M. Night Shyamalan's 5 Best And 5 Worst Reveals

Since the dawn of cinema, it's been proven time and time again that audiences love a good thriller. One that tells a spiraling tale full of mystery and secrets that ultimately leads to heavy revelations meant to shock and amaze. Filmmakers have long attempted the fine art of creating captivating plot twists on the big screen; sometimes they succeed, other times the reveal is utterly predictable — and on certain occasions, the big twist is simply a catastrophic failure. Ultimately, the judge is the audience, who flood theaters far and wide looking for a film meant to deliver the goods.

The art of the plot twist isn't an easy feat to pull off. While the reveal itself must be shocking, a healthy dose of anxiety and burgeoning pensiveness must prelude the eventual revelation in order to hook viewers to the very end. Arguably, creating an unpredictable narrative that synchronizes the beginning and the end masterfully is a difficult task.

M. Night Shyamalan is known for creating strange cinematic stories that have audiences begging to know what the catch is behind seemingly unnatural happenings afoot. A majority of the time, the film director has no problem hooking audiences with a mysterious premise. However, his big climactic plot twists are often hit or miss. When they hit, they're strong and mind-bending. Misses often have us swearing off Shyamalan movies entirely, until we are once again hooked with the next big trailer. 

With the obvious warning of serious spoilers ahead for every plot M. Night Shyamalan has ever tried to twist, let's take a look at some of the director's best and worst final acts in his cinematic career.

By the time "The Village" hit theaters, Shyamalan's predilection for supplying audiences with the ultimate shock was now a calling card forever associated with the director. As many would come to learn, however, not every plot diversion or narrative twist satisfies viewers, even if it has utilized its unpredictability. "The Village" told the story of a 19^th century village called Covington in rural Pennsylvania. The entire town is surrounded by stretches of woodlands.

The townsfolk don't tread into the woods, as they know mysterious creatures inhabit the area. There's a longstanding agreement between the village leaders and the spooky creatures in the forest; if the good folks of Covington don't enter the woods, the creatures won't come down into the village to terrorize the locals. One of the locals, Lucius Hunt (Joaquin Phoenix) desires to journey outside of the village to neighboring towns in an effort to procure medical supplies for the community. His request to do so is denied by the leaders and his own family who criticize the wicked neighboring towns and the potential for peril within the woods. At one point, Lucius enters the woods to see what the fuss is all about. The creatures head to the village and leave red warning markers on their doors for the breach in the agreement.

In a moment of desperation, Ivy Walker (Bryce Dallas Howard) traverses the woodlands to find medical supplies for Lucius after he had been stabbed by a local. What she finds is a paved road with automobiles and modern civilization unveiling the fact that the village leaders have created a secluded village and kept the locals inside through fear tactics. The mystery and suspense behind the legends and what it meant for Ivy as she plunged into the forest was captivating. The reveal, however, was anti-climactic and quite dull.

In perhaps one of the most disappointing revelations of the Shyamalan oeuvre, "The Happening" made bold promises that it simply couldn't deliver. The premise was bizarre, with trailers that were begging audiences to come see the hidden secret, one that seemingly caused mass groups of people across the country to inexplicably commit mass suicide.

Sweeping across regions of the United States, the phenomena resulting in humans ending their own lives in an apparent mental breakdown was perceived by many early on as a bio-terrorist event. The film followed Elliot (Mark Wahlberg) and Alma Moore (Zooey Deschanel), a married couple attempting to flee an invisible, self-destructive agent apparently carried by the wind. Early in the film, a farmer suggests that plants have created a defense mechanism materializing as an airborne toxin that ultimately causes humans to kill themselves unwillingly. In the end, the big reveal was that the farmer's theory was actually true.

Many audiences likely brushed off the absurd ramblings of the man — surely there must be something more intriguing at play. But when the truth was revealed, the film's perplexing narrative took an unintended comedic turn, presenting an element of camp akin to sci-fi horror films of the '60s and '70s. Although some have come around to appreciate the film for what it is, the release of "The Happening" drew the ire of fans and critics.

Shyamalan is known for producing films that are often overly serious and fairly melodramatic. However, the director changed gears with "The Visit," framed as a mysterious horror film of the famous found-footage subgenre. But what audiences were treated to instead was a bit of levity in the form of a comedy horror. The film may have one of the worst reveals in Shyamalan's catalogue, but it's still a fun watch for fans that enjoy a humorously disturbed horror film.

"The Visit" follows Becca (Olivia DeJonge) and her younger brother Tyler (Ed Oxenbould), two children of single mother Loretta (Kathryn Hahn). Their mother heads off on a cruise with her boyfriend while Becca and Tyler are sent to stay with their grandparents. The catch, however, is that Loretta hasn't spoken to her grandparents in several years and her children have never met them. After "Nana" (Deanna Dunagan) and "Pop Pop" (Peter McRobbie) pick up the kids from the train station, the kids document everything via their camcorder. In a rural farm house, the grandparents instruct the grandchildren to never go downstairs due to the mold and to be in bed at 9:30 every night.

Quickly, the kids begin witnessing strange, frightening behavior from the elderly couple including odd nightly activities post-curfew, vomiting, shaking, and screaming. Tyler finds feces and diapers in the shed, and a visitor seemingly disappears. Finally, after speaking with their mother and showing her images of the crazed older couple, she tells the kids that those people are not her parents. The bodies of their actual grandparents are in the basement, and the two posing as Nana and Pop Pop are escaped mental patients — an unfortunate reveal many saw coming a mile away,=, given the odd, suspicious conceit that the kids had never seen a picture of their grandparents.

"Lady in the Water" came at a time when audiences were primed for a strange premise from Shyamalan, expecting it to result in another fun, out-of-left-field revelation. But instead, this film doubled-down on "The Happening," further disappointing audiences with an absurd narrative that you didn't want to see twist so much as you just wanted it to stop.

The film followed apartment manager Cleveland Heep (Paul Giamatti), rescued by a mysterious girl from the swimming pool after injuring himself and falling in. The girl, named Story (Bryce Dallas Howard), is a narf, a fairy tale creature seeking to awaken a vessel who will better the world from his or her newfound enlightenment. A scrunt, a grass-covered red-eyed wolf, is hunting the narf. Cleveland must learn more about the fairy tale in order to help Story complete her objective and return home on the wings of a giant eagle.

Ultimately, the story is what it is on the surface, and there are none of the major plot revelations Shyamalan is famous for — the twist, it seems, is that there wasn't one. The reveals come instead as Cleveland and individual tenants in his apartment complex are shown to be chosen helpers with abilities to aid Story in her cause. The film was critically panned for taking wild leaps into fantasy that critics felt were unearned given the film's everyday setting of an apartment complex. Some critics took umbrage with the idea that Shyamalan cast himself as the foretold visionary (vessel) who'd inspire great things through his writing while boldly realizing on screen the misgivings and death of a contemptuous film critic in the apartment complex. Whatever Shyamalan's intent may have been, the film never quite landed with audiences.

"Glass" is the climactic ending to a trilogy of films that began with "Unbreakable." "Split" was a surprise semi-sequel to that film and "Glass" brings all of the characters together in a final act. This film, named after the mastermind Mr. Glass (Samuel L. Jackson) from "Unbreakable," follows a confrontation between The Horde (James McAvoy) and David (Bruce Willis). The two are eventually detained and held within the same psychiatric hospital as Elijah (a.k.a. Mr. Glass). Dr. Ellie Staple (Sarah Paulson) oversees the rehabilitation of all three individuals, who she insists falsely believe have superhuman abilities.

Mr. Glass, being the conniving mastermind that he is, makes a play at escaping with the help of The Beast and David through trickery and deceit. The end result is a clash in the parking lot of the hospital, which ultimately results in the deaths of all three individuals. Joseph (Spencer Treat Clark), David's son and Casey (Anya Taylor-Joy) witnessed the entire debacle and had always insisted that superhuman abilities do, in fact, exist. Staple then reveals herself to be part of a clandestine government agency attempting to squash superhumans and keep their reality a secret from the public. Joseph and Casey, however, use the security footage of the hospital parking lot to go public with the truth about superhumans, much to Staple's dismay. 

The reality that superhuman abilities exist in this universe was already well established with the critical hit films "Unbreakable" and "Split." An attempt to gaslight audiences into a potential psychiatric explanation was futile, and the admittance of superhuman existence in the final act of the film felt like a retread, telling audiences what they already knew. Unfortunately, this tale of Mr. Glass wasn't the critical darling that its two predecessors were.