‘Oppenheimer’ Ending Explained: What Did Oppenheimer Say to Albert Einstein?

Four months after Oppenheimer opened in theaters, it’s now finally available to buy on video-on-demand today. You can get it on platforms like Amazon Prime, Google Play, Apple TV, Vudu, and more, for $19.99.

Christopher Nolan’s biopic—which chronicles the life of the man who invented the atomic bomb, J. Robert Oppenheimer—is the third highest-grossing film of the year so far, with nearly $949 million at the worldwide box office. It’s an incredible feat for a three-hour, R-rated, historical drama, and it’s largely thanks to the “Barbenheimer” event this summer.

That said, there are plenty of people who will be watching Oppenheimer online for the first time today and may find themselves confused by the sprawling, non-linear narrative. Read on for a full breakdown of the Oppenheimer plot summary and Oppenheimer ending explained.

Oppenheimer plot summary:

There are several different timelines in the Oppenheimer movie, each depicting a different moment in the American physicist’s life, and they are not presented in strictly chronological order. The narrative backbone of the film is a 1954 private hearing where Oppenheimer is accused of being a Soviet spy while he was working on the atomic bomb.

This hearing serves as a storytelling device for Oppenheimer to relay his life story. We see Oppenheimer go from a Cambridge University student studying physics in 1926, to getting involved the Communist Party USA, to meeting his wife Kitty (Emily Blunt) and his mistress Jean Tatlock (Florence Pugh), to being recruited by U.S. Army General Leslie Groves (Matt Damon) to lead the Manhattan Project to develop an atomic bomb in 1942.

A significant portion of the movie is spent at Los Alamos, New Mexico, where Oppenheimer and his team worked developing the atomic bomb. In one scene, Oppenheimer consults with his friend and fellow scientist Albert Einstein (Tom Conti) about the slight possibility that, according to their calculations, the bomb will cause an endless chain reaction that will blow up the entire world. But it’s probably fine! Oppenheimer completes the bomb and runs a successful test of it, dubbed the Trinity test. By this point, it’s 1945, and Adolf Hitler is dead. The war is nearly won, and some question if the bomb is still necessary. Oppenheimer believe that it is. President Truman (Gary Oldman) agrees, and the bomb is dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in Japan, killing over 100,000 people.

Meanwhile, another timeline is being woven throughout the movie: The 1959 Senate confirmation hearing of Lewis Strauss (Robert Downey Jr.), which features the U.S. Senate listening to testimonies on Strauss’s character to decide whether or not to confirm him for Secretary of Commerce. Many of the questions focus on Strauss’s relationship to Oppenheimer. Strauss was the chairman of the United States Atomic Energy Commission, and Oppenheimer was an advisor. After the 1945 bomb, Oppenheimer voiced controversial concerns about the U.S. continuing to develop and use nuclear weapons. Strauss also resents Oppenheimer on a personal level: Oppenheimer humiliated Strauss in a public hearing, and (Strauss believes) talked shit about him with his buddy Einstein, thus turning Einstein against Strauss.

Oppenheimer ending explained:

The 1954 private hearing accusing Oppenheimer of being a Soviet spy concluded with Oppenheimer being stripped of his security clearance. At the 1959 Senate confirmation hearing, Strauss admits—behind closed doors—that he orchestrated the entire hearing against Oppenheimer, and appointed the hearing board himself, all but guaranteeing that Oppenheimer would be stripped of his security clearance. This was done out of petty revenge.

Another physicist David L. Hill (Rami Malek) delivers a surprise testimony at the Senate confirmation hearing in which he recommends Strauss not be confirmed, because of the way he took down Oppenheimer. Strauss is ultimately not confirmed, thanks to a few senators swayed by Hill’s testimony, including a young John F. Kennedy. Strauss laments to his senate aide (Alden Ehrenreich) that Oppenheimer has always hated him. Remember that time he poisoned Einstein against Strauss when he said something to him by the pond?

Ehrenreich suggests to Strauss that perhaps Oppenheimer and Einstein were not even discussing Strauss at all, but rather something “more important.” In a flashback to that scene by the pond, we learn that Ehrenreich is right. The reason Einstein looked so grim is because Oppenheimer had just informed the famed scientist that he believed that long-ago theory—that the atomic bomb would cause a chain reaction to blow up the world—has come true.

He says, “Remember when I came to you with those calculations, we thought we might start a chain reaction that would destroy the entire world? I believe we did.”

Oppenheimer is not in the literal sense, of course. The bomb did not instantly blow up the entire world when it was dropped on Japan. But Oppenheimer still believes he created a chain reaction of violence—of more bombs, more weapons, more threats, and more wars. He believes he did blow up the world, even if the implosion is happening in slow motion.

If someone had just told you that they believed they had destroyed the world, would you be in the mood for making small talk with Robert Downey Jr.? I didn’t think so.