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THE_ENDING_MANIFESTO

                                                       December 30, 2012

   In which I supply a heart-felt
   plea to creators and production         Though I guess, this being a
   companies to allow their series         manifesto this should be a
   fiction to conclude, to do an           "demand" not a "plea".
   actual wrap-up with a sense of          I never get these right.
   closure, of finality.

   The problem: when a series is
   successful, the obvious move      All the balls must stay in
   is to keep it going.              the air; hero must not
                                     settle down with heroine;
   When a series is no longer        evil-doers must remain
   successful, the obvious move      active; the quest un-ended,
   is to just stop.  Why bother      the kingdom un-won;
   even thinking about a proper      understanding and wisdom
   conclusion when no one is         must still elude; and so on.
   going to see it?

              And so, there remain many ungainly
              incomplete artworks in the world,
              many a story-line that drags on too
              long and gradually fizzles out
              and fades away.

              This syndrome is a trap:

              I would argue that it makes it
              difficult for the producers to        The value of the
              sustain interest in the property.     "back catalog" is
                                                    often where the real
              They've surrendered one of            wealth is-- an
              the more powerful features of         incomplete fizzle
              fiction in hopes of                   is less likely to
              continuing to milk the                be valued over the
              property, but this may very           long haul.
              well cause people to lose
              interest, and it certainly
              undercuts the kind of
              word-of-mouth (or
              tube-of-internet) you're
              hoping for to generate
              interest in the first place.

                  This dilemma has an
                  obvious solution:

                  Just end it,
                  but do it out        IMAGINARY_FINISH
                  of sequence.

                  You could close a season of anime
                  with an actual Final Episode, but
                  make it clear that it's set some
                  time in the future.

                  Then if you succeed in getting
                  funding for another season, those
                  stories are set before the actual    "prequel" is an
                  finish, presented as prequels.       interesting bit of
                                                       jargon: I think it's
                  Clearly the audience                 made a transition to
                  is sophisticated                     just another word.
                  enough to deal with
                  non-linear chronology.
                                                              SKET_DANCE
                  Consider something like "Sket
                  Dance", where the strongest stories
                  are "flashbacks" explaining how the
                  characters got to their present             ORIGIN
                  state-- and it should come as no
                  surprise that these "origin stories"
                  are the strongest: they involve
                  actual transformations of character
                  and changes in relationships.

                  They have an opportunity to "go
                  somewhere" and it hardly matters
                  that we know where they're going.

                        I get the sense that there's a fear that
 An audience that       if the audience understands precisely
 can grasp flashback    where the overall arc of the story is
 origin stories can     going that this will make the story seem
 clearly deal with      flat by eliminating surprise...
 flashforward
 conclusion stories.    That's a very shallow understanding
                        of the way fiction actually works.
                                                             SPOLIERS
                        Even in the case of a "mystery",
                        if you know the solution of a
                        mystery before the end of the
                        story, while that does change the
                        way you experience the efforts of    However, for
                        the characters trying to solve it    a contrary view:
                        it doesn't necessarily eliminate
                        your sympathy.                       CHEAP_SUSPENDERS

                                                             Or:

                                                             OPENENDED

                        And there are many stories where
                        you need some foreknowledge to get
                        it to work.

                                                    ORESTEIA





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