I KNEW IT! I KNEW ROBERT DIDN’T MOVE FRED!

even if my mother said otherwise.

never read the novel, both of us, but both of us preferred the alternate ending.

the theatrical ending, to put it so “eloquently”, was dumb.

I saw the movie, without prior knowledge of the book, and the ending sucked. I didn’t like the religious overtone or the fact that Nevielle was a self sacrificing saint. It just didn’t seem to fit in. It was so clear to me that the vampire didn’t came to slaughter Nevielle, but to rescue the leaders big love from the monster.

But the alternate ending made the movie so good. To realise that the person you routed for, you tought was the good guy, was actually the monster. A big schocker and made me think. Someone ought to be slapped with a curled up newspaper for ruining a superb ending.

[…] Not to mention that this un-twisting of the ending seemed to be a last minute change. One likely done to dumb down the movie. An alternate ending that leaked out on the internet revealed that the movie was initially supposed to end on a similar note as the book – with Neville being the monster. […]

@ Luke – I know they showed the shorts on television (I think I saw one at a bar, since I don’t get cable, and don’t generally watch TV).
They had also had the shorts on the Apple Quicktime trailers site.
I found the pages, but it looks like the movies have been removed since then (try http://www.apple.com/trailers/wb/iamlegendisolation/)

Do a search for “I am Legend: Awakening” and “I am Legend: Isolation”.
They were all animated by DC comics Vertigo.

@Garrick – forgot to comment on this earlier – have you seen these shorts on youtubes anywhere? I’d love to see them, but I don’t feel like buying (or even renting) the DVD for just that reason.

I wonder why they didn’t put this stuff in the actual movie. Do they really think so lowly about their target audience that they stripped it down out of anything that could be even remotely confusing?

@jambarama – Actually, I believe the original Neville was not a scientist. I think he worked in some factory – I vaguely remember parts of the book mentioning him carpooling with his neighbor or something.

This sort of made him more human. He did try to figure out what was causing the disease but he was struggling when reading the biology books he got from the library. I remember being frustrated with the character at that point. I was like “DUDE! It is not that hard!”

But you’re right. It would make for a much better movie. This ending by no means redeems the movie. It is still very flawed and has very little in common with the novel.

This ending made the movie make much more sense. And it is also *closer* to the book I suppose. So I liked it better than the theatrical ending. However, had this been the ending in the theater, I’d have still been disappointed.

__SPOILER ALERT__

I loved the way Neville was in the book – a tanned blond bearded thor-god. Huge, muscular, and merciless in wiping out the vampires by day. Neville of this story was a scientist, like in the book (although probably of overblown importance in the movie) – but the vampires were much more fierce, and dangerous. This forced Neville to be a scaredy-pants who wet himself anytime the vampires were around. Rightfully so too. Book Neville was cautious, he knew they could kill him, but he was far more potent an opponent – which is why the twist was so much better. Book Neville was the “bad guy” coming in the day to murder loved ones, the way vampires are traditionally seen as the “bad guy” coming in the night to murder loved ones. There could be no such twist with movie Neville, who couldn’t have been all that scary to these uber-men.

I also missed the real human element in Neville some. Smith was very good, but I wanted him to have a vampire he knows, but doesn’t want to kill, like in the book. I wanted him to beg for the dog to come in to his garage, and be heart broken when the vampires get it & turn it. I wanted him to experiment with the vampires more than the disease. I wanted him to wilfully deceive himself when he meets another person, just to have some company. This wasn’t possible in the movie because the way they created the vampires.

Ah well, maybe in 30 years they’ll do a third remake.

Yup, and I was wrong. :) It’s all because of the silly theatrical ending.

THEY MOVED FRED

I was right dammnit

Never read the original story, but I thought the alternate ending was better.

I haven’t read the book, but the alternate ending was way better than schmaltzy hollywood ending I sat through at the theatre.