The Fall Guy ending explained

Turns out, there’s more to The Fall Guy than a bunch of explosive stunts, so here’s the movie’s full ending explained.

Barbenheimer’s elite duo Ryan Gosling and Emily Blunt are ready to blow the socks off of movie lovers in a whole new way with the release of David Leitch’s The Fall Guy.

Taking the story from the 1980s TV show of the same name and adapting it into a feature-length film, Gosling and Blunt star as Colt and Jody, a stuntman and camera operator whose fling leaves a bitter taste when it’s time for Jody to direct her first film.

Action fans can rest assured that The Fall Guy will set them up for a bumpy ride, so here’s the full ending explained. Warning: Spoilers ahead.

The Fall Guy ending: Colt and Jody reluctantly reunite

Colt (Gosling) is the lead stuntman in a film for hotshot actor Tom Ryder (Aaron Taylor-Johnson), who is known for his over-inflated ego. Camera operator Jody (Blunt) is working on the same movie, and the two have a love affair for the movie’s duration. Colt breaks his back after a life-threatening stunt falling from the ceiling of a skyscraper goes wrong, causing him to leave the stunt game for good. A year later, producer Gail (Hannah Waddingham) tracks Colt down while working as a valet at a restaurant, saying that Jody has requested him to work on her directorial debut.

Willing to do anything for Jody — having had no contact with her for almost 18 months — Colt jumps on the first plane to Australia, where sci-fi blockbuster Metal Storm is currently being filmed. Nobody on the crew seems to be aware that Jody and Colt know each other, while Gail is more intent on setting Colt to work. Tom hasn’t turned up on set for days, and neither has his former stunt double. After reluctantly performing a world-breaking car roll on the beach, Jody finds out that Colt is the man behind the helmet, and immediately requests that he be removed from set.

While filming a scene that involves repeatedly setting Colt on fire, the pair try to work through how their communication broke down in the first place. Colt reveals that he was too in his own head about reaching out to Jody, not wanting her to see the reality of what happened. Jody says that all she wanted to do was be there for him.

Metal Storm becomes more than a space movie

Universal Pictures

After filming for a little while, Gail reveals the real reason why Colt has been flown over — Jody didn’t request him, but he’s the only person who can find out where Tom has gone, given that they previously spent so much time together. Told that Tom has fallen in with bad people, Colt starts a dangerous mission to try and find out the truth. Heading to his flat to try and find clues, Colt is tipped off by Tom’s wary girlfriend that he had been meeting with drug dealers on the side. After a grisly encounter at a club where Colt is spiked, he ends up at the hotel where Jody and Gail are staying, with a corrupt receptionist hinting that Tom meets up in a particular room.

While trying to win Jody back through phone calls, Colt finds a dead man on ice in the room. Caught leaving on CCTV, he tries to warn Gail, who doesn’t respond. Back on set, Jody and Colt are growing closer again, filling in for Tom using a deepfake scan taken of Colt before he started filming. Just as the good gets going, Gail says that Colt is in too deep with Tom’s enemies and tries to send him on a flight back home. Refusing to leave for Jody’s sake, Colt runs into assistant Alma (Stephanie Hsu) who has Tom’s phone. A group attacks the pair to try and retrieve it, resulting in a standoff on a moving dumpster truck. While Jody learns that Gail tried to send Colt away, Colt misses turning up for their plans.

Colt gets revenge on Tom Ryder

Universal Pictures

In The Fall Guy ending, Colt is convinced that the truth lies on Tom’s phone, where he finds the passcode written on a post-it note in Tom’s flat. Colt learns that during a drunken party, Tom killed his previous stunt double after being questioned about doing his own stunts. This was the body on ice in the bath, with Tom — and Gail — bringing Colt to Australia to frame him for the murder. The gang arrives at Tom’s flat to try and get the phone back, resulting in a shootout that leads to Tom trapping Colt on his private yacht.

Colt manages to escape from Tom and his cronies by using their weapons of choice against them, fleeing onto a waiting boat. While on the boat, a deepfaked clip of Colt’s face on Tom’s body makes public news, incriminating him as the suspect in the stunt double’s murder. Colt phones Jody to tell her that he’s lived his life in complete regret since his accident and professes his love. The boat explodes into the ocean and Colt is presumed dead.

However, Colt emerges from the water and makes his way to Jody’s trailer in disguise. Colt tells Jody exactly what happened — including that Gail is in on it — and the two hatch a plan to get Tom to confess. Tom comes back to Metal Storm’s set to film his final scenes and is challenged to perform his own stunts. Thinking he is only in a car doing close-ups for VFX, Colt suddenly appears next to him and threatens to drive the car off a 250-foot jump. The gang and Gail chase after the car and Jody and the crew make their pursuit as difficult as possible. Colt manages to get Tom to confess to the framing and murder, with Jody’s sound team recording through Tom’s microphone. The pair also make the jump.

Gail then turns on the crew to try and get the recorded tape, with an all-out fight breaking out between the crew and the gang. She tries to flee in a helicopter along with Tom, but Colt manages to get on board by jumping from a camera crane. After fighting mid-air, Colt retrieves the tape and jumps onto a crash mat the crew has waiting for him below. Colt’s name is cleared, starting his love affair with Jody all over again.

Find even more amazing movies, TV shows, and true crime documentaries to catch on streaming this month. If that’s not enough, find out what’s in store this year for K-drama.