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The Ending Of Jolt Explained

Contains spoilers for "Jolt"

Kate Beckinsale is no stranger to kicking butt and taking names. She's best known for starring in the lead role in the "Underworld" series, but she's also proven she can handle herself in a slew of action scenes with "Van Helsing," "Contraband," and "Total Recall." Now, she's back with her most electrifying performance to date in Amazon's "Jolt."

If you thought you had anger problems, wait until you get a load of Beckinsale's Lindy. She's a troubled woman with a penchant for knocking the snot out of anyone who annoys her in even the most minuscule of ways. That's why she utilizes an experimental treatment where she shocks herself any time she feels the anger bubbling. She finally thinks she might be able to handle her anger issues without the jolts when she meets a lovely guy, Justin (Jai Courtney). Things go haywire quickly when Justin winds up dead, sending Lindy on a revenge mission around the city for payback.

It all culminates in a thrilling conclusion that hints at big things to come for Lindy and her crew. We have everything you need to know about the "Jolt" ending right here.

Alive and well

Justin seems like the perfect guy when he's first introduced. He's charming, but he enjoys a good dirty joke. It appears as though he was specially tailored to Lindy, and as it turns out, he was. When Lindy walks toward Gareth Fizel's (David Bradley) lair toward the film's climax, it seems like she's about to go head-to-head with the film's big bad in an epic battle to the death. But when she arrives, he's already dead. 

It seems anticlimactic, but that's when we get the big reveal that Justin is alive. Not only is he still kicking around, but he masterminded the entire operation. It turns out he works for the government, which wanted to kill Fizel but knew he was too powerful to take out via the CIA. That's where Lindy comes into play. 

The government couldn't kill Fizel, but some woman with a revenge streak became the perfect alibi. Justin led Lindy right where he wanted her to go, and she played her part perfectly. One could say the entire operation was all for the greater good, but all Lindy feels is betrayal. Justin may have the button to elicit electrical shocks to Lindy, but it doesn't do much good when Lindy overpowers her treatment, and as expected, kills her former lover. 

Hello, Susan Sarandon

Naturally, Lindy's angry after she finds out Justin got all the information on her from Dr. Ivan Munchin (Stanley Tucci), who developed the treatment in the first place. She visits him, and he's promptly arrested. Before that, he mentions how they can move onto the next stage, and it's not until the end of the film where we get a better idea of what that stage entails. 

In a scene reminiscent of Nick Fury telling Tony Stark about the "Avengers Initiative," a woman played by Susan Sarandon enters her charred apartment. Through clever editing, we realize that she's someone who has a past with Lindy and was there when she was just a child undergoing experiments for her abnormal condition. Now, it appears she wants to recruit Lindy as part of some covert mission where her abilities can be put to "good" use. 

She doesn't say who she works for and what kinds of missions Lindy would go on. But suffice to say, it would likely include killing scores of people. 

Some mid-credits fun

Susan Sarandon's cameo is the final scene in the movie. Given everything that transpires, you might assume that reveal is the end of everything. But you may want to stick around for a bit longer once the credits start to roll. 

The bonus scene doesn't have anything to do with the plot, but it's a nice payoff to what we saw earlier in the film. When Lindy's trying to get more information on her date's killer, she heads to a tech shop to get more data from Justin's phone. While she encounters a bunch of men on the main floor, they take her to the back containing their savviest programmer, who looks like a hacker straight out of a '90s movie

She's able to give Lindy the information she needs, and as payment, Lindy hands over the keys to her car, which just so happens to be a McLaren Spider. Naturally, she's stoked on the new ride in the mid-credits scene, and hopefully, she has the chance to drive it around for a bit before the police confiscate it for its role in a high-speed pursuit earlier in the film. 

Hell hath no fury ...

"Jolt" follows in a current trend of female-led action movies all about the kind of agency society allows women to have. From the beginning of the film, we see how much Lindy suffers due to her condition. Rather than help her or race to discover a cure, Dr. Munchin is only interested in testing the boundaries of how intense her powers can get. For this reason, he tells Justin about her, which results in all of the mayhem that transpires in the film. 

Rather than attempt to recruit her, Justin decides to manipulate her. He terrorizes her emotions and makes her believe the one person on the planet who understood her was taken away. Men control every aspect of her being, but she regains a tiny sliver of it by the end of the film. Susan Sarandon's character appears to offer her another route, but it's unclear how much control she'll have in her life moving forward.

Similar themes have come up with other action films within the last few years, like "Captain Marvel" and "Black Widow." All three stories have to deal with women forcing themselves to break free of the confines placed on them from the patriarchy. The trend likely started in response to the #MeToo movement, and hopefully, it brings about plenty of other projects with exceptional female characters. 

Sequel potential

It certainly seems like the creative team behind "Jolt" have hopes for "Jolt 2." Susan Sarandon's character coming at the end of the film hints at a whole world lying beneath the surface of what Lindy knows, and another adventure could very well be in store for her. It all comes down to whether Amazon wants to go around for another ride.

"Jolt" just came out, so it's still a bit early before a sequel announcement likely comes. Star Kate Beckinsale is certainly no stranger to leading franchises with her turn as Selene in the "Underworld" movies. "Jolt" isn't based on any pre-existing intellectual property, so it could be her version of "John Wick," launching her into a killer role she gets to play for years to come. 

If "Jolt 2" doesn't happen, fans can look forward to seeing Beckinsale next in "El Tonto," written and directed by Charlie Day. The comedy should make for a decidedly different pace than "Jolt."