Upamanyu Biswas
At the end of Netflix’s ‘Our Times,’ Nora and Hector are faced with the dreaded decision of having to choose between their love and their personal fulfillment as the window of opportunity for a return slowly draws to a close. As they navigate the personal challenges in their path, they are pulled in different directions, with the past and future playing a game of tug-of-war between them. It leads to many difficult conversations as they both realize their shortcomings and desire to flourish in their preferred environment. However, as depicted in the movie, this environment is often shaped by the forces of one’s time, nurturing different types of outlooks. To that end, while one set of parameters might be applicable for one person, the same may be true for another person in a different surrounding, which leads to a bittersweet conclusion for the couple. SPOILERS AHEAD.
Our Times Plot Synopsis
As the movie begins, we are introduced to Dr. Nora Cervantes, a leading physicist at the University of National Autonomy of Mexico (UNAM) whose work specifically revolves around space-time theory. Nora and her husband, Dr. Hector Esquivel, are collaborating on a machine that could break the time barrier and travel across different eras, combining her expertise and Hector’s mastery of tachyon particles. However, because they are both living in 1966 Mexico, the brunt of sexism and discriminatory practices against female scientists is blatantly oppressive, leading to Nora constantly finding herself trying to justify herself to the college’s higher-ups. Her only solace is that her husband, Hector, is an unequivocally loving man who tries to stand by her as best as he can.
After several trials and errors, Nora and Hector make a breakthrough in their time travel project after the former receives a shipment of transducers from the Soviet Union. Using the device, the couple takes the machine for a test run, hoping to step foot in the future, just fifteen minutes ahead of their time. However, during the revolution process, something goes amiss, and Hector and Nora end up way beyond their expected time travel date. When they look out of the machine’s glass windows, they realize that they are on an abandoned train platform. Following a brief discussion hypothesizing about why they are no longer inside the college’s lab, they realize that they must have successfully traveled into the future but missed their mark by a considerable distance.
As their first order of business, Hector and Nora wrap up the machine with a nearby advertisement poster sheet before heading into the world of the future to figure out more about where they are in time. It does not take them long to learn that their current year is 2025, meaning they have traveled 59 years into the future. Soon after, they find their way to the UNAM campus, where, surprisingly, they are greeted by an older Julia, Nora’s college student from 1966. She is now the dean in charge of UNAM and immediately recognizes Nora as her professor from years ago. She also knows that Nora likely traveled through time, which is why she went missing in 1966. While repairing the time machine is imperative for them to return to their timeline, Julia urges Nora and Hector to acclimatize themselves to the social dynamics of 2025, which are very different from the ’60s.
Our Times Ending: Do Nora and Hector Reunite?
The significant change Nora feels after arriving in 2025 is the newfound freedom in her career to flourish as a leading voice in cutting-edge scientific research as a woman, which was not possible in 1966. As such, Nora quickly realizes that rather than going back to 1966, she could lead a vastly more productive and fulfilling life in 2025. The idea takes root in her head, refusing to let go, especially after she receives multiple offers from Julia to contribute more tangibly to the UNAM Department of Science. These invites to major events make it evident to her that she is afforded far greater opportunities than she ever was in 1966. Thus, she starts considering the possibility of staying back in the future to experience how else she might flourish.
While the future holds a lot more promise for Nora, the opposite is true for Hector, who starts feeling less and less valued as a member of the scientific community and as her life partner. In fact, as time passes, his anger and frustration start to get the better of him, which manifests in ways that are often toxic to their relationship. Eventually, it leads to a major argument where they both end up saying hurtful things to one another while also realizing that they are at a crossroads over their perception of how society functions in 2025. Even though Nora has seemingly accepted these standards as part of her outlook, Hector finds it tough. To that end, he makes the difficult choice of leaving Nora behind by taking a trip back to 1966 in the time machine by himself, basically stranding Nora in 2025.
