One Battle After Another Explained | What Time Is It?

To understand One Battle After Another, I want you to think about a garden. 

If you put time and effort into a garden, it will look nice. If you ignore the garden, then slowly and inevitably other forces will act on it. Insects will eat the leaves and roots. Weeds will commandeer the soil. Animals will dig and burrow. Weather will take its toll. The world will destroy your garden if you let it. 

Stay active, and you’ll have the garden you want. Get distracted and you’ll lose it.

Paul Thomas Anderson takes this concept and maps it to life, specifically the idea that, when we’re younger, we’re more active and more willing to fight for the garden. But, as we get older, we become complacent. Weeds collect. Grubs feed. The flowers wilt. 

Pat vs. Bob

Zoom out for a second and ignore the insane amount of story beats and just think about Leonardo DiCaprio’s character. Pat is a 26-year-old revolutionary, the Rocket Man. Bob is a 42-year-old burnout. He goes from young and happy to old and dormant. What happens when we become complacent is the core of the film. 

Lockjaw as entropy

Like with Eddington, I think people will focus on the politics of One Battle After Another and miss the bigger picture. They’ll center discussion around left vs right, revolution vs obedience, and overlook the heart of the matter. 

Lockjaw doesn’t just represent the right and white nationalism, he is a consequence of poor choices, much like Anton Chigurh in No Country For Old Men. 

Three key bits of dialogue

There are three bits of dialogue from Bob that I really want you to pay attention to. 

The first is when Bob can’t remember the password and keeps calling and arguing with Comrade Josh. Here’s what he said then: My name is Bob Ferguson. I don’t know if you’ve ever heard of me, alright. I was part of French 75 for years, years and years. They used to call my Ghetto Pat. Rocket Man. Stuff like that. Only problem is I’ve fried my brain since then, man. I have abused drugs and alcohol for the past 30 years, man. I’m a drug and alcohol lover. And I cannot remember for the life of me or the life of my only child the answer to your question. What time is it? 

The second is a bit later, when Pat’s in the car with Sensei. He says: Just never thought this fucker would come back for us. I got lazy, man. I wasn’t paying attention. I thought the person coming through that door one day was gonna be her mom, not this fucking asshole. See her daughter, you know. Teach her girl stuff. She’d do her hair. She’d be a mom. I can’t do her hair, man. You know that? I don’t know how to do her hair right.

The last one comes once Bob and Willa are back home. I’ve been holding onto something for a while now, and I wanted to give it to you, okay? And I didn’t give it to you before because I just didn’t want to expose you to certain stuff, you know? I didn’t want you to feel sad or confused about it. I don’t, I don’t know what I wanted. I wanted to protect you. From all your mom’s shit. From all my shit. I supposed I wanted to be the one that you came to for help, right? You know, the one, the cool dad, that you could say anything to. Even though I know that’s impossible. But I don’t want to lie to you about anything anymore. 

In the first quote, Bob acknowledges that his poor lifestyle is why he can’t remember the password that would save his life and his daughter’s lives. His stagnation has led to an inability to take action. He outright states that in the second quote. And in the third one, he comes clean to Willa about his own weakness and fear. The first quote is desperate, the second is reflective, and the third is cathartic. The events of the film are essentially a way to trigger the character’s self-reflection and redemption. 

You could tell Bob’s story any number of ways. He could have been a celebrated guitarist in a popular rock band, but then quits the band to be a dad. In this version of the story, he still spends 16 years on the couch. Then, say, his daughter forces him to go on a road trip with her and Bob once again falls in love with music. Or, he could have been a gardener who gave up gardening because he got distracted by other things. Only for the events of the story to remind him why he needs to garden. 

The basic movement is “I knew something. I forgot it. And this experience reminded me why the thing is important.”

Willa’s coming of age and the letter from Perfidia

Willa’s character arc is similar. Except it’s not about remembering a lesson lost. She’s learning the lesson for the first time. For her, it’s a very dramatic coming of age story. Early on, she’s just a normal, clueless teenager at a school dance. By the end, she’s incredibly aware of the world at large and the struggles that take place therein. Her innocence is gone. Having crossed that threshold, she earns the letter from her mom, which essentially states that Willa now shares responsibility for the garden. 

Dear Charlene. Hello from the other side of the shadows. I don’t mean to shock you, but I’ve been contemplating writing you for a long time. I often wake up and I find it completely crazy how and why I am where I am today, disconnected from my family. I pretend my whole life, pretend to be strong, pretended to be dead. Is it too late for us, after all my lies? Are you happy? Do you have love? What will you do when you get older? Will you try to change the world like I did? We failed. Maybe you will not. Maybe you will be the one who puts the world right. I think of you every single day. every single day. And I wish I had been strong for the both of us. I know some day, when it’s right and it’s safe, you will find me. Please send a kiss to your dad, my Ghetto Pat. Love, your mom, Perfidia. 

Bob has an iPhone

At the end of One Battle After Another, Bob’s on the couch, trying to figure out how to use an iPhone. That may seem silly but it’s actually a huge sign of growth. He had spent 16 years completely paranoid and disconnected from everyone and everything. Him having an iPhone means he’s trying to be part of the world again. Likewise, Willa has joined the revolution. She’s taking action, trying to help, trying to make a difference. And both are much happier than they were. 

