Jossed
Xibalba's "You will see Maria again" will turn out to be a case of Exact Words.
He'll let Manolo return to the Land of the Living, but only to catch a glimpse of Maria in a Not What It Looks Like moment, possibly orchestrated by Xibalba himself. Xibalba will then declare that Maria has moved on and use this as an excuse to drag Manolo off to the Land of the Forgotten.- Jossed
Manolo will end up Deader than Dead at one point.
It'll be temporary, of course.- Jossed. It's shown through Manolo's grandfather that the remembered dead are pretty hardy, and Manolo is never seriously injured after dying.
- Although if they had gone with him turning into a Forgotten the longer he spent time in that land, that could have been this.
Alternately, he'll jump off the slippery slope and try to stop Manolo out of spite.
This will lead to his own downfall.- Jossed. While he does try to stop Manolo, it's mostly because he's a poor loser. He even seems repentant when Manolo completes his final trial.
The tour guide who narrates the film is a descendant of Manolo and Maria.
That's why she chooses to tell the children their story.- Jossed. She's La Muerte in disguise.
Manolo and Maria will end up Together in Death.
If we choose to take this remark
as foreshadowing. Perhaps the bandits attack San Angel in the climax, Manolo gives up his chance to be resurrected in order to help save the day and Maria gets fatally wounded while protecting the town.note - Jossed. They both live.
- Although, considering the setting, they are pretty much confirmed to eventually end up like this. Probably of old age.
A Bittersweet Ending will ensue.
Perhaps Manolo would realize that Maria would be better off with Joaquin and pulls off a Heroic Sacrifice that saves the entire town at the cost of his second chance to live. Joaquin will learn his lesson about humility and promises to name his child after him.- Alternately, all three of the leads end up dead somehow and only two of them can be resurrected. Joaquin decides to stay behind so Manolo and Maria can be together.
- Jossed. There are a few bittersweet elements in the ending (namely the death of Carlos and the loss of Joaquin's eye), but the characters are portrayed as being better off for their sacrifices and the overall tone is very happy.
The gods won't have the ability to resurrect Manolo, but The Power of Love will save him.
Not only Maria's love, but the love of his family and friends as well.- Jossed.
A third possibility for a Bittersweet Ending:
In this world, godhood works under a You Kill It, You Bought It system. Xibalba goes totally evil and kills La Muerte to take control of the Land of the Remembered. Because having him be the ultimate death god is a bad thing for obvious reasons, someone has to kill him. Either Manolo or Joaquin have to do the deed and become the new ruler of the Land of the Dead in the process. If it’s Manolo, then he’ll find some way to make Maria a goddess and they’ll rule together for eternity. The worlds are safe and the lovers are reunited, but likeable characters who could have been saved are gone and the heroes have been forced to make a major sacrifice for the greater good.- Jossed.
Xibalba will try to win the bet by casting a spell on Maria to make her love Joaquin.
As we've already seen, he clearly isn't above toying with people's emotions through non-magical means. It won't work, of course; either he'll have a change of heart and lift the spell before it's too late, or Maria's love for Manolo will overpower the magic.- Jossed.
If the movie series continues, it will be revealed that Chakal and Captain Mondragon are the same being.
In released images, Captain Mondragon looks a lot like Chakal and even has one of Xibalba's medals. Even further, Jorge refused to give away any information in regards to the similarities.- Based on the above guess, a future plot will involve Joaquin going into the underworld to rescue his father's soul. Perhaps he is trapped in the Land of the Forgotten as Chakal and Joaquin needs to get him to remember his true self so he can enter the Land of the Remembered?
- As of a recent tweet, this theory is Jossed.
Confirmed
Manolo and Xibalba will share a moment of similarity.
When you get right down to it, all they want is to get back to the women they love. La Muerte and Xibalba's estrangement.
The reason for the estrangement between named God Couple most likely had to do with the latter's constant interference with humans, and on one occasion he took the incident too far. Leaving La Muerte to separate (but not divorce) from him.- La Muerte still has feelings for her husband (since she didn't officially end her marriage with him), but wants him to change before going back to him.
- The incident that Xibalba went too far with was a Star-Crossed Lovers scenario that parallels the protagonists' situation.
- As it turns out, Word of God confirms that part of the reason for the estrangement included Xibalba cheating on La Muerte....or at least it looked like he did.
La Muerte will help Manolo on his journey.
La Muerte will offer Manolo advice on his journey, as well as provide him with the assistance of either her friends or his family.- We see him with at least one other spirit when he enters the rolling maze, so it's likely.
- Jossed. La Muerte is incapacitated for much of the film, and Manolo's journey is to find her.
