‘Love, Death & Robots’ Season 1 Episode 7: Beyond The Aquila Rift Ending Explained

Those visuals, that is all. For anyone bamboozled about the ending to the seventh episode of Love, Death and Robots allow us to help! We’ve been covering the remaining episodes too of Love, Death, and Robots, but here is the ending explained to Beyond The Aquila Rift.

The Crew of the Blue Goose is set to travel amongst the stars for a high-paying job. Awakening months later to find they are light years off course, the crew struggles to come to terms with their new surroundings.

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Ending Explained

After spending another night with ‘Greta,’ Thom begins to question what Suzy spoke of when she freaked out. Confronting Greta for the truth, she admits to Thom she lied, and he is, in fact, still asleep inside his tank. Everything he’s experienced has been a simulation. His ship flew beyond the Aquila Rift and is not thousands of light-years from Earth. Thom angrily asks to see the truth, the station that he is being kept in. Fake Greta exclaims he isn’t ready and that she’s been through this countless times with many ‘lost souls.’ Undeterred, Thom still seeks the truth. Regretfully, the fake Greta grants his request, stating, “I do care for you, I care for all the lost souls that end up here.”

The Hive

Thom awakes from his tank, but his appearance has drastically altered, appearing malnourished and close to death’s door. As Thom looks at his surroundings, he isn’t in any space station he’s seen before. Surrounded by a giant hive, there are a great many ships that have crashed into the hive with no chance of escape. It’s unclear if Suzy is dead, but she looks just as malnourished as Thom and may have recently died herself. Ray has been dead for a very long time, as his body is now skeletal.

Greta’s voice calls out to Thom as a female figure approaches. As the form enters the lights, a giant spider-like creature enters the light. Thom screams at the sight before him but once again ‘wakes’ up from his tank. A familiar scene unfolds as Thom is once again greeted by Greta and surprised at her appearance. As the camera pans out of the station, just as when you think Thom may have awoken for real, the scene flips, and Thom is still trapped inside the Hive, doomed to repeat his awakening until he inevitably dies.

Inevitable Death

Thom will eventually die, but until he accepts the simulated world that Fake Greta has kept him inside, then he will be doomed to repeat the process of awakening and discovering the hive. It’s unclear if Suzy is dead but it appears that Suzy had already had reawakened multiple times hence why she knew Greta wasn’t real. The Spider creatures don’t appear hostile as ‘Greta’ seems to be sincere in looking after those unfortunate to crash into the hive. However, there’s nothing to suggest that the Spider creatures don’t eat the remains of the dead spacemen. Inevitably, more travelers will crash, and the spiders will either eat them or ease their passing.

Arkangel

Ultimately, it must come down to the mistake of the Arkangel. The machine used to transport ships across the Galaxy appears alien in so it’s a huge risk sending ships through it. While not every ship may end up beyond the Aquila Rift, it appears a great many ships have crashed into the hive.

It took the Blue Goose hundreds of years to arrive despite it only being a ‘few months’ for the crew. Assuming the ships that entered before them only minutes before we’re going to the Aquila Rift, too, they may have been at the Space Hive for decades prior to Blue Gooses’ arrival. Therefore, countless ships would have traveled with Arkangel in those hundreds of years, and Blue Goose would have been seen as just another spacefaring vessel lost to the stars.

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