seemingly averted in 1991's Terminator 2. With John Connor and his future bride Kate Brewster (Claire Danes) safely tucked away in a bunker, the nukes go off and the world as we know it is obliterated.

It was certainly a real eye-opener for a big budget, mainstream friendly film to end in such a bleak fashion, but ultimately all it serves to do is set the scene for a fourth Terminator film in which we would finally see John Connor battling Skynet in a post-apocalyptic future.

And considering how Terminator: Salvation turned out, the ending of Terminator 3 seems even bleaker.