Having played an iconic stripper in Hustlers and a lovestruck pop star in Marry Me, J.Lo is back, and this time she's angry. In Netflix's The Mother, Jennifer Lopez plays a deadly assassin with a perfect aim, who is forced to give up her child for adoption to keep her safe from dangerous associates.
After going into hiding in Alaska for over a decade, Lopez learns that her daughter Zoe (Lucy Paez) may be in trouble. It soon becomes clear that there's a plot to kidnap Zoe. From there, a deadly game of cat and mouse ensues, and The Mother becomes intent on killing anyone trying to harm her daughter. The action-packed Netflix movie continually showcases just how incredible J.Lo is as an action hero. But what happens at the end of The Mother?
The Mother trains her daughter.
After rescuing her daughter from her heavily-guarded ex Hector Álvarez (Gael García Bernal) in Cuba, The Mother sends Zoe back home with FBI Agent Cruise (Omari Hardwick). However, Cruise is intercepted by Adrian (Joseph Fiennes), The Mother's other dangerous ex who was previously thought to be dead, and just so happens to be Zoe's biological father. Unbeknownst to them, The Mother has hopped on a motorcycle to chase down Cruise and Zoe to make sure they're safe. Tragically, Cruise is shot to death by Adrian's men, but The Mother manages to escape the scene with her daughter.
With Adrian hunting them down, The Mother retreats to Alaska where she's been hiding out since Zoe's birth. There, she trains her daughter in survival skills, target practice, and knife work. Relations remain tense, but The Mother endeavors to equip her daughter with everything she might need to survive an attack from dangerous people.
Adrian tracks them down in Alaska.
Before long, Adrian and his henchmen track The Mother down. Fearing for her daughter's safety, The Mother tells Zoe to run while she fights Adrian and his men. Like mother, like daughter, Zoe doesn't listen, and follows her mom into the fray. While The Mother is successful in killing all of Adrian's hired help, her ex is less easy to defeat.
Using a trick learned during her survival training, Zoe shoots a salt round at Adrian and The Mother as they tussle. The non-lethal round interrupts the fight, and knocks Adrian and The Mother down the side of a hill. Fearing the worst, Zoe runs to help The Mother, who has been knocked unconscious. Unfortunately, this gives Adrian an opening to kidnap Zoe, and throw her into his car.
When The Mother wakes up, she has to reset her dislocated shoulder, screaming in pain as she does so. She sees Adrian driving away with Zoe, and knows she has to stop them. Usually a fiercely accurate shot, The Mother struggles with her aim having hit her head during the fall. She shoots but misses Adrian, and fears that he may succeed in kidnapping Zoe. Luckily, her second shot hits her target, killing Adrian and saving Zoe in the process. Mother and daughter embrace, finally free from the danger that's been lurking in both of their lives.
The Mother and Zoe forge an unbreakable bond.
The Mother returns Zoe to her adoptive parents, who are overjoyed to have their daughter returned safely to them. In the final scene, Zoe is seen skating through a park alongside her parents, and it's revealed that The Mother is covertly watching from a nearby apartment using some less-than-discreet binoculars. Zoe smiles, because she knows her birth mother is watching over her. She then pretends to shoot her mom, and The Mother mimes being hit in the heart. That's when we see that The Mother is wearing a friendship bracelet with the word "mom" on it. The bond between mom and daughter has finally reached a positive place, and The Mother audibly says, "You got me," before stepping away from the window.
During an interview with Tudum, director Niki Caro addressed the ending of The Mother, and the important relationship that builds between a parent and her child. "The idea is: she’s always going to be there as her protector," Caro told Tudum. "You see her wearing the little bracelet that her daughter made for her, which indicates that they have a relationship going forward."
While The Mother features a lot of action and some impressive stunts, the relationship between Zoe and her birth mom is the real heart of the film. "It’s a slow process from where she has Zoe in her care and she has to have a relationship with a child [who] is a stranger to her," Caro told Tudum. "And so it’s a slow and incremental thing that just gets stronger and deeper every moment those two are together." The film ends on a positive note, suggesting that Zoe is safe, and The Mother finally has a relationship with the child she was forced to give up all those years ago.
Will there be a sequel to The Mother?
According to Netflix's Top 10 website, The Mother was watched for 83.71 million hours during its first week of release. Considering the film's success, it's possible that Netflix will consider making a sequel to the fast-paced thriller. When asked about the possibility of a follow-up, Lopez quipped to Variety, "I think it would be The Daughter." As J.Lo is so well-suited to playing the lead in an action film, we are already on board with the idea of a sequel to The Mother. Somebody greenlight that, please?
