UPDATE: Original Fight Club ending restored in China after backlash

UPDATE: The original Fight Club ending has been restored in China after facing censorship backlash. Chinese streaming service Tencent Video has backtracked in recent days and restored the majority of the cuts they made. Most importantly, Fight Club’s complete ending is now viewable as originally intended in China.

ORIGINAL STORY

David Fincher’s 1999 cult classic Fight Club is beloved by movie fans so any alterations to the film would be met with raised eyebrows. That’s exactly what happened in China when a new version of Fight Club available to Chinese audiences received a drastically different ending.

Film fans in China noticed over the weekend that a version of the movie, newly available on the streaming platform Tencent Video, was given a makeover of sorts that alters the anarchist, anti-capitalist message of the ending. In the closing scenes of the original film, Edward Norton’s character The Narrator kills off his imaginary alter ego Tyler Durden, played by Brad Pitt. After this event, he watches multiple buildings explode, suggesting his character’s plan to bring down modern civilization had begun.

The new ending in China provided a much different take. In the new version, The Narrator still kills Tyler Durden, but the exploding building scene is replaced with a black screen and a coda that reads, “The police rapidly figured out the whole plan and arrested all criminals, successfully preventing the bomb from exploding”. It then adds that Tyler – a figment of The Narrator’s imagination – was sent to a “lunatic asylum” for psychological treatment and was later discharged. You can see a screengrab of the coda below!

Chinese viewers were not happy with the new ending, who would’ve only seen the original film via pirated versions. One viewer commented, “This is too outrageous. Fight Club on Tencent Video tells us that they don’t just delete scenes, but add to the plot too.” It’s not clear at this time if government censors ordered the alternate ending in order for the film to be available on the service or if the original movie’s producers made the changes. It is common for Hollywood studios to release alternative cuts in the hopes of clearing Beijing’s censorship hurdles so they can gain access to millions of Chinese consumers.

Do YOU agree with the Fight Club ending change in China?