Paramount Pictures

There are few things more beautiful than when a motion-picture show manages to authentically offend you . If you ’re a pic yellowish brown , it ’s probable that you ’re on the lookout for potential twists or bring out that could totally upend you ’re sympathy of what you ’re watching . Even the most experient motion picture watchers still get surprised sometimes , though , and that ’s peculiarly coarse ingreat science fiction movies .

Because sci - fi movies often have to build their own worlds that have wholly distinguishable rules , it ’s potential for us to watch something without fully understanding what we ’re seeing until the motion-picture show ’s final moments . That ’s where the scandalous closing comes in , and we ’ve take five of the very best for this list .

Amy Adams in Arrival.

Paramount Pictures

Warning : There are spoilers for each of the movies on this list .

5. Arrival (2016)

The honest twist of recent year number inArrival , which rivet on a linguist who has to decipher the language of an alien race that has bring down on Earth . The movie , which seems to be taking lieu linearly , instead uses its final minute to reveal that the daughter it seemed like Amy Adams was mourn at the beginning of the film had n’t actually been bear yet .

She larn that she will have a daughter and misplace her , and decides to have her anyway , understanding that the delight of knowing her will be deserving the infliction she ultimately feels when it ’s all over ( hopefully the daughter was also nerveless with it ) .

4. Soylent Green (1973)

distinguish the floor of a New York detective who is investigating a murder in the heart of a city that is easy starving , Soylent Green‘s final moments probably are n’t a surprise to anyone who has heard the famous line “ Soylent Green is people ! ” And really , that ’s basically what the whirl is here .

Soylent Green , a food that is ostensibly made from algae and is helping to stave off a thirst crisis , is in fact made from the great unwashed . We have all become cannibals , and we do n’t even know it . It ’s a creepy , shocking reveal that feels like a real warning about how bleak human beings ’s future might be .

3. Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1978)

The originalInvasion of the Body Snatchersis plenty temperature reduction , but it has nothing on the conclusion of the 1978 version . After a group of friends are slowly picked off by the eubstance snatchers , we see the pic ’s main character , Matthew , on his way to the health department .

We have n’t go steady him be replaced , but when one of his friend who has managed to escape capture name out to him , he give off the nightmarish screech that only the duplicates can make . It ’s a chilling , upsetting final moment that offers no Bob Hope , and in reality propose that thing are even worse than we suspected .

2. Planet of the Apes (1968)

One of the most famous twist termination of all time , Planet of the Apesis a great science fiction movie that also turns into a admonition about atomic annihilation . When Taylor find out that his ship did not crash on a alien planet , but is in fact still on Earth in the distant future , he bring in that the imitator emerge as the rife raceway following a nuclear apocalypse .

The Statue of Liberty , which juts out of the side of a rock , is a shivery reveal that confirms what many had already suspect . It ’s a bleak , terrifying finish made all the better by Charlton Heston ’s desperate screams .

1. The Empire Strikes Back (1980)

Perhaps the greatest reveal in motion-picture show story , The Empire Strikes Backcaps off one of the good Star Wars movies in the best potential way . Luke get wind that Vader , the evil entity that he has been fighting to destroy , is his father , leading to a crisis of identity that come hot on the dog of him being whole destroy in a fight .

Empireis a much darker movie than   the originalStar Wars , and it ’s all the better for its willingness to lean into that timbre . Its ending is not whole without optimism , but it does n’t put our heroes in a good piazza , and it depart Luke without one of his hand and with the realization that he has more household out there than he once recall .