Divergent. Insurgent. Allegiant. Detergent.
Psych. Lionsgate did, however, reveal today that the final film in its blockbuster dystopian Divergent series -- previously slapped with the imaginative monicker The Divergent Series: Allegiant — Part 2 -- has a new name that's slightly less of a mouthful: Ascendant.
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The film is still based on the second half of Allegiant, the final book in Veronica Roth's bestselling Divergent series. That said, its new name could indicate further divergences (get it??) between the novels and the film series.
Roth indicated as much in an ambivalent Tumblr post published shortly after MTV News announced the title change:
What does this mean? Well, basically, it means there are going to be some changes, but it’s really too early to know exactly what those changes will be or the extent of them. I know changes always make fans of the books– and the author!– nervous, but hopefully the characters we know (and love. Or sometimes love to hate?) will still be intact, which is really the important thing. I am eager to see how these movies turn out, along with you guys.
Interesting! Though Roth points out that it's still too soon to say what form those changes might take -- Ascendant doesn't hit theaters until March 24, 2017 -- if you've read her series, it's tough to keep from wondering whether the films might decide to throw out Allegiant's original, bleak ending for something a little more, well, Ascendant. The trilogy's closer (spoiler alert!) ends with main character Tris dying a noble death, without coming back to life, a la Harry Potter.
"The end is never what you expect." #Ascendant pic.twitter.com/koH0Ot1HZp— Divergent Life (@DivergentLife) September 10, 2015
Though bold and gutsy, the ending was an authorial decision that didn't sit well with many fans. Readers were so incensed that Roth felt compelled to write a lengthy defense of her ending shortly after the book's release: "I thought about reaching out with my authorial hand and snatching her from that awful situation. I thought about it and I agonized over it. But to me, that felt dishonest and emotionally manipulative. This was the end she had chosen, and I felt she had earned an ending that was as powerful as she was," she wrote.