{"id":2534,"date":"2020-01-28T09:00:07","date_gmt":"2020-01-28T14:00:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.shanafigueroa.com\/blog\/?p=2534"},"modified":"2020-01-25T23:11:49","modified_gmt":"2020-01-26T04:11:49","slug":"the-4-key-attributes-of-a-good-ending","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.shanafigueroa.com\/blog\/the-4-key-attributes-of-a-good-ending\/","title":{"rendered":"The 4 Key Attributes of a Good Ending"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\"><figure class=\"aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"265\" height=\"346\" src=\"http:\/\/www.shanafigueroa.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/good-ending-pic-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-2536\" srcset=\"http:\/\/www.shanafigueroa.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/good-ending-pic-1.jpg 265w, http:\/\/www.shanafigueroa.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/good-ending-pic-1-230x300.jpg 230w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 265px) 100vw, 265px\" \/><figcaption>&#8220;Sprinkling some magic ending fairy dust&#8230;send this beautiful bitch to PRINT!&#8221;<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p>There\u2019s\nhonestly not a lot to say about endings except they should be a satisfying\nconclusion of everything that\u2019s come before\u2014but, of course, that can be harder\nthan it sounds. An exceptionally good ending can elevate a story to greatness (<em>The Usual Suspects, The Shawshank Redemption<\/em>),\nor ruin it (Season 8 of <em>Game of Thrones,\nThe Rise of Skywalker <\/em>for some current examples<em>)<\/em>. To clarify, when I say <em>good<\/em>\nending I mean <em>satisfying,<\/em> which isn\u2019t\nnecessarily a <em>happy<\/em> ending.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<!--more-->\n\n\n\n<p>So\nendings are important, but you don\u2019t need a big twist or shocking reveal or a\nbunch of deaths to do it right. All that\u2019s really required is that the ending\nbe <em>the logical conclusion of the story.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>On a technical level, all you really need to do is wrap up whether your main character gets what they want and need. If you\u2019ve done your homework, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.shanafigueroa.com\/blog\/9-steps-to-start-your-story\/\">you should know this before you even start writing<\/a>. The real question becomes <em>how<\/em> your protagonist gets to their end-state.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Here are the four key attributes of\na good ending. A good ending should:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li><strong>Make\nsense<\/strong><\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>In\na coherent story, one thing should lead to another, that leads to another, that\nleads to another, etc., ideally based on <em>choices<\/em>\nthe characters make and not happenstance (with the exception of the inciting\nincident). The ending should be the last tile in this line of dominos. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This is why the <em>Game of Thrones <\/em>series finale didn\u2019t work (spoilers follow, if you\u2019re one of the five people on the planet who don\u2019t know what happened). Yes, the audience received hints throughout the series that Daenerys was capable of evil. However, there were still a lot of dominos missing between hints she was capable of evil to her actually committing genocide. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=2mlNyqhnc1M \">Foreshadowing is NOT character development<\/a>, and her sudden pivot from aspiring world leader who sometimes does bad things to bad people for the greater good to mass murderer of the innocent made no sense. It was certainly shocking, but big twists for the sake of shock value alone aren\u2019t good twists.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The\nexceptions to this rule\u2014where out-of-left-field endings are acceptable\u2014are\ncomedies (specifically farces, ala <em>Life\nof Brian<\/em>), and satires, ala <em>Bad\nLieutenant: Port of Call, New Orleans.<\/em> <\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li><strong>Feel\nearned<\/strong><\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>Per the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.shanafigueroa.com\/blog\/breaking-down-what-a-story-actually-isand-what-it-isnt\/\">definition of a story<\/a>, the protagonist should have <em>gone through <\/em>something. They should have been challenged and grown as a result (in a happy ending), or been crushed under the weight (in an unhappy ending). Either way, the ending the hero gets should be <em><a href=\"http:\/\/www.shanafigueroa.com\/blog\/we-need-to-talk-about-the-darkest-minds-and-the-importance-of-choice\/\">due to their own actions and choices<\/a><\/em>\u2014this is what we mean when we say an ending is <em>earned<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Again\nto use the <em>Game of Thrones <\/em>example\n(man, that show crashed HARD), Arya killing the Night King was exhilarating at\nfirst, but when people realized that really was the end of the entire 8-season\nspanning apocalypse storyline\u2014I honestly thought there would be more to it,\nlike another Night King would rise\u2026but nope\u2014the majority of viewers felt\nrightly unsatisfied. Arya literally appeared out of nowhere, scored a lucky\nshot to the Night King\u2019s suspiciously flimsy armor, thereby killing the entire\nundead army, including the undead dragon which Jon was fighting by, uh, yelling\nat it. \u2026And somehow no other major characters died during this massive zombie\nattack because\u2026??? Plot armor I guess. The Night King, <em>knowing he was his army\u2019s critical weakness<\/em>, could have waited\noutside Winterfell until his unlimited forces eventually overran the humans,\nbut instead he did the incredibly stupid thing for no obvious reason and went\ninto Winterfell himself. I could go on and on about how dumb all this was, but\nthere are plenty of think pieces floating around the internet on <em>Game of Thrones\u2019<\/em> awful ending. I won\u2019t\nwaste time piling on here.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The\npoint it, there were no big decisions that weren\u2019t solely to move the plot\nalong; the ending came about through sheer luck and serendipity. The ending to\nthis storyline wasn\u2019t earned.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li><strong>Be\nconsistent with established themes<\/strong><\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>Themes\nare what give a story its meat. They present a question about the world that\nyour story answers throughout its telling, with your ending being the final\nverdict. For instance, if a major theme of your story is the healing power of\nlove, then the ending to your story should confirm that theme with someone\nbeing healed through love. <em>The Godfather<\/em>\u2019s\nmajor theme is the corrupting power of unquestioning loyalty, and its ending is\nconsistent with that theme as Michael is completely corrupted in his quest to\nstay loyal to his family.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>A\nbad example is a domestic thriller I read recently (I\u2019ll throw the author a\nbone and won\u2019t call them out here). We spend the entire book learning about all\nthe ways the main female character was a victim of domestic abuse, and how she faked\nher own death in order to get away from her horrible husband. The theme: domestic\nabuse is terrible and should be taken more seriously! Only in the last three\npages of the story, we learn it was all a lie\u2014he never abused her. She ran away\nbecause she stole a bunch of money from him. <em>\u2026WTF??<\/em> So\u2026I guess we\u2019re not supposed to be sympathetic to abuse\nvictims after all, because they could be lying thieves? Talk about a whiplash\nof an ending, and not in a good way.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li><strong>Make\nclear if the protagonist gets what they want and\/or need\u2026unless left\nintentionally ambiguous<\/strong><\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>When\nthe question of whether the protagonist gets what they want and\/or need is\nanswered, the story is over. It\u2019s as simple as that. The question of the want\nand the need are usually answered either at the same time, or very near each\nother. In <em>The Godfather,<\/em> we see\nMichael get what he wants\u2014to stop being pulled between his crime family and the\n\u201clegit\u201d life\u2014while closing the door (literally) on what he needs\u2014to break free\nof his family\u2019s corrupting control. Then the movie immediately ends (well\nthere\u2019s a part 2, but that\u2019s a different story).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>A word on <em>ambiguous<\/em> endings: an ambiguous ending happens when it\u2019s unclear\nwhether the protagonist gets what they <em>want<\/em>\nat the end of the story, ex: <em>Inception<\/em>.\nI love a good ambiguous ending! However, the key to pulling off a satisfying\nambiguous ending is that it can\u2019t be a cop-out because the author doesn\u2019t know\nhow to end the story (ex: <em>Lost<\/em>). An\nambