Theory suggests that another boss was controlled in ‘Ratatouille’

Released in 2007, in “Ratatouille” we learn the story of the little mouse Remy, who dreamed of becoming a chef, and ends up having this opportunity when he meets Linguini, son of the renowned Chef Gusteau, but who did not know how to cook. With that, the rodent starts to help his new friend by controlling him hidden under his hat, where together they create impeccable dishes.

However, a curious theory shared by a fan on Reddit suggests that another character was also controlled by a rat: Gusteau himself.

The theory

According to user pinktense, there are two main pieces of evidence for this theory. The first is based on the opening scene of the film, where a television shows a report on the bad review the chef received from Anton Ego. The report shows different magazine covers that praise the chef’s success, and in one of them, you can see his hat raised, containing the shadow of what is supposedly a rat.

The second piece of evidence appears in the scene where Chef Skinner is trying to prove whether Linguini is really Gusteau’s son and the heir to the restaurant. To do this, he decides to perform a DNA test using a strand of hair he found on the renowned chef’s hat.

However, when talking to the lawyer who would take the hair for testing, the man tells him that, in fact, the hair he had given him was rodent hair. As pointed out by ScreenRant, during the film, at no point does Skinner pick up Linguini’s hat to look for a strand of his hair, since, to perform the DNA test, he used the younger man’s saliva.

In this way, the internet user points out that the rodent thread found in Gusteau’s hat could not be Remy’s, but rather the rat itself that controlled the renowned chef. Furthermore, the theory also states that Gusteau would not have died due to Ego’s bad review, but rather because his rodent friend would have also died.

Thus, the great chef, who did not know how to cook without the help of the rat, came to the conclusion that he would not be able to maintain his reputation without the presence of the rodent. Ego’s terrible review, in fact, would have happened because the dish he tasted was made by Gusteau alone, after the death of the little rat.