JFF: The Really Real Ending to Clue

For all topics regarding speculative fiction of every stripe. Otherwise known as the Geek Cave.
Post Reply
User avatar
Winter
Captain
Posts: 2316
Joined: Wed Jun 07, 2017 6:01 pm

JFF: The Really Real Ending to Clue

Post by Winter »

I'm bored, let's talking about something fun.

The movie Clue was a film released in 1985 and is based on the board game of the same name and is both famous and infamous for it's multiple endings with the third ending be called, by the film itself, the true ending of the film. But is it? IMO the third ending has the most plot holes and raises the most questions and while it may fit some of the facts it ignores others to make it's ending work. So, I'm going to cover each death in the movie and at the time each one happened and go over who was the most likely suspect in each situation.

27 minutes 45 seconds, Mr. Boddy turns off the lights in the study in an attempt to kill Wadsworth. The Gun is fired at Mr. Boddy. The lights are turned on and Mr. Boddy is on the floor apparently dead but aside from the bullet graze on his ear his has no wound on him.

29 minutes 25 seconds, Yvette screams everyone from the study leaves to go check on her. During this time Mrs. Peacock is never seen during the whole scene.

34 minutes 40 seconds the cook is found dead. As Miss Scarlett, Colonel Mustard, Mrs. White, Mr. Green and Wadsworth try to figure out who killed the cook Pro. Plum, Mrs. Peacock and Yvette are all missing from the scene but at 35 minutes and 40 seconds both Pro. Plum and Mrs. Peacock are seen again. Yvette is unaccounted for during this whole scene.

38 minutes 37 seconds Mr. Boddy's corpse is found, he has new injuries and is bleeding from the head.

52 minutes and 45 seconds The Motorist is murdered.

54 minutes later The Motorist's corpse is found by Miss Scarlett and Colonel Mustard after they find a secret passage that leads to the lounge.

1 hour, 4 minutes and 17 seconds the power to the house is cut off which leads to the death of Yvette (strangled to death with the rope in billiard room) the cop (hit over the head with the lead pipe) and a singing telegram girl (shot with the revolver) at 1 hour 4 minutes and 57 seconds, 1h5m27s and 1h5m40s respectfully. Before the murders we see Green in the Attic, White and Wadsworth in the rooms on the second floor & Plum and Peacock in the cellar.

So, those are all the murders and we're not going to be covering the endings or Wadsworth explanation as the whole point is to figure out who killed whom based on what we see in the movie until the final murder. So, let's start with the first attempt on Mr. Boddy. This is the hardest as everyone moves around after the light are turned off so no one is in the same position and the angle at which Mr. Boddy is shot at doesn't match where Plum is later.

However, since Plum did check Mr. Boddy's pulse he very well might have realized that Mr. Boddy was alive and kept that fact to himself.

As stated above while Yvette is screaming Peacock is missing during the entire scene and is not seen again until after everyone is back in the study making her the most likely suspect for the Cook's death. It's possible she had stayed in the study and picked up the dagger to tried to find a way out, spotted the cook, recognized her and realized she was the one who informed on her to Mr. Boddy and killed her. Given how heavy the cook is it's most like that she had gone into the fridge to use the secret passage to escape Peacock but didn't make and Peacock took the secret passage thinking it would lead out the house only to learn it lead back to the study and just rejoined everyone before they returned to the study.

The cook is a bit more complected because Three people are unaccounted for when her body is found. Plum, Scarlet and Yvette. HOWEVER, Yvette is not seen at all during the whole scene and only is seen again when everyone returns to the study. So, while Plum and Peacock are still on the suspect list Yvette is the mostly suspect for Mr. Boddy's death.

And here's where things get REALLY complicated which is at the Motorists' death. Before his is killed we cut to the cop and don't cut back to any of the other characters until after the Motorist's death. As such everyone is a suspect but I think we can take a few of the characters off the list by looking at their location. Green, Yvette, White and Wadsworth are all up stairs while Plum and Peacock are in the Cellar so it's unlikely that they could have got down or upstairs without getting Mustard and Scarlet's attention so that makes both of them the most likely suspects for the Motorist's death.

However, how did either of them know about the secret passage? This btw is one of the issues I have with the "True" ending of the film as how Mustard knew of the passage is never told to use. Like I said it's likely that Peacock found out about the secret passage when she killed the cook who was likely trying to use it to escape but Mustard couldn't have learned about the other secret passage or where it lead without someone telling him. Same thing goes for Scarlet but it's possible that Yvette told one of them and with that in mind Scarlet seems to be the most likely suspect for the Motorist's death.

And finally the last three victims.

