10 Sci-Fi Movies Where Evil Won
1. 12 Monkeys
Terry Gilliam strikes again, with another expertly crafted, bleak vision of the future in which a virus is released in 1996 and wipes out the vast majority of humanity, forcing the survivors to live underground.
The great brilliance of 12 Monkeys is that the bad guys have already won when the movie begins, having nearly annihilated humanity.
As such, when protagonist James Cole (Bruce Willis) is sent back in time to try and track the origins of the virus, he's succinctly informed that the future cannot be changed - his mission is simply one to preserve what remains of the human race.
And so, it's a foregone conclusion that Cole's death at the end of the movie - a sight he himself witnessed as a child - must happen in order for the scientists to learn that Dr. Peters (David Morse) was behind the virus, and maybe, just maybe, keep the dwindling human race in the future alive.
Though there's a glimmer of hope for the scraps of humanity that remain, it's still an unchanging and inevitable victory for Peters.