Bugonia's Screenwriter Details the Countless Surprising Turns of Emma Stone's Latest Sci-Fi Film

Bugonia screenwriter Will Tracy has a hazy memory of what happens in the original Korean movie. It's a little surprising, since he penned the script for the director’s new adaptation of the 2003 Korean dark sci-fi comedy. Instead of analyzing the original script for ideas, the screenwriter behind his previous work watched the film once, jotted down some thoughts, and began writing.

“I watched the original the one time,” Tracy explains. “I didn’t really remember the film all that well. My aim wasn't to feel as though I had to be faithfully adapting or remaking or honoring another filmmaker's work. The most respectful approach to both films was to have them each stand on their own.”

While the premise of a emotionally troubled man (Jesse Plemons in the new version) who kidnaps a business leader he’s convinced is an extraterrestrial hiding on Earth is pretty much the identical in both films, the variations are significant. Firstly, Tracy rewrote the executive character, played by a man in Jang Joon-hwan’s first version, as a female character. (Lanthimos chose his regular partner the actress in the part.) The endings differ slightly as well, in the way they address their shared core mystery: Is the character an alien in disguise or not?

The screenwriter believes that resolution is somewhat not the main focus.

“I wasn't really focused on the twist aspect,” he says. “I didn't want the movie to just be a toy that performs one surprise, and then after the reveal, it's like: OK, well, what else does this toy do?”

However, Tracy has a lot to say on the subject. Our discussion with the screenwriter covered Bugonia’s finale and its implications, along with the methods he and the director collaborated to bring those twists to life.

Warning: Complete details follow for the conclusion of the movie.

So is Emma Stone an alien or not an alien?

In brief: Absolutely.

Similar to in the original film, the conclusion of Bugonia discloses that the CEO, a big pharma CEO named Michelle Fuller, is actually a royal extraterrestrial in disguise. After tricking her kidnapper the unstable man (Plemons) into ending his own life using her teleportation technology, Fuller beams back up to her Andromedon spaceship.

The reality that this is unexpected is a testament to Stone’s acting skills. Throughout the two-hour movie, she maintains suspense through a layered performance that may require multiple viewings to comprehend entirely.

“She frequently discussed how it was the initial instance she had to give a performance where she felt she had to be conscious of people watching the movie a second time. What the repeat viewers are going to perceive,” Tracy says. "She was aware the upon a repeat viewing a person watches this movie, They are aware I am conscious of… you know?”

He trails off, before continuing, “Thus, her performance needed to reflect of that in her acting.”

Creating the Andromedons and their spaceship

Once the CEO finally does reveal her true nature, we get a quick look of her spaceship and fellow aliens before the film concludes. Their ship has a unique design, which Tracy reveals was intended to look like a sea creature while avoiding high-tech visuals.

“[Yorgos] was really interested in almost like a jellyfish-type design for the vessel, something quite organic,” Tracy comments.

The goal was for them to seem strangely kind of tribal or ancient.

The aliens' attire is just as interesting as their ship: rounded dress-like garments made from thick, woven cords. Once more, the aim was to defy sci-fi movie tradition.

“For the costumes, rather than being advanced, they [were meant to|aimed to] feel strangely somewhat tribal or basic, and yet also highly decorative and not primitive, because it's a very detailed and beautiful design on those strange knit costumes,” the writer says. He notes that the director “thought of it as being a very ancient civilization. He wasn't into the idea of any element being smooth and metallic, or some ultra-modern cosmic vision.”

The end of the Earth (or only humankind)

Maybe the most significant change between Bugonia and the original is that in the original Korean movie, the aliens react to their leader's kidnapping and abuse by blowing up planet Earth. This adaptation adopts a somewhat more nuanced approach, with its aliens choosing to eliminate all human life, while keeping the Earth and its other inhabitants unharmed.

“My intention to achieve in the screenplay was a depiction of the planet after humanity,” the writer says.

In the film's conclusion, we see a series of shots of life across the globe. All humans lie dead where they were located moments earlier, but the world continues. What we, as an audience, are meant to make of these events is open to discussion. Does the conclusion of Bugonia hopeful or bleak? Are people doomed or worth saving? Is the planet be improved without us?

Tracy does not wish to offer a definitive answer either way.

“Certain viewers see it as a very bleak conclusion, or a tragic finale, a despairing ending,” he says. “Other people view it as being a oddly hopeful or positive conclusion. I think there are various interpretations to understand it.”

Bugonia is in select cinemas now, with a wide release on Halloween.