9 Plot Twists I Figured Out Wayyy Before They Happened, And 10 I Could Never Have Guessed In A Million Years

Who else guessed the ending of Shutter Island?

🚨 Warning – this post contains A LOT of spoilers, so if you see a film you haven't watched yet, feel free to scroll by! 🚨

Also, TW for references to suicide, mental illness, and racially motivated violence.

1. DIDN'T SEE COMING – The Uninvited

Paramount Pictures

What it's about: After losing her mother in a horrific fire, Anna (Emily Browning) is confined to a psychiatric facility following a suicide attempt. When she's discharged ten months later, Anna returns home to find her father is dating her late mother's nurse, Rachel (Elizabeth Banks), which perturbs both Anna and her older sister Alex (Arielle Kebbel).

The twist: Basically, the sisters become convinced that Rachel is evil. When she sedates them both one night, it becomes a game of who can kill who first! Alex finishes off Rachel, but when their father returns, and both sisters try to explain the situation, it's revealed that Alex isn't there – she died in the fire too and Anna has been imagining everything.

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Why it was shocking: It just didn't enter my mind that Alex wasn't really there! I think the whole thing is played out really well, and I certainly didn't question Alex's existence.

2. DID SEE COMING – Get Out

Universal Pictures

What it's about: Chris, a young Black man (Daniel Kaluuya), goes to stay at his white girlfriend Rose's (Allison Williams) parent's house for a few days to get to know her family. But as soon as he's there, he's struck by how strange everybody is, especially the other Black people he encounters.

The twist: Rose and her family are part of a racist cult that traps Black people, and forces them to become surrogate bodies for their largely white membership. It's Rose and her brother Jeremy's job to ensnare unsuspecting Black people, and Rose had been pretending to be interested in Chris the entire time.

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Why it was predictable: First off, this film is amazing – the fact that I guessed part of the ending doesn't change that. But yeah, I could just tell Rose was in on it – she was too... perfect. And we all knew something was up when those photos came out!

3. DIDN'T – Parasite

CJ Entertainment

What it's about: An enterprising family – the Kims – living in relative poverty in Seoul, South Korea try to change their fortunes by each getting hired to work for a wealthy family – the Parks. After the Parks go away on a camping trip, the Kims move in to stay at their swanky pad temporarily, during which time they discover that the house has secrets of its own.

The twist: The Park family have no idea that their former housekeeper Moon-gwang (Lee Jung-eun) has been keeping her husband Geun-sae (Park Myung-hoon) in the basement of their house. The revelation is a catalyst for the final act of the film in which members of both families, as well as Moon-gwang and Geun-sae, are all tragically killed.

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Why it was shocking: WHO KNEW that there was a man living in the Park's basement? Cos I had no idea things were gonna go in THAT direction. And then when damn near everybody died... I had to pick myself up off the floor!

4. DID – The Prestige

Buena Vista Pictures Distribution/Warner Bros. Pictures

What it's about: In Victorian London, two magicians – Robert Angier (Hugh Jackman) and Alfred Borden (Christian Bale) – compete to be the best performer in town. After Borden creates a trick called "the Transported Man", in which he seems to travel instantly between two wardrobes on opposite ends of a stage, Angier commits to create his own version of the act, but even better!

The twist: Borden's "the Transported Man" is made possible by the fact that Borden is an identity shared by two identical twins! The brothers would take turns being Borden as well as his henchman Fallon, who wears a disguise. They kept the truth hidden from everyone, even from Borden's wife, and used it aid their magic careers.

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Why it was predictable: Despite being created by Christopher Nolan, this movie's focus on cloning and doubles got me thinking that Borden was a twin from the off. After all, Fallon kind of looked like Borden anyway, and Borden was always nice to wife one minute, then mean to her the next!

5. DIDN'T – Cabin in the Woods

Lionsgate

What it's about: Five stereotypical college friends go away for the weekend to a remote cabin in the woods, but out there waiting for them is the absolute shock of their lives.

The twist: You think this is a typical slasher movie but holey moley – it's not! Basically, the entire vacation has been arranged by a secret organisation who are manipulating everything. The organisation regularly hoodwinks innocent people into facing off against a supernatural foe of their choosing, all so they can be sacrificed to the Ancient Ones.

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Why it was shocking: I guess I thought the movie was a cookie cutter horror, but then it REALLY goes off. I mean, when I realised the whole thing was a set-up and the friends were being watched and forced into things... I was shook.

6. DID – Incredibles 2

Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures

What it's about: In this sequel to the iconic 2004 original, superheroes are once again in everybody's bad books. Enter multinational DevTech, who plan to legalise superheroes once more using the Parr family matriarch – Helen (Holly Hunter) – as their mascot. While Bob (Craig T. Nelson) struggles with everyday domestic duties, Helen must stop supervillain Screenslaver from brainwashing everyone.

The twist: Screenslaver is revealed none other that DevTech's lead inventor, Evelyn Deavor (Catherine Keener) who runs the company with her brother, Winston (Bob Odenkirk). Unlike Winston, Evelyn believes superheroes should be outlawed and blames them for the death of her parents.

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Why it was predictable: This is simple a case of... she looked evil to me. Also, we knew Screenslaver had to be ~someone~ in the movie.

7. DIDN'T – The Orphanage

Warner Bros. Pictures Spain

What it's about: Laura (Belén Rueda) and her husband Carlos (Fernando Cayo) decide to buy the dilapidated orphanage where Laura grew up, and turn it into a home for sick children. They move in with their adopted son Simón, who soon goes missing. Months go by and Simón is presumed dead, but Laura can't stop searching for him, or seeing ghostly flickers of the place her house once was.

The twist: Simón never went missing per se. During an argument with his mother, he ran off and hid under the stairs where he found a passage into a secret basement. Later, when she checks the cupboard under the stairs, Laura accidentally drops some heavy construction scaffolding against the only exit to the basement, preventing Simón from getting back out.

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Why it was shocking: Not only was it completely WILD that Simón had technically been in the house the whole time, it was unbelievably sad that a grief-stricken Laura had inadvertently caused her son's death.

8. DID – The Visit

Universal Pictures

What it's about: Loretta (Kathryn Hahn) decides to send her two teenaged children, Becca and Tyler, off to meet their grandparents for the first time. Since she is estranged from her parents, the two teens go alone. After a couple of days, they begin to notice something is very off with their allegedly friendly grandparents.

The twist: The couple Becca and Tyler are staying with are actually imposters. They are escaped patients from a psychiatric hospital who broke in and killed their real grandparents, then posed as them because they wanted to pretend Becca and Tyler were the children they murdered years ago.

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Why it was predictable: So I'm a horror fan and this one was obvious from the beginning! Becca and Tyler have never met their grandparents or even seen pictures of them, so it follows that these people aren't them. It's still a very compelling movie though!

9. DIDN'T – Zootopia

Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures

What it's about: Judy Hopps (Ginnifer Goodwin), an ambitious young rabbit, moves to the big city of Zootopia to become a police officer. There, she becomes embroiled in a mysterious case that involves upstanding "civilised" animals suddenly regressing into their once feral states and attacking others.

The twist: Although Judy initially thinks it is the Mayor's (J. K. Simmons) doing, it's revealed that his under-appreciated assistant, Dawn Bellwether (Jenny Slate), orchestrated the entire scheme. Dawn wanted to frame predator animals – who she feels have shunned her all her life – as a danger to society.

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Why it was shocking: Dawn, the eternally optimistic yet totally undervalued assistant to the Mayor, is such a familiar stock character! I guess I never saw her as being behind the whole thing.

10. DID – Knives Out

Lionsgate/MRC

What it's about: When Benoit Blanc (Daniel Craig) is hired by a mystery client to investigate the apparent suicide of famous crime novelist, Harlan Thrombey (Christopher Plummer), he decides to re-interview all of Harlan's larger-than-life family and staff to find out exactly how he died.

The twist: Okay, this is slightly complicated, so bear with me! Harlan's attempted killer is revealed to be his grandson, Ransom (Chris Evans), who was so concerned with being written out of his grandfather's will in favour of his personal nurse Marta (Ana de Armas), that he swapped over the labels on Harlan's medication. Ransom intended for Marta to inadvertently overdose Harlan with morphine, thereby murdering him and losing out on claiming the inheritance as a result of her crime. On the night in question, however, Marta correctly doses Harlan. She subconsciously recognises the weight of the two medications in her hand, and administers them accordingly. When Marta realises the labels have been switched, she falsely believes she has given Harlan a deadly dosage of morphine. Knowing that an innocent Marta will be implicated in his death, Harlan promptly kills himself, but unbeknownst to the pair his suicide is not actually necessary.

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Why it was predictable: Obviously, half of the fun of a murder mystery is figuring out who did it (usually the most famous member of the cast). When his medication became so crucial to the plot, and there was no toxicology report to confirm what Harlan had actually been dosed with, I just knew they'd been swapped and Marta was being framed. And it had to be was Harlan's wayward and elusive grandson, Ransom!

