Apple TV Plus’ The Family Plan stars Mark Wahlberg as Dan Morgan, a covert operative who leaves his old life to start a new one. However, his family has no inkling about the person he once was. Dan unwittingly invites trouble after someone posts a photo of him online, thus pulling a lot of “unexpected rabbits” out of the hat for his family.
The Family Plan is a fun family comedy that delivers on its promise. Although the expectations are low, to begin with, you will have a good time with your family watching this.
The Family Plan isn’t able to escape the clutches of genre saturation, though, and lacks imagination. The writing doesn’t offer many twists and turns but the chemistry among the core family is quite good. Besides Wahlberg, Michelle Monaghan and Ciaran Hinds also add star power to the cast. In this explainer, we revisit the movie’s plot and break down its essential elements for our readers, along with an explainer for its ending.
The Family Plan Plot Summary
Dan Morgan is a seemingly ordinary car salesman. He is great at his job, meriting an employee of the month award on every occasion. However, he refuses to accept it, for some reason. Dan remains detached from technology and hardly steps out of Buffalo, New York, where he lives with his wife, Jessica, and kids Nina and Kyle. Jessica is a physical therapist, who has arguably grown bored with the mundane rigour of their lives. Dan is dutiful to his responsibilities as a father, ticking every box when it comes to being present in his kids’ lives.
He takes an active interest in everything that they do, earning him the tag of a “softie.” However, all of this changes on the day of the couple’s marriage anniversary. During their regular celebratory routine at a theme park, a hooligan clicks a photo of the couple kissing. Despite Dan’s pleadings, he uploads it online. That sparks a chain of events that forces Dan to go on the run with his family – an impromptu road trip with the family to Vegas.
Why are McCaffrey’s men after Dan?
McCaffrey is portrayed as a crime boss who runs a gang of covert operatives. Dan explains that his job was to go on these missions to assassinate their targets. They were mostly bad villain-type guys but after a certain point, Dan and the others had no idea whom they were killing. McCaffrey started selling them as a mercenary team to the highest bidder and that is when Dan decided to leave his old life behind. McCaffrey explains that he has “unfinished business” with Dan, a.k.a, his son. He had invested all his energies and significant money on Dan to perfect him.
Some members of the team also want revenge because Dan abandoned them. They were like a close-knit family and his betrayal not only put them in danger but also took him out of their lives. As soon as they got a whiff of his whereabouts, McCaffrey and his men were after Dan. The real reason, as revealed by McCaffrey at the end, was to recruit him back. He explained that Dan was his best operative and that he himself missed the action.
McCaffrey alludes to the fact that even on a family vacation, Dan ended up killing four men like it was nothing for him. He relished the adrenaline rush like the old days, which is enough evidence to suggest that he wants to go back to his old life.
How does Dan’s family react when he tells them the truth?
This part of the movie goes quite predictably. After having reached Vegas successfully, Dan met with Augie, his resource person, at the bar. Augie had made fake IDs and passports for Dan and his family to crossover into Canada. Dan had also planned a romantic dinner with Jess where he was supposed to tell her the truth. However, before that could happen, McCaffrey’s men caught up with them and attacked the couple. Dan sprung into action and saved Jess. But they didn’t have enough time to talk about what happened since both the kids were missing from the room.
They were at an event called HypeX where Kyle participated in a gaming tournament under his game tag “Kyllboi.” Somehow, they managed to evade the attention of another killer, who came very close to killing the family. Dan finally told them the truth about his past life and how he ran away from his old gang. The reaction of the family is along expected lines, where they claim not to recognize or know the person that Dan really is. They are all befuddled and hurt by the lie that has come to shape their lives all these years.
This prompts the kids and Jess to abandon him. Jess calls Gwen, a travel agent she had earlier met during a boxing training class. She makes arrangements for Jess’ family to be flown out of Vegas to her immediate family. However, there is yet another twist in the tale as Gwen turns out to be Dan’s ex-wife.
The Family Plan Ending Explained:
The trio is then taken to an abandoned hotel/casino where McAffrey calls Dan and offers him a choice. Either Dan can choose to come back and join his gang or watch his family die. If he chooses the former, he will not be able to contact them ever again. He chooses that option and Jess takes the kids back. As they are going down the elevator, the kids encourage Jess to not abandon Dan like this and fight for him. Jess is inspired by the suggestion and tries to get back to the relevant floor. Gwen initiates physical intimacy after they are gone and Dan expertly cuts himself free and neutralizes her.
However, McCaffrey gets a whiff of the emerging situation and brings all of his men back to the atrium. Dan and his family have no other options for leaving the hotel. Dan decides that he will take them out one by one and sends everyone to the roof. He also asks Kyle for his help by using a high-tech drone to navigate the sea of men that he will face. Dan and Kyle collectively take out most of McCaffrey’s men. This overlaps with Gwen regaining her senses and going to the roof to confront Jess.
Since Dan isn’t willing to kill his father, McCaffrey takes advantage of it and holds him at gunpoint. Jess pulls out a remarkable manoeuvre where she throws a bamboo at Gwen like a javelin, using her decathlon experience. This kills Gwen and the trio rushes down before McCaffrey can kill Dan. Nina distracts him with an emotional speech, giving Dan enough time to knock him unconscious. As they leave, we see a fleet of police cars already at the scene.
The final moments of the scene reveal the following about the members.
Dan is now working as a security consultant for law enforcement, helping them shore up defences against modern methods of robberies and aggravated attacks. The story about McCaffrey and his gang is broken out by Nina, who is now determined to realize her dreams of becoming a journalist. Kyle has managed to strike a balance between his gaming addiction and other things in life. Jess is now the coach of a high school decath team, training athletes like herself.
The family is shown to have overcome their dysfunction to a great extent and started a new chapter in their lives together.
Read More: The Family Plan Movie Review