If you need that shocking Foe ending explained, we don't blame you—the twists and turns are so plentiful in the 2023 sci-fi flick that we here at What to Watch dubbed it one of the most shocking movie moments of the year.
Based on Ian Reid's 2018 novel of the same name, Foe stars Saoirse Ronan and Paul Mescal—who you can also currently see in All of Us Strangers opposite Andrew Scott—as a married couple, Hen and Junior, who live in a near-future dystopia in which a climate crisis is ravaging the planet. (Sounds familiar!)
Their simple, rural life in the American Midwest is turned upside down when a stranger named Terrance (Aaron Pierre) comes to inform them that Junior has been selected to live on a space station for two years as part of a governmental program to test whether humans can adapt to permanent settlement in space.
Hen has to stay behind but she'll be accompanied by a "simulant" programmed to look and act like her husband while Junior is away in space. While A.I. Junior is being developed, Terrance will be staying with the spouses and interviewing them about their life and relationship to help set up the simulant. Creepy stuff, huh?
Well, it goes without saying that things get infinitely more complicated for the couple as time goes on and the countdown to Junior's take-off creeps ever closer. Now that Foe is available to stream with a Prime Video subscription, let's unpack that big plot twist, shall we?
Warning: spoilers for the film Foe are very much ahead!
Foe ending explained: what happens to Junior and Hen?
Here's the biggie: Mescal's Junior that we follow through the entire film isn't Junior at all, but the simulant. Yes, by the time we see Terrance "arrive" at the couple's home in the beginning of the movie, the real Junior has already been sent to the space station and the A.I. replica is the one we see living at home and bonding with Hen. And the whole time, Terrance's interviews with Junior and Hen weren't part of the set-up but to monitor the android.
We see the real Junior return home after his two-year space sojourn. As a result, the simulant Junior is decommissioned as the real Junior and a devastated Hen watches on: the android is stripped naked, covered in a mysterious liquid and basically vacuum-sealed by government officials.
The relationship between the real Junior and Hen deteriorates because it's clear that Hen began having feelings for the simulant. At the film's end, Hen has abandoned her husband to fulfill her dream of exploring the world, leaving behind an empty note. However, soon "Hen" returns to their home, happy and docile—but it's clear that this Hen, too, is a simulant, left behind to accompany Junior.
This switcheroo is suggested by the presence of a three-horned beetle, which A.I. Hen sees in one of the final scenes and is a motif that director Garth Davis utilizes throughout the film to clue in audiences that "Junior" isn't entirely who he thinks he is.
As the real Hen sits on a plane awaiting her adventure, we hear her in voiceover: "My whole life people have been telling me what I like, what I want, what I need. I had to become someone different, someone else. But now I know. There is only one of me."
Foe is now available to stream on Amazon Prime Video.
