Unveiling the Fate: Does the Dog Die in ‘The Choice’?

Divesh Solanki
January 17, 2024

Ross Katz’s feel-good romantic comedy “The Choice” from 2016 is based on a Nicholas Sparks novel. The film centers on two citizens of a small village, Gabby and Travis, played by Teresa Palmer and Benjamin Walker. Travis and Gabby are rivalrous next-door neighbors who first get into arguments before falling in love and navigating life’s challenges together. The couple’s dogs, Moby and Molly, who served as both their constant companions and the impetus for their meeting, travel with them. Given that Travis and Gabby experience several years of struggle throughout the film, viewers may question if Moby or Molly suffer any untoward events. So, here is all the information you require regarding what happened to the dogs in “The Choice.” Warning: Spoilers ahead!

Survival and Support: Moby and Molly’s Journey

The movie establishes an intriguing opposites-attract relationship between Gabby and Travis right away. When Gabby, a medical student, confronts Travis about his loud music late at night, that is how the two first meet. Gabby also believes that Molly, her dog, has been impregnated by Travis’ dog, Moby, during the same period. At the end of their first meeting, Gabby is furious with Travis because of his arrogant demeanor and he seems to be falling hard for the medical student. Eventually, Gabby learns that Travis is a veterinarian who practices at the same clinic when she goes to see the neighborhood vet.

Travis discloses that Moby is neutered and couldn’t have gotten Molly pregnant during another humorous meeting. Travis and Gabby frequently run into each other because they live next door in a small town. But for their lives to truly entwine with one another, Molly has to step in. Molly has a uterine collapse the night she gives birth to her pups. After her dog begins to weep and puke up in the middle of the night, a distraught Gabby knocks on Travis’ door.

Travis, a veterinarian, is able to assist Molly in giving birth to her puppies. To keep an eye on Molly’s health, he later drives her to the clinic. But Travis has to spend the remainder of the night on the clinic’s chilly floor since he heads there as soon as Molly gives birth. Travis becomes aware of the intensity of his affections for Gabby when his father, Dr. Shep, draws attention to the seriousness of his behavior. On the other hand, after seeing Travis’s loving and caring side, Gabby also begins to view him differently.

As the movie goes on, it becomes inevitable that Travis and Gabby will get together and start a family together with two children and their dogs. But soon after, after Gabby is involved in a car accident and goes into a coma, tragedy strikes the happy family. The Shaw-Holland household is barely hanging on during this period. Finally, when the doctors advise Travis to take Gabby off life support, he is faced with the hardest decision of his life.

Nevertheless, Moby’s discovery of Gabby’s misplaced wind chime at the waterfront gives Travis hope. Travis gets to work building a gazebo on their remote island for Gabby’s wind chime. Travis uses the construction of the gazebo as a diversion from his thoughts and a way to maintain his sanity, thanks to Moby.

After a while, Gabby emerges from her coma and goes back to her ecstatic family. In “The Choice,” neither of the dogs ends up dead. Moby and Molly offer Travis and Gabby support and friendship throughout the movie. Similarly, Moby and Molly are still adorable parts of the Shaw-Holland family even after Gabby’s recuperation.