Sequel will make sense of Edge of Tomorrow’s ending

Last Updated on August 5, 2021

Did you find that the ending of director Doug Liman's 2014 alien invasion film EDGE OF TOMORROW left dangling questions? Were you confused by what happened?

Alien blood could do crazy things to a person in that film, a much different sort of crazy than the acidic blood of the xenomorphs in the ALIEN franchise. When Tom Cruise's character Bill Cage died after being doused with blood during a battle with alien forces, he then woke up again, having gone back in time to a point soon before the battle. Like restarting at a save point after a death in a video game. Cage dies over and over during the film, always waking up after death at that same moment before the battle.

This is how the synopsis put it: 

The action unfolds in a near future in which an alien race has hit the Earth in an unrelenting assault, unbeatable by any military unit in the world. Lt. Col. Bill Cage (Cruise) is an officer who has never seen a day of combat when he is unceremoniously dropped into what amounts to a suicide mission. Killed within minutes, Cage now finds himself inexplicably thrown into a time loop—forcing him to live out the same brutal combat over and over, fighting and dying again…and again.

But with each battle, Cage becomes able to engage the adversaries with increasing skill, alongside Special Forces warrior Rita Vrataski (Emily Blunt). And, as Cage and Rita take the fight to the aliens, each repeated encounter gets them one step closer to defeating the enemy.

Being covered in alien blood gave Cage the ability the aliens have to reset time. For the aliens, these resets are controlled by a specific creature called the Omega, and in the end Cage and his cohorts sacrifice themselves to take down the Omega. In the process, Cage is once again covered in alien blood, this time Omega blood, allowing him to reset time into what appears to be a happily ever after.

And yet, since there's going to be a sequel, it looks like the war with the aliens isn't over yet.

If any of that seemed muddled to you, don't be discouraged. The sequel has you covered. During a recent Twitter Q&A, frequent Cruise collaborator Christopher McQuarrie, who co-wrote EDGE OF TOMORROW with Jez and John-Henry Butterworth, said that one thing the sequel will have to offer is that it make the end of EDGE 1 "finally make complete sense".

The end of Edge I will finally make complete sense.

— ChristopherMcQuarrie (@chrismcquarrie) June 18, 2017

McQuarrie isn't writing the sequel, Joe Shrapnel and Anna Waterhouse are currently at work on the script, but he is still involved in the creative process. However, there is one thing about the sequel he had nothing to do with – the title.

The title has proven to be very troublesome for these films. The first movie went into production under the title ALL YOU NEED IS KILL, which is the name of the manga it was based on. The title was changed to EDGE OF TOMORROW, but the marketing tagline "Live, Die, Repeat" became even more popular than the EDGE title. So Liman recently announced that the sequel will be called LIVE DIE REPEAT AND REPEAT… which is dopey as hell, as far as I'm concerned. When asked about this title, McQuarrie simply said "I was not consulted."

I was not consulted. #McQandA

— ChristopherMcQuarrie (@chrismcquarrie) June 18, 2017