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I've recently watched the final episodes of The Magicians and Agents of SHIELD. And I am thinking about the endings of narratives; novels and TV series. And film series, too. I have, I think, about 13 points to make on this.
1. Both series ended satisfactorily from my point of view. Plotlines were tied up, narrative themes echoed back, characters were shown to have ongoing lives - which could be the subjects of future stories, if that were to happen - and the characters who didn't make it were noted.
2. The endings of novels are more or less taken for granted. The novel doesn't get published if it doesn't have an ending (usually, anyway), except for the really big fantasy doorstopper-series, and I suspect those are getting some suspicion in the wake of GRRM fucking around instead of finishing Game of Thrones.
3. TV series often don't get an ending, because they get cancelled. On the one hand, this is annoying because it leaves a story hanging. On the other, it means that nobody is disappointed with the actual ending, as inevitably happens to someone otherwise.
4. A disappointing ending can straight-up erase a TV from public memory. This is visible in Game of Thrones, where it was the subject of memes and water-cooler conversations for years, and then completely evaporated after that. Although I'm not familiar with it, I understand the same thing happened with How I Met Your Mother.
5. Most disappointing endings result from the writers not having a plan to begin with. This is a perfectly ok way to write a single work; you can go back and fix stuff before it's seen by the public. It doesn't work so well with something that's being sent out into the world as you're working. Lost is the canonical example of this, with Battlestar Galactica not far behind.
6. Shakespeare, it's claimed, had two endings; the comedy, ending in a marriage or reunion, and the tragedy, ending in the death of the hero. This doesn't fit the kind of endings we want to see anymore, quite, (and particularly not with ensemble narratives) but it does give a shape to things.
7. I was about to set out the kinds of endings there are for ensemble shows, but realised that's a trap - endings are more about tone than actual events.
8. In Western music theory, there's a chord progression (II-V-I) which sounds like the end of a piece. We have a similar concept around the end of a sentence (even if some accents handle it differently).
9. So there's a kind of narrative beat that makes sense to us as an ending, and it doesn't entirely matter if all the loose ends are tied up, or the actual plot resolves, as long as it feels like an ending.
10. It's possible to do this well in film and TV as well as writing, obviously. The two series I've mentioned here do it. the Lord of the Rings movie has about five endings, to make sure you really know, and that works there.
11. As far as I can see, it's usually achieved by having all the major characters - or all the surviving major characters, and maybe some representation of the fallen - in one place, each having achieved some thing during the course of the overall plot, and then showing that they're continuing with their lives/existence/other quests.
12. I'm not sure how applicable this is to my chosen medium, tabletop RPGs, but I reckon I can think about it. I've brought a few campaigns to an end, but doing so in a manner satisfactory to all players is really tough. And because of my habit of running long campaigns, I don't get much practice.
13. I think my description of the way TV plots end also applies to the Marvel Cinematic Universe's first full arc, finishing up at Avengers: Endgame. I'm trying to think of series it doesn't apply to, because surely it can't be that simple.
1. Both series ended satisfactorily from my point of view. Plotlines were tied up, narrative themes echoed back, characters were shown to have ongoing lives - which could be the subjects of future stories, if that were to happen - and the characters who didn't make it were noted.
2. The endings of novels are more or less taken for granted. The novel doesn't get published if it doesn't have an ending (usually, anyway), except for the really big fantasy doorstopper-series, and I suspect those are getting some suspicion in the wake of GRRM fucking around instead of finishing Game of Thrones.
3. TV series often don't get an ending, because they get cancelled. On the one hand, this is annoying because it leaves a story hanging. On the other, it means that nobody is disappointed with the actual ending, as inevitably happens to someone otherwise.
4. A disappointing ending can straight-up erase a TV from public memory. This is visible in Game of Thrones, where it was the subject of memes and water-cooler conversations for years, and then completely evaporated after that. Although I'm not familiar with it, I understand the same thing happened with How I Met Your Mother.
5. Most disappointing endings result from the writers not having a plan to begin with. This is a perfectly ok way to write a single work; you can go back and fix stuff before it's seen by the public. It doesn't work so well with something that's being sent out into the world as you're working. Lost is the canonical example of this, with Battlestar Galactica not far behind.
6. Shakespeare, it's claimed, had two endings; the comedy, ending in a marriage or reunion, and the tragedy, ending in the death of the hero. This doesn't fit the kind of endings we want to see anymore, quite, (and particularly not with ensemble narratives) but it does give a shape to things.
7. I was about to set out the kinds of endings there are for ensemble shows, but realised that's a trap - endings are more about tone than actual events.
8. In Western music theory, there's a chord progression (II-V-I) which sounds like the end of a piece. We have a similar concept around the end of a sentence (even if some accents handle it differently).
9. So there's a kind of narrative beat that makes sense to us as an ending, and it doesn't entirely matter if all the loose ends are tied up, or the actual plot resolves, as long as it feels like an ending.
10. It's possible to do this well in film and TV as well as writing, obviously. The two series I've mentioned here do it. the Lord of the Rings movie has about five endings, to make sure you really know, and that works there.
11. As far as I can see, it's usually achieved by having all the major characters - or all the surviving major characters, and maybe some representation of the fallen - in one place, each having achieved some thing during the course of the overall plot, and then showing that they're continuing with their lives/existence/other quests.
12. I'm not sure how applicable this is to my chosen medium, tabletop RPGs, but I reckon I can think about it. I've brought a few campaigns to an end, but doing so in a manner satisfactory to all players is really tough. And because of my habit of running long campaigns, I don't get much practice.
13. I think my description of the way TV plots end also applies to the Marvel Cinematic Universe's first full arc, finishing up at Avengers: Endgame. I'm trying to think of series it doesn't apply to, because surely it can't be that simple.
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I didn't hate the end of HIMYM but I was never invested in it. GoT and BSG, now...
And as for Dexter!