- It's technically true... in that La Muerta pretty much ends Manolo's journey in the Land of the Dead once he tells her what Xibalba did
Xibalba will do a Heel–Face Turn.
In the end, he'll realize that his actions have hurt innocent people and bring Manolo back to life, regaining La Muerte's respect in the process.- In fact, the reason he may pull one if for the his wife, La Muerte. To explain, during the movie, one of his schemes go haywire and end up hurting his wife in some way or another. Causing the winged God to truly think about how his selfish actions lead to the near death of his beloved.
- Confirmed.
The female spirit seen with Manolo in the trailer is his mother.
It's been implied that Manolo is a "Well Done, Son" Guy, and in fiction, it's nearly required that this kind of character have a dead mother. He gets to connect with her (or reconnect, depending on how old he was when she died) once he enters the Land of the Remembered, and she becomes a mentor/guardian to him during his quest.- Confirmed.
Something bad will happen to La Muerte.
The Bet stipulates that the winner will become ruler of the Land of the Remembered. During the Darkest Hour, Xibalba will either win the bet or consider it won and arrive to conquer the place. Maybe La Muerte will be imprisoned, or she could even get killed. Basically, she'll be put in danger somehow to demonstrate how serious things are getting.- Sort of confirmed. She becomes trapped in the Land of the Forgotten when Manolo dies. However, it's made clear it's because of her own will, and she is seriously pissed when she finds out the Xibulba cheated.
- Xibalba still loves her. He may be fighting with her over their realms, but if she got really hurt in any way he would not be happy.
The bull that Manolo refuses to kill becomes important later.
The townsfolk kill it anyway, and Manolo finds it while trapped in the Land of the Forgotten. He befriends it, and it helps him escape somehow.- Yes and no. While that particular bull does not become important, Manolo's unwillingness to kill bulls helps him calm the spirits of all the bulls the Sanchez family had killed, thus winning back his life.
Manolo is resurrected before the Final Battle.
Released images show him in human form with Maria and Joaquin, seemingly preparing to fight an offscreen foe.- Confirmed.
Manolo's death was more or less a suicide attempt.
In reference to the original Orpheus myth, Manolo believes that Maria died by Xibalba's snake (which as he discovered a little later on that this is an elaborate ruse), and subsequently agrees to die along with her.- More or less confirmed. Judging from the way it's described in the novelization, he knows exactly what seeing Maria again entails when he tells Xibalba that he wants to do so.
One of Joaquin's medals was given to him by Xibalba in some form.
I noticed the one where his heart is was glowing in one shot of the trailer, and there was a green glow when Joaquin was fighting some bandits in one scene. There could be a connection between the two.- Confirmed. According to the novelization, it's the Medal of Everlasting Life (a medal that prevents the wearer from being injured or killed) that Xibalba secretly gave a young Joaquin in an attempt to cheat and win The Bet between himself and La Muerte .
Manolo and Maria's descendants are the Rivera family from El Tigre.
Look into your heart, you know it's true. Plus Manolo's body structure bares resemblance to the Rivera Heroes and El Tigre I.- As it turns out, Carmen's maiden name was actually Rivera and it is in fact those specific Riveras (or their ancestors)... so while it probably is not direct heritage, they are all family down the line.
The goth boy is a Sanchez.
- He's supposed to be Mexican-American, and he's the one who gets the most invested in the story.
Goth boy watches Mexican Soap Operas.
- I really have no proof, I just think it'd be cute/in character for him. Explains the whole "what is it with Mexicans and death" line.
Xibalba is secretly a bit of a kind-hearted animal lover.
- He starts having a change of heart right after he sees Manolo subdue the bull monster by singing to it and apologizing for the pain his family has caused it/them. Maybe killing animals for sport is part of the reason he thinks Humans Are Bastards, and Manolo's kindness to the bull is why he starts helping him instead.
- This post did some research, and this guess might be true.
- This post
The ashes of people in the Land of the Forgotten are eventually re-made into new souls to be reincarnated on earth.
- Because the Land of the Forgotten being a necessary part of the cycle of death and rebirth makes the concept of it a little less bleak. Not to mention the ashes could easily be one of the main ingredients to the Candlemaker's candles.
La Muerte, Xibalba, and the Candlemaker arranged the detention kids' trip
Seems a little too convenient for La Muerte to randomly select the last tour. Both La Muerte and Xibalba can take human forms, so there's no reason the Candlemaker shouldn't be able to make himself less cartoony. The point? To get the kids to remember them.- Corollary: the elderly tour guide from whom Mary Beth/La Muerte takes over at the beginning of the film was the Candlemaker.