When Nora finds out what Hector did, she is devastated because just moments ago, she had decided that she would compromise her values because he was the love of her life, and she could not live without him. However, upon seeing that he is gone, she realizes that their love story might be at an end. While it feels like a sad conclusion to their story, the film provides a twist at the end. Years after Nora had lived a fulfilling life contributing to the sciences, she made another time machine and traveled to 1996. There, she runs into an older Hector, who is astonished to find out that his long-lost lover has crossed the immense gap in time between them to spend the final parts of her life with him. Although it does not compensate for the time they were separated before, it is a moment of happiness to see them get back together after decades.
Why Does Hector Go Back to the Past?
Although seeing Nora and Hector reunite is one of the satisfying moments of the film’s conclusion, the reasons behind the latter’s departure to 1966 are one that requires further discussion, mainly because it digs into the heart of the narrative. ‘Our Times’ tries to illustrate how people are a product of their times, something that is perfectly shown through the character of Hector. Despite seeming like a loving and progressive gentleman during his time, he becomes persona non grata within days of traveling and living in 2025, an era where there is a high degree of scrutiny over chauvinistic ideas or “toxic masculinity.” Hector exhibits all these characteristics, thereby turning him into a “bad guy” in today’s world. However, this does not fully represent his issues, especially when dissecting his reasons for returning to the past.
Like Nora feels increasingly more valued and free to explore herself as a woman in the future, the same applies to Hector in his time. While he may be a proponent of the “patriarchy” in some form or another, the film tries to tell us that he is a product of his time. In a moment of vulnerability, he even admits that he is stuck in the past and feels more comfortable in 1966, making him tangentially opposite to where Nora finds herself after seeing how women can be happy in the future. She starts to understand that while she may be welcome in this new and exciting world, her husband and love of her life find it a scary world where things are upside down. Yet, when asked about his actual qualities, even she realizes that for their time (1966), he is a progressive and loving man who values his wife very highly, the main reason she fell in love with him.
The dilemma of what to do with their conflicting position ultimately resolves itself when Hector takes the step to remove himself from the equation by traveling back to 1966 without Nora. The decision is a painful one for him, but one he realizes he must make, not just for himself but because Nora belongs in a world where she is untethered by someone like him, bringing her down by his way of thinking. He does not want to impede her growth as a person and instead loves her enough to realize that he is wrong in the end. Thus, despite their differences, Hector showcases that even though he might be wrong to think of Nora and women in general in quite antiquated terms, he is also open-minded enough to admit that the progress of the world of 2025 is monumental. And if he can’t be a part of it, he should certainly not hinder someone like Nora from taking a part in it.
What Does Nora Do in the Future?
Once Hector leaves Nora in 2025, it takes her a while to get over her relationship with him and also the pain of being ripped away from her 1966 time period forever. As such, she is considerably distressed for a while. However, she soon gets to work as she realizes that being sad about her predicament is not what she should be doing. In fact, Hector makes it clear to her that one of the reasons he is leaving is so that she can accomplish “great things” in the field of science by herself. Thus, with Julia’s support and the constant attention from Alondra, her great-niece, Nora begins her research work in cutting-edge fields of Physics. As time passes, she quickly puts a marker down as one of the most influential scientific voices of her time, a feat that is exemplified through the various newspaper reports and awards decorated around her apartment.
Even though we are not provided an exact glimpse of what Nora achieves in the future, it is evident that she turns herself into an uber-successful lady who not only breaks the bounds of human ingenuity but also inspires countless other women to study physics. She serves as a beacon of aspiration for them, just as she once did for a young Julia in the halls of UNAM in 1966. However, throughout the numerous accolades and groundbreaking research papers she published, Nora never forgot about her love for Hector, who remained in her heart. Therefore, we never see her date anyone else in the future. Instead, once she has completely exhausted her mental bank for great scientific ideas, she rebuilds the time machine and travels back in time to reunite with him again, a meeting that brings their story to a close.
Read More: When Does Our Times Take Place? Timeline Explained
