It’s been 14 years since Inception first hit theaters, and ever since, fans have been debating the film’s famously ambiguous ending.
But a fresh fan theory is now gaining traction, and it might just provide the definitive answer we’ve all been waiting for.
Released in 2010, Christopher Nolan’s mind-bending thriller starred Leonardo DiCaprio as Dom Cobb, a thief who specializes in infiltrating people’s dreams to extract secrets from their subconscious.
Alongside a star-studded cast including Sir Michael Caine, Elliot Page, Tom Hardy, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Cillian Murphy, and Marion Cotillard, the film kept audiences questioning what was real, and what wasn’t.
The ending sparked instant debate. In the final scene, Cobb returns home to his children and spins his totem, a small top that, if it spins endlessly, signals he’s still in a dream. The camera lingers on the top before cutting to black, leaving its fate (and Cobb’s) unresolved.
For over a decade, viewers have argued over what it meant. But a Reddit user, EndlessEdvoid, has revived the conversation with a compelling twist: the top, they say, was never Cobb’s real totem. Instead, they suggest Cobb’s true totem is his wedding ring.
“The debate over the ending can be ended by looking at Cobb’s wedding ring,” they wrote in a post on the MovieDetails subreddit. “In the real world, he doesn’t wear it. In dreams, he does. In the final scene, he’s not wearing it, meaning the ending is real.”
The theory quickly caught fire, with others expanding on the idea.
“Dom’s wedding ring is his real totem, whether he realizes it or not,” one user noted. “The spinning top was Mal’s, not his. A totem has to be unique to you and his ring only appears in the dream world, where Mal still exists.”
Another chimed in: “The top is just a misdirection. It doesn’t matter if it wobbles or falls, it was never his to begin with.”
Even DiCaprio himself seems as puzzled as fans. In a 2020 interview on Marc Maron’s WTF podcast, he admitted: “That’s like Inception for me. What happened? I have no idea.”
He explained that while he focused on his character, the intricate details of Nolan’s plot remained elusive, even to him.
As for director Christopher Nolan? He’s remained deliberately vague, stating only that what matters is what Cobb believes to be real.
Still, with the “ring theory” gaining momentum, fans may finally have a satisfying answer, or at least a new layer of the dream to ponder.