An alternate ending (or alternative ending) is an ending of a story that was considered, or even written or produced, but ultimately discarded in favour of another resolution. Generally, alternative endings are considered to have no bearing on the canonical narrative.

Examples in literature

• Charles Dickens' novel Great Expectations originally had a bleaker conclusion, with Pip meeting Estella, but after she remarried. In a letter, Dickens stated that he had been persuaded by Edward Bulwer-Lytton to change it prior to publication.^[1]
• Ernest Hemingway struggled with the ending of A Farewell to Arms. By his count, he wrote 39 of them "before I was satisfied."^[2] However, a 2012 edition of the book included 47 alternative endings.
• Robert A. Heinlein originally killed off the protagonist of Podkayne of Mars, but grudgingly let her live in response to his publisher's objections.
• John Green tied one of the characters to railway tracks in his second draft of The Fault in Our Stars to explore the trolley problem.^[3] He also wrote an ending in which Hazel and Van Houten die in a shootout with a drug lord.^[3]
• Felix Salten's The Hound of Florence differs greatly in the original German language (Der Hund von Florenz) and in the English translation. The German-language version ends in tragedy: the archduke stabs the dog to death, killing Lukas, and his body is disposed of.^[4] In the English translation, a wholly new ending of six more pages has been written: Lukas survives, gets medication and is united with the courtesan.^[5]

Examples in movies

Alternative endings are often filmed before being scrapped as a deleted scene, and may be included as a special feature in the film's home media releases. Some movies also present the alternative ending on international releases as well as their international home media release. In other cases, ideas that were presented but discarded early on are alluded to by the production team in commentary or interviews.

The following are examples of alternative endings to movies:

• Harikrishnans: In the 1998 Indian Malayalam Film Harikrishnans, the director used two climaxes to please the fans of both the lead actors, Mammootty and Mohanlal.
• 1408: An alternative ending is present on the director's cut disc (much like The Butterfly Effect, with a few deleted scenes reinserted). Mike Enslin dies in the fire he causes. At his burial, his wife is approached by the hotel manager, offering his personal belongings. She refuses, and he lets her know that her husband did not die in vain. Back in his vehicle he listens to the tape recorder, and screams in fear as he sees Enslin's burned deformed body in his back seat for only a moment. The film closes with an apparition of Mike Enslin still in 1408, muttering to himself. He hears his daughter's voice, and finally exits the room with her.
• 28 Days Later: Several darker alternative endings were filmed and put on the DVD release. The first has Jim gravely injured and taken to a hospital. He dies before he can be given medical attention, and his body is left behind, completing a cycle; he woke up alone in a hospital and has now died there. Some versions also involve him dreaming of the accident that put him in the hospital at the beginning of the film. An unfilmed ending picks up after Frank has been infected, where they take him to a research complex and Jim sacrifices his own life to give him a total blood transfusion to restore him, and he is once again left alone in a hospital bed.
• 3 Ninjas: The American cut originally showed that the boys had won the basketball challenge and effortlessly won Emily's bike back. In an extended international version, they lose the basketball challenge along with their own bikes, so they fight the bullies to get them back. In the United States, this alternative ending can only be seen on certain television channels such as Starz, Showtime and Showtime MAX; international DVDs have this version, as well.
• Apag: The domestic screening of the film in the Philippines as part of the 2023 Metro Manila Summer Film Festival features an alternate ending with a "culinary violence" twist. The film had a "happy ending" in prior screenings at international film festivals. The ending was introduced to make it eligible to enter the 2023 MMSFF.^[6]
• Army of Darkness: In an alternative ending Ash inadvertently drinks too much of the potion that would make him sleep long enough to wake up in his own time, and wakes up in a post-apocalyptic wasteland.
• The Astronaut's Wife: When Spencer is killed, Jillian is not possessed by the alien. Instead, she moves out to the country. Sitting beneath a tree, looking up at the stars, she tunes her radio to the same signals Spencer was receiving while possessed by the alien, her twin babies controlling her movements from inside the womb, listening, and waiting.
• Blade: Trinity: The original ending is far more ambiguous with Dracula and Blade's fates not as determined. The ending only appears in the unrated DVD and was intended by the director David S. Goyer. In another alternative ending Hannibal King and Abigail Whistler confront a werewolf.
• The Bourne Identity: An alternative ending on the DVD has Jason Bourne collapsing during the search for Marie, waking up with Abbot standing over him, and getting an offer to return to the CIA. The ending was filmed after the studio became concerned that the film's treatment of American foreign policy and the intelligence community would be perceived as anti-American following the September 11 attacks.^[7]
• The Butterfly Effect: Evan watches a home video of his mother pregnant with him and returns to the memory of himself as a fetus. Convinced that his very existence has ruined the lives of those around him, he strangles himself with his umbilical cord and dies, stillborn. In the theatrical ending, he simply stops himself from becoming friends with Kayleigh.
• Cats & Dogs: Mr. Tinkles was taken to a pet hospital by Sophie the Maid to be neutered, however his cat followers manage to free him by tackling Sophie.
• Child's Play 2: An extended ending reveals that a chunk of Chucky's skin after his head exploded was mixed in with the Good Guy doll making plaster. A machine is then seen making a new Good Guy Doll head, which then forms a sinister smile.
• Clash of the Titans: After defeating the Kraken and Hades, Andromeda falls into the sea and Perseus dives in to save her. When he reaches her, he embraces her with a passionate kiss, indicating that they have fallen in love. After reaching the shore and regaining consciousness, Perseus tells Andromeda that he will return. Getting on Pegasus, he flies to Mount Olympus and confronts Zeus, stating that he does not wish to be one of them. After slamming his sword into the gods' map and shattering the models of every living person, he flies on Pegasus over the sea, presumably back to Argos.
