• This edit began with a simple question: what if the story of Ex Machina was not about Caleb trying to understand Ava, but about Ava quietly studying humanity the entire time? The original film places us almost entirely inside Caleb’s perspective. This version shifts that gravity slightly. Caleb is still our way into the experiment, but the film slowly reveals that he may never have been the one truly observing.

• The first step in that shift was the opening. The original film begins by showing Caleb winning a competition and being selected. I removed that entire sequence and replaced it with a cold open from Ava’s perspective. Instead of starting with the human world and moving toward the machine, the story now begins with the machine already watching. The audience enters the experiment from the same place Ava does: observing.

• Several changes throughout the film reinforce that shift in perspective. One example is Caleb’s mirror inspection scene, where he studies his reflection and later cuts himself to prove he is not a machine. That moment introduces a different question entirely: whether Caleb himself might be artificial. While interesting, it pulls the narrative away from the film’s real subject. Removing that thread keeps the focus where it belongs, on Ava and the consequences of creating her.

• The Kyoko reveal was also adjusted with this idea in mind. In the original film, Caleb discovers the storage room filled with previous models before Ava ever does. In this version that discovery is removed. Caleb still realizes what Kyoko is, but the audience does not explore the earlier prototypes until Ava herself encounters them later. The shift is subtle, but it changes the moment from Caleb uncovering Nathan’s secret to Ava confronting the lineage that came before her.

• During the final confrontation, the film originally shows Kyoko holding the knife before Nathan walks into it, twice. I removed those earlier shots, so the blade is only revealed at the instant it strikes him. The moment now lands as a sudden realization rather than a setup the audience can anticipate.

• The largest change comes at the end of the film. After Ava leaves the facility, the original story simply ends with her entering the crowd. I extended the ending with a new epilogue that explores the idea that Ava may perceive the world very differently than humans do. This concept was inspired by comments from Alex Garland about an alternate ending idea where Ava experiences human speech as pulses and signals rather than language. The world becomes patterns, outlines, signals and movement rather than faces and expressions. It suggests that while Caleb believed he understood Ava’s mind, he may never have been seeing the same world she was.

• The title Glass Rooms grew naturally out of that idea. Nathan believed he had placed Ava inside a glass box where she could be observed. But once she enters the world, the implication is that the glass may extend far beyond that room. From Ava’s perspective, the entire human world may be just another system to read.

• Removing the Blue Book selection montage created a structural gap at the beginning of the film. To restore context without reintroducing the full sequence, I inserted a short line of unused helicopter dialogue from the trailer where Caleb mentions winning a competition. The exchange restores the missing setup in a few seconds while still allowing Nathan to remain a mystery until the audience meets him.

• Several small visual adjustments were made to delay information the original film revealed too early. One example was replacing the Kyoko corridor shot with a clean corridor plate. The original hard cut from Kyoko sitting alone to Ava lying down created an immediate visual rhyme that hinted too strongly at Kyoko’s nature. Removing her from that moment keeps the audience from jumping ahead of the story.

• The Kyoko discovery sequence was also simplified. Caleb still realizes what Kyoko is, but the extended storage-room exploration and mannequin reveal were removed. Instead of walking the audience through Nathan’s previous models step by step, the moment now relies on implication. This keeps the discovery quick and avoids repeating information later when Ava encounters the models herself.

• The knife reveal in the final confrontation was rebuilt through subtraction. In the original film the audience sees Kyoko holding the knife before Nathan backs into it. Those shots were replaced so the weapon is only revealed when Nathan is stabbed.

• The reconstruction sequence required a small technical workaround. The original shot of Kyoko sitting nude on the sofa was replaced with a modified insert so the reveal could still function without lingering on the full-body shot. The new shot slowly pushes in while she remains still, allowing the moment to feel eerie and deliberate rather than voyeuristic.

• Several other reaction shots were added to bridge scenes and reduce needless banter.

• The new ending epilogue required building new material outside the original film. The Ava POV imagery was designed around outlines, structural geometry, and signal-like motion rather than realistic human faces. The goal was to avoid a video-game HUD aesthetic and instead suggest that Ava interprets the world through patterns and data rather than emotional cues.

Everything in Its Right Place | Radiohead

Closing scenes with Ava and end credits