Kids vs. Aliens (2022): Movie Ending, Explained

“Kids vs. Aliens” gives you exactly what you would expect from it. A huge, gigantic, colorful, and gory and a half-hour of Kids fighting absolutely vicious aliens. The movie adaptation of Jason Eisner’s segment “Slumber Party Alien Abduction” from V/H/S 2 (2013) is pretty much straightforward and very much “Stranger Things”-esque and fun enough to be your Halloween night movie.

It has almost everything which you would expect from this particular genre: nerds, jocks, bullies, a badass heroine “coming of age,” and, of course, creepy horror stuff sipping through a small, quaint town. What sets it apart is the climax, especially the ending. However, I don’t see those who have watched the VHS 2 segment finding it surprising.

Kids vs. Aliens (2022) Plot Summary & Movie Synopsis:

It is a usual night in the middle of the sea for three fishermen. One of them is very homesick because he has a kid. Suddenly, the emergence of strangely bright light ruffles their boat. Without understanding what is happening, two of them get taken by something from under the water. The last one doesn’t get much time either before succumbing to the same fate, and all we get to see is a glimpse of a creepy greenish hand with strangely long fingers.

Meet the kids, and Sam

Gary, Miles, and Jack are three hyper-nerdy kids, a hybrid between the geeks from “Freaks and Geeks” and the “Stranger Things” kids. Together they’re making an amateur movie featuring elements like dinosaurs and mystical powers. And of course, costumes which are actually very well thought-out.

There is another older member in the hang, Gary’s older sister Samantha aka Sam, who is the lead in her brother’s movie. While shooting their movie in an old warehouse, the group runs into three teenagers: Dallas, Trish, and their de-facto leader Billy.

Sam is instantly attracted to Billy, and she tries to dissociate herself from the group, which pisses off Gary. The teenagers are pretty much your stock-character bullies, although Billy appears to be nicer than the rest of them, especially the way he conducts himself with Sam.

Garry gets further mad when Sam refuses to shoot the rest of the movie. Sam also starts to dress differently in order to appear “more attractive” to Billy, I suppose. Despite Sam bailing on them, Garry goes on to shoot his movie with his two friends and accidentally injures himself.

This brings Sam and Garry’s parents into town. Yes, they are exactly the kind of ignorant, busy parents you see in movies like these. Naturally, they ground Sam for neglecting her brother, given Garry’s well-being is her responsibility. This shows how great these parents are who do the very wise thing to burden their teenage daughter with such a duty, right?

Party Planning

While the search for those three missing fishermen goes on, Trish, Dallas, and Billy contemplate what they are gonna do on Halloween. Billy promises the other two to do something and goes to see Sam at her home. He comes across the kids outside who are still shooting their movie, which is not at all coming well.

Proving himself to be worse than in season 1, Steve Harrington (another Stranger Things reference, but I can’t help it) by being his worst self in front of the kids, Billy goes inside and put on his “nice guy” charm in front of Sam. Impressed with the house, Billy sees the opportunity to throw a grand party there.

Sam hesitates a little bit but eventually welcomes the idea. It’s certainly, another move to impress Billy, aka her new (and most likely the first) boyfriend. Inside her room, Billy pretends to be amazed by all the cool things, especially the Halloween costume Sam is making and a poster of wrestler Valera, Sam’s inspiration.

Just when Sam and Billy get really close, and things are about to turn really intense (if you know what I mean), Garry, Miles, and Jack storm into the room with flickering lights and so much other equipment to ambush them as an act of revenge. Right at this moment, another bright light lights up (similar to the one the fishermen saw), and we see the shadow of some aliens right outside the window.

The kids are dumbstruck. But Billy comes to the conclusion that it is the kids who are behind this and throws them out of the room. With the coast clear now, Sam and Billy get back to what they were doing as if nothing happened.

Worst Halloween Party ever

Being treated that horribly by Billy, the kids plan to ruin the Halloween party and come up with a pretty great plan. Sam’s idea of a real small-scale party gets tossed to the bin when she sees things are totally out of control as there are way more people than she expected, and her house is getting trashed.

When she complains to Billy about it, Billy ignores and misbehaves with her, pretty much showing his true self. While Sam fails to contain the party, Garry drops the bomb by showing a video of an unhinged Billy trashing Sam’s room, making fun of her with Trish, and literally pissing all over the room.

