Ready Player One, Steven Spielberg's adaptation of Ernest Cline's bestselling novel, has finally
arrived in theaters.
From its dazzling opening sequence to its epic final battle, the film is absolutely
packed with decades upon decades of pop culture references.
But while some are just fun Easter eggs, others actually serve a plot function in the grand
finale.
We're here to sort it all out as we explain the ending of Ready Player One.
The ultimate video game showdown
For Ready Player One's finale, only the biggest pop culture-packed showdown would do.
So Parzival — also known by his real name of Wade Watts — takes action, putting out
an open call for help to the entire world, setting the stage for the ultimate battle
inside the virtual universe known as the OASIS.
Taking place on Planet Doom from the Voltron cartoons, the battle involves everyone from
the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles to Chucky himself, who goes on a murder spree perhaps
unmatched in his own franchise.
And after the evil Nolan Sorrento summons MechaGodzilla to assist him, he's taken down
by Daito, who pilots the iconic RX-78-2 Gundam from Mobile Suit Gundam after being dropped
off on the planet by Serenity from Firefly.
Perhaps the best part?
Just as the evil I-Rock is about to kill the good guys, Sho takes him out using the ultimate
'80s weapon — the glaive from Krull.
Nice.
A magic spell
The whole battle is staged in order to help Parzival and his friends get inside Castle
Anorak, which is covered by a magic spell summoned by the powerful Orb of Osuvox.
Luckily, the team has someone on the inside — Artemis, who is able to take down the
shield by uttering the magic incantation that summoned it.
Here's the kicker: the spell is actually a quote from from the 1981 fantasy film Excalibur
known as "The Charm of Making," a spell spoken by both Merlin and Morgana Le Fay.
Who knew, right?
"Have you forgotten the charm of making?"
(Klingon translation: "South Park's Imaginationland did it first.")
The value of an extra life
Even after the Orb is deactivated and the battle seemingly lost, Sorrento isn't ready
to quit.
Instead, he uses the Cataclyst, an artifact which unleashes a mega bomb that instantly
kills every avatar on the entire planet.
Every avatar except, as it turns out, Parzival's.
Why?
Well, earlier in the film, Parzival had won a bet with the robotic curator of the Halliday
Journals, an archive that documents all the pop culture obsessions of OASIS founder James
Halliday.
The reward for winning the bet was an old quarter — which, in classic video game terms,
could be used for an extra life to keep playing on an arcade game after you died.
Thanks to having this extra life, Parzival's avatar was resurrected, and he was able to
complete Halliday's final puzzle.
The original Easter egg
After all of that trouble to get there, Halliday's final challenge seems deceptively simple:
A vintage television, an Atari 2600 console, and playing the right game in the right way.
The game is the 1979 classic, Adventure.
And the trick, which Parzival immediately understands, is that you're not actually supposed
to win the game — you're just supposed to find the Easter Egg hidden inside it.
It's not just any Easter egg, though — it's literally the first video game Easter egg,
as the very term "Easter egg" was coined to describe the secret message in the game, which
reads "Created by Warren Robinett."
A movie about Easter eggs which has an Easter egg about the first Easter egg?
Now that's truly meta.
One last test
Even after he's won the final key, Parzival's challenge isn't over.
The last test comes when Anorak offers Parzival a contract, telling him all he has to do is
sign and the OASIS will be his.
Parzival refuses to sign, though, because he realizes it's a test — Halliday, played
by Mark Rylance, had forced his partner Ogden Morrow, played by Simon Pegg, to sign a similar
contract and regretted it for the rest of his life.
Fittingly, the test is an echo of a similar morality test that plays out at the end of
the classic film Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, from which the plot of Ready Player
One is borrowed.
"I said GOOD DAY!!"
The true Easter egg
When he completes the third challenge and passes Anorak's contract test, Parzival is
indeed granted control of the OASIS.
But the true prize, represented by a literal giant glowing egg, isn't money or fame — it's
Halliday's belief that connecting with real people in the real world is more important
than anything you might do in an imaginary online fantasy world.
Wade finally comes to agree, which is how and why he wins in the end.
The lesson is driven home when Parzival emerges from the real world to find Halliday's one
time partner and best friend, Og Morrow, waiting for him.
It turns out Morrow had secretly been monitoring the competition through his own OASIS avatar
— the curator of the Halliday Journals, who gave Parzival the extra life he needed
to win.
In a symbolic gesture, Wade honors what he's learned from Halliday by hiring Morrow back
as an OASIS consultant, finally repairing the rift that cost Halliday his best friend.
Taking the leap
As the new owner of the OASIS, Wade is suddenly the most powerful person in the world.
But he uses his powers for good, putting the lessons he's learned from Halliday into play.
He and his friends get Sorrento arrested for ordering the murder of Wade's aunt.
Then, he orders that the OASIS be shut down two days a week to force people back out into
the real world.
And finally, he does what Halliday couldn't and kisses the girl, winning Artemis as the
ultimate prize.
Because in the end, love is the ultimate Easter egg.
Or...something.
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