As Judith helps him recover, Dan starts noticing odd things about her behavior and inconsistencies in the story she’s told him. He also begins to understand that he used to be quite the asshole after trying to pal around with his slimy business partner, Jeb Scott (Corbin Bernsen) so he decides to dig deeper into the events that led to his fateful accident with the help of a private investigator called Gus (Hoskins, doing a hilariously over-the-top New York accent).
It’s not long before Dan uncovers a web of lies. He learns that, prior to the crash, his wife had been having an affair with a guy called Jack Stanton, and she eventually reveals to Dan that he’d found out about the affair and killed Stanton in a jealous rage. The two had apparently gotten rid of Stanton’s body together at an old, abandoned shipwreck and had crashed the car after leaving the scene.
That seems like an acceptable twist in the tale, but Shattered isn’t done. Though Judith’s story sounds viable, Dan still isn’t convinced, so he and Gus finally decide to get to the bottom of what the hell actually happened the night of the crash. Exploring the shipwreck, they open a tank of formaldehyde and discover the preserved body of the real Dan Merrick. That’s right, we’ve actually been following poor Jack Stanton with the surgically reconstructed face of Dan Merrick this entire time!
Judith reveals that she was the one who actually killed Dan after he attacked her in a jealous rage, and she and Stanton disposed of the body. Stanton wasn’t comfortable getting away with it. He had second thoughts and decided to go to the police, which sent Judith into a panic at the wheel that led to the late-night crash. In the end, Judith dies in yet another insane car wreck. Luckily, Stanton escapes this one, and the police close in to wipe up all the mess as the credits roll.
It’s a fantastic twist that you don’t see coming, despite a fair amount of signposting. That’s down to some great direction by Petersen and canny editing by Hannes Nikel (Das Boot) and Glenn Farr (The Right Stuff) who collectively manage to keep the truth from the audience until the tail end of the final act.
As a result, Petersen really does his adaptation of Richard Neely’s pulp noir novel The Plastic Nightmare justice. Not only does he pull off the 1969 book’s twists and turns in a more modern setting, but he also deftly uses his middling budget to swing between car chase action, soapy drama, and the spooky chills of the abandoned shipwreck, where his previous experience on Das Boot must have come in handy.
