Ashes (Kül) Ending Explained: Who Killed Duygu Akkaya? Did Gökçe Live the Story or Was it Part of a Book?
What happens at the end of the movie Ashes (Kül) on Netflix? It turns out that it’s all fiction from a novel, or is the story based on reality? The Turkish film has been available on the platform since 9 February 2024 and keeps viewers glued to the small screen until the last moment. And it is precisely at the end that many questions arise about what happens during the film. In particular, the question is: is what I saw real or is it the fruit of the imagination of the writer Taner Alpar? Let’s see together what happens during the film and especially at the end. If you are a fan of psychological thrillers, then you have already devoured “Ceniza” (“Kül” in its original language and Ashes in English), a new movie that arrived on Netflix. The special thing about this proposal is not only that it has romantic elements, but that it plays with the minds of the characters and the audience.
Ashes (Kül): Story Plot
The plot of the film Ashes (Kül) begins with the narrator questioning the sense of reality, as when a lie is passed off as truth. Sometimes, reality might seem like a dream and vice versa. This thought is carried forward throughout the film. The protagonist is Gokce, who is a married woman with a daughter. Her husband is Kenan, owner of Urkan Publishing, which publishes books. Gokce always takes care of finding the best works to publish. She reads the manuscripts and Kenan acts on her intuition. During their tenth anniversary, Gokce’s attention is drawn to a manuscript, which bears the title Ashes (Kül). The woman begins to read it and she slowly lets herself be overwhelmed by the story, trying to live the life of the protagonist, going to the Balat neighborhood, where the plot takes place. Gokce wants to find out if this manuscript tells a true story or is just a fictional story.
Her doubt clouds her mind and she manages to find the protagonist man, defined as M. He is a carpenter, recognizable by the tattoos on his arms described by the author of the book. The man matches exactly the one described in the manuscript and is called Metin Ali Soykan. Gokce starts dating him and, in the meantime, reads the story that completely overwhelms her. Meanwhile, her husband appears annoyed by her constant absences. Gokce feels alive after so many years and, in the meantime, she discovers that Metin is a married man. He had been in an arranged marriage and he intended to separate. The woman understands that the situation is dangerous, but she continues to get involved and hang out with Metin.
Ashes (Kül) Ending Explained
Is the story of the movie Ashes (Kül) fake or real? Towards the end, Kenan reveals his true intentions at dinner by showing the manuscript of Duygu Akkaya to Metin, who is shocked. He denies having killed her, pointing out that the woman was taking a lot of medicine she had already attempted suicide, and that he had not cheated on her with her sister. Gokce seems to move away from them with his mind, so much so that she stands still shocked by this whole story. Instead, Metin and Kenan get into a very heated physical fight, both falling into the pool. All this while Gokce sits at the table with a blank look and watches them from afar. Eventually, Metin hits Kenan with a sharp object and kills him. After that, you can see Gokce alone with her daughter. We then move on to the real ending, the one where the writer Taner Alpar presents his new novel, Cenere, published by his publisher Kenan.
Therefore, this already suggests that Kenan is not dead and that that clash with Metin is only the fruit of Taner’s imagination, who would have created the novel by combining two stories. The most likely thing is that the writer merged the separation between Gokce and Kenan after her betrayal and the story of a woman killed by her carpenter husband. It seems, therefore, that what we saw is the story told in Taner’s novel, which combined the two real situations by creating a fictional story. Therefore, Gokce would never have met Metin and Kenan would still be alive. In any case, the novel ends with the suicide of Gokce, who would instead still be alive and with her daughter. Certainly the ending of the film Cenere leaves the spectator the possibility of interpreting everything as he sees fit. What I just made is a personal interpretation of what could have happened.
Why Was Gökçe so Involved in the Story?
Gökçe became so involved in the story because of what the film describes as fictophilia, a term that describes the state of falling in love with a fictional character. Gökçe’s confusion about her feelings towards ‘M’ causes her perception of her reality to be seriously affected. Your immersion in history goes beyond mere curiosity; she is driven by a deep emotional connection to the character and her romance, which leads her to lose sight of the line between fiction and reality.
Whose Story was the Manuscript?
The story of the manuscript, which Gökçe practically revived, actually belonged to a woman named Duygu, who had experienced that same romance he described with Metin. Kenan discovers the connection when he notices his wife’s strange behavior related to the manuscript and tracks down the address where the book was sent a year ago. At the scene, a woman named Reyhan Akkaya denies knowing the book but reveals that her sister Duygu was living with her at the time. As in the book, Duygu is dead, although the circumstances of her death remain unknown. The main revelation is that Metin tricked Duygu into falling in love with him and then became involved with her sister, which devastated Duygu and is believed to have contributed to her tragic death.
Did Metin kill Duygu?
The question of whether Metin killed Duygu remains without a definitive answer. Metin claims not to have been responsible for Duygu’s death, arguing that she was obsessed with him and had attempted to take her life on multiple occasions by not following her medication. However, the veracity of his version of events is called into question, since we do not have concrete evidence to support his claim. Duygu’s death remains a mystery in the plot of Ashes (Kül) (Kul)
Is Gökçe’s Story True or Fiction?
Gökçe’s story in Ashes (Kül) (Kül) is a fascinating labyrinth between truth and fiction. After the tragic confrontation in which her husband Kenan loses his life at the hands of Metin, Gökçe finds himself in a state of disbelief, unable to discern whether what he is experiencing is real or simply a creation of her mind. This moment reveals the complexity of the borders between reality and fantasy. The plot takes an unexpected turn when we discover that everything is part of the new book by Alpar, a writer whose works were rejected by Kenan due to their excessively autobiographical approach. Although it appears that Gökçe’s story has been a literary invention, Alpar’s words about infiltrating another person’s mind and seeing life through his eyes suggest that he may have drawn elements from Gökçe’s real life to his work. This aspect is reinforced when we witness Gökçe with his son on the train tracks, evoking the final scene of the book where a character faces a similar fate. Although Alpar claimed it was a reference to “Anna Karenina,” the connection to Gökçe’s true story is undeniable, leaving the viewer reflecting on the blurred boundaries between reality and fiction.
Who Killed Duygu Akkaya?
While reading the manuscript, Gokce discovers that the book’s author predicted her death while writing the manuscript. Her mother, who corresponds to Metin, would have killed her by stabbing her. The author says that the latter would have cheated on her with a certain R. Gokce, now taken by the carpenter, returns the manuscript to Kenan and advises him not to publish it. Her husband, however, noticed her involvement in that story and her obsession. So he decides to find out the truth and discovers Metin and Gokce together. Meanwhile, he discovers that the author of the manuscript, who is dead, was called Duygu Akkaya. Kenan finds her sister, Reyhan, who, however, doesn’t want to talk about this story and slams the door in his face. By following her she can identify Metin as the character M in the manuscript. Kenan then lets Gokce know that the author of the manuscript died last year and that her suicide would not have been a suicide. The woman is shocked and believes that Metin killed Duygu. Through her deception, Kenan manages to invite Metin to their house for dinner to have a face-to-face discussion.