11. DIDN'T – Us

Universal Pictures

What it's about: Adelaide (Lupita Nyong'o) can't stop thinking about a traumatic incident that occurred when she was a child, and she wandered into an abandoned house of mirrors. After she and her husband Gabe (Winston Duke) decide to take their two children on a vacation to the place where Adelaide grew up, they have an unwelcome run-in with a family who look exactly like them – except significantly more scary!

The twist: Basically, there are identical "tethered" versions of people all over America living underground. But Adelaide doesn't have a tethered version of herself because when she was younger, her doppelgänger choked her unconscious in a house of mirrors, imprisoned her underground, and returned to the surface to take Adelaide's place.

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Why it was shocking: Even though this film wasn't perfect, the specific plot point that the real Adelaide had been abducted and replaced by the tethered Adelaide was a pretty cool twist!

12. DID – Last Christmas

Universal Pictures

What it's about: Kate (Emilia Clarke) is a down-and-out twenty-something living in London. Her overbearing mother (Emma Thompson) worries about Kate's health, as she only recently received a heart transplant. Kate fears she will never make it as a singer, until the day she meets the charming Tom (Henry Golding) who inspires her to get her life back on track.

The twist: Even though they meet several times and form a romantic attachment, Tom isn't real. He died a year earlier... and guess who got given his heart via an organ donation?

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Why it was predictable: Well, it's there in the song! But I've also learned from The Uninvited that if a character seems fishy, and they only ever interact with ONE other character in a movie, it's probably because they're a figment of that person's imagination.

13. DIDN'T – Exam

Independent/IFC Films

What it's about: Amidst a viral pandemic going on in Britain, eight candidates are invited to take part in a top-secret interview for a prestigious job. The interview takes the form of an 80-minute exam consisting of only one question – but what that question is exactly is unclear. Over the course of the exam, the candidates desperately battle it out to become the last person standing.

The twist: The candidates go to extreme measures to figure out what the question is, eventually turning on each other and attempting to get one another disqualified. But the only question it could be is one that was posed by the invigilator before the exam even started – "any questions?"

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Why it was shocking: I mean, it was kind of a stupid twist which is partly why it's genius – who's going to think "any questions" is actually THE question you need to answer in an exam?

14. DID – Stonehearst Asylum

Millennium Films

What it's about: Dr. Edward Newgate (Jim Sturgess), a recent Oxford medical school graduate, arrives at a mental institution where he asks to take up residency. Though he is welcomed in by Dr. Silas Lamb (Ben Kingsley), Edward can't help but be unsettled by the unorthodox way the asylum is run. He quickly becomes infatuated with a resident named Eliza (Kate Beckinsale), who also appears as a subject during a practical demonstration at a university in the beginning of the film.

The twist: It's revealed early on that the patients of the asylum have revolted and imprisoned the real staff in the boiler room – that's in one of the trailers. The real twist is that Dr. Edward Newgate is an imposter. The real Edward (Brendan Gleeson) is the professor who conducts the demonstration at the start of the movie, the imposter is an escaped patient with pseudologia fantastica.

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Why it was predictable: Once the film had us doubting who was truly sane and who wasn't, it didn't take a huge leap in logic to presume that the protagonist was also mentally ill. Also, at one point, Edward tells Eliza he has come to rescue her after encountering her at the university demonstration. Since Edward wasn't in the audience for the lecture, I assumed he was the mystery second subject who Eliza was staring at as she was wheeled out of the theatre.

15. DIDN'T – Saint Maud

StudioCanal

What it's about: A devout palliative care nurse, Maud (Morfydd Clark), is sent to look after a terminally ill dancer named Amanda (Jennifer Ehle). At first they seem to get on, but Maud eventually clashes with Amanda and is dismissed. After a period of hedonistic self-destruction, Maud makes her way back to Amanda before a final test of her faith.

The twist: Once she's reunited with Amanda, Maud reminds her of a time earlier in the film when they prayed together, and Amanda seemed to experience God's presence. Immediately, Amanda starts to taunt Maud and refutes the existence of God, which causes Maud to question her own faith. Amanda then switches into her demonic form, who Maud stabs to death. Maud later appears in her angelic form and heads down to the beach where she self-immolates.

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Why it was shocking: Saint Maud is a real slow-burner, and it's never entirely clear whether Maud's saint-like powers are real, or whether she's experiencing powerful delusions. In any case, the last ten minutes were as unexpected as they were electrifying!

16. DID – Fractured

Netflix

What it's about: Parents Joanne (Lily Rabe) and Ray (Sam Worthington) rush their injured daughter Peri to A&E after she accidentally falls into a pit at a petrol station. Whilst Joanne accompanies Peri to have a scan, Ray falls asleep in the waiting area, only to wake and discover that both Joanne and Peri have disappeared without a trace.

