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inception - Why didn't the team wake up from the multi-level kick?


In the movie, there's one scene that seems very strange to me.


First, the point:


When the team gets in the first level, they find out that Fischer has a militarized subconscious. After they freak out, and argue about it, they also find out that they can't die, otherwise they'd get stuck in limbo.


So, when Eames says that he won't go further, Cobb states that, since the first level sedative will last a week they would be killed. They needed to go on to the next levels as fast as possible, so the combined multi-level kick would make them wake up.


Here's the point: The plan was the multi-level kick would wake them up before the sedative was off




Ariadne: ...is ten years! Who would wanna be stuck in a dream for ten years?
Yusuf: Depends on the dream.
Arthur: So, once we've made the plant, how do we go out? Hope you have something more elegant in mind than shooting me in the head?
Cobb: A kick.
...
Arthur: Are we going to feel a kick with this kind of sedation?
Yusuf: Well, that's the clever part. I customize the sedative to leave inner ear function unimpaired. That way, however deep the sleep, the sleeper still feels falling, or tipping.





Now, the question:


When they finish the job, they perform the kicks



  • The van hits the water

  • Arthur detonates the elevator

  • Eames explodes the fortress


But they don't wake up. They are back in the drowned van. So, as far as I could understand, they still had to sit and wait for the first level's week to end.


(We see Fischer talking to his godfather)


Why didn't they wake up with the kicks, as it was planned? And how did they managed not to get killed by Fischer's projections after they got out of the Van?




Answer



It's not confirmed in the film screenplay or the shooting script but I have a couple of theories:


Theory 1


Since the enhanced sedative was only required in order to allow the "inception team" to reach the second and third dream levels, it seems quite logical that Yusuf (the driver) would not be using it.


As he was only ever intended to be on the first level, he would be using the standard Somnacin compound that allows you to wake up when you get killed.



COBB: We need you there to tailor compounds to our particular requirements.
YUSUF: Which are?
COBB: Great depth.
YUSUF: A dream within a dream? Two levels?

COBB: Three.



When they all surfaced from the van, they could simply have killed Yusuf and he, in turn could have turned off the PASIV dream machine.



Theory 2


Note that in the original shooting script, the suggestion is that they could somehow survive inside Fischer's dream for "a couple of days" then use a kick to completely exit the dream. In the film, this whole sequence was much compressed:



EAMES: It’s not going to take us long to crack Fischer open once we get going. We’ll be out in a couple days, max.


ARTHUR: How do we get out once we’ve made the plant? (to Cobb) I hope you’ve got something a little more elegant in mind than shooting me in the head like last time.




As to how they could have survived that long, it seems that the dreamer's subconscious only becomes hostile when the participant makes changes. By passively accepting the world of the dream, you could avoid an attack indefinitely:



ARIADNE: Why are they looking at me?


COBB: Because you’re changing things. My subconscious feels that someone else is creating the world. The more you change things, the quicker the projections converge on you.



They could simply have hung out in the warehouse, played some poker and waited until the dream ended.


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