Discuss Inception
Discuss → Movies → Inception → General
When was Cobb locked and who's the anthagonist [spoiler]
posted by HikariSTAFFMOD on March 1, 2017 at 7:54 AM
Indeed a great movie, Nolan is the best! As we see in the end, Cobb's token fails. He tests it to see if he's dreaming, but when he listens to his children and sees their faces he just "falls in the ilusion" and forgets to look back to the token and doesn't notice it keeps spinning.
But I keep thinking, if he was still dreaming in the end, when did the dream started? Looking back in the movie, he verifies the token at 0:16 and again at 0:34. At both times he's not dreaming! so the movie isn't fully inside a dream, at some point he starts the dream and never wakes up again. At 0:44 he tries it again, but the token falls on the ground and Saito disturbs him, so he doesn't actually try it. So, it's when he falls asleep to try the sedative.
Now the more important questions. Who led the job of locking him in a dream and why. Watching the movie with more attention, I noticed that Cobb keeps getting led by people way too often. It seems he's leading and deciding what to do and who does it, but in fact it's always somebody else that brings some need, and Cobb decides what to do with it. That's interesting because creates in him the feeling that he's in control, but in fact people are leading him into actions and places.
At first I believed it was Ariadne who was leading the job, because she gets close to him very quikly and learns a lot about him and leads him into telling his secrets. But first time they met he's awake, and it's his chidren's grandfather that presents her to him. So, either the grandfather is together in the plot, waiting Cobb to come to him asking for an architect, or Ariadne is innocent.
That's interesting, because at first anyone would believe that Mal was the way into making him not wanna wake up. But we see that he was just afraid of challenging her, and when he finally does he lets her go. Cobb doesn't love Mal enough to fall asleep for her. But he does for his children, he always avoid looking on their faces, never says that explicitly and it can only be noticed by staying on his side and paying attention, and when he finally see their faces he locks himself in the dream. And only Ariadne would be smart and close enough to Cobb to discover that without making him say it - because probably even he himself doesn't know it! - that they are his weak point.
I also noticed that only Arthur is indeed Cobb's friend. Everybody else he's just met or he just knows but isn't close friend. That adds to the possibility that he's being led by a team to deceipt him.
My bet is that the deception started on the real world, where Cobb could try the token and see he wasn't dreaming. He wasn't dreaming, but was still being deceipt. Then he entered on the job to steal from Saito, entered and left a dream. Saito was included on the decept team, and his previous architect was taken away. Without an architect he went on the most obvious contact to get another one, and Miles, the grandfather, was in the team and already waiting for him to present Ariadne, who was leading everything and needing a way to meet Cobb.
But, why lock him in a dream? That's the issue. Shared dream jobs are about stealing secrets from people, in rare cases about inserting ideas, not about locking people. We could suppose that Cobb is skilled and some anthagonist already failed to chase and kill him, so decided to lock him in a dream. But if this anthagonist would be able to get Cobb into dreaming, it'd just be a matter of killing him while he's vulnerable. No need to lock him. Also, no matter how much and how long Cobb would stay on limbo, he'd eventually wake him in a few hours. Sedate him forever? make him into a coma? It's easy to just kill him while dreaming.
Another possibility is that there's no deception at all and I'm imagining it all. It was all real, and just in the end, instead of waking up, he falls in a new illusion. He doesn't wake up and dreams entering the country and going meet them. But this hypothesis also fails, because Saito gave him the offer to free him while he was awake, so Saito was indeed able to do that. Cobb didn't need to dream it because it wasn't an illusion, he just needed to wake up and really meet them in reality. Why'd he lock himself in a dream of something that was about to happen in reality? And again, eventually he'd wake up, leave the plane and meet them, so this ending would have no meaning.
Reply by Russ007
on March 3, 2017 at 4:53 AM
Well I haven't seen the film in ages and I've forgotten all their names (reading them in your essay doesn't help) but I thought that Nolan said that he left the ending open up to interprtation because it didn't matter to Leo's character whether it was a dream or not. He'll be happy and that's all that matters. But I personally think that it was a dream since the spinning top never fell.
