Frank: Why are you wearing that stupid man suit?
Scared sleepless by the awful Frank-Bunny and having spent ages trying to figure out the timeline/jet-engine, I think I've finally arrived at a personally satisfactory understanding of the film. The jet-engine that crashes through Donnie's roof in both the Primary and Tangent Universes at the same point in collateral real-time is an Artifact thrown back in time through a wormhole or portal of sorts 28 days later in the Tangent Universe, where its presence is a jarring paradox (since it has no cause for being) that causes a rift in space-time resulting in the Tangent Universe to branch off from the Primary, of which the former occupies the bulk of the plot. So under the urging/orchestration of Frank-Bunny (the Manipulated Dead: having died in the Tangent Universe) and with the help of some other Manipulated Living (Roberta Sparrow/Grandma Death, Miss Pomeroy, Dr. Monitoff, etc.), Donnie is the Living Receiver who unfolds a chain of events that eventually lead up to his deliberate sending of the falling jet-engine through the time portal, thus giving the 28-day-old fallen jet-engine a reason for being, and preventing yet another paradox of two metaphysically identical fallen jet-engines in the Tangent Universe, which would destroy it (and send it back on yet another loop?).
Interestingly, information collected from a few web sources (yes, I actually did research!) pointed out that this Tangent Universe goes on a replay loop until this had been done, as suggested by and giving reason for the characters' studied behavior, especially Donnie's creepy smiles; as well as Frank-Bunny's existence, since he dies only in the Tangent Universe, but when he appears to Donnie in it, his death hasn't even taken place yet. Just moments ago, I was wondering what Donnie's eventual death had to do with his saving the world, and I figured it out. He didn't die to save the world, he died because he saved the world, since Frank-Bunny never died to appear as a vision to get him to leave the house before the jet-engine crashed directly on his room. I suppose the former would be accurate as well, since (after multiple Tangent-Universe loops and some retained impression of things and events) the Donnie Darko in replay #? finally did everything he did with the understanding that it would cost him his life. In the theater, he asks Frank-Bunny when 'this' all ends (doubly meaning the relooping as well as the nightmarish visions), and Frank-Bunny replies saying Donnie should know.
But I don't get why the time portal opens in the Tangent Universe, though I think both Tangent and Primary Universes do not interact at all, save the jet-engine; and they both have equal cause for independent existence (or more accurately the lack thereof for the opposite), which means that the film jumps from one to the other rather than their taking turns to occupy the singular plot. I THINK. And I also don't get why the Tangent Universe branched off prior to the appearance of the jet-engine. Oh wait, that could've been when it was passing through the time portal and flying through the air before it actually landed. Okay. It all makes sense now! Frank-Bunny isn't scary just because of his costume, but what his presence stands for: the space-time warp from hell. Bloody scary. The Donnie Darko filmmakers really bound their cult-classic brainchild well; it was microcosmically perfect, which makes a sequel not only unnecessary but impossibly difficult to successfully produce well, with the expectations it has to live up to. Which is probably why S. Darko sadly but not unexpectedly sucked ass, despite having some (inadequately redemptive of the overall product) interesting qualities of its own.
Oh yes, the fictional Roberta Sparrow's The Philosophy of Time Travel is fascinating.
Oh yes, the fictional Roberta Sparrow's The Philosophy of Time Travel is fascinating.
The dreams in which I'm dying are the best I've ever had.
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