Christopher Nolan's Tenet Fan Theories - 4 Fan Theories Explained

Christopher Nolan's Tenet Fan Theories

Did the mind melting Tenet trailers leave you scratching your head? Don't worry. You aren't the only one.

“Well, I've seen too much.”

 “Well, we'll try and keep up.”

On this very hypothetical article, we take a look at some brain-busting fan theories that could help explain what Christopher Nolan's next action-packed epic is all about.

#1 IsTenet an Inception sequel?

This seems to be the most popular theory making the rounds. And that is easy to understand, as Tenet looks and feels very similar to Inception. Both films play with the space and/or time of the world, though Inception does so in dreams. Both blend the genres of espionage, science fiction, and action and follow well-dressed and highly-trained characters in dangerous professions on globe-trotting missions. And both feature Michael Caine.

 

Based on his appearance in the film, some fans believe that Michael Caine is reprising his role as Miles from Inception. This idea that both movies share characters is taken one step further with the wild speculation that Robert Pattinson and Clémence Poésy's characters in Tenet are the adult children of Cobb, played by Leonardo DiCaprio in Inception. One more piece of information to support this theory is that Tenet's release date has been pushed to July 31. And a theatrical release of Inception will come out 14 days prior on the 17th, with a sneak preview of never-before-seen Tenet footage, to potentially get fans ready for the secret sequel.  You can communicate with the future, time travel?  No. Inversion.

#2 What the heck is time inversion?

As we heard from the previous clip, in Tenet, there isn't time travel, but rather something called time inversion. And many have surmised that it is the ability, whether by individual or device, to cause people or objects to move forward or backward in time while the rest of the world around them stays the same. This is based on moments from the trailer like the car flip, the floating gear, and the bullet catch. “You're not shooting the bullet. You're catching it.” Whoa.

Some believe that Nolan will use time inversion to make the film and its ending more difficult to decipher.The word Tenet is a palindrome, meaning it's read the same backward as it is forward, a concept he might apply to moments in the film. In the trailer, there are certain actions, like the spinning of a pill, pull-ups, and the scaling of a wall, where we cannot tell if time is moving backward or forward. This means that several parts of the movie, including the ending, could be interpreted differently, just like the last scene of Inception.

“You mustn't be afraid to dream a little bigger, darling.”

#3 Are the good guys working for Tenet?

In the second trailer, a character says, There are people in the future that need us. They need Tenet. This reference to it as a group has led certain Nolan-philes to believe that Tenet is a top secret organization.

[VICTOR] “That test you passed? Not everybody does. Welcome to the afterlife.”

The test that Martin Donovan's character Victor is referring to is likely how John David Washington joined the clandestine organization. And his mention of the afterlife could mean Washington is legally dead, so he can operate in the shadows. But what does the secretive group actually do? Your duty transcends national interest.

Based on this comment, and the fact that Kenneth Branagh's villainous character can somehow communicate with the future, it is theorized that Tenet's job is to protect the future at all cost. And in this case, it's to stop a massive global conflict.  

“We're trying to prevent World War III.”

“You must see an Armageddon here.”

“No, something worse.”

#4 Does Tenet connect two worlds?

Certain fans believe that Tenet will feature not only time inversion, but the travel between different realities. The theory came about from the inclusion of a diagram of Maxwell's Demon in the background of the second trailer. The thought experiment was created by physicist James Clerk Maxwell to show that the second law of thermodynamics can theoretically be violated by creating an opening between two different chambers of gas by something called a Demon Door. Tenet could replace the two chambers with two separate realities that the characters travel between.

“That part is a little dramatic.”

It has also been speculated that the use of the colors red and blue, which represent the two different chambers of gas in the thought experiment, will be used to signify which of the two realities characters are from. For example, Elizabeth Debicki is seen in both red and blue outfits, meaning that there could be two of her in the film. And the machine is bathed in both red and blue light, which led some to theorize that this is the device that connects the two worlds, a.k.a. Maxwell's Demon Door. And speaking of, in the film, Debicki's son's name is Max.

“You have to start looking at the world in a new way.”