It's funny the way you can start a post series, but take so long in between installments that what you wanted to say shifts over time. That's definitely the case here. Welcome to another infrequent Workshop Wednesday post, this one the second part, and conclusion, of this post about story endings.
In my Part 1 post, I talked about the importance of audience expectation, and of maintaining the integrity of your character journeys. I talked about my dislike for the "shock value over substantive conclusion" approach to storytelling. And, in general, I like to talk about the ways the characters of our stories take on lives of their own and steer our stories. They do; they absolutely do. But there's one very important aspect of writing endings that I haven't discussed yet, and which I want to focus on here.
It's this: no matter how real it feels, no matter how organic and human, a fiction story is, at its heart, fiction, and you the author are choosing to tell it.
You choose the ending.
You also choose which aspects of the story to focus on along that journey. You choose that emphasis. The ending should carry forward the themes already established and it should preserve the emphasis you've already layered into the beginning and middle of your story.
When I see readers and viewers come to the defense of a piece of media that has disappointed its audience, I often hear this phrase: "Not all endings are happy. Life doesn't always work out the way you want it to."
Yes, that's correct. But this wasn't real life - even if parts of it felt terribly real. This was a story. This was a construct that someone created with purpose, piece by piece. If the end was discordant, that wasn't a reflection of "real life." That was the creator dropping the ball.
Every scene in a story serves a purpose, even the quietest and fluffiest of scenes. Each scene tells us something about the people, the characters, who populate the story. As an author or filmmaker, you get to choose what to tell your audience. If you want the audience to root for the romance, you have to build that romance on the page or screen. If you want the audience to revile a character, you have to show them the reasons to do so. Over the course of a story, you're showing your audience who your characters are, and the ending should underline what you've already said - not walk it back.
Back in the spring, I went on a bit of a blog post rant (nothing "bit" about it. I ranted, friends) about the "final" film in the decade-long run of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Avengers: Endgame. A film so mind-bogglingly out of step with every film that came before it, that it's soured every Marvel film property for me. In the wake of the film, there was a clear divide online between fans who thought it was wondrous, and fans like me, left with an ugly taste in their mouths.
The thing about this superhero films is: I know they aren't high art. They aren't Oscar-worthy, and I never needed them to be. With each film helmed by different directors and writers, there's lots of inconsistency; the mash-up, ensemble films are messy and clumsy. It's been clear from the first that, until very recently, there was no effort toward a unifying ending; they kept making movies in an anthology format, building on what was already there as popularity allowed. I never asked them to be perfect. But I did love many of the characters - I wonder now if that was all tied up in the actors' dedication to those characters - and had managed, through the jokes and missteps, to understand the overarching narratives being built for each character.
But the film billed as the "epic conclusion" doesn't only fail to underline what we've already learned about our characters - it seemed to purposefully strip away the qualities the audience found endearing. At times I've thought it was just clumsy on the writers'/directors' parts, especially given their nonsensical "explanations" after the film's release. But at other times it feels like Marvel intended to alienate some fans. It feels vicious. "Steve was this dork who needed to get a life," the writers joked, and that tells me they never had a clue what anyone loved about that character.
There was no love in that film. It was a cash grab - a successful one. I guess I never should have expected anything more.
Oh, the essays I could write on the travesty that is character development in that franchise, but for now, I'm officially divorced from any and all future MCU content. I would have rather watched all my favorite characters die heroically than watch them abandon the character arcs those same writers and directors have spent years trying to sell me as the most important. They retconned their own stories at the eleventh hour, and any writers' workshop would tell you that was not the thing to do.
Endgame is my white whale of bad endings, but let's not forget Lost, and How I Met Your Mother, and Game of Thrones, and Dexter...the list could go on.
In each of these cases, I think the problem isn't a case of the audience wanting a happy ending - or any sort of specific ending. It's a case of the narrative dedicating itself to one thing, and then, at the end, revoking that narrative.
It's one thing to be sad at the end; it's quite another to feel like the end of the story is a zero sum. Like you've become invested for nothing. Like all the things you loved about that piece of media were never true.
People would forgive you making them cry. What they don't forgive as easily is making them feel stupid.
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