No, no nothing to see here...
Just bad man. But he no win! CHINA WIN!
Fight Club may have come out over 20 years ago – and sure, it has become a cult classic – but Chinese authorities noticed some not-so-pro-government imagery that could possibly corrupt the minds of the Chinese people.
Spoiler alert! (But seriously why haven't you seen Fight Club yet??)
At the end of Fight Club, Edward Norton's character, The Narrator, kills off his imaginary alter ago Tyler Durden, who is played by Brad Pitt, and then watches on as multiple buildings explode in the climatic final scene.
The film's message? Anarchy. A plan to bring down modern civilization is under way.
In China, that type of insinuation can lead to thoughts and hopes of freedom...
They can't have that!
So, China did what China does best: censor and erase history.
The new and "improved" version still shows The Narrator killing off his alter ego, but the explosions are replaced with a new ending.
The screen fades to black and the words "The police rapidly figured out the whole plan and arrested all criminals, successfully preventing the bomb from exploding."
It adds that Tyler – a figment of the narrator's imagination – was sent to a "lunatic asylum" for "psychological treatment" and was later discharged.
"The new Chinese version of Fight Club puts power back into the hands of the police and implies an ideal closure in line with the Chinese state discourse in which the symbiotic relationship between the police and the state is a given," said Dr How Wee Ng, who teaches Chinese film and media at the University of Westminster.
The new ending does exactly that, it puts the power back into the hands of the authorities – exactly what China wishes to maintain.
The new version can be streamed through Tencent Video. When fans in China noticed the change over the weekend they were not happy!
"This is too outrageous," one commented on Tencent Video. "Fight Club on Tencent Video tells us that they don't just delete scenes, but add to the plot too," one user complained on China's social media platform, Weibo. "I'd rather see Tencent pull this film. What you are propagating here is not ‘positive energy'. What are you trying to achieve by changing the ending?" remarked another disappointed viewer on Douban.
