Shyamalan said that he wanted to market Unbreakable as a comic book movie, but Disney—which had not yet bought Marvel Comics—preferred to advertise it as a supernatural thriller like The Sixth Sense.
Shyamalan has noted that while it is based on comic book superheroes, and refers to comic books, it is not actually derived from comic book material itself. In contrast to most superhero films, the series is also generally grounded in reality, and is seen as a deconstruction of the superhero genre.
Unbreakable is considered the first auteur superhero franchise, as all of its movies are written and directed by the same visionary filmmaker: M. Night Shyamalan. The Unbreakable movie trilogy, also known as the Eastrail 177 trilogy, draws inspiration from superhero comics.
M. Night Shyamalan completed the Unbreakable trilogy with his crossover comic book thriller Glass, which connected the characters and events of Unbreakable to Split in a few unexpected ways. Split was a stealth sequel to Unbreakable.
Featuring characters like Samuel L. Jackson's villainous Mr. Glass and the many personalities who inhabit the body of James McAvoy's Kevin Wendell Crumb, this universe has its roots not in the comic libraries of Marvel or DC but rather in Shyamalan's own imagination.
Glass is a 2019 superhero film written and directed by M. Night Shyamalan, who also produced with Jason Blum, Marc Bienstock, and Ashwin Rajan. The film is a crossover and sequel to Shyamalan's previous films Unbreakable (2000) and Split (2016) and the third and final installment in the Unbreakable trilogy.
Glass combines characters from Unbreakable and Split in a showdown showcasing their unique superhuman traits in a psychiatric facility setting. While Glass can be enjoyed as a standalone film, watching Unbreakable and Split enriches the narrative with important context and character connections.
Invulnerability: David Dunn's main power is the ability to withstand incredible physical abuse leaving him with no markings at all. It was first revealed to him at the beginning of the film when he was able to be the sole survivor of a train crash without a single scratch on him.
David Dunn is a fictional superhero and protagonist in M. Night Shyamalan's Unbreakable film series, portrayed by American actor Bruce Willis. Dunn is a former college football prodigy and a security guard who discovers he has superhuman abilities.
Unbreakable's story subverts superhero tropes until it reaches an unusually happy ending for Shyamalan—then Price asks Dunn to shake his hand. That's when Dunn realizes that Price engineered the circumstances that revealed his powers, including a train crash at the beginning of the movie that claimed 130 lives.
Bruce Willis's character David Dunn actually has a couple superpowers. He's basically invulnerable, which is how he survives the train crash, and he has some kind of extrasensory perception, so he can identify criminals through physical contact. (He's like The Flash TV series' version of Vibe.)
In Philadelphia in 1961, Elijah Price is born with Type I osteogenesis imperfecta, a rare disease that renders sufferers' bones extremely fragile and prone to fracture.
He suggests to Dunn that he could possess superhuman strength and an inability to become sick or get injured, and although Dunn is skeptical, he goes through a series of tests that seem to confirm this theory. It's revealed, however, that his weakness is water.
By contrast, The Beast has a raw power that seems to carry him through fights. His instincts appear to be better than Dunn's, and they're basically matched in terms of strength. Kevin likely would have won if the two hadn't been interrupted in Glass.
Some of Shyamalan's appearances in his movies can be ruled out. For example, unless David Dunn and Malcolm Crowe are identical twins who were separated at birth, it's safe to say that The Sixth Sense and Unbreakable are not set in the same universe.
"Glass" takes place ~19 years after "Unbreakable," but pretty soon after the end of "Split." David Dunn tells a character in "Glass" he used to work as a security guard in a stadium 15 years ago. But later in the movie, Elijah makes it clear that the train accident David was in occurred 19 years ago.
This happiness came to an end when her uncle molested her while they were on a hunting trip together, leaving Casey traumatized. To make matters worse, Casey's uncle, John was the only legal guardian to take care of her after her father passed away.
There have been no discussions about continuing the Unbreakable franchise with a fourth installment, but M. Night Shyamalan has now revealed a scrapped idea for Glass that would have connected The Visit to the series.
The camera then tracks over to reveal Bruce Willis, reprising his role of David Dunn (evidenced by his nametag), who dryly confirms the old villain's identity as Mr. Glass and walks out. It's a plot twist that reveals the characters of Split and Unbreakable have been in the same world all along.
