Summary

• Trapped is a hidden gem on Netflix, with a complicated story and an action-packed ending that has propelled its popularity on the streaming platform.
• Joe's motivation for kidnapping Abby in Trapped was driven by his grief over his own daughter's death and a desire to make his family whole again.
• Cheryl agreed to help Will in Trapped because she was forced to comply with the kidnapping plans and became increasingly aware of Joe's dangerous behavior. She ultimately empathized with Will's concerns for Abby's safety.

The 2002 movie Trapped ended with a huge final confrontation on a highway, complete with a multi-car pileup, an impromptu plane landing, and a logging truck crash. The thriller currently streaming on Netflix features a steady buildup to its climactic ending. The film follows Joe Hickey (Kevin Bacon) and his crew as they attempt to kidnap Karen Jennings' (Charlize Theron) daughter Abby (Dakota Fanning) in search of $250,000 in ransom money. It was later revealed that the kidnappers were not truly after money but believed that Karen's husband Will (Stuart Townsend) was responsible for their daughter's death and were seeking revenge.

Trapped was initially met with poor critical reception on its release, but its complicated story and action-packed ending helped propel the thriller to a new life on streaming. Trapped can be considered one of Netflix's hidden gems, for good reason. While the actual events of the ending are fairly clear, some of the motivations were left unexplained during the dramatic climax of the movie's ending.

Why Did Joe Want To Take Abby In Trapped?

It was revealed earlier in the movie that Joe and Cheryl (Courtney Love) had a darker reason for their kidnappings than money: they were seeking revenge against the doctors who operated on their daughter, Katie, when she died. What started as the perfect crime committed by a lowlife criminal family was turned into a quest for revenge by a grieving family. Joe was thinking mostly of Katie throughout the movie, and Abby's asthma reminded him even more of his daughter and her fatal health conditions than the previous kidnappings.

Joe had been through a very stressful 24 hours leading up to the end of the movie. What was supposed to be a well-planned and routine kidnapping turned into the challenge of a lifetime when every member of the family began to fight back. That stress, combined with the huge loss of blood he had from Karen cutting his thigh open, could have led to Joe becoming delirious. He was more paranoid at the end of the movie than at the beginning, and though he was right about the FBI helicopter, he wasn't healthy.

The biggest reason Joe tried to take Abby and have her live with him and Cheryl was because of his daughter. As Joe said, he wanted to make his family whole again, and he believed Katie's absence was the reason it wasn't complete. This touches on one of the central themes of the movie: the idea that revenge can't fill the void left by loss.

Why Cheryl Agreed To Help Will

Cheryl had been an unwilling participant in the kidnapping since the beginning. While Joe was enthusiastic about his plan and focused on everything he needed to do, Cheryl was always more interested in other things while holding Will hostage, like watching television or taking a shower. During one of their fights, Will saw bruises on her stomach that came from Joe beating her, hinting at the idea that Cheryl was forced to comply with the kidnapping plans. Even though Katie was the reason for their actions, Cheryl wasn't very interested in the revenge aspect of their plan, as she just wanted to grieve her loss.

Along with her unwillingness, Cheryl also knew how dangerous Joe was becoming as his plan unraveled. Will convinced her that if she didn't help stop Joe, he would end up killing Abby. He also told her that another doctor had lied to her, and that he wasn't responsible for Katie's death, which Cheryl believed. She then empathized with Will's situation and worry over Abby, and decided to help him fight back against Joe.

Why Will Landed The Plane On The Highway During Trapped's Ending

Will was initially reluctant to have the FBI involved in trying to save Abby, as he thought Joe would kill her if he knew Will had called the police. After Will and Cheryl picked up the money, though, it became clear that Joe was becoming even more irrational and unpredictable than before, as he began deviating from his perfect plan. As they were so far away from Abby when this began, they devised a plan to use Will's plane to come to her rescue. Will had been feeling powerless throughout the movie, both due to being held hostage and because he was a long way away from Karen and Abby, and taking the plane to them felt like doing something rather than nothing.

Once WIll found Marvin's (Pruitt Taylor Vince) truck on the highway, he tried to radio the FBI from the plane and have them land their helicopter to stop them. The FBI explained that they wouldn't do that, as their ground team was still 20 minutes away. Feeling like he had no time before Joe would have Abby killed, Will decided to take matters into his own hands. The only way he knew he could stop Marvin from going any further with Abby was to block his truck with the plane physically.

Why Did Marvin Carve The Statue For Abby?

Joe's cousin Marvin was also a reluctant participant in the kidnappings. He was mostly involved because Joe asked him, and because he still missed his niece, Katie. He was in charge of watching the children through the night of the kidnapping, meaning he had the most chance to form a connection with them. When Abby had her first asthma attack at the cabin, she reminded him of Katie, and he started thinking of her more fondly than the other children he had kidnapped. Marvin probably carved the statue for Abby because of her similarities to Katie, and because he didn't realize how traumatic the experience was for her and believed they were closer than they were in reality.

What Trapped's Ending Really Means

Trapped kept its main theme hidden for much of the movie, but by the end of the film, it had explained what it was all about. Joe, Cheryl, and Marvin were out for revenge because they believed Will was responsible for Katie's death. They had been grieving their loss for at least a year, and they were trying to fill the hole left in their hearts by Katie's absence. Revenge was never going to fill that void, though, and the crew learned that lesson in the end.

Joe learned that lesson first, and it caused him to try taking Abby as his own daughter in a desperate attempt to find something to put his life back to normal. Marvin and Cheryl were able to let go of their grief in the end, as they decided to help keep Abby safe and return her to her parents, which is one of the reasons they lived while Joe died. Joe let his grief consume him, and it led him to commit the terrible crimes he did throughout the movie.

Trapped was an emotionally complex movie about grief and the consequences of holding onto the past. What began as a simple thriller about the perfect kidnapping was quickly revealed to be a much more complicated story about trying to fill a hole that cannot be filled, and how ugly those efforts can become. Revenge always has its consequences, and neither the Hickeys nor the Jennings would ever be the same after this experience.

Watch Trapped on Netflix