Everything changed, but nothing changed at the end of the Totally Killer movie, and it was a bit confusing. But fear not because I am here to throw and kill that confusion like the Sweet Sixteen Killer did to all those girls in this movie.
So what could be more appropriate for the scary season than an 80s slasher comedy? Well, seeing that Totally Killer is exactly that, how about you combine it with Back to the Future? In this article, we will discuss the 80s time-traveling antics, do Totally Killer Ending Explained, talk about some sneaky killer hints, and, of course, I will also tell you about what I thought about this movie.
If you combined Back to the Future, Scream, Mean Girls, and a few other 80s classics, you would get Totally Killer, a bizarre 80s slasher starring Kiernan Shipka as Jamie. A tense Gen Z high school student who, unsurprisingly, doesn’t get along well with her mother. We all know we have seen this dynamic a lot of times.
Totally Killer Movie Explained
It’s Halloween night, so Jamie’s mother Pam is extra worried because 35 years ago, in 1987, all three of her best friends died at the hands of The Sweet Sixteen Killer, a notorious 80s killer with a mask that looks like Patrick Wilson mixed with Max Headroom and Johnny Bravo. Look, the jawline and all, and I just couldn’t get over this because it exactly looks like Patrick Wilson.
Additionally, that killer stabbed each victim 16 times, which is their unique mark. Despite the fact that the masked killer only attacked that one night in 1987, the killer has since gained fame in North Vernon, where people wear the same mask for Halloween.
The 1987 tragedy even inspired a true crime podcast because, well, why not? Just Hold on to this detail because “Unexpected Reveal” is coming at the end. Wait, did I just spoil the ending for the people who didn’t watch the movie? Well, what are you guys doing at Totally Killer Ending Explanation if you haven’t even watched the movie?
Anyway, at Taco Bell at 2 in the morning, the past inevitably comes back to haunt you, and on Halloween, Jamie’s mother is attacked by the Sweet Sixteen Killer once more.
She is incredibly prepared—to the point where she could as well have been Laurie Strode—but unfortunately, she becomes the fourth victim in the group of her three best friends. Jamie and the locals are upset by this news because the Sweet Sixteen Killer has gone for years, so why is he back now?
The Time Machine To The Rescue
Now, Jamie’s friend Amelia is making a time machine, as shown by scenes from a scientific fair display and an unrelated abandoned amusement park.
Yeah, this is solely a plot device, learning she developed this off Lauren, her mother’s plans, building it into an old photo booth machine. Jamie is, of course, still torn up about her mother’s killing, but soon becomes a target herself, as the Sweet Sixteen Killer chases her around this abandoned amusement park, with Jamie hiding in this same old photo booth machine. And you… you see where this is going.
The killer attempts to stab Jamie but instead stabs the control panel of this makeshift time machine, activating it and sending Jamie back to the decade of big hair and tubular tuneage 1987, the same year the Sweet Sixteen Killer first struck.
Here it’s straight up Back to the Future, with Jamie having to warn everyone of the impending doom. Of course, she thinks she is a lotta crazy, as she learns her teen mom, dad, and others are far from their adult personas back in the present day.
The Time Traveling Rules
Now, with this being a time travel movie, concepts, and rules need to be established. And sure, there is some timey-wimey made-up bullshit nature to all of this. But it’s soon realized that certain events from the past, like where victims were killed, begin to change the future because of Jamie’s involvement. Rightfully so, what do you think this is, Endgame?
So aside from poking fun at time travel movies being convoluted, here it’s explained that time is like a river. Jamie essentially ran upstream and jumped back in. Everything keeps flowing, so whatever she changes changes the future, for better or worse, as it’s still playing out.
Amelia, the police, and people are looking for her in the future but have an inkling she’s in the past, proven by old photos now showing Jamie was present.
Now, I did think it was clever to explain all of these future changes away as the “Mandela effect.” You know, instances of false collective memories, like the Bernstein bears vs the Bearenstin bears or thinking Sinbad was in a genie movie called Shazaam rather than Shaq’s critically acclaimed Kazaam genie movie. So, thumbs up for creativity.
Totally Killer Ending Explained
This all leads to a Halloween-themed amusement park end sequence, with a couple of Pam’s friends unfortunately still becoming victims, despite Jamie’s future foresight. The top of the suspect list is Damon. The reason is that his sister was teased; Pam and the others called her Fat Trish, and she had unfortunately died in a drunk driving accident a year prior, so the motive is there.
The group sets up a trap in the dollhouse of horrors, all waiting to jump the Sweet Sixteen Killer if/when they show up to claim their final victim, which, of course, happens.
Luckily, Kara pulls a literal grim reaper, stabbing the killer with her scythe, revealing it to be… Doug Summers? Believe me, it’s an out-of-left-field reveal, but they all realize he had been dating Fat Trish, and all of them were responsible for her drunk driving accident night by teasing her and feeding her shot after shot, like Lil John at the club.
Who Was The Second Sweet Sixteen Killer?
Girlfriend revenge was the motive, and the Sweet Sixteen Killer is finally gone… Psyche, a new Sweet Sixteen Killer, takes Marisa’s life and runs off. Jamie is running out of time, so she heads to the gravitron, where Lauren has set up a new and improved time machine, using the g-forces of the spinning gravitron to power it.
However, like a bad case of the herp, the killer pops back up, having one last go at Jamie. As the gravitron fires up, Pam jumps in, making it a tag team match in one of the most logical physics-broken fight scenes I’ve ever seen. How is he standing? Where are the g-forces? Does anyone give a shit anymore?
Pam is stabbed but luckily ejected out of the gravitron, ripping off the killer’s mask, revealing that the second killer is… Chris Dubasage?
Yep, he had killed Pam in the present day to get more content out of the Sweet Sixteen Killer for his true-crime podcast and then headed back in time to make sure the murders still happened so he could still have a podcast, which meant stopping Jamie from solving the murders and telling everyone what she had learned.
Also, part of Dubasage’s motives was that he felt like a second banana to his father, a Pulitzer prize-winning news broadcaster, while Chris was just a podcast host. Hey man, whatever gets those numbers up.
The scuffle between Jamie and Chris lasts about 3 seconds, as Jamie shoots him with a nail gun, sending him flying into the gravitron wall, and due to the sheer force, explodes into a pink mist cloud, cleverly teased by Doug earlier in the movie.
Everything Is Changed, But Nothing Is Changed
Jamie is transported back to 2022, very much happily ever after. Everything changed in her favor, like at the end of Back to the Future, as adult Lauren, who was basically Doc Brown, sits her down to tell her everything that changed due to her involvement with the past.
I guess the final reveal is that her parents got together well before they were supposed to, so she has an older brother named Jamie, and her name is now Collette. So yaaaaaaayyyyyyy!
Ohh, but it is interesting because all of this was supposed to play out this way anyway, because the polished crystal Pam gave to Jamie, she had said it was from a psychic, of which Jamie was that psychic, giving her the crystal in the past. So Jamie changed everything but didn’t really change everything, but like, she did, you know?
