10 Brilliant Movie Plot Twists That Don't Actually Make Sense
2. Us - Adelaide Is Red
Jordan Peele's Us is great in some ways, but it doesn't make any sense whatsoever.
Us revolves around an army of doppelgangers mounting an attack on their counterparts across the USA. They are revealed to be clones created in a scientific experiment that was long abandoned, and they're led by Red (Lupita Nyong'o), a clone of protagonist Adelaide (also Nyong'o). What follows is a thrilling, visually brilliant horror that deftly blends action, black comedy, and supernatural terror, and it also ends with a killer plot twist that few will have seen coming.
Adelaide is actually a clone. Years earlier, the version of her from the surface world wandered into the facility and the clone incapacitated her and then took her place. The fact that Red could speak when none of the other clones do might've had some confused, but otherwise, the hints of this are few and far between, and it comes out of nowhere in the best possible way.
It's such an effective surprise that viewers might not question it until later on. Namely, why the hell didn't the real Adelaide just return to the surface world once she'd freed herself? If there was anything stopping her from doing this, it's not explained. That's not even mentioning Us' many other plot holes, such as all those millions of clones somehow surviving in underground tunnels with nothing but an apparently infinite supply of rabbit meat for food.
Us is a well-made and well-acted movie, but is it smart? Not in the slightest.