How It Should Have Ended

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.

"Sometimes movies don't finish the way we'd like"

How It Should Have Ended is an Internet parody series depicting alternate endings for popular movies. It was started by Daniel Baxter and Tommy Watson, featuring Tina Alexander. The episodes are hand drawings given animation, and augmented with special effects and music. Each features an original "ending" that ranges from crazy awesome crossovers, to ridiculous and funny developments, to deconstructing it by simply shooting the villain or taking a third, sensible action. It also hosts featurettes such as "Surviving an Alien Invasion" and comics.

The site can be found here, and their YouTube channel is here.

Now has a Shout-Out page.

Spoofed films:
Spoofed video games:
Spoofed television shows:


Tropes used in How It Should Have Ended include:

Cap: But wait! Shh! Do you guys hear that?
(Beat)
Batman: Hear what?
Cap: Do I hear the Justice League calling?
(Beat)
Superman: I don't hear anything.
Batman: Yeah, me neither.
Cap: Exactly!
Superman: (laughs)
Batman: Whammo!
Superman: Captain America burn!

  • Adaptational Personality Adjustment: Frequently features this when parodying various movies:
    • The trolls are snarkier in the Frozen parody, saying that Elsa and Anna's parents have mixed-up ideas about how to help Elsa control her powers. They recommend sending her to Professor Xavier's school instead. We also see that Wolverine likes to sing.
    • Ares hates humanity in Wonder Woman, but he and Steve call a brief truce when Wonder Woman pulls her invisible plane out of nowhere and shoots down the German planes with chemical bombs. After a Jaw Drop, they both agree she is a "Mary Sue".
  • Adaptational Weakling: occurs frequently in How It Should Have Ended when the characters point out the logical flaws within established narratives:
    • Peter Parker in Captain America: Civil War webs up all of Cap's team before the airport fight can begin. During the actual fight in the movie, the rogue Avengers managed to hold off Iron Man's team long enough for Cap and Bucky to escape.
    • Spiderman: Into the Spiderverse showed two reenactments of the climax where realistically, Miles would not be able to hold off Kingpin. During the film he struggled but succeeded when showing Kingpin how his desire to reunite with his family would keep pushing them away. He dies in one because Kingpin smashes his ribcage multiple times. In the other reenactment, Miles's dad realizes that Spider-Man needs help and shoots Kingpin repeatedly. He's then shocked when Miles says, "Thanks, Dad!" without thinking.
    • Princess Diana aka the title character suffers this in the Wonder Woman 1984 reenactment. When facing Barbara, while on the ropes she manages to electrocute her former friend and knock her out of the fight. Cheetah is able to pounce on Diana because she points out she's got cat powers, and Diana in her armor looks like a bird. Remember what cats eat again?
  • Affectionate Parody: Sometimes. They also have a knack of making fun of films but making fans of the film laugh as well as haters.
  • Alas, Poor Villain: In-universe, the "I'm just a lonely Zombie" song from Resident Evil.
  • All Just a Dream: If only! Poor Indy.
  • All-Star Cast: Parodied in the Ocean's 40 trailer.
  • Alternate Character Interpretation:
    • One of Glinda the Good Witch becomes revealed in-universe after one of the Munchkins shoots the Wicked Witch of the West:

Well, this ruins my plan to send you [Dorothy] on a journey, and teach you a lesson, and eventually have you kill the Wicked Witch yourself!

    • One of Bowser becomes revealed in one of the other videos: He witnessed Mario slaughter his people, and so decided to call Princess Peach for negotiations. Unfortunately, Mario always interrupts, and nearly kills Bowser in the process.
    • Bella from Twilight when turned is not a Vegetarian Vampire like the Cullens and is pretty damn happy about it.

Bella: Lets go eat some PEOPLE! Woo!

Iron Man: You mean to tell me you've never revealed your secret identity before?
Batman: Uh, no.
Superman: Ha! Try every girl you've ever dated!
Batman: What?
Superman: "Oh, I'm Bruce Wayne, and I like you! Let me tell you my big secret!"
Batman: Oh, you're one to talk, Mr. Mind Eraser.

  • Canon Discontinuity: Lampshaded in-universe, after Batman has declared that he has the power to "make an incredibly awesome movie!":

Superman: So, we're just going to pretend like those guys never happened? [Points to a table where the Penguin from Batman Returns, Two-Face and the Riddler from Batman Forever and Mister Freeze from Batman and Robin are sitting] Is that what we're doing?
Batman: Yep.

Kratos: Ares? I already killed you.
Mars: Nope, I'm Mars, the Roman God of War... Tooootally different.
Kratos: NO!
Mars: Aww man.

"That wasn't a magic trick! I saw the pencil just went up into his eye, this is lame..."

GLaDOS: Would you like some delicious cake?

"Hey, you guys ever think we should use all this money and technology to actually solve the world's problems? End world hunger? Save the rainforest? No, just me? We'd rather kids fight to the death. Okay... Just thought I'd ask."

"Can you imagine what it would've been like if we had walked the entire way"
(Everybody starts laughing)
"It's funny because it's extremely far."

Kirk: Computer, I want you to shut down all the lens flare generators.
Spock: Fascinating, I was unaware that we had that.
Kirk: It's nice, right? I mean, who designs a starship where lights shine right in your eye from virtually every angle!

Tom Hanks, Bill Murray, Leonardo DiCaprio, Sean Connery... Neil Diamond, Optimus Prime, George Lucas, Chuck Norris... and Julia Roberts.

Dutch: You idiots! There are weapons on the choppaaa!

