Warning: The following article contains spoilers for The Platform and The Platform 2.
Of every question left unanswered in The Platform, none is as baffling as what’s at the bottom of the Pit. Fortunately, The Platform 2 gives more pieces fans can try to fit into Galder Gaztelu-Urrutia’s unnerving puzzle.
At the end of the first movie, Goreng (Iván Massagué) finds himself at the bottom of the Pit. There, engulfed by darkness, he meets his deceased cellmate, Trimagasi (Zorion Eguileor). This fateful encounter is at the core of all the fan theories people have been discussing since the movie first came to Netflix in 2019. That’s because the nature of the Pit changes depending on what Trimagasi’s presence means.
Since Goreng arrives at the bottom of the Pit after being beaten to an inch of his life, he may be imagining Trimagasi. Visions of Trimagasi tormented Goreng since he killed his cellmate and ate his body in a desperate struggle for survival. So, it makes sense he manifests his guilt right before his death. However, the whole scene plays as if Trimagasi was there, as the dead man is aware of Goreng’s plan to use Mali (Ziyara-Llana) as a message of solidarity the Administration can’t ignore. This supernatural knowledge can mean Trimagasi has somehow returned from the grave.
So, which one is it? Is Trimagasi a ghost or a figment? The Platform 2 still doesn’t deliver all the answers. Still, we can now be sure the dead live at the bottom of the Pit.
The Platform 2 takes fans to the bottom of the Pit
For most of its runtime, The Platform 2 tricks the audience into thinking it’s a sequel, set after Goreng’s solidarity gesture causes a transformation in the Pit. However, the movie is a prequel. Yet, once again, we see a character reaching sublevel 333, finding a child, and sacrificing their own life to save them.
What’s more curious, though, is that Perempuán (Milena Smit) has a similar experience as Goreng at the bottom of the Pit. First, she also leaves a child on the platform to ascend toward the Administration. Plus, she’s greeted by the people who died during her stay at the Pit. Finally, she remains at the bottom of the Pit until many months pass, despite the head injuries that most certainly claimed her life. Perempuán even crosses paths with Goreng after he reaches the depths of the Pit. As it turns out, they were lovers before each one of them arrived in the Pit, both driven by the tragic death of Goreng’s son.
After The Platform 2, it’s clear the bottom of the Pit functions as an afterlife. Those who die during the bloody experiment put together by the Administration are doomed to wander the dark bowels of the prison. Sadly, we still can’t know if the Pit is also part of this afterlife or only its bottom. While many purgatory theories are bound to arrive, it’s worth noting that everyone ends up in the same place regardless of people’s choices in favor of solidarity or self-preservation. So, we’ll need a third movie to iron out some of the lore.
It’s also interesting to observe that the dead masses at the bottom of the pit are not simply ghosts. They are material, somehow. In different moments of the sequel, the dead bodies that fall into the emptiness of the structure’s central well end up being devoured by the people at the bottom. Furthermore, whenever the Administration resets the Pit’s configuration, assigning surviving inmates to new floors, they also tie up every dead body together and push the whole mass below. Finally, the dead maintain the scars of the injuries they suffered in the Pit.
It would be a stretch to say there are zombies at the bottom of the Pit. Yet, the people at the bottom are somehow the bodies discarded through the central well. For now, that’s as much as we can say with confidence. Let’s hope Netflix greenlights another sequel to unveil the whole truth. That shouldn’t be hard, given the sequel’s critical acclaim.