Argylle ending spoilers follow.
Argylle is now available to stream on Apple TV+, so those viewers who missed it in the cinema can now enjoy the movie's many (many) plot twists at home.
The big mystery is not who the real-life Elly Conway is, but who the real agent Argylle is, and the ending finally delivers some answers — and an unexpected credit scene too.
The new movie is a meta take on the spy genre that sees bestselling author Elly Conway (Bryce Dallas Howard) find herself in an actual spy thriller that appears to mirror the events of her novels.
In Argylle's trailer, there's a tease that Elly will meet the "real agent Argylle", but who did that end up being?
With Argylle now out in cinemas, let's untangle the twisty plot of Argylle to explain all. Needless to say, there are major spoilers ahead.
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Who is the real agent Argylle?
We'll cut to the chase: the 'real' agent Argylle is none other than... Elly Conway.
Elly's real name is Rachel Kylle (Agent R Kylle... Argylle... get it?) and she went missing five years earlier when she went to London to meet hacker Bakunin, who had got his hands on The Division master file which would reveal all their darkest secrets.
Aidan (Sam Rockwell) and former deputy director of the CIA Alfie (Samuel L Jackson), planned to use the master file to expose The Division. But they never got the chance after Rachel went missing.
She was found washed up on the shores of the Thames with no memory, and Division boss Ritter (Bryan Cranston) got to her first. Ritter and the Division's head of psy ops, Dr Margaret Vogler (Catherine O'Hara), posed as Rachel's parents and brainwashed her into thinking she was Elly Conway.
They gave 'Elly' a journal of all of Rachel's missions and told her she was an author. Over the past five years, she has written four novels with her main character Argylle carrying out the missions Rachel had already done. They were memories of her former life, not premonitions.
The fictional Wyatt, Argylle's sidekick in the spy world, is based on Aidan, who worked together with Rachel. They also worked closely on missions with Keira (Ariana DeBose), but Vogler didn't have to change her identity as the real-life Keira was killed in an earlier mission.
The fifth book sees Argylle attempt to recover a file that would uncover the secrets of the spy organisation he works for. It's why Elly was struggling to finish the book as she didn't manage to get her hands on the master file when she went to London to meet Bakunin.
But is Rachel Kylle the heroic spy that Aidan thought she was? The real Argylle reveal is only the start...
Argylle ending explained
Once she's recovered her memories, Rachel/Elly (we'll call her Rachel for ease from now on) needs to head to the Arabian Peninsula to meet with the Master of Secrets (Sofia Boutella).
She has the master file and will only give it to Rachel, so she must pretend to still be the badass spy she once was. Rachel gets the file, but it reveals that she's basically as bad as the rest of the Division agents.
Rachel killed Bakunin in London, which set off an explosion in his apartment so Rachel had to jump out of the window. She landed in the Thames, resulting in her amnesia and the brainwashing was the Division's convoluted way of finding out where the master file was.
Unfortunately for Rachel and Aidan, Ritter and Vogler arrive shortly after Rachel gets the master file. They capture the duo, knock them out and take them back to Division headquarters which happens to be on an aircraft carrier.
Ritter burns the master file, but there's one loose end to deal with: Alfie. Aidan is being tortured for Alfie's whereabouts and, seeing that he won't tell them, Rachel shoots Aidan in the heart and manages to use Ritter's computer to work out Alfie's location anyway.
However, she's really playing Ritter as she uses her access to Ritter's computer to send Alfie the master file. In another twist, Aidan isn't dead as Rachel shot him in the "vascular corridor" where a reader had previously told her that somebody could get shot in the heart and live.
In order to get the master file to Alfie, Rachel and Aidan have to fight their way through countless Division operatives to the server room. Ritter tries to stop them there, but Aidan gets the better of him and kills Ritter.
There's still one final step to send the master file and as it finally starts to upload, Vogler pops up again and triggers Rachel into fighting Aidan. Aidan refuses to fight back and Rachel is about to kill him until Keira arrives and knocks out Vogler, destroying the music box that contained Rachel's trigger.
Keira didn't actually die all those years ago as she was shot in the vascular corridor and she was the reader who sent the theory to Rachel. The trio make their way off the ship which is then blown up by Aidan, giving Rachel one final chance to imagine Argylle, Wyatt and Keira completing the mission.
It's a happy ending as Rachel, now back as Elly Conway, releases her fifth – and possibly final – Argylle book, Alfie has exposed all of the dodgy dealings of the Division and Keira has become a powerful tech wizard like Steve Jobs.
There's time for one final twist though as during a book reading, Elly is asked a question by somebody who looks exactly like Argylle (Henry Cavill) who thinks that they need to have a chat.
Who is he? Well, we'll have to wait until the next movie to find out...
Argylle is now available to stream on Apple TV+.
Movies Editor, Digital Spy Ian has more than 10 years of movies journalism experience as a writer and editor. Starting out as an intern at trade bible Screen International, he was promoted to report and analyse UK box-office results, as well as carving his own niche with horror movies, attending genre festivals around the world. After moving to Digital Spy, initially as a TV writer, he was nominated for New Digital Talent of the Year at the PPA Digital Awards. He became Movies Editor in 2019, in which role he has interviewed 100s of stars, including Chris Hemsworth, Florence Pugh, Keanu Reeves, Idris Elba and Olivia Colman, become a human encyclopedia for Marvel and appeared as an expert guest on BBC News and on-stage at MCM Comic-Con. Where he can, he continues to push his horror agenda – whether his editor likes it or not.
