Spaceman Director Reveals the Film Originally Had a Very Different Ending

Spaceman director Johan Renck says that the ending of the movie wasn't always the same. ComicBook.com caught up with the filmmaker for the Netflix science fiction project. Renck told us that they swapped the original planned ending for something with a bit of a more hopeful tone. Spaceman filmed during the pandemic and Renck admits that the global outlook could have affected his feelings about the ending. People's hope is really remarkable at the end of the day, and that ray of light ended up factoring into the director's decision. Check it out up above!

"No, they did not always plan for that. And, it's funny how that kind of works because to some extent, anything you do is going to be very much subjected to where you are on your personal journey at that very moment," Renck mused. "We shot this film during the pandemic. At the sort of 'tail end of it' and so on and so forth. There was a certain sort of slightly dystopia view on us as humans in the world at that end. And at some point, the ending was not gonna be like it was in the book. But, it was less hopeful to be honest, but then I guess I'm getting old. I don't know what it is, but I really felt that we need to show the beauty of…"

"Like Hanus says in the end of the film. But, you know when Jakob says, 'I feel fear' and Hanus says 'But, you also feel hope, that is the wisdom of your kind.' I do think that is the wisdom of our kind. It is the sense of hope and the fact that we, no matter how bad things might look, we have this ability to look for grains of hope within that. And I do think that it became at least slightly a more impressionistic ending towards something that would really suggest that we don't know if they're going to get back together again. But, at least they're going to try.

Adam Sandler In Spaceman

Sandler has spent the last few laughs providing emotional drama performances alongside his trademark comedic output. In a conversation with Netflix's TUDUM, the director of Spaceman talked about shooting for a more dramatic version of Sandler with this movie. From the initial reactions, it sounds like he's absolutely got something there.

"I really wanted to have a performance from him that had nothing to do with the Adam Sandler we all know," Renck explained to TUDUM earlier this year. "I don't think people understand how [although] he may come across as funny and sweet and all that, he's very intelligent, really smart, profound.

"It's tremendously uncomfortable with all these harnesses and hanging in your own body weight," Renck continued when describing Sandler's performance. "I think it's painful in a way that's actually going to be intrusive to your performance — unless you're Adam, because he just pushed through that in an incredible way."

What Is Spaceman About?

Netflix has a fresh synopsis for their new movie: "Six months into a solitary research mission to the edge of the solar system, an astronaut, Jakub (Adam Sandler), realizes that the marriage he left behind might not be waiting for him when he returns to Earth. Desperate to fix things with his wife, Lenka (Carey Mulligan), he is helped by a mysterious creature from the beginning of time he finds hiding in the bowels of his ship. Hanuš (voiced by Paul Dano) works with Jakub to make sense of what went wrong before it is too late. Directed by Johan Renck and based on the novel Spaceman of Bohemia, the film also stars Kunal Nayyar, Lena Olin, and Isabella Rossellini."

Do you think happy endings are better? Let us know down in the comments!