However, Billy wearing the crown of terrible teen charger ever, retaliates and forcefully brings Garry, Miles, and Jack in front of everyone. While Dallas refuses to take part in his torturing kids in front of a bunch of hungover teenager acts, Billy decides to do Garry a real number while a helpless Sam watches.

But then comes the real deal.

Yes, the aliens. And these aliens are absolutely not messing around. So with their signature bright yellow light blooming, they just storm into the party and abduct Garry, Miles, Jack, Billy, Dallas, and Trish and take them to their underwater spaceship, which they have docked at the lake right beside the house. Sam manages to survive by locking herself inside her room.

Kids vs. Aliens (2022) Movie Ending, Explained:

How does Sam save Garry from the Aliens?

As if her Halloween evening couldn’t get more worse with Billy being the worst boyfriend ever, random aliens have now kidnapped her brother. Sam has had it enough. She follows the aliens right away, dives under the water, and gets inside the ship. Inside the ship, she finds a sword (a very convenient plot device, but I absolutely don’t mind it). Soon she reaches the place where the aliens are holding everyone and doing their thing.

First up is Trish. Despite all her screams and begging, the Aliens pretty much melt her by pouring some sort of molten lava terrifying-looking liquid on her. Next up is Dallas, but instead of doing the same, they do something different to Dallas and use a green puke-looking liquid and turn him into an alien-looking evil Edward Scissorhands. While all these are going around, Billy is still the stupidest asshole as he continues to put the kids in front in order to save himself.

When the Aliens take Garry to do whatever they were planning to, Sam launches a quick sneak attack with the sword and kills several of them. Freeing the kids and Billy, Sam takes everyone out of the water. But the Aliens are not gonna let go, so they do follow. Meanwhile, Jack can’t take the toll of all these and faints abruptly. Sam, Garry, and Miles vehemently try to bring him back, which happens right at the very moment the Aliens come out of the water with the Scissorhands Dallas.

Running for their lives, Sam and the kids try to enter the house but find out Billy is already inside and has locked it. Now a complete, shameless asshole, Billy mocks Sam and the kids and trolls them about the inevitable. But Dallas has other plans. Instead of attacking everyone else, he rages at Billy by breaking the glass door and entering the house.

Sam and the kids take refuge in the abandoned warehouse where they were shooting the movie. But somehow, Billy also manages to reach there, that too with the sword which he holds to Sam’s throat while grabbing her. But after everything that has happened, this is not going to have any effect on the kids. So they charge to Billy as Sam gets away, but Billy accidentally puts the sword inside Jack. Like a true gaslighting asshole, he even blames Sam for everything. But the more imminent threat is there, in the form of Dallas, who arrives and, this time, doesn’t fail to maim Billy’s face, which effectively kills him.

By now, they have managed to deduct that the aliens are using human skin to fuel their ship. Sam fights like a true champion against the other Aliens who try to take away Garry again. But the Kids still have something up their sleeves. And they have Jack to thank for that. It is the fireworks that Jack has saved for the movie.

Using the fireworks, the kids manage to distract the aliens and escape from the warehouse. But Jack dies soon after, leaving Sam his magic crystal to protect. With no time to grieve, Sam, Miles, and Gary runs to go far from the Aliens, but they find out a flock of Aliens surrounds them, and there is no way out.

But then something miraculous happens. A group of soldiers come out of nowhere and kill all the aliens instantly. What happens next is not something Sam, Garry, and Miles wished for, I’m sure. Right after finishing the Aliens off, the soldiers, led by an evil-looking suit-clad man, abduct the kids and take them all away.

What does the ending mean?

Well, we don’t know who or what those people in the end are, but they don’t seem like good people. But given things are not always what they seem like, here’s what I believe- these are government people running some sort of secret scientific research regarding the aliens, and given Sam, Garry, and Miles have seen the aliens, they want to make sure that the secret doesn’t spill. I’m making this assumption based on the kind of movie this is, but I would be happy if I’m proven wrong.

It is pretty obvious that the ending was purposefully done, keeping a sequel in mind, and I am very much game if that really happens. With Shudder backing and this movie actually turning out to be something that has delivered what it promised, I don’t see any reason for that not happening.

Kids vs. Aliens (2022): Movie Ending, Explained – How does Sam save Garry from the Aliens?