Magneto: Charles? Wh-what are you doing?
Xavier: I've been shot you selfish a-hole!

  • Smug Super: Superman is very fond of lording all his superpowers -- and the awesome things they enable him to do -- over Batman.
    • Iron Man in spades, his reply to Batman telling him he shouldn't have revealed his identity.

"Why not? Cause I did... and I'm awesome! So... in your face!"

Superman: But dude, you know what I would've done?
Batman: Oh, I don't know, probably just-
Superman and Batman simultaneously: Fly really fast, saving everyone from the bullets and explosions!
Superman: Exactly!
Batman: Yeah, well, I can't do those things. Because I'm not a super-bulletproof alien from another planet that can defy gravity. But you know what I can do?
Superman: What's that?
Batman: Make an incredibly awesome movie! ...You know why?
Superman: [Resigned] Because you're Bat-
Batman: Because I'm Batman!

    • Batman calls Superman out on his twitter feed consisting of him repeatedly posting;

Batman: "Just saved the day. Just saved the day. Just got back from saving the day. Here I go to save the day. Just saved the day twice. I'm saving the day. Just saved the day tagged with Wonder Woman. Just saved the day" *phone beeps* And you just posted something new, what does it say, ah, "Just saved the day".
Superman: Yeah I just rescued these people while you were reading that.

    • Superman counters that Batman isn't much better, as he keeps posting "I'm Batman!" on twitter.
  • Stolen MacGuffin Reveal: In the Sherlock Holmes 2 parody, Holmes and Moriarty try to one up each other in this regard with an air tank and life vest, respectively.
  • Stupid Sacrifice: Captain America's Heroic Sacrifice is parodied to be this in HISHE. Why couldn't Cap turn the plane around, circle for a while, find warmer water to crash land into, fly one of the bomb-planes as an escape, or try to find some other way to avoid crashing into freezing arctic water? The film proper never explains, and HISHE has a field day with it.
  • Tempting Fate: Kat refuses to put on her helmet in the Halo: Reach short, and Jorge talks abut "going down with the ship" while playing with a miniature Covenant Corvette toy. Carter goes on about how he'll "fly right into the heart of the enemy" and Emile is obsessed with sharp objects. Gee, I wonder what happens?
  • The Dog Was the Mastermind: The Stinger of Spider-Man 3.
  • Those Two Guys: Superman and Batman often meet in a diner and comment on such occurrences as Spider-Man's Character Derailment and HISHE's revival.
  • Toe-Tapping Melody: Their Frozen parody acknowledges that "Let It Go" is super-catchy; the HISHE version has trolls advise that Elsa's parents send her to Professor Xavier's school for mutants, so as to control her ice powers. The video ends with Wolverine walking in on present-day Elsa, Anna and the students singing "Let It Go", before joining in with an operatic belt and encouraging Iceman to recite the last line.
  • Vitriolic Best Buds: Superman and Batman.
  • Vocal Evolution: Darth Vader sounds very different in Star Trek compared to the videos about the Star Wars sequels.
  • Warm Bloodbags Are Everywhere: In Twilight.
  • What the Hell, Hero?: To Jake in Avatar.
    • And Harry Osborn to his butler after realizing the latter knew the truth about his father but never told him.

"I took a grenade to the face, dude!"

    • Also, Bishop and Newt to Ripley after she opens the airlock.
  • What Happened to the Mouse?: Jun doesn't even appear in the Halo: Reach short. But the Chief does.
  • Why Don't Ya Just Shoot Him/Her: Frequently subverted.
    • A Munchkin decides to use his gun against the Wicked Witch of the West in The Wizard of Oz.
    • Iron Man uses a tank missile against Obadiah Stane.
    • In Revenge Of The Fallen, they just use the Rail Gun to kill the Fallen.
    • In The Dark Knight, this becomes "Why Don't You Just Run Him Over":

Superman: Woah, hold on a second -- you hit him?
Batman: Yep.
Superman: You hit the Joker.
Batman: Uh-huh.
Superman: You ran over a human being.
Batman: Sure did.
Superman: But... what about your rule?!
Batman: [Smugly] Didn't kill 'im.
[Cut to the Joker, lying in a hospital bed covered in casts, moaning in pain]
The Joker: You wanna know how I got these scars?
Nurse: From Batman?
The Joker: From Batman.

    • In Harry Potter, Snape shoots Voldemort, then uses the Time Turner and Invisibility Cloak to kill young Tom Riddle as well.
  • Within Parameters: Parodied in Spider-man 3:

Scientist 1: There's a change in the silicon mass.
Scientist 2: Yeah, it's probably just a bird.
Scientist 3: Here's a bright idea: why don't you make sure it's just a bird before you mutate the crap out of something just because you were too lazy to safely run this nighttime sand mutation experiment?
Scientist 2: Fine. (stops experiment) ...That is a big bird down there. Kinda looks like a guy. Oh, wait, it is a guy down there!

  • Worth It: In Game of Thrones Sansa's head-on-a-spike invokes this after pushing Joffrey of the rampart to his death.
  • Writers Cannot Do Math: When Snape goes back in time with the Time-Turner to kill Voldemort, he turns it over about 262,000 times, which, at an hour per turn, should put him back about thirty years - nowhere near enough to get Tom at the orphanage.
    • Ignoring the amount of time Snape uses to turn the Time turner in the first place.
  • Wrong Genre Savvy: Venom in Spiderman 3.
  1. ↑ Also on this list were Anubis, Diablo, L. Ron Hubbard, Okami, Raiden, Gozer, Cthulhu, and the Flying Spaghetti Monster
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