Warning: SPOILERS for Leave the World Behind are ahead! If you haven’t seen the movie yet, check it out on Netflix now.
Netflix subscribers have a new hit movie to check out as 2023 winds down. Leave the World Behind, which former president Barack Obama produced (and he didn’t hold back on giving notes) has arrived, and the apocalyptic thriller has been quietly racking up a lot of positive notice. This flick starring Julia Roberts, Mahershala Ali and Ethan Hawke follows two families trying to figure out what’s happened that’s led to their technology becoming useless, all while overcoming their personal differences.
It’s looking like Leave the World Behind, one of the many book-to-screen adaptations delivered to the 2023 movies calendar, may end up becoming one of the best movies on Netflix, but there are certainly a lot of questions left behind by the time we’re wrapped up. So let’s not only break down the movie’s ominous conclusion, but also talk out where the Sanfords and Scotts could go from here, as well as discuss the significance of the sitcom Friends within the story.
What Happens At The End of Leave The World Behind
By the time Leave the World Behind ends, the Sanfords and Scotts are on good terms with each other for the most part. Ethan Hawke’s Clay Sanford and Mahershala Ali’s G.H. Scott work together to get medical care for Clay’s son, Charlie Evans’ Archie. And Julia Roberts’ Amanda Sanford and Myha’la Herrold’s Ruth Scott come to an understanding through the latter elaborating her concern for her mother and the former explaining why she’s a misanthrope. It’s a good thing there’s little to no drama left between all these people, because they’ll need to work together in order to survive what’s coming.
While it’s never made specifically clear who’s responsible for things like knocking out the power and emitting that shrill noise during the events of Leave the World Behind, G.H starts to piece together what’s happened after he and Clay retrieve medicine from Kevin Bacon’s Danny for Archie, whose teeth have started falling out. Per what G.H. once learned from a friend of his who’s a high-ranking officer in the United States military, everything they’ve seen or heard about in the last few days are the signs of a coup d'état, including the knockout of technology, the spread of disinformation and chaos unfolding. The endgame is to turn the people of the United States against one another, which will destabilize the country.
G.H.’s theory is never outright confirmed, but what Amanda and Ruth see while they’re on their own together does lend credence to his musings. While searching for Ruth, and after they avoid being attacked by a herd of deer, the women witness New York City being bombed and hear gunfire in the aftermath of the devastation.
Finally, Rose Sanford -- Amanda and Clay’s daughter -- is last seen walking into the home of one of G.H.’s neighbors, and after partaking of some of their food, she finds their bunker, the same one that Danny mentioned to G.H.. Within it, she finds a DVD set of Friends Season 10, and since this bunker has its own generator, she’s able to pop in one of the discs and play “The Last One,” i.e. the show’s series finale. We’ll talk more later about why Friends was so significant to Leave the World Behind, but first, let’s delve into what may await the Sanfords and Scotts after the movie’s finished.
Do The Rest Of The Sanford And The Scott Family Make It To The Bunker?
Things are already bad enough for the two families when Leave the World Behind is finished between the power being out almost everywhere, the oncoming wave of violence and those crashed self-driving cars blocking the highway out of Long Island. But to make matters worse, when Rose was walking around in that neighbor’s house, there was an Emergency Alert System display revealing that the United States is at war with rogue armed forces, and elevated radiation levels had been detected.
Between the explosions seen in the distance, and the screeching noises that may have been the cause of Archie's symptoms, including his teeth falling out, it's clear the situation is very bad. I think the odds are more likely than not that Rose will soon find herself joined by familiar faces. For one thing, Amanda and Ruth weren’t that far off from the house Rose wandered into, so once they get over the shock of seeing New York turned into a war zone, they’ll hopefully investigate the house and find Ruth seated in front of that TV.
As for G.H., Clay and Archie, because Danny told them about the bunker’s existence, that also bodes well for them eventually heading there. What’s not working in their favor is the unlikelihood that Amanda and Ruth will be back at G.H.’s home when the trio returns. The men may instead go out looking for them and Rose, not realizing that heading to that neighbor’s home is the best course of action. We can only cross our fingers that they end up there before it’s too late, but as Rumaan Alam, the author of the original Leave the World Behind novel, told Variety, he felt it would have been “dissatisfying” for the movie full closure by the end.
The Significance Of Rose Sanford’s Obsession With Friends
Throughout the entirety of Leave the World Behind, Rose’s obsession with Friends is on full display. She’s streaming the series on her tablet throughout the first chunk of the vacation, and when the internet cuts out, all she has remaining to watch is the two-part series finale. Even in the midst of everything terrible that’s happening, Rose is desperate to finish the show, as Rachel, Monica, Phoebe, Joey, Chandler and Ross mean a lot to her. It’s no wonder she grabbed that DVD set the minute she saw it in the bunker, the world going to hell be damned.
Interestingly enough, Rose’s interest in Friends isn’t something that was present in the Leave the World Behind novel, but it was included in the movie for good reason. Writer and director Sam Esmail explained to USA Today that the sitcom as the “heartbeat” of Leave the World Behind, in that Rose’s attachment to Friends represents her “yearning to escape to that comfort zone.” He also said the following about having the show’s theme song, "I'll Be There For You" by the Rembrandts, play once the credits started rolling:
After putting audience through all the bleakness, I wanted to end on small light at the end of the tunnel.
Rumaan Alam added in the aforementioned Variety interview that he doesn’t see the Friends-centric ending as a “joke” in any way because it’s a “reminder that art is kind of a salve.” The author felt that Sam Esmail ending with that “particular jolt of humor” was “rewarding” and “satisfying.” Still, now that Rose is done with Friends, she’ll need to pick another TV show from that bunker’s collection with which to keep herself occupied.
For those who’ve already streamed Leave the World Behind on Netflix, take a look at the Netflix movie schedule to see what cinematic entertainment the streamer will deliver for the rest of the year. If you’d rather learn what’s coming in the year ahead, the 2024 movies calendar is available for perusal.
