Who wants to play Bodies Bodies Bodies? Before you answer, this article is full of SPOILERS for the 2022 movie release.
Bodies Bodies Bodies is one of those rare movies that ends in a number of vocal reactions from audiences. From ‘Ohhhhh!” to nervous laughter in realization, it has the kind of twist that reminds us why we love the ride of experiencing a good movie. This critically-acclaimed A24 movie is part slasher, part murder mystery movie along with being a super funny comedy. Once you’ve experienced director Halina Reijn’s shocking, and incredibly fun movie, it’s time to delve deeper into WTF just happened.
The movie begins as a lighthearted party between old friends, but quickly goes sideways when the group engage in a game they’ve played many times before: Bodies Bodies Bodies. Let’s get to what exactly that game was, solve all the deaths from the movie and explain what the end means from the filmmaker’s standpoint.
(Image credit: A24)
What Is The Game Bodies Bodies Bodies?
Bodies Bodies Bodies is a real game, similar to Mafia or Werewolf, for a group of people to play. In the movie, the players each picked a piece of paper and the one with an X on their card plays the murderer. Then, the lights are turned off and the group disperses while the murderer secretly makes their move and tags one person to become their “victim.” The victim then lays on the ground and plays dead. When someone finds the “dead person” they yell “Body! Body!”
That’s when the lights go back on. As the “victim” must continue to remain silent for the duration of the game, the group of the living discuss who the murderer is and take it to a vote. The game continues until everyone is either dead or the murderer is caught. At the start of Bodies Bodies Bodies, the characters start to play this game, with Lee Pace’s Greg being the first victim and Myha’la Herrold’s Jordan secretly the “murderer” on paper. But then, someone actually dies.
(Image credit: A24)
Every Bodies Bodies Bodies Death Solved
David
David dies right outside the house and causes a panic throughout the rest of the house and a hunt for a murderer throughout the movie. However, once Sophie and Bee open his phone at the conclusion of the film, they see David filming a TikTok of himself trying to open a champagne bottle with a massive sword to the turn of Curtis Roach and Tyga’s “Bored in the House.” In his own frustration as the trick doesn’t work, he accidentally slits his own throat and dies. No one killed him. If you look back at David’s scenes early on, the character was high on cocaine and took a ton of shots of hard alcohol, most certainly affecting his judgment when using the sword carelessly.
Greg
The second character to die in Bodies Bodies Bodies is Greg, who is the new (and much older) boyfriend to Rachel Sennott’s Alice. Greg goes up to bed before David dies and the group jumps to conclusions that he was killed, and shortly after the girls start to assume Greg could secretly be some kind of psychotic killer. After the girls find a go bag with a knife and a map with the house circled in his room, they find Greg in the gym laying down using a light therapy mask. They wake Greg up and surround him with knives and such, leading Greg to become defensive as they start to blame him for murder. In the heat of the moment, Bee smacks Greg over the head with a weight twice and he dies by her hand.
Emma
The next death comes following an argument between Emma and Sophie. Sophie, who recently became sober, gets stressed decides to use drugs again and start drinking. As she gets back into her habit, Sophie starts to take things out on Emma. A few minutes later, Sophie apologizes to Emma and she starts to kiss her. Confused by the response, Sophie declares Emma always thinks someone is in love with her. Then Sophie gives her some kind of drug, which looks like a hallucinogen like MDMA, which she accepts, and Emma goes to the bathroom. A few minutes later, Emma is found dead at the bottom of the staircase. Emma tripped out and tripped down some stairs, hit her head and died.
Alice
Jordan finds a gun in the house, but hides it from the rest of the group that’s left. When Jordan and Sophie get into a cutthroat argument, Sophie points out how much Jordan despises Alice and pretends to be her friend, citing that she hate-listens to Alice’s podcast. When Alice starts to get on her nerves as these hard truths are becoming known, Jordan shoots Alice in the leg. After Jordan fires the gun, all the girls scramble to grab the gun from Jordan and it results in Alice getting shot again, and this time it is fatal.
Jordan
The final death occurs just following Alice’s death. Sophie continues to grab the gun from Jordan’s grasp who is even more freaked out after killing Alice. As Jordan points the gun and backs up with Sophie following her, they go up an imperial staircase. At the top of the flight Bee takes a more aggressive approach, fighting Jordan for the gun and ends up leading Jordan to fall off the top of the staircase into the lobby in front of it one floor down. She lets off a few shots in the gun while on the ground before appearing to die as well.
(Image credit: A24)
What Does The End Of Bodies Bodies Bodies Mean?
So Bodies Bodies Bodies was not about a murderer or a sick horror game after all. They did it to themselves as the night got more and more irrational for the group of childhood friends. When CinemaBlend’s own Sean O’Connell spoke to the movie’s director Halina Reijn for the ReelBlend podcast, the filmmaker had this to say about the ending:
I think when we came up with the idea for the ending, that absolutely excited me. To me, the ending is the key, for me personally, into the whole film. When we thought of the ending, that’s when I knew I could do this. That’s when I knew I could actually make it my own and not betray what I built my whole life to be, which is, you know, darkness. I wanted in the end to say something hedonistic almost about and nihilistic about life, because I feel we’re all gonna die. And that’s an absurd thing! We know we’re all gonna die, yet we sit here, we dress up, we go through the motions, you know, war is happening, people are dying, and it’s crazy. So I feel the ending was just a great idea.
The ending to Bodies Bodies Bodies is really the key to the whole film. The fact that the deaths cannot be blamed on one villain, but more so the actions of the group collectively leading each other to their death. Based on her explanation, the real killer was the darkness of humanity coming out all along. Oh… and TikTok.