- Semi-Confirmed: The Candlemaker was meant to be revealed as the bus driver, but this was cut to not take away from the reveal of La Murte and Xibalba at the end.
La Muerte and Xibalba had a son who grew up to be in charge of the holiday before Day of the Dead and called himself by the English version of his name.
Based entirely on this fanart from tumblr. And this one. Xibalba's eyes didn't used to be red. They turned red the first time he saw La Muerte.
Same for her. Just because of the cuteness and the "they only have eyes for each other" thing. Joaquin is biracial.
While answering tweets about Joaquin's mother, Jorge revealed that her first name is Gertrude. Obviously not a name commonly found in Mexico, being Germanic in origin. However, a significant number of Germans settled in Mexico in the mid-1800s. It's possible that Gertrude's ancestors were among these settlers, and that Joaquin is half white.- Confirmed.
Manolo and María will have a daughter...
And name her Catrina. The Medal of Everlasting Life is an Artifact of Doom
Let’s face it, anything made by Xibalba must have some major cons. You know what they say about ultimate power, and something that makes you invincible is pretty ultimate. Fortunately, Joaquin managed to use it for years and just gain a swelled head because he had two very important things to focus on: living up to his father’s heroic legacy, and María’s memory. This can also fit into the theory that Chakal is Captain Mondragon, and has been corrupted by the medal. Thomas (tour guide at the beginning) is a descendant of Maria
One fan pointed out the strong resemblance between Thomas and Maria's father. He might be a son or grandson of Maria and Manolo's.- Or he could be descended from a cousin of Maria's
- It's been confirmed that his last name is Posada and that he's a relative of Maria's, but he's most likely descended from one of her siblings or another family member.
Other
Maria is not General Posada's biological daughter.
Considering GP's personality and the knowledge that his marriage to Maria's mother ended in divorce, it's reasonable to assume that said marriage was an unhappy one. This eventually led to Mrs. Posada having an affair which resulted in a child, which she decided to pass off as her husband's. GP doesn't know for sure if this is the case, but he's suspicious enough that it's a factor in the divorce and in his callous treatment of Maria later on. One or more of the Trio could still be alive
It's more than a bit of a stretch seeing as the story proper takes place in an alternate 1920's, but hear me out here. Word of God said that Manolo's mother Carmen is the sister of Justice Jaguar from El Tigre, who is the father of Puma Loco, the title characters still living grandfather. So assuming that Carmen and Justice Jaguar were of similar ages, and started having kids at around the same time, then that would mean that Manolo and his friends would be in the same age group as Puma Loco, making it possible for them to still be alive. (Of the three Maria is the most likely, as women live longer, and she is the youngest of the three)- Actually, an original draft of the movie had an elderly Maria be the one to narrate the story instead of La Muerte (although she would have died shortly afterward), so it's not impossible.
The Bet would backfire in a future sequel
Not so much in the sense that it's wrong that Manolo and Maria got married. Rather, it was the conditions of how Xibalba lost the wager. La Muerte's condition was that if she won, he would stop interfering with the lives of mortals. One could say this was how the gods "disappeared" from mortal recollection in this story. However, if there were plans to eventually have Xibalba's evil brother be a villain, then there might come a time where the heroes ask him for help. But due to the previous wager, he'll be unable to help in the way they need him to. This leads me to 2 possible solutions.1. Using Exact Words, Xibalba will help in a way that doesn't count as interfering.2. La Muerte will make a bet with Xibalba, saying that if he completes a certain task contrary to his nature, she'll allow him to mess with humans again. This might make some more sense given their dynamics as gods, but you never know. The previous wager regarded Chakal
How else could he have known about, and possessed such a supernatural item as the medal without interference from the gods?We know that Xibalba cheated to win the last bet, and that Chakal was a successful, and terrifying bandit when the plot begins, so it would make sense that the story as we know it is Xibalba trying to pull the same trick to win again.note Those who eventually disintegrate in the Land of the Forgotten will be reincarnated into new individuals.
A continuation of the cycle of life, if you will, and reincarnation has been confirm to exist in the Mexopolis universe. When bit once by Xibalba's snake staff, the victim technically dies but has their soul trapped inside their body.
Surely, Manolo or Joaquin would first check for her pulse before believing Maria is dead. If Maria was simply unconscious or under a coma, they should easily be able to tell that she's still alive. One snakebite might kill a victim's body, while the second would release their soul. Even though she was technically dead, Maria couldn't go to the Land of the Remembered because her soul was trapped inside her unresponsive body. However, this also allowed Joaquin to revive her later on; Maria could regain control of herself once her body was restored.