Willa becoming a revolutionary means that Bob didn’t just save his daughter. He also saved someone who will make a difference in the struggle. Even if he himself isn’t fighting on the front lines, by doing his part as a parent, he’s contributing. That’s another reason why his constant pursuit of Willa was important. Even though she kind of ultimately saves herself, with a little help from Avanti, Bob finally giving a damn meant something.

And I want to clarify, the film isn’t saying all kids should become revolutionaries. The literal resistance in the film is hyperbole, dramatization. In real life, a positive contribution can take many forms. Being a great teacher, a caring doctor, a patient friend, a present parent. What matters is showing up and engaging with the world.

Am I really going to ignore the political discussion?

Okay, so with Eddington, I really believe anyone who primarily thinks of that film as a political statement is missing Aster’s larger point about the loss of a shared reality and how that’s created conflict in society as a whole, not just politically. It’s not about right vs. left so much as it’s about what has created such a rift between the right and the left. 

With One Battle After Another, PTA takes sides in a way Aster doesn’t. Progress is the garden. And far-right conservatism is the force acting on the garden. If no one fights for progress, for freedoms, for equality, for themselves, for others, for our children, for the future, then you’ll lose ground to the Lockjaws of the world who want a Christmas society (white nationalism). 

And that’s what’s happening right now, in America, in 2025. Trump’s government is full of Lockjaws and Christmas Adventurers Club members.

We’re the ones who have to fight for the garden we want. For the country we want. For the world we want. But many of us are distracted. By phones, computers, social media, YouTube, Reddit, etc. The real world is stressful, so we’d rather read about celebrity gossip, or run a stan account on Twitter. Weeds collect. Grubs feed. We don’t vote. Racists take over the government. 

It’s one battle after another. That’s how we have to live our lives, to get the most out of life. And that’s the generational struggle that parents pass down to their children. 

With that said, I don’t mean all of us have to become political revolutionaries. But you should come out of OBAA doing some self-reflection about the ways in which you have grown complacent, like Bob, or been sheltered from the world like Willa. If you’re honest with yourself, One Battle After Another could be one of the most important movies you ever watch, because it’s one of the few movies that directly calls out our bad habits, our delusions and illusions. 

To get personal for a moment. I’m 38. My main goal in life was to be, is to be,  a great novelist. And while I’ve had two novels published through a small press, I’ve lost momentum. From ages 22 to 27, I read 30 pages every day. I wrote, every day. I was submitting poems and short stories. But then I moved to Austin, TX. I started dating my now wife. I spent a bit more time on Film Colossus, on a Kanye West podcast that went from popular to doomed, almost overnight. I got a dog. I’ve played more video games. I spent more time on Reddit, on Twitter. I got a corporate job to see what that’s like. I keep telling myself, “Yeah, I’ll write. I’ll get back to it.” It’s been 5 years since my last book. The days pass by like each of those hills in the car chase, one after another, after another.  

Do you remember the answer to the question “What time is it?” It was “Time doesn’t exist, yet it controls us anyway.” It’s easy to forget that time is real. That time matters. That we’re running out of it. Every second gained is another lost. That there’s a Lockjaw coming for us, in the form of disease, or a car crash, or falling down the stairs, or financial ruin.

What we put in, we get out. What we fight for, we protect.

One Battle After Another was a polite criticism I needed to hear. It has me reevaluating my priorities, how I’m spending my time, etc. I’m seeing things as gardens, and some are lovely. Others need attention. This is power of a movie that’s a work of art and not just a temporary escape. A great movie can change your life, save your life. Man, I love movies. Thanks, PTA.

Sensei Sergio St. Carlos 

Immigration is obviously a major motif in One Battle After Another. The film starts with the operation to free immigrants from the Otay Mesa detention center. And then we have Sergio’s evaluation of the undocumented workers in Baktan Cross. 

I think it’s worth noting that Sergio’s the opposite of Bob. Where Bob gave up, Sergio is still an active revolutionary. He’s been actively helping people, he has a plan, he doesn’t miss a beat. In fact, most of the active revolutionaries are people of color. Regina Hall’s Deandra. The nuns at Sisters of the Brave Beaver. Even Avanti, the indigenous bounty hunter, ends up revolting against the racist group he was supposed to leave Willa with.  

I wonder if this was a conscious choice on PTA’s part, him showing that non-white people never gave up the fight while Bob had the privilege to disconnect from it all? Or if that’s reading too deep into it/ 

Cast

• Directed by – Paul Thomas Anderson
• Bob Ferguson/Pat Calhoun – Leonardo DiCaprio
• Willa Ferguson/Charlene Calhoun – Chase Infiniti
• Colonel Steven J. Locklaw – Sean Penn
• Sergio St. Carlos – Benicio del Toro
• Perfidia Beverly Hills – Teyana Taylor
• Deandra – Regina Hall
• Mae West – Alana Haim
• Laredo – Wood Harris
• Junglepussy – Shayna Mchayle
• Howard Sommerville – Paul Grimstad
• Avanti – Eric Scweig
• Based on – Vineland by Thomas Pynchon
• Written by – Paul Thomas Anderson