Extraction Ending Explained: Does [SPOILERS] Survive?

With everyone still at home under lockdown and looking for something to watch, Netflix’s Extraction has been generating a lot of buzz ever since arriving on the streaming service on Friday, with fans really digging Chris Hemsworth’s old-school action movie. And if you’ve seen it, you’ll know why.

Extraction is roughly two hours of wall-to-wall set pieces that takes viewers on a wild ride and offers up some expertly choreographed action and tons of thrills. Sure, the plot is as generic as they come and pretty bland on the whole, but what it lacks in story the film more than makes up for in its stunts, explosions and hand to hand combat. Simply put, it’s an action lover’s dream come true.

It seems there may be more to come as well, as Extraction ends on a very ambiguous note. During the big third act set piece, Hemsworth’s Tyler Rake is shot in the neck by Farhad (Suraj Rikame), one of the main villain’s henchmen. It looks like a fatal hit, too, as blood starts spurting out everywhere and our hero falls off the bridge he’s on and into the river below, seemingly ending his story for good.

But we then cut to several months later, and we see the young boy who Tyler had been protecting, Ovi (Rudhraksh Jaiswal), resuming life as normal. And right before the movie finishes up, he goes for a swim, holding his breath underwater in a pool. When he surfaces, though, he sees someone watching him from the edge. Who this person is, we can’t say for sure, as the figure is blurred, but it certainly looks like Tyler.

Of course, the question here is: is this really Tyler, or is Ovi just imagining him? It certainly seemed like Hemsworth’s character died on that bridge, but then why leave things so ambiguous and open-ended? And let’s not forget the various hints spread throughout the film which seem to imply that maybe Tyler survived after all.

For one, we know he can hold his breath for a while underwater and we also never see what happens to him once he falls in. For all we know, he could’ve swam to safety or been picked up by someone and nursed back to health. Not to mention there was also that cryptic quote Ovi told Tyler earlier in the film, saying: “You drown not by falling into a river, but by staying submerged in it.”

While that seems to reference Tyler’s guilt over his dead son, it could also be a hint at him having survived his fall. Of course, you’d still need to explain the blood loss he suffered, but given that we’ve heard that Netflix does indeed have sequel plans for Extraction, we’re sure they’ll find a way to make it work.