Before she is killed Yvette is heard speaking to someone and said someone Obviously has a woman's voice which lead to only three suspects but given how event talks to her it's obviously someone she knows AND given how they are talking to one another they are working together before she is murdered. There's no indication of who killed the cop or the Telegram girl but once again let's use environment to figure out. We see Wadsworth and White in the rooms on the second floor and while Yvette is heading down stairs White is screaming in fear and is seen in the exact same spot where a jack-in-the-box springs up and scares her causing her to scream again.

Wadsworth is a little harder to figure out because we see him run in the room he is in yet he fumbles around trying to find the door yet walks right into the shower because, again, he can't see where anything is.

It's unlikely that Green got from the attic all the way down to the main floor, where all the murders take place, in the dark without anyone noticing and we see him run into a closet in the attic RIGHT After the gun is fired off. Peacock and Plum are also off the suspect for these murders because both are in the attack when the lights are off and it's even darker in the cellar then anywhere else.

That just leaves Mustard and Scarlet again. Given that rooms Yvette and the cop are killed in are right next to each other it is possible for someone could have killed Yvette and went right over to where the cop was and killed him too. And the Telegram girl was killed soon after and it would have been easy to get from where the cop was to where the front door was even in the dark.

Also keep in mind that after the Telegram girl is murdered we see Mustard going under the table to hide in the dining room would have been hard to get to after the gun shot without anyone hearing anything.

So, with all that in mind the most likely suspects for all the murders are, Mrs. Peacock for the cook (in the kitchen with the dagger), Yvette for Mr. Boddy (hallway with the Candle Stick) and Mrs. Scarlet for the Motorist (lunge with the crowbar), Yvette (billiard room with the rope), The Cop (library with the lead pipe) and the Singing Telegram Girl (front yard with the gun).

Does any of this matter, no I'm just board and want to talk about a movie I like. :lol:
stryke
Captain
Posts: 655
Joined: Fri Feb 28, 2020 10:42 am

Re: JFF: The Really Real Ending to Clue

Post by stryke »

Love Clue. Legit amazing film.

Do agree that I don't think 3 is the true ending. Personally I've always favoured the first myself as it felt to me like it held together the best with Scarlet purely in it for the money and killing to off a loose end in Yvette and to maintain her blackmail scheming.
Last edited by stryke on Sat Mar 19, 2022 11:24 pm, edited 1 time in total.
User avatar
Frustration
Captain
Posts: 1607
Joined: Wed Sep 01, 2021 8:16 pm

Re: JFF: The Really Real Ending to Clue

Post by Frustration »

Are you figuring in the planned, but never released, fourth ending?
"Freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two equals four. If that is granted, all else follows." -- George Orwell, 1984
User avatar
hammerofglass
Captain
Posts: 2623
Joined: Sun Aug 29, 2021 3:17 pm
Location: Corning, NY

Re: JFF: The Really Real Ending to Clue

Post by hammerofglass »

True, that setup with the dogs never goes anywhere without the fourth one.
...for space is wide, and good friends are too few.
User avatar
Winter
Captain
Posts: 2316
Joined: Wed Jun 07, 2017 6:01 pm

Re: JFF: The Really Real Ending to Clue

Post by Winter »

Frustration wrote: Sat Mar 19, 2022 5:26 pm Are you figuring in the planned, but never released, fourth ending?
No, because this wasn't a case of factoring in the endings because, IMO, none of the endings really work in the end. First ending has an issue in how and when Scarlet told Yvette to kill the cook or how Yvette knew where the dagger was to use to stab the cook. The second ending raises a bunch of questions like how Peacock knew of the secret passages or how she turned off the power, went back down stairs to do her whole "Don't you touch me!" only to go back up stairs to kill three people then get back down stairs in the dark without anyone noticing. Ending 3, how did Mustard know about the secret passage, where was Yvette during Boddy's actually murder, why kill off your informants when you're in no real danger, why did J. Edgar Hoover call the house when the person most likely to answer it was Wadsworth and not Green and why did Boddy's bulter never reveal the truth when he was being threatened and why would Boddy give people weapons to kill him with?

The fourth ending makes the least sense because there's no way Wadsworth could have killed the first 3 victims without anyone noticing and his motivation makes no sense. In the other endings the motives makes some sense but the fourth one he wanted to become a perfect murderer because he wasn't a good husband?

But this wasn't to determine the real ending but rather to figure out what actually happened based on what we see.
User avatar
CharlesPhipps
Captain
Posts: 4953
Joined: Wed Oct 04, 2017 8:06 pm

Re: JFF: The Really Real Ending to Clue

Post by CharlesPhipps »

Well the endings work together when not apart because the audience realizes, "Oh, this is based on a board game so ANYONE could have done it."
Post Reply