The twist: Both Peri and Joanne unfortunately died at the petrol station – Peri died from falling into the pit, and Joanne was killed when a traumatised Ray pushed her and she landed head first on a metal spike. Ray put both their bodies in the car boot where they have been ever since. He then repressed the truth of what had happened and began searching for his "missing" wife and daughter.

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Why it was predictable: This Flightplan-esque feature is pretty engaging, but I knew it was heading in one clear direction from the minute Ray woke up and discovered Peri and Joanne were missing.

17. DIDN'T – The Book of Eli

Warner Bros. Pictures/Sony Pictures Releasing International

What it's about: In a post-apocalyptic world, a nomadic man named Eli (Denzel Washington) carries his most prized possession with him at all times – a mystery book. Though Eli hopes to deliver the book to a safe zone on the West Coast of the United States, a warlord named Carnegie (Gary Oldman) seeks to take it away from him.

The twist: So Eli is like this bad-ass who can kill about twenty thugs in a shoot-out, easy. How? Well, he's actually blind and has incredibly astute hearing, which enables him to target people with extreme precision. Also, the book he carries with him is the last remaining Bible in existence.

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Why it was shocking: I guess this movie is a little rough around the edges, but I genuinely did not expect Eli to be blind. And although Carnegie manages to obtain Eli's Bible, the fact that it's in braille and he cannot read it is a pretty satisfying ending!

18. DID – Shutter Island

Paramount Pictures

What it's about: U.S. Marshal Edward "Teddy" Daniels (Leonardo DiCaprio) is sent with his partner Chuck (Mark Ruffalo) to investigate the disappearance of a patient from a highly secure psychiatric facility on Shutter Island. But as Teddy goes deeper into the case, he finds it increasingly hard to separate fact from fiction.

The twist: On the surface, Teddy may be looking for a missing patient called Rachel Solando, but he's also trying to track down a killer named Andrew Laeddis for personal reasons. Teddy believes Andrew is a patient on the island as well. Both of the names of the so-called escaped patients – Rachel and Andrew – are anagrams of Edward Daniels and Dolores Chanal, Teddy's late wife (Michelle Williams). It transpires that Teddy is Andrew Laeddis, a dangerous patient at the hospital who refuses to accept that he murdered his depressed wife after she drowned their children in a lake. Instead, he creates elaborate fictions in which he is the hero, Edward Daniels. The Rachel Solando case was invented by Andrew's doctors as a ruse to force him into admitting what he has done, and avoid him being lobotomised.

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Why it was predictable: Don't get me wrong, this is one of my favourite films, but there are a few subtle clues that Andrew isn't really a U.S. Marshal. For instance, in the scene where he's denied access to hospital records, Andrew doesn’t know where his report is going – Dr. Sheehan completes his sentence for him by saying that his report will go to the FBI, or "Hoover’s boys". Also, when Andrew encounters the "real" Dr. Rachel Solando (Patricia Clarkson) in the cave, she calls him Marshal despite the fact that Andrew only identified himself to her as a cop. But perhaps more importantly than that, this movie makes use of the old "the-protagonist-is-the-one-who's-mad" movie trope, which made it easy to anticipate the ending. Nevertheless, this is an AMAZING film that is definitely worth the watch!

19. DIDN'T – Hereditary

A24

What it's about: Miniaturist Annie (Toni Collette) is left confused and grief-stricken after the death of her estranged mother, Ellen. She begins to uncover evidence of her mother's unusual private life, and sets out to find the truth. That is until her world is suddenly thrown into utter turmoil by another catastrophe, which sets off a chain of events that completely alter Annie's life forever.

The twist: Annie's mother was the leader of a cult who worship a demon-king named Paimon. Ellen had been trying to find Paimon a male host all her life – she had even tried to possess Annie's daughter, Charlie. After Charlie is decapitated during a car ride with her brother Peter (Alex Wolff), the family begin to fall apart, and Annie's increasingly erratic behaviour basically leads the Paimon cult to her door. During one bizarre evening, Annie and her husband Steve (Gabriel Byrne) are killed, and Peter reluctantly becomes a host body for Paimon.

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Why it was shocking: I mean this was a bonkers film, wasn't it? I guess the cult stuff is familiar territory for a horror, but no one could have been prepared for that decapitation scene! And then the last fifteen minutes of the film, well, they have to be seen to be believed...

Tell us about the plot twists you did or didn't see coming in the comments below!