REVIEW: It Ends [2026]

Rating: R | Runtime: 89 minutes
Release Date: August 21st, 2026 (USA)
Studio: Neon
Director(s): Alex Ullom
Writer(s): Alex Ullom

Do you no longer meet the day with glee?

I don’t think it’s just a throwaway gag when James (Phinehas Yoon) tosses a couple logs into the road and declares that they’ll know they’re in a loop if they see them again. Yes, it’s funny because of the earnestly serious way this character does everything while trying to solve the puzzle of their endless asphalt path through a forest of trees. But it’s also a means from which writer/director Alex Ullom can ensure we understand that’s not what’s happening.

The name says it all: It Ends. Maybe it means the nightmare James and his three best friends from high school (Mitchell Cole’s Tyler, Akira Jackson’s Day, and Noah Toth’s Fisher) are now enduring with no way off the ride. Maybe it means the road itself. Either way, however, it tells us that they won’t somehow run into another version of themselves. They won’t discover that the same day is being repeated. No. Whether it ends or you end it first, escape is possible.

What we must figure out ourselves is the definition of “escape.” Not in a mortal sense where suicide is concerned. Not through a desire for a rebirth to life with a different trajectory of choices either. I’m talking about the contrast between literal and figurative. Escaping patterns. Escaping expectations. Escaping malaise. Because when you start to consider what it means to be stuck on an infinite road to nowhere, stopping isn’t quitting. Continuing forward is.

Or is it?

We are not all the same. Whether by nature or nurture or both, no two people share the same wants, motivations, or purpose. No one is wrong to say they want to leave the car and walk into the woods. No one is wrong for deciding to stick it out no matter how long it takes or where it takes you. Ullom hasn’t concocted this film to tell us which answer is correct. He’s using it to remind us that both are valid. What makes you tired is exactly what excites me to keep going.

And he sets it all up perfectly with an inane question that itself holds no correct answer. Which two of fifty hawks, ten thousand rats, five gorillas, or 1 gunman with a rifle would you choose to defend you from the other two? James is fully invested in the experiment to the point where anyone who doesn’t agree with his choice is wrong. Fisher is desperate to prove he is by getting the others on board. Day enjoys the chaos. Tyler just wants the stupidity to stop.

The only thing this quartet would agree on is that the prospect of coming up with an answer is edifying. It gets them talking. It gets them thinking. It even inevitably gets the ball rolling for them to talk about pieces of their lives they wouldn’t have otherwise. Because this is a reunion of sorts since Tyler enlisted while the others went off to college. They’re catching up on lost time, busting each other’s chops, and pausing their routines.

So, why can’t the mystery road they find themselves on that has inexplicably closed its entrance and holds feral people in the woods who attack their car while screaming “Help me!” whenever it’s parked longer than ninety seconds provide the same? Sure, it’s scary at first. Sure, it’s confusing to wrap their heads around time standing still since their gas never depletes and they feel no hunger or fatigue. But it’s one helluva riddle to get those synapses firing.

Until it’s not.

Because everything eventually loses its luster. The thing that broke your routine eventually becomes a routine too. These friends’ desire to help each other through the anxiety and depression soon makes way for them to realize they must also help themselves through the reality of their own existential demands. That which was living soon becomes death. That which seemed like death soon becomes a fresh path towards life. Perspective is everything.

That goes for the characters on-screen (each actor embraces their role’s identity well to set themselves apart and stay true to who they are within the group and as individuals) and the crew off it. Ullom shot an initial version of the film in 2022 that he knew wasn’t working before continuing to edit and shoot pickups. He’d eventually find financing to dig even deeper before reshooting about seventy-five percent of what he already had en route to locking a final cut.

Which choice did he make to do so? Did he finally conjure perfection by driving thousands of miles without an off-ramp until reaching the end? Or did he get out of the car knowing there was as much potential for things to start getting worse as there was for him to make it better? You’ll have to ask Ullom. Just like you’ll have to ask yourself what you’d do on that road. Dig in with determination or veer away with the courage to try something new?

You might not know which at the start. None of these characters did. Each finds their breaking point (or moment of clarity depending on your read) as the days add up. Regardless of whether they are correct, however, none of them regret their choice. And that’s truly all you can ask. To keep going until you know in your heart what your next chapter must be. Maybe this is a nightmare you must escape. Maybe it’s the escape you didn’t know you needed.

I’d be remiss not to mention the unique position It Ends finds itself as far as its release is concerned. While Neon is putting it into theaters on August 21, 2026, the film was technically already independently distributed online via Letterboxd on December 10, 2025. Since Letterboxd billed it as an “undistributed title” (Neon bought the rights a week later, perhaps as a result of its rental stats), that forum acts like a festival sneak preview.

So, I’m going with 2026 as its “official” release year.

Phinehas Yoon, Akira Jackson, and Noah Toth in IT ENDS; courtesy of NEON.