That being said, this movie has tons of plot holes. E.g when they die in the "super deep dream lvl" by a train and they wake up through like 8 dream states.
Reply by Hikari
on March 5, 2017 at 5:49 AM
lol good point, they'd have to die multiple times to wake up, maybe testing the token each time. That would make Mal understand when she had actually waken. Also, she doesn't have to die to wake up, she only needs to fall. If she'd fall multiple times and not wake up, she'd eventually realize she's not dreaming.
But I don't think that being dreaming or not wouldn't matter to Cobb. That's very relevant to him, because when he was in limbo with Mal he wanted to wake up, and once awaken he wanted Mal to come back to reality. And of course he can be with his children only in reality. He also rejected his projection of Mal. So I highly doubt he'd accept to live with projections of his children.
That he was asleep in the ending I'm sure, because the token kept spinning. What I can't find out is, as I said, when he started dreaming, who if any locked him and why. He had many enemies and met some good amount of new people during the movie. Him letting the token fall in the bathroom wasn't a coincidence.
The ambiguity is in the middle of the movie. The ending was pretty clear.
Reply by Russ007
on March 5, 2017 at 7:30 AM
Wasn't Cobb (Leo) actually using Mal's token that she previously kept in the safe? And he earlier explained to the architect it only works if no one else touched the token....
True, it probably does matter to Cobb but he is so fatigued that he actually believes that he has awoken but the token is showing us otherwise. I don't think we'll ever discover if someone "locked" him in but like you said, why would anyone? You gotta ask Nolan
Reply by Hikari
on March 6, 2017 at 6:40 PM
It's not that the token only works if nobody touches it. It's that if somebody understands how it works this somebody can create a dream and simulate the token behavior, faking reality for that person. As long as nobody knows that his token keeps spinning infinitely inside dreams, it's ok. I'm not sure but I think he explained that to Ariadne at some point...
That's what's odd for me. He was already on the plane, close to getting access to country to meet his children. He was very lucid about dreaming and reality and close to meeting his children. He had no reason to wish to keep dreaming. That's why I think more probable that somebody managed to learn his weakness, which he himself didn't know about, and use it to lock him.
But maybe I'm thinking too much it was just a joke from Nolan.
Reply by Fergoose
on August 19, 2017 at 7:21 PM
For me the end is reality. The top begins to wobble as you can tell by the change in the sound it makes. A top that wobbles must fall, as lost momentum cannot be regained.
The kids are probably dressed similar because if Nolan had had them dressed completely differently to the memory then the ending would have been a bit conventional and transparent. And directors seem terrified of such endings these days.
Reply by Fayrow
on August 27, 2018 at 9:03 AM
It's quite clear he's awake at the end.
The movie makes a big deal about how in a dream you never remember how you get somewhere. Notice Cobb has a whole montage of traveling through airports at the end.
Reply by tivep
on February 6, 2019 at 5:43 AM
Actually, as Fergoose mentioned, there is a distinct wobble on the top in the end. In the scene inside Limbo where Cobb has left Mal's top spinning, we see no wobble when she opens her safe. Also, the dresses the kids are wearing, down to the actors portraying the kids, there is definite proof that the kids are not the same.
This article - Inception Ending - Dream or Reality clearly explains about the kids and the wobble related to the top.
To add, the general thought that most people have about the ending is that whether a dream or reality, Cobb has found his peace. Well, Cobb and Mal were parents taking great risks without the consideration of what would happen to their children if something were to happen to both of them. Cobb eventually resorts to stealing information (from the mind) to keep himself employed. Yes, he's dying to be with his kids. Think of this from the kids perspective - unless Cobb is back home in reality, they are going to grow up as orphans. So the film really has a happy ending only if Cobb really made it back. Else the kids are going to left all alone to fend for themselves, not like Grandpa would be around for much longer.