What Does The Ending Of 10 Cloverfield Lane Really Mean?
What's The Deal With Howard?
Although the movie's ending twists itself onto a bigger, more global scale, much of its runtime is spent in the bunker, with the big question centring on what exactly is up with Howard - is he the movie's real "monster", or just a dutiful man protecting those in his care? The answer is that he's a bit of both. He clearly has a skewed outlook on life, with a military-influenced loyalty and a very short fuse, yet also appears genuine when saying he wants to ensure Michelle and Emmett are kept safe; he owns up to having ran Michelle off the road, bringing her back out of a sense of duty. However, beyond that, there is no escaping that he is also disturbed on a deeper level - he kidnapped Brittany and held her hostage in the bunker before doomsday, pointing towards some much darker motivations and desires. It would be easy to say the latter element is dominant throughout the movie, but we actually have something more complex here; much of what we learn about Howard may come from Howard himself, but there are some resolute facts to be gleaned. From Emmett we learn that he worked with satellites, lending credence to the doomsday theorist side being genuine, while the bunker's design is made the be totally self-sustaining, meaning it wasn't (at least not entirely) built for kidnapping. This is a complex contrast of character traits, and makes Stambler a tricky screen foe.
Why Did He Take Michelle?
Howard tells Michelle that Brittany is his daughter Megan, something Emmett refutes; she's a girl who went missing a few years back. This could point towards Megan being a complete fiction, the product of a disturbed mind used to justify horrific actions. However, Emmett does further allude to Howard at one point having a wife and child who moved away, meaning that we can conclude there is indeed a Megan; that her mother "turning her against" Howard could even be the revealing of his deeper psychological issues. Following their leaving, it looks like Howard has been trying to replicate his father-daughter relationship with other girls who remind him of Megan. He's kidnap of Brittany was likely an early attempt of this - evidenced by him referring to her as Megan - while he seems to have hidden aims for Michelle also; he is immediately protective of her when Emmett touches her, tells her she will become a good cook like Megan and even dresses her in his daughter's clothes. This may be why he kidnapped Michelle in the first place; we see in the opening that he drives up behind her - could he have ran her off the road while racing home to his bunker so he could have a surrogate daughter for after the end of the world? I'd say it's very likely; that crash isn't just from an accidental knock.
