Totally, 100% – I’ll come back and comment properly in a bit. But I’m currently posting an interview I did with Tony Dean Smith about Volition. You might get a few answers there as well… I’ll yell once the interview is up.

But after giving it a bit more thought, I’m not so sure anymore, because the ending as it is, not only demonstrates that the very idea of volition is still possible even under such rigid and unforgiving time travel conditions (remember In the Shadow of the Moon?), it also shows the filmmakers have volition of their own, by having total control over the outcome of their own script, rather than have the strict mechanics dictate the outcome. So hmmm, I think I like this movie more for the ‘cheap ending’, er, I meant ‘unconventional ending’.

And oh, Taylor, you mentioned a possible grandfather paradox plot hole that if James5 doesn’t jump to 6th and 7th, there’ll be no dying James7 telling the younger professor to adopt kid James, which means there’ll likely not be any James1 to begin with? I think there’s a way around this, because after the movie ends, off-screen James5, the one who creates an alternate timeline and gets the girl, can always jump back to do what the original James7 did, and that is to make sure young James gets adopted by Elliot.

Now if we think a bit further along this line, it is logical to think James might even attempt to jump waaaay back to save his mother from the car wreck. Yes? IMHO, I suspect he did or will do exactly that, even if it means risking The Butterfly Effect thereon. That’s because the movie explicitly shows that our hero’s precognition ability is derived from his future self being in the same time and space of his present/past self, and quantum entanglement or something further explains that present/past self is then able to experience what future self has already experienced. So for kid James to have a premonition of his mother dying in a wreck, his future self must have been around the time and place of the accident, right?

Also, the fact that the bad guys know about his precog ability should also infer that James must has jumped back in time numerous times throughout his life? Possible plot holes or am I missing something obvious here?

In any case, I absolutely love movies that continue to play on in the mind long after the credits roll… yes!