‘Fifty Shades of Grey’ Offers a More Hopeful Alternate Ending for Fans

If you head on over to iTunes to purchase and download Fifty Shades of Grey, you’ll receive an extra gift: an alternate ending to the film, which originally ended somewhat abruptly on a down note. The new ending isn’t so much an alternate version as it is an additional one, which is a bit more hopeful and teases the reunion of Anastasia and Christian in the sequel.

First, a refresher: at the end of Fifty Shades of Grey, Anastasia breaks up with Christian after he flogs her (ugh, flogging ruins everything), storming out of his apartment while he chases after her. She enters the elevator and sternly tells him, “Stop.” As the doors close, the film ends, and people are like, “Really? That’s it?”

Well, not exactly. MTV has a breakdown of the additional ending which comes with the digital download of Fifty Shades of Grey. In this version, Ana goes home, gets in the fetal position and cries over Christian, while ol’ Mr. Grey has a hard time concentrating at work because he misses her so much. Ana manages to stop crying long enough to send Christian a toy model of the plane from that one romantic afternoon they shared, with a note that says, “This reminded me of a happy time.”

This version of the film leaves the door open between Ana and Christian, even though it’s incredibly sappy. In hindsight, I think the original theatrical ending is a bit ballsy, even if Ana’s ultimate reason for breaking up with Christian seems kind of ridiculous. There are a bunch of reasons not to date Christian Grey, and I don’t know that flogging ranks high on that list.

At any rate, we know they’ll be getting back together in 2017, when Fifty Shades Darker hits theaters. And if they break up at the end of that film, the third time’s always a charm when Fifty Shades Freed arrives in 2018.