I respect the ending of CTRL, even though I don’t like the movie very much. It seems right to me that a techno thriller about our always-online generation never quite manages to turn off. No lessons are really learned, except the one about the futility of fighting back against the system. When attention and companionship is all we crave, we’d rather live in the fantasy that provides it than the reality that doesn’t.
Nella isn’t the hero of this story, she’s just another victim. And that’s good! If nothing else, Vikramaditya Motwane resists the easy temptation of having her save the day. Despite her determination to investigate Joe’s suspicious death despite the resentment she had for him, and her willingness to risk her own success to challenge the power of Mantra, Nella ultimately recognises that the fight is futile and resigns herself to a life of make-believe.
Mantra’s Plan Isn’t Much Of A Stretch
The idea of a company trying to take over the world by manipulating people’s personal data isn’t farfetched – it’s already happening. And based on what we’re seeing all over, an unavoidable AI assistant is absolutely the preferred means of seducing people into surrendering everything about themselves.
An influencer makes an easy mark, which is why it’s perhaps the most novel development of CTRL that Joe was working in secret to blow the conspiracy open. The video he makes exposing Mantra is a smoking gun because it opens people’s eyes to how their personal data – including their likeness – can be used against them. We’ve resigned ourselves to mundane ideas attached to data privacy, convinced that more tailored advertising is the worst we have to worry about. Joe was clearly killed for pointing out the obvious, and it’s so obvious that people would believe it.
That’s the worst thing that can happen to a company like Mantra. It isn’t just the truth being exposed, since the truth is rarely believed. But people won’t tolerate being made to look stupid, having their most cavalier behaviour used against them. Joe had to go.
Project Unicorn
The funny thing is that an evil corporation would almost certainly call their worldwide mind control project something innocuous like “Project Unicorn”. And they would almost certainly get around a video like Joe’s by deep-faking it to instead incriminate Nella. It accomplishes two things – it discredits Joe, and it frames Nella.
The speed and level of detail of this framing is evidence of how damaging Project Unicorn would be. Every detail is addressed. Nella’s AI companion had been fitting her up from the start, sending Joe messages on her behalf, implicating her in the crime, and steering public sentiment such that, when she was inevitably accused, her defence would never be believed. The case is watertight.
This is the crux of CTRL’s terribly cynical ending. Nella, instead of resolving to fight this at all cost, realizes she’s beaten. The terms and conditions she didn’t bother to read prohibited her from seeking legal recourse against the company under any circumstances.
Nella’s New Beginning
If nothing else, Nella isn’t delusional. Or is she? Yes, she takes Mantra’s deal, well aware that she would have no means of contesting it in either a legal court or that of public opinion. Mantra controls both.
But she doesn’t resolve to live in a different way, to avoid the same pratfalls. Instead, she retreats into the comfort of the illusion Mantra provides. She lives in her parents’ house and works a menial job, free from the burdens of being an influencer but not, crucially, from technology, or Mantra’s manipulation. CTRL ends with her talking long into the night with her AI assistant, now modelled on Joe.