• Clerks: Dante is still inside the Quick Stop after it closes. A customer enters and, without saying a word, shoots Dante and empties the cash register. A customer comes in and steals cigarettes without noticing Dante's body behind the counter.
• Clue had four different endings, and each one distributed to theatres had one of three of them. The video and DVD version had all of these three endings on it. The fourth one has not been included because the director did not approve of it.^[8]
• Die Hard with a Vengeance: In the first filmed ending, Simon Gruber smuggles the gold out of the country disguised as Empire State Building statuettes and McClane takes the blame for the failure to stop the robbery. McClane locates Gruber months later in a bar in Hungary and makes him play a game called "McClane Says". This involves a form of Russian roulette with a rocket launcher with the sights removed, so it cannot be determined which end is which. McClane poses riddles similar to the ones he played in New York. When Gruber gets a riddle wrong, McClane forces him at gunpoint to fire the launcher, which blows Gruber to bits. This ending is in the novelization, only McClane fools Gruber into thinking the tube-like launcher is pointed at McClane. Gruber guesses the trick question and shoots himself.
• Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Rodrick Rules: Greg finds out Rodrick told the story of how he got stuck in the lady's room at Leisure Towers to his friends, and his friends told their family and friends and so on. But when he comes to school, everyone is congratulating him, figuring out someone messed up and exaggerated the story.
• Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story: The Average Joes lose the game when White Goodman hits Peter with the ball. According to the DVD commentary, this was the writer's original intention for the movie, but the studio insisted it be changed when test audiences reacted poorly to the unhappy ending. (The antagonist references this at the end of the movie, by mocking the audience for wanting a happy ending and saying, "You happy now?")
• Ella Enchanted: The movie originally ended after the wedding, where Hattie is turned into a frog by Lucinda, Ella's father demands a divorce from Dame Olga, Heston is still alive but suffering torment from the Char Fan Club, Slannen becomes a lawyer, and Dame Olga ends up with Nish. The scene was cut and replaced with a musical ending with the entire cast present, and they exit like they do on stage.
• Ernest Goes to Jail: The network broadcast version of the film included an extra scene where the bank guards demonstrate a computerized security system to the branch manager while Ernest is seen working as a bank clerk (his dream job in the film). The movie concludes when Ernest's computer shocks him and two file cabinets move toward him.^[9]
• Fatal Attraction: Alex Forrest was originally scripted to commit suicide and make it look like Dan murdered her, for which he is arrested. Test audiences did not respond well to this finale, mainly due to a lack of revenge from Beth and the family. This resulted in a three-week re-shoot for the action-filled sequence in the bathroom and Alex's death by shooting.
• Final Destination: Alex is killed when he grabs the downed power line to save Claire, ending Death's pattern. In the final scene, it turns out that Claire is pregnant with Alex's baby.
• Final Destination 2: The original movie was supposed to end with Kimberly and Officer Burke embracing in the hospital after Kimberly is revived. Instead, David Ellis, the director, decided to end the film with a bang and include the barbecue scene.
• Final Destination 3: The film has two alternative endings. In the first ending, Ian is fully crushed by the sign and Wendy, Kevin, and Julie decide what to do next. In the second ending, which involves the subway, the train headed for Wendy actually hits her, instead of being a vision.
• The Final Destination: In one alternative ending, Nick realizes he has to kill himself for the chain to end. He puts out the initial fire and then jumps out a window, killing himself. Janet and Lori sadly embrace, as Lori says, "The chain is broken." A piece of the chain holding the A/C unit breaks and lands next to Lori. Lori picks it up, and the unit drops and crushes Lori and Janet. In another, Nick is also crushed with Lori in the escalator, instead of it being a vision.
• Final Destination 5: In the ending in the original script, Sam, Molly and Nathan take a walk through a memorial park believing they finally cheated Death, but Death is still in action after Nathan is crushed by Flight 180's landing gear while Sam and Molly stare at him in horror.
• First Blood: In an alternative ending, John Rambo commits suicide rather than be arrested. This ending is included as an extra on the First Blood Ultimate Edition DVD released in 2004.
• Friday the 13th Part III: Chris wakes up the morning after killing Jason Voorhees, only to find he is still alive when she opens the back door of the lake house. Jason cuts off Chris's head. Chris wakes up screaming in the back of the police car, revealing her entire death was a dream and Jason remains dead in the barn.
• Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter: An alternative ending, included in the 2009 Deluxe Edition DVD, shows a dream sequence where Trish finds her mother drowned in the bathtub. Mrs. Jarvis' eyes open and Jason appears behind Trish, ready to strike. Trish then wakes up in the hospital in a scene reminiscent of the ending of the first movie. In his commentary, the director says this scene was cut because it interfered with the idea that this would be the final film.
• Game of Death: This movie has two alternative endings. In the Hong Kong Cantonese print, after Billy defeats Dr. Land, who falls from the rooftop, the police and an ambulance arrive. The police arrest Billy and the ambulance takes Dr. Land. In the Mandarin print it shows that after defeating Dr. Land, Billy is with Ann at a harbor, saying good-bye to Jim. The next scene shows a ship departing and a picture of Bruce Lee. This scene is also in the Hong Kong ending.
• Happy Death Day: An alternative ending has Tree recovering in the hospital from her ordeal with Lori, while being visited by her father and Carter. After they leave, a nurse enters and reveals herself as Stephanie Butler, the wife of Dr. Gregory Butler. She kills Tree out of revenge for her affair with Gregory.
• Hide and Seek: This movie had many different endings on whether Dakota Fanning's character, Emily, had split personality and whether she ended up at a mental hospital or at a new home.
• I Am Legend: As the "Alpha Monster" begins to break into the lab area, Robert Neville realizes that all they want is the "Monster Woman" back. Neville rolls her out of the lab and awakens her out of her medicated state, and the "Alpha Monster" picks her up and takes her away.
• I Know What You Did Last Summer: In the alternative ending, Julie receives an invite to a pool party and reads an email that reads "I still know". This scene was used in the trailer for the film.
• Infernal Affairs: In the mainland Chinese version, the police find evidence proving Lau Kin Ming is a triad mole and arrest him. The sequel, Infernal Affairs III, follows the original Hong Kong ending where Lau gets away with his crime.
• Little Shop of Horrors: The original conclusion to the off-Broadway musical was filmed and preferred by the director Frank Oz and the majority of the actors. However, test audiences disliked how Audrey and Seymour, the main protagonists, were both killed by the evil alien plant, and the ending had to be re-shot so that their deaths were removed.
• Men in Black II: The original ending featured a scene in which the towers of the World Trade Center open to release a swarm of UFOs. After the terrorist attacks in 2001, the ending was reshot.
• Orphan: In an alternative ending, Esther hurries into her room, face covered in blood. She re-applies her makeup, puts on the dress she wore for her first day of school, and greets the police, who arrived after receiving Kate's frantic call before she reached the house. It is not explained whether or not she has killed Kate or Max, although the dead body of John can be seen.
• Paranormal Activity: In one version of the film that was shown at only one public viewing, Katie returns to the bedroom after struggling with Micah. She is holding a knife and covered in blood. She closes and locks the bedroom door, then slits her own throat. There is a third ending in which, after killing Micah, Katie returns to the bedroom and sits down against the bed with the knife in her hand, rocking back and forth, for almost two days straight. Katie's sister comes looking for her and screams after seeing Micah's body. The creature possessing Katie leaves her body and scares Katie's sister out of the house, before returning to Katie. The police arrive at the house about 30 minutes later, and Katie comes out of the bedroom with her knife, calling for Micah. Following a heated confrontation, a door behind the officers slams shut, causing the officers to shoot Katie.
• Paycheck: Jennings and Rachel are wondering what to do next when Jennings spots the kid who stole the engagement ring from him on the subway coming out of a pawn shop. He goes into the shop for a few minutes and when he comes back he asks Rachel "do you believe in fate?" and they kiss. It is assumed he then proposes to her.
• Pineapple Express: Both main characters are killed off by a man they forgot to shoot down.
• Rocky Balboa: Rocky defeats Mason "The Line" Dixon by split decision.
• Ronin: Deirdre decides against joining Sam and Vincent in the café. As she is getting into her car, she is snatched into a van and killed by men in the IRA who call her a traitor. Sam and Vincent finish their conversation and depart, completely unaware of what has just happened.
• Scream 3: When Ghostface enters the screening room, he does not have a white sheet covering him. After Roman notices Sidney Prescott has disappeared after he supposedly killed her, he searches the screening room for her shouting and telling her all the doors are locked, most of the scene shows Sidney's point of view which was not shown in the actual ending. Also, Kincaid does not enter the screening room in this ending.
• Scary Movie 3: Cindy is told Cody does not exist. After hitting a few people in the face with a shovel, Cindy asks everybody who is not real to stand a specific spot. Cody goes there, and is followed by Santa Claus. The aliens invade but George stops them by transforming into the Hulk. President Harris tries to hulk out, but ends up soiling his pants. Cindy enters the Logan House, where she is attacked by Tabitha. She is teleported away to Aunt Shaneequa, who teaches her how to defeat Tabitha. Cindy must then confront hundreds of Tabithas. She wins the battle by performing moves from The Matrix and teleports back to the Logan House. The cast then gets into a car with the President, but are horrified to learn that the driver happens to be M. Night Shyamalan.
• Scott Pilgrim vs. the World: The original ending of the film saw Scott ending up with Knives, but was changed to fit in line with the ending of the graphic novels.
• Seven: Writer Andrew Kevin Walker completed two separate drafts of the ending. The first was used in the theatrical edition. In the second, John Doe is killed by Somerset instead of Mills. This alternative ending sequence was storyboarded and is included in the published script, but never filmed.
• Sliver: Carly Norris and the killer fly over a volcano when the killer suddenly confesses his crimes. He then veers the aircraft into the volcano and leaves the audience to decide whether they survive.
• Smokin' Aces: Rather than pulling the life support cords of Israel and Sparazza as he does in the used ending, he instead draws his weapon and empties his pistol into them.
• Super Troopers: Another ending was filmed that starts the same way as the real ending, by the police station being closed down. The former officers are now working in a meat packing plant. They tell their boss that bad meat should not be sent out for people to buy, and the boss says to do it anyway. The officers take off their jacket to reveal that they are now local police officers and chase him throughout the meat packing plant.
• Swordfish: The DVD version contains an alternative ending wherein Ginger is told in the bank that the account is already empty, alluding to the possibility that Stanley has played one final trick on them and taken the money himself. In a companion scene to the alternative ending, Stanley is shown on a trip with his daughter in a brand new RV. While eating at a diner, Stanley transfers many billion dollars to various charities before continuing his trip.
• The Terminator: The alternative ending, included in some DVD releases, shows the cleanup and police response at the factory. A group of company representatives find the terminator wreckage and decide to hide it from police and have it analyzed. The screen pans out to show the factory is owned by Cyberdyne Systems. The sequel is based on this alternative ending.
• Terminator 2: Judgment Day: The alternative ending shows Sarah Connor alive and well on August 29, 2029. She is by then a grandmother (and John Connor is a Senator) in a world where Skynet was never able to start its war on humanity.
• Titanic: Old Rose is seen by her granddaughter dropping the "Heart of the Ocean" diamond into the ocean.
• Topaz: While Nicole and Michèle waiting in front of Stade Charléty, there was a duel between André and Jacques in the French football stadium. Jacques is shot down by a sniper. This ending was poorly received by audiences during test screenings.
• X-Men: The Last Stand: Not only different endings were intended to use in this film, but nearly a whole different plot, significantly the role of Jean Grey being more aggressive and disobeying direct orders of Magneto several times. The alternative endings are: the re-opening of the Xavier Institute in which Beast is now a professor; Logan coming back to Alberta, Canada, specifically the tavern seen in the first X-Men; and Rogue keeping her powers.
• Wallace and Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit had two different endings. One had Lady Totington marrying PC Mackintosh and another had Lady Totington visiting Wallace and giving Gromit the golden carrot.
• Whisper: In the alternative ending, the kidnapper Max has chased the demon boy David through the forest. David makes him believe the wolves around him are the people who died. When they turn into wolves, they attack Max and maul him to death. The police show up and wrap David up in a blanket and take him to safety. As the police van leaves, David smiles.
• Sailor of the King: Two endings were filmed, one in which Jeffrey Hunter's character dies and one in which he is rescued. Film audiences could vote on which ending they preferred.

Examples in television

In TV shows, producers may want to keep the ending of an episode a secret, even if it means keeping it from the stars themselves. In such a case, they will usually film more than one ending and not tell the cast which one will be used.

• 24: To keep the ending to Season 1 a surprise, the crew shot multiple endings. Teri's death was the one they aired. A second ending had Teri live through the gunshot, and a third had her not being shot at all, with the family embracing each other after the long day was over.
• D.I.E: In the original ending, Yue Sir dies from a car accident, but the audience wanted a happier ending, so TVB created a new one in the style of mo lei tau comedy. In the new ending, the cast tries to stop the car accident that would kill Yue Sir from happening.
• Do the Right Thing: BBC series 1994–1995, presented by Terry Wogan, in which audience members decided moral and ethical dilemmas in fictionalised examples with only one of multiple prerecorded story endings broadcast.
• E.U.: Due to the popularity of Michael Tse's character Laughing Gor, who dies in episode 22, an ending was shot where Laughing changes into his police uniform and talks. The ending never implies whether Laughing is alive or not and leaves it open for the audience to decide.
• Green Wing: In the final Special, Guy and Mac are dragged into the air in an attempt to rescue Caroline, who has been dragged into the air by holding too many helium balloons. Whilst in the air, Mac tells Caroline he has something to tell her. After walking into the sea, Alan and Joanna are last seen hanging onto a buoy, waiting to drown. The actors wanted to use this ending but it was turned down.
• Sex and the City: In the series finale, three endings were shot, in which Carrie Bradshaw: (1) becomes engaged to Aleksandr Petrovsky, (2) resumes her relationship with Mr. Big, and (3) turns down both suitors and reaffirms her love for her friends.
• The Simpsons: In the two-part episode "Who Shot Mr. Burns?" there was an alternative ending where it is revealed that the shooter of Mr. Burns was Waylon Smithers rather than Maggie Simpson. Shots of other characters shooting Mr. Burns were also fully animated, though no other complete ending scenes were produced. (These alternative shootings were intended to be intentionally 'leaked' as an elaborate practical joke on the media, but the producers could find no journalists who would take the bait.)
• Lost: At the end of Season 4, the audience learns that one of the main characters will die in the future. To keep the identity of this person a secret, three different versions of the final scene were shot. The canonical ending shows that Locke will die, while the alternative endings had Sawyer and Desmond die.
• Total Drama: For every season of this animated "reality show", two endings were filmed in which both finalists would win the competition. Every country Total Drama aired in got to decide which ending to air.
• King of the Hill: Some episodes have alternative endings (including the episode "The Company Man"), which can be found on the DVD special features.
• Psych: the episode "100 Clues", a parody of the board game Clue, had alternative endings where the fans decided who was the culprit of murdering a guest at a party. Also, the episode "Right Turn or Left for Dead" involves the main character, Shawn, playing out an alternative ending to the episode in his head had events in the previous episode been slightly different.
• Pretty Little Liars: In the episode "The Lady Killer", three endings were shot, each revealing a member of the A-Team. Because the producers wanted to keep this member a secret from everyone (including the cast members), they shot three endings and did not tell anyone who the member of the A-Team was. Out of Paige's alternative ending, Caleb's ending, and Toby's ending, the producers ended up showing Toby's.
• Secrets and Lies: In order to keep the real killer's identity secret until the end, several multiple endings were shot.
• Breaking Bad: A man who wakes up in a different life completely, telling his wife that he was a “world class meth dealer”. The producers liked this idea and Gordon Smith wrote it. This alternative ending features Hal and Lois from Malcolm in the Middle, when Bryan Cranston's character Hal wakes up and tells Lois about every major character in Breaking Bad and their actions, calling Hank Schrader "the guy from The Shield". Lois tells Hal not to eat deep-fried Twinkies anymore as they go back to sleep and the camera pans to Heisenberg's hat.
• How I Met Your Mother: An alternative ending was edited together for the Season 9 DVD. This ending omits the scene in which Tracy dies, while making no other changes to the plot.

Examples in music

• English rock band Marillion's 1994 concept album Brave is one of the very few examples of an alternative ending appearing in music. The vinyl edition of Brave featured a double groove on side B of the second record, the final side of the album: depending on where the needle was dropped, the record would either play the standard track listing (the songs "The Great Escape" and "Made Again") or would instead play only an alternative version of "The Great Escape" with different lyrics, presenting an alternative, darker ending to the album's story.^[10]

Examples in video games

Many video games also have alternative endings. Since video games are an interactive medium, these endings are generally posed as a result of player action, such as completing the game in a harder difficulty, taking a different route through the game's storyline and succeeding or failing at given tasks. It is generally possible to play a game a second time, make different decisions or achieve a different degree of success, and arrive at a different ending than the first time, complicating the canonicity of the ending(s).