Editor's note: The below article contains spoilers for Don't Look Up.Adam Mckay's apocalyptic satire Don't Look Up is currently Netflix's most-watched title and for good reason. The film features hilarious black humor, plenty of thrills, and more talented A-listers than the average blockbuster can usually afford. In fact, several iconic moments from the smash hit film wouldn't have even been conceived if it wasn't for that talent, and Meryl Streep in particular initially pitched one of the best aspects of the film, its shock mid-credits scene, during an improv session with McKay and co-star Mark Rylance.
Towards the end of the movie, Streep's character, narcissistic President Orlean, has a conversation in the White House with billionaire Mark Zuckerberg stand-in Peter Isherwell, brilliantly portrayed by Rylance. Peter reveals that he possesses technology that informs us on how we will die and when. Orlean asks how she will die and Peter tells her she will be eaten by a brontaroc, but they currently do not know what that is.
Jump to the mid-credits scene, and earth's elite have just emerged from their cryo-chambers onto a new planet 22,740 years after the comet decimated earth and destroyed humanity. While the elites are exploring the colorful foreign planet in their birthday suits, President Orlean spots a large, beautiful bird-like creature. She runs towards it excitedly, and it eats her alive. Peter informs the other elites that the creature that just consumed Orlean is called a brontaroc while several more brontarocs emerge towards the rich survivors of the apocalypse.
In an interview with Variety, McKay revealed that Streep came up with the idea of Peter Isherwell being aware of how everyone will die. According to Mckay, “We were shooting the scene with Rylance, Meryl, and Jonah in the BASH control room for the second launch, and I’m like, ‘We should play around. Why don’t you guys talk about something? You never know. It could show up.’ And Meryl, who’s such a great improviser, says, ‘I want to know how I’m gonna die!’” McKay continues on the subject, saying “I think every time we said the name of the creature, it changed — and the take we used was a brontaroc. And then after we shot it, I said, ‘That’s really funny. We should end with her getting eaten by a brontaroc!’"
Apparently, a totally separate mid-credits scene was shot and scrapped after the decision to create an ending where President Orlean is eaten alive by the fictional animal known as a brontaroc. McKay went into detail regarding what that original scene would have featured, saying “The original ending was, ‘Oh, let’s start building our houses.’ And then someone says, ‘Oh, the pod carrying all the workers blew up,'” McKay said. “And then it was Mark Rylance going, ‘I’ll give anyone who builds me a house a billion dollars.’ And then the guy next to him was like, ‘I’ll give $2 billion.’ And then you realize they’re all billionaires.”