The Multiverse Problem: What Everything Everywhere Gets Right

Episode six, the last in this run. Everything Everywhere All at Once. And I want to argue that this film solves a problem that most multiverse films have, which is that the multiverse is usually a gimmick rather than a structure.

Here is the problem. In most films with parallel universes, the multiverse is a set of locations. The characters travel between them, and each one is a new setting with new costumes. It is essentially a travelogue with a sci-fi excuse. The mechanics do not tell you anything about the characters.

The Daniels do something different. In their film, jumping between universes requires doing something statistically improbable. That is the rule. And because the rule is absurdist, it means the film's most ridiculous gags are also plot-relevant.

The hot dog fingers are not just a joke. They are a universe, and accessing it requires Evelyn to do something bizarre with her hands. The googly eyes are not just a joke. They are a universe, and getting there requires a specific action. So the film's comedy and its mechanics are the same system.

And that matters because it means the escalation is controlled. The film is not throwing things at the screen randomly. It is throwing things at the screen in an order that follows from its own rules, and the audience can feel the difference even if they could not articulate it.

Now the second thing, which is what the film is actually about. Strip away the universes and this is a film about a mother and a daughter who cannot talk to each other. Evelyn is disappointed in Joy. Joy resents Evelyn's expectations. Neither of them can say what they actually want, and the film uses the multiverse to show Evelyn every version of her daughter and every version of herself.

And the bagel — Jobu Tupaki's everything bagel — is the film's central image. It is a nihilistic void created by someone who has experienced everything and concluded that nothing matters. And that is a real philosophical position, and the film takes it seriously rather than treating it as a villain's plan.

Which brings me to the answer. The film's response to nihilism is that kindness in the face of meaninglessness is a choice worth making. And I want to be honest: that is not philosophically sophisticated. A philosopher would not accept it. But the film is not making an intellectual argument. It is making an emotional one, and it presents that position through a character — Waymond — who has decided that being kind is a strategy rather than a weakness.

And that works because the film has earned it. Ke Huy Quan's performance is the reason. He is the moral centre of the film, and the fact that he is playing a man who has been overlooked his whole life and has responded by choosing gentleness is what makes the argument land. It is a position, not a platitude.

Now the craft, because this is worth mentioning. The film cost about fourteen million dollars and the visual effects were produced by a team of roughly five people. And that constraint is visible in the best way. The film's aesthetic embraces its own artifice. It does not try to be photorealistic. It tries to be inventive, and the inventiveness is what sells it.

Where it goes wrong: the second act. It is repetitive. The film returns to the same emotional beat several times before the climax, and some of the universe detours are more entertaining than meaningful. A tighter cut would have improved the whole thing, and I think the film's length is its main weakness.

But the ending works, and it works for a specific reason. The resolution is not cosmic. Evelyn does not save the multiverse. She talks to her daughter, and the talking is what matters. The film builds an enormous structure and then resolves it with a conversation, which is the correct choice and the one that makes the film memorable.

So that is the run. Six episodes, six films, and thank you for watching all of them. If you want the written versions, every one of these films has a full review on the site, and I have linked them below. Next run starts with the films of the 1990s, and I will see you then.