10 Movie Mysteries With Annoyingly Simple Answers

Andy Serkis' Caesar is at the center of the modern-day Planet of the Apes franchise - though he will be absent from the upcoming Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes - but each movie in this trilogy so far has featured a different human lead.

James Franco's Will essentially kicked off the entire demise of the human race and was heavily hinted to have been killed by the Simian Flu virus, while Woody Harrelson's Colonel ultimately killed himself before falling victim to the new version of the disease. However, there was never any on-screen confirmation of what happened to Jason Clarke's Malcolm from Dawn of the Planet of the Apes.

This was the man who arguably knew Caesar more than any other human, even Will, and he risked everything to try and work with the apes' leader for a harmonised community. Still, after Caesar promised him war was coming, since it had already begun, there was no mention of Malcom's fate in War of the Planet of the Apes.

According to director Matt Reeves, though, there was a version of the script that had Woody Harrelson's character explain that he killed Malcolm for suggesting he try to create peace with Caesar.

So, that's it? You can give it whatever reasons you want, but a major character being killed off-screen and never mentioned again is always going to be disappointing.