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China Edits ‘Fight Club’ to End With Authorities Arresting Everyone

It’s not clear who made the call to end the movie with a win for the state.

If for some reason you haven’t got around to watching Fight Club over the past 23 years, then look away now. If you have, then prepare to be outraged. According to the Guardian, censors in China appear to have changed the original ending of the movie to make it seem as if the authorities successfully thwarted Project Mayhem. In the original ending, Edward Norton’s character The Narrator looks on as multiple buildings explode around him, suggesting his anti-corporate plot to bring down modern civilization has begun. However, on China’s new streaming service Tencent Video, that scene isn’t shown. Instead, a black screen with text on it appears, and tells viewers: “The police rapidly figured out the whole plan and arrested all criminals, successfully preventing the bomb from exploding.” It’s not clear if the government changed the ending or if a Hollywood studio altered it so it could clear Beijing’s censorship rules. Tencent Video didn’t respond to questions from the Guardian.