Spoiler Warning: The following article contains some major spoilers for the Bugonia ending. If you haven’t watched the new Emma Stone movie, please check it out with a Peacock subscription and then return.
Like a lot of people I know, I spent much of my holiday break working my way through the backlog of great 2025 movies I never got around to watching the first 51 weeks of the year. The 138th and final new cinematic adventure before the stroke of midnight was Bugonia, the latest (and perhaps best) collaboration between Emma Stone and director Yorgos Lanthimos. Though I knew critics called this quirky thriller a “mesmerizing riot,” I went into it blind, not knowing about any twists or turns that awaited.
I’m glad I knew next to nothing about the movie going in, as my ignorance made an already hilarious and painfully realistic scene early on into the movie into something deeper and far more terrifying by the time it was all said and done. Allow me to explain…
At First, I Saw Bugonia’s ‘The 5:30 Thing’ Scene As A Hilarious Critique Of Corporate America
Early on in Bugonia, shortly before Michelle Fuller (Emma Stone) is abducted and held captive by two conspiracy theorists (played by Jesse Plemons and Aidan Delbis) who are convinced she’s an alien, the Auxolith CEO has an awkward and hilarious conversation with her assistant regarding “The 5:30 Thing.”
At first, I thought this scene, which follows Michelle as she explains that employees can leave at 5:30 p.m. each day in a way that is both hard to follow and full of coded messages, was some critique of corporate America. With phrases like “let your conscience guide you,” “of course, it’s not compulsory,” this whole conversation sounds like it’s from some HR director at a massive corporation, making it all too realistic.
However, now that I’ve finished this outrageously weird movie, I look at this scene in a completely different way.
After Watching The Movie’s Big Twist, I Think It Offers Some Foreshadowing
I had a spoiler warning at the top of this, but seriously, don’t proceed unless you’ve watched it already. Okay, with that out of the way…
In the final moments of Bugonia, Michelle Fuller reveals that no, Teddy and Don weren’t crazy, and that she is actually an alien and the leader of the Andromedans. This leads to one of the most fascinating sequences of the movie, and perhaps all of 2025, before Michelle escapes and is transported back to her world, and decides the Earth experiment has failed, ultimately ending with her killing every human being.
After the movie ended, I found myself looking for clues hinting at the big twist. It didn’t take too long before I started thinking about the “5:30 Thing” all over again. Only this time, I was looking at it less as commentary on work/life balance in a corporate setting and more of a situation where Michelle’s mask began to slip. Her lack of humanity isn’t just a caricature of a corporate executive not knowing how the common man lives and works (that’s very much something), but also an alien failing to understand humans and their need for time off. If that is Yorgos Lanthimos’ plan all along, then more power to him!
No matter how you look at it, Bugonia is a bonkers dark comedy that is truly out of this world (in more ways than one). This Golden Globe-nominated film is one of the most bizarre cinematic experiences I’ve had in some time, and I can’t wait to watch it again.
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