There’s been years of multiple endings to some long-running serials on TV, regardless of their popularity and quality. After investing so much time in these shows and movies, complaining about everything that’s been falsely represented, fans are now having to confront the reality of finding new things to complain about.
In a sense, it’s not unlike the reaction to the redacted Mueller Report, which I’d represent in a vein similar to a character of mine: AntiClimax Man.
“THAT was the series finale?! I can’t believe it!”
“It’s not over yet. There’s still more to come.”
“Yeah, but I was still hoping for more. There was so much built up over the years, and they kept stringing us along, with the hope that everything would be wrapped up in a satisfactory manner!”
“So... let me get this straight. You’ve got a guy who resolves everything anticlimactically. He’s known for defusing unstable situations that others would escalate. And you’re upset that the end of the season was anticlimactic?”
“It should’ve been more far-reaching!”
“If you bothered to read the original work it’s based on, you’d know it’s par for the course.”
“This latest season is a complete waste of time! I don’t know why I bothered!”
“So I take it you’re not going to watch the next episode then?”
“Are you kidding?! If I don’t, I won’t know what everybody’s talking about!”
In a sense, the ending to a series can make or break a title. Just look at the vicious fan reaction to the abysmal endings to LOST and Game of Thrones, the former which relied heavily on the Mystery Box, without delving any deep thought to what the contents of the Mystery Box should contain. The whole purpose of stringing an audience along is not just to compel them to follow the story you’re setting up, but also operating under the promise that there’ll be a well-deserved payoff that’s worth what everybody’s going through. And if the results are lackluster... well, metaphorical heads are gonna fly.
More than a rushed conclusion due to dwindling numbers, a truncated ending can fall flat if it fails to adhere to the genre conventions following the logic of the story’s format. The ending has to make sense otherwise, it’ll all fall apart. Whether it’s a satisfactory ending conveyed through a good or bad ending, what matters is how it impacts the audience.
Some years back, I finally found an Arcade game that'd been haunting me as a kid, Empire City 1931; a FPS shooter that looked notoriously difficult, since all the targets were constantly off-screen, and you had to scroll to find them, and they could be either in the windows or on the streets. As a result, seeing these two losing screens was extremely common, as you only had one hitbox.
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I’d never really warmed up to violent scenes (I veered away from playing Double Dragon because it looked too realistic), but seeing this Game Over screen and the high difficulty of the gameplay was more effective than any anti-war movie could’ve been. And being a young inexperienced gamer, I saw this crawling in blood image often. It showed me the futility of vengeance in an uncaring world.
It is as unglamorous as a GAME OVER screen can get, not the unmarked grave in Deja Vu, not the descending sawblade in the Ninja Gaiden Arcade game. Just a cold acceptance that the odds are against you.
Can you imagine any arcade game going that far under the pretense of gobbling up quarters and unintentionally delivering a profound message instead?
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