There are three parts to any story. The beginning sets up the characters and puts them on the path to the journey that will unfold. The middle showcases the journey and the obstacles that the characters must overcome to complete the journey. The ending wraps up the journey in a way that will hopefully satisfy viewers and make them appreciate what they just experienced. Each part of the story plays an important role in how people connect with it, but the ending might be the most important.
A tarnished ending could have serious effects on how people view a movie. The ending is the last thing they see before stepping away. If the ending is underwhelming, the audience could walk away feeling that the entire movie was underwhelming because it ended on an underwhelming note. That is why twist endings can be so divisive. If a twist ending is a shock and makes the audience see the story in a whole new light, the movie could become a beloved classic. If it fails to live up to that standard, it can fall completely flat.
One twist ending trope that tends to fall flat is the trope of everything being a dream. It is a twist ending with a major problem that enters the picture simply because the twist ending exists at all. In almost every use of the “it was all a dream” twist ending, the bulk of the story that unfolded becomes negated. It never happened. The only reason that any of it played out is that the person was asleep. It didn’t change their life. It didn’t change their character. They dreamed it and that was all.
The “it was all a dream” trope has been a part of movies and television for generations. It’s not something new that recently started popping up in stories. It has been around nearly as long as film itself. One of the most famous instances of the trope came in 1939 through a little film called The Wizard of Oz. In that flick, Dorothy awoke after her adventure through the magical land of Oz and noticed she was back in Kansas. She told everyone about her dream and how they were all there. The many-years-later sequel would question whether it was a dream at all, but for the sake of that first film, Dorothy dreamt the entire story.
Television wasn’t going to take the backseat when it came to the “it was all a dream” trope, either. Dallas was one of the most popular shows of the late 1970s and 1980s. The ninth season saw the departure of one of the show’s stars, Patrick Duffy. His character was killed at the end of season 8. There had also been a major overhaul behind the scenes. Season 9 saw the ratings take a hit. Patrick Duffy also wanted to return to the show, even though his character was dead. Rather than continue down the path they were going, Dallas hit the reset button with the dream, negating the entire Bobby-less season. It didn’t really help the ratings. It was a bold move that didn’t pay off.
Now, with those two examples, you have an idea of what the “it was all a dream” trope is about. It brings characters back to their previous reality after a fantastical story, without having to follow through on any of the consequences the story provided. In the case of The Wizard of Oz, Dorothy didn’t have to worry about the characters she had met on her journey, or fret over the evil witches she murdered. In the case of Dallas, any of the story elements that the producers didn’t like from season 9 could be dropped with zero consequence. It was an easy way out that meant the characters would be safe to live on.
This same sort of thinking was used when it came to Hallmark’s television Christmas movie, Holly’s Holiday. Holly Maddux (Claire Coffee) was an advertising executive in New York City. She was one of the few people in her office not in a relationship, which was why she got tasked with a new ad campaign during the holidays. She was paired with Milo Aimes (Jeff Ward), a photographer at the agency who was interested in her. While their relationship was about to blossom, Holly fell in love with Bo (Ryan McPartlin), who just happened to be a perfect mannequin brought to life. Wacky antics and mannequin jokes came in rapid-fire succession.
The plot of Holly’s Holiday involved a woman dating a man who used to be a mannequin. She didn’t realize that throughout much of the film. She might not have realized that at all. All she knew was that she slipped on her way to work, bumped her head, and woke up to the sight of a perfect man. She fell in love instantly, and they began a relationship. However, Bo wanted to move too quickly. He wanted Holly to meet his parents less than a week into their relationship. He was already thinking about marriage, children, and their future together. Holly wasn’t into that and broke it off in the end. If you caught the bit where she slipped and bumped her head, that will come back in a few minutes.
Aside from the speedy relationship, Bo was constantly hinting at his life as a mannequin. He needed his surroundings to be picture perfect, like those of a window display at a fashion store. When he brought his parents over to Holly’s apartment, he and his dad moved the couch to make for a more aesthetically pleasing arrangement. Then he started organizing Holly’s books. Bo mentioned that he used to be a model, showing off surfboards, back-to-school, vitamins, and even slacks. His past relationship didn’t work out because his head “wasn’t screwed on right.” Everything he was saying about his past was some sort of joke dialogue about being a mannequin. Holly never caught on.
The people that Bo brought into Holly’s life were also former mannequins who constantly hinted at their former lives. Bo’s parents showed off their old modeling techniques, highlighting their poses from the different seasons they would model for. Each pose was stiff and the exact same, as they would be for a mannequin. Bo’s father had a constant, goofy smile on, as though designed by someone trying to convey an emotion through something non-living. Bo’s ex-girlfriend even got in on the action, leaving the display she had been in with Bo so that she could seek revenge on Holly. The girlfriend mentioned how she and Bo had stood by each other’s sides for many years. They were all constantly referencing being mannequins.
Back to Bo, though. The relationship between Bo and Holly was destroying the life that Holly built for herself. When she was given the new assignment for the holidays, she was excited to create the perfect ad campaign. Everything was going to be a romantic fantasy. Living through her own fantasy with Bo was teaching her that perfection wasn’t everything. As her work partner Milo had told her near the start of the film, imperfection was better. It was real. People connected more with imperfection than the fantasy.
Bo’s striving for perfection both visually and in his relationship with Holly wasn’t the only problem. He was also trying to drive perfection into other parts of Holly’s life. She and Milo set up their shoot for the new advertising project. Bo went ahead and cancelled it, setting up a new one. He got the right photographer, found the right setting, and ended up having the right models in himself and Holly. Everything was going perfect. But Bo’s ex-girlfriend got in the way and ruined it. Bo didn’t apologize for it. He ruined Holly’s work life and was refusing blame for it.
In the end, Holly’s relationship with Bo had destroyed her career and her relationships with other people. He seemed like the perfect man. Everything was going swimmingly until it wasn’t. Holly broke up with Bo and chased down Milo in the street to confess that she loved his imperfection and wanted to be with him. Then she tripped and hit the ground again. She woke up in the hospital.
That was where the trope came in. When Holly woke in the hospital bed, she discovered that everything after she hit her head on the way to work had been a dream. Her entire relationship with Bo had been a dream. The ruined career was a dream. Meeting Bo’s parents was a dream. Every single thing that had happened after Holly fell down had been a dream. None of it had happened. Her life was back to where it was at the beginning of the film, only with a minor concussion that had kept her unconscious for two days. It was all a dream.
Holly’s Holiday didn’t only use the Dallas style of “it was all a dream.” It wasn’t simply erasing things to reset the story back to a point before the events that unfolded. The trope was also used in the way The Wizard of Oz used it, which was to have the character learn an important lesson. In The Wizard of Oz, that lesson was that there was no place like home. Holly’s Holiday featured a lesson about there being perfection in imperfection. Holly learned that things were better when they were imperfect because they felt realer. She was able to use what she learned in her dream to better her life, her friends’ lives, and her career. The plot of the dream might not have mattered, but the lessons learned certainly did.
“It was all a dream” has become one of the most cliché story endings. People cite it all the time when they bring up endings that they dislike. They feel as though the story that played out was pointless to watch because everything got reset to earlier. That is a fair interpretation in some cases. But in the case of movies like The Wizard of Oz and Holly’s Holiday, the dream situation allowed for a fantastical story that could teach the main character the lessons that they needed to learn. The twist to the fantasy helped to change the reality. It wasn’t all that bad a twist.
When it comes to telling a story, the three important parts are the beginning, the middle, and the end. When one of them puts another in jeopardy, the whole story could fall apart. If the beginning doesn’t set up the characters and situations properly, audiences won’t care what the characters overcome in the middle and the end. If the middle doesn’t raise the stakes and provide compelling obstacles, audiences won’t believe the struggle and character arc from beginning to end. If the ending doesn’t resolve things, people might feel cheated out of a solid story. “It was all a dream” might feel like an ending that cheats viewers out of a story but, when used right, it can be just the twist to teach the main character an important lesson. That’s not all that bad, really.
Now for a few notes to finish this off:
- Roy Jenkins was in both Movie 43 (week 243) and Holly’s Holiday.
- Finally, Holly’s Holiday featured Bill J. Stevens from Spawn of the Slithis (week 257).
- Have you seen Holly’s Holiday? What did you think? What do you think of the “it was all a dream” trope? Let me know in the comments or on Twitter.
- If you go to my Twitter, you can also suggest movies that I should be checking out for Sunday “Bad” Movies. You can drop those suggestions in the comments, too. Tell me what to watch.
- Go check out Sunday “Bad” Movies on Instagram. I’ll be putting stuff up there again soon.
- And now I must discuss next week’s movie. With Christmas coming up this week, I’ll be switching to a New Year’s movie for next week’s post. That movie will be a 2002 flick called Taboo, which I don’t know a whole lot about other than it being set on New Year’s Eve. So, yeah, that’s the movie. I’ll see you next week for the post.
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