‘Tacoma’ Movie Ending Explained & Full Story: Do Leo And Alejandra Save The Serum?

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Tacoma has an original story at the heart of it, although it might remind you of the fascinating Upstream Color (2013) in one or two aspects. That wouldn’t have been the issue as long as director Magar had executed things right. Sadly, that’s not the case here. The major problem with this movie is its vagueness, which is quite unnecessary. And there’s not much artistic or cinematic brilliance to overshadow that and provide you an engaging experience. Instead, it is quite the slog, and you find it hard to get through the whole thing. Anyway, my job here is to lay down the story and its ending for you. 

Spoilers Ahead


What Happens In The Movie? 

Scientist Leo Verma injects a serum inside a very sick baby pig, who’s called Tacoma. He is filmed by his partner, Alejandra. Leo explains the purpose of the experiment on camera—nursing the pig back to health within the span of five days. The ultimate goal is finding a way to repair damaged human organs, which, in due time, is going to be a revolutionary breakthrough in the field of medical science. 

But how did it all start? We go back three months and find a frustrated Leo at the lab, which is inside his house. He’s struggling with the experiment and constantly arguing with a woman who keeps asking him to handle the whole thing like a man. It also becomes quite evident that the two of them are romantically involved as well. To get away from the woman for the time being, Leo goes to a nearby restaurant to work in peace. He happens to be a regular here. This is also the place where he meets Alejandra, who’s a newly hired waitress. But Alejandra is only doing this job to get by. In reality, she’s as brilliant as Leo, or maybe even better than him. Leo finds out about this after Alejandra casually solves one of the equations he was struggling with on a napkin. He immediately starts pursuing her to work with him, and after a while, she accepts. 

Leo brings Alejandra to his house and shows her the lab while the woman keeps kicking up a fuss about the new girl. By this point, it is not hard to realize that the woman is not real but a hallucination of Leo. She was his girlfriend, who died of some incurable disease. Leo actually started doing the experiment for her, but he couldn’t crack the code and save her in time. The hallucination is an obvious manifestation of both his grief and his guilt. However, the movie’s depiction of this here is quite amateurish and doesn’t have much emotional impact.


Does the serum work?

With Alejandra coming onto the scene, Leo has it much easier, and the serum is finally prepared. Given Tacoma does return to good health, it becomes quite evident that the serum works—although there’s no guarantee that it’ll react the same way with human bodies. In case you’re looking for an explanation regarding the science part of the movie, all you have to know is that what Leo was basically doing was making plant and animal cells interact with each other. But the problem was the two cells not understanding each other, and this is where Alejandra came up with the idea of a translator. Obviously that worked out, and Tacoma is the proof of that.


Do Leo and Alejandra manage to save the serum?

Tacoma could have been just about Leo struggling with personal tragedy while trying to achieve the scientific breakthrough. But obviously the director wanted to bring a dramatic angle to it, and that’s where the film falters the most. The reason behind that has to be the stagnant character of Gene, who’s the antagonist of this story. He’s a bedridden wealthy businessman who still manages his empire. While the movie never really makes it clear, it is a given that Gene’s empire is not entirely built on legal businesses. But Gene is obviously dying, and in order to prevent that from coming to pass, he’s in need of some kind of a miracle. You know from the very beginning the serum is the only thing that can save him. But since Gene is the bad guy, he doesn’t try to get it the right way. Well, in his defense, he’s not quite aware of it in the beginning. It’s his good-for-nothing grandson Philip, who’s trying to prove himself so that Gene hands him over the empire.

Philip is friends with this guy, John, who’s Alejandra’s ex. With her wheelchair-bound father as well as a whole family to feed, her situation is quite complicated. What’s even worse is they’re all illegal immigrants. That’s why Alejandra has to work for her ex, time to time. We are not told what kind of work that is, but John values his ex’s brilliant mind, so it can be assumed that these odd jobs are related to that only. Alejandra and her ex don’t have much bad blood between them either—a flashback sequence actually shows how she met him when he saved her from an assault. However, she also doesn’t want to remain much involved with John because of his ties with bad people like Gene.

It was always going to come to John trying to acquire the serum from Leo through Alejandra in the end. When she finally tells Leo about all this, he is obviously frustrated and angry. But upon realizing she has her hands tied, Leo decides to take them out. Well, he’s just one man against many, but that’s not a factor considering what he does—wearing a hazmat suit, creating a volatile environment, then splashing a liquid on the attackers that instantly burns and kills them. Alejandra is understandably shocked, as she never imagined she would kill someone one day, but there’s no other way either. John, meanwhile, develops a conscience and refuses to do Philip’s bidding. He has to pay for that by getting shot by one of Philip’s henchmen. But thanks to Leo outsmarting his minions, Philip (and Gene) are tamed for now. They’re still going to come after Leo and Alejandra, though, so they must go away. But before that, Alejandra convinces Leo to use the serum on her father to see if it works on humans or not. They do just that, and the movie ends with the scene of the paralyzed man standing up, all healthy and fine. If only that serum was a thing in the real world!


Rohitavra Majumdar
Rohitavra Majumdar
Rohitavra likes to talk about movies, music, photography, food, and football. He has a government job to get by, but all those other things are what keep him going.


 

 

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