Arka Mukhopadhyay
Helmed by Chris Gorak, the science fiction horror mash-up ‘The Darkest Hour’ follows a group of survivors as they make their way through the city in the aftermath of a mysterious alien invasion. The premise of the film is far from convincing, and halfway down the line, the narrative turns noticeably imprudent. The aliens have obliterated most of the city, and as the invisible electromagnetic creatures come in contact with the humans, the humans seem to be annihilated.
While the idea of the alien-infested, bizarre, and visceral apocalypse seemingly borrows extensively from its spiritual precursor ‘Skyline,’ among other genre deployments, the film packs enough goof to cater to the appetites of genre fans. Known faces in Hollywood such as Emile Hirsch and Olivia Thirlby take the helm in the acting department. As the anticlimactic ending descends upon the viewers, they get the idea that the film is a prologue to a bigger narrative. If the ending of ‘The Darkest Hour’ has puzzled you to the core, we shall attempt to shed some light over this darkness. SPOILERS AHEAD.
The Darkest Hour Plot Synopsis
The film begins with two budding entrepreneurs, Sean and Ben, flying to Moscow to seal a business deal. They take a taxi from the airport to visit their Swedish business partner Skyler, but at the meeting, they have little luck since Skyler seems to have stolen their original idea and presented it before the Russians. On the other hand, Natalie and Anne take a tour of the Red Square. After clicking some selfies together, they head to a night club which Natalie discovered from a blog.
At the nightclub, the girls are approached by a bunch of guys before being stepped over by our entrepreneurs. Anne gets her phone out to click some more pictures with the guys, but the lights go out in the meantime. The people at the party come out in the open to experience little globes of yellow light falling from the sky, and as a police officer attempts to touch a globe, he gets disintegrated into ash in the blink of an eye. Thoroughly scared, the crowd disperses in different directions.
The invisible extra-terrestrial entities haunt humans and kill them, and we come to know that most of the city has been infested by the aliens. Ben, Sean, Anne, Natalie, and Skyler hide in the club for a week. Upon coming out, they experience the city devoid of people. In a plaza complex, they come across a crashed aircraft. They go on to spend the night in the plaza, but the invisible assailant compels them to flee the scene. They escape and come to the US embassy, but the building looks scorched from the outside.
They come to know that Moscow is not the only city experiencing the phenomenon, as other cities such as New York, Tokyo, Paris, and London have had the same unfortunate fate of being visited by the aliens. They find a radio in the embassy and take it to a nearby apartment upon seeing light. There, they meet electrical engineer Sergei and a young girl named Vika. Sergei has turned his apartment into a Faraday cage, where the party is safe.
With the help of Sergei, Sean and the team can decode the radio message, which says a rescue submarine is about to depart from Moscow. Vika takes Natalie and Anne to gather food but scared, Anne chooses to separate herself from the team, endangering the safety of those inside the cage. An alien follows Anne back into the cage, and Sergei unsuccessfully tries to fire his ad-hoc alien gun, getting killed in the process. Anne pays with her life.
Natalie sets the whole apartment ablaze as they come down. On the ground, they encounter a team of renegade policemen led by Matvei, who are out to kill the invisible entities. Initially adamant to battle the aliens with weaponry, Matvei chooses to help the kids on their journey to the submarine. The boat capsizes, Natalie goes missing, and Sean would not leave without her. The finality of the film sees a daring feat by the heartthrob hero, and it ends on a happy note.
The Darkest Hour Ending: Can The Aliens Be Killed? What is Their Purpose on Earth?
The aliens seem to be run by electric energy. They are invisible and have a shield of protection around them. However, they can see humans through their yellow-tinted alien lens. They seem to detect the electromagnetic energy of the human body. But these invisible enemies can be fought back. According to Sergei, who has invented the alien gun, the aliens can be discharged with the weapon. He has also built a Faraday cage around his apartment that seems to block the electromagnetic fields and keeps those inside the cage safe from the aliens.
Later in the plot, Matvei and his fellow soldiers fight an alien with the unusual weapon. The encounter ends with the alien getting killed. Sean kills another in the bus to protect Natalie. So, it seems that the aliens are not invincible after all. At the end of the film, Matvei tells them the day of extermination has ended and the day of war has begun. After that, we get the news of militia groups fighting off the aliens in places around the world. So, it seems that the aliens can surely be killed. And as the submarine charts through the seas, we get the idea that the film prepares the viewer for a follow-up narrative.
The purpose of the aliens in visiting Earth is not quite clear from the beginning of the film, but as the ending nears, we begin to get some idea about their incentive. In the scene where the group procures a boat to get to the submarine, red beams flare up in the sky. The aliens seem to be extracting the deposit of natural metals and minerals from the core of the earth. The minerals can create electricity and keep the alien balls charged for days.
Is Natalie Dead or Alive? Does She Fall For Sean?
At Sergei’s place, we get to know from the radio broadcast message that a Russian submarine waits for the survivors on the bank of the Moskva River. Towards the end of the film, the crew tries to reach the nuclear submarine on a boat. However, Natalie goes missing when a crumbling building causes enough impact on the water to capsize the boat. When Sean reaches the submarine, the operators seem too eager to commence their journey.
However, Sean manages to hold the submarine crew by stating his faith in Natalie’s survival skills. Somebody signals a flare gun, and Sean seems to think that Natalie is still alive. Matvei, Yuri, and other policemen help Sean rescue Natalie. Natalie is hiding in a bus, and Sean finds her there. However, not long after, they are attacked by another one of those entities. Sean shoots the alien gun at it, and while the gun seems to be broken at first, Sean manages to kill the alien.
In the end, Natalie and Sean get back to the submarine to make the journey. Initially, Natalie is smitten with Ben and not Sean. At the party, in the beginning, Natalie seems to pass glances at Ben. However, following Ben’s fatal encounter with an alien, Sean and Natalie seem to hit it off. Even though urged by the ship’s crew, Sean does not leave Natalie and goes on to rescue her. As Natalie and Sean have a personal moment in the submarine, it becomes evident that Natalie has fallen for Sean.
Where is the Submarine Headed?
As the land is not safe for travel due to the invisible assailants, the Russian Navy has arranged for a nuclear submarine for the survivors of the alien invasion. Moreover, the protagonists also find out at Sergei’s chamber that the Russian submarine is not the only one handling rescue operations, as a British submarine waits at the English Channel to cater to the survivors. Moreover, a US submarine is waiting to commence its journey from Nova Scotia. But we don’t know the destination of the submarines.
Following a suggestion from Sergei, it is possible that the survivors are being taken to an underwater Faraday cage. The underwater Faraday cage seems to be a plausible idea since the physical construct of the Faraday cage can protect people from the electricity-clad aliens. However, it can also be that the nuclear submarine (one which is made to withstand nuclear attacks) is itself the Faraday cage that Sergei is referring towards. Either way, the international submarine operations seem to be carried out in the interest of the survivors.
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