Warning: This article contains spoilers to Netflix’s Awake.
Despite the past year of global panic, the sheer amount of apocalyptic offerings hitting our screens is almost insurmountable.
Now, Netflix has brought another to our attention, but this time, it focuses less on viral plagues and more on something we’ve had plenty of in the last year—sleep.
Netflix’s Awake follows former soldier, Jill, and her two children, Noah and Matilda, as they navigate the world after a mysterious event sees humanity lose its ability to sleep, resulting in mass hysteria and paranoia. As scientists work to find a cure, the human race must try to avoid insomnia’s fatal capabilities.
And while the plot line alone is enough to have us scratching our heads in confusion, it’s the ending that has everyone talking.
Below, we break down the film’s twist ending—from what caused the mass insomnia, whether a cure was found and what really happened to Jill.
What Caused The Mass Insomnia?
For those who need a refresher, Awake starts off with a look into Jill’s life. Now a security guard at a hospital, she steals and sells drugs to earn extra money. Having lost custody of her two children, she picks up Noah and Matilda from her mother’s house for a scheduled visit, but while they’re in the car, the electronics fail, resulting in a devastating car crash.
The car rolls into a body of water, and while attempting to get her children out of the submerged car, Jill notices that Matilda is missing. When Jill and Noah reach the water’s surface, they notice Matilda being resuscitated on the shore by a police officer—but more on that later.
Informed that the electronics are out, the three head to the hospital where they discover coma patients. Heading back to Jill’s mother’s house, they soon discover that nobody is able to sleep, besides Matilda.
Now, here’s where things get interesting. Upon returning to the hospital, Jill runs into her former army boss, Murphy, who tells her that there’s mass insomnia, except for one woman who is able to sleep. Later, Jill tells Murphy’s son, Brian, that Matilda was asleep after the ‘event’ took place.
Toward the end of the film, Jill and her children make their way north to find ‘the hub’, where the one woman who can sleep resides. Once there, Jill begs the woman to become a guardian to Matilda, however, she reveals that the situation shouldn’t exist, because when the ‘event’ occurred, she should have been dead.
But as for what caused the mass insomnia in the first place? Murphy then finds Jill and tells her that he believes it is because of a solar flare that has affected humans’ glymphatic system, which in turn, causes the internal clock to disintegrate, leading to insomnia.
Do They Find A Cure To The Mass Insomnia?
By the end of the film, the sleeping woman passes away, leaving Jill to rescue Matilda. Noah, heavily impacted by the insomnia, is found tampering with electronics and ultimately electrocutes himself and dies.
Matilda attempts to use a defibrillator on Noah, however the charge shocks her instead and knocks her out. When Matilda wakes up, she discovers Jill mourning over the loss of Noah, only for him to start breathing once more.
But what does this all mean? Well, it becomes clear that the cure to the mass insomnia is to, well, die and be revived immediately.
What Happened To Jill At The End?
As for Jill, once Noah is awake, the three begin to make their way back to their truck when Matilda has an idea. Thinking back to the car crash at the beginning of the film, she realises that the reason she can sleep is because she technically died in the car accident. And as with Noah, he died before she was able to resuscitate him.
In order to ensure their mother survives the insomnia, they use their hypothesis on her. Taking Jill to the water, Noah and Matilda drown her and Noah immediately begins CPR while viewers look straight into Jill’s lifeless eyes and hear one final gasp. Which can only mean that the family found the cure, proved by Jill being successfully revived, meaning that she will now be able to sleep.
