Ambiguous Ending

Sometimes the resolution isn't clear-cut. There's a lot left unexplained and the audience is still asking questions.

Contrast Happy Ending and Downer Ending, where the conclusion is obvious.

Examples of Ambiguous Ending include:

Anime and Manga

• The utterly infamous Hentai Doujinshi Emergence by ShindoL ends this way in the manga itself. Did Saki merely hallucinate about being a mother before dying of a drug overdose, or did she get to survive after all, clean up her act, and become a mother for real? Assuming that Death of the Author is in play, the manga seems to suggest that it could go either way (though comments by ShindoL strongly suggest it's the former).

Film - Live Action

• Inception: Ends with Cobb returning home to his children after a successful heist. Just to be sure, he spins his totem top one more time, but runs off to see his kids before it stops. The screen cuts to black before the audience knows as well, leaving it up in the air if Cobb is still dreaming or not.

Video Games

• Deadeus: The Sleep Ending, the Leave Town Ending, the Dad Ending and (possibly) the Flower Ending qualify. In the Sleep Ending, nothing seemed to happen, but since the boy was asleep, there would be no way for him to know if he had died. In the Leave Town Ending, the boy is still alive, but it probably would not matter if Deadeus destroyed the world. The Dad Ending has the boy deciding to stay with his father's body, and it is not clear what happened after that. In the Flower Ending, Deadeus accepted the offering and spared the boy's life, but it implied that it would not do the same for everyone else.
• No Delivery: As for the fate of the player character, the Survival Ending implies that they survived, the Death Ending says that they are presumed dead, and the rest do not really say. The one exception is the Termination Ending, where the Manager kills the player character. As for what happens after the endings, they give some messages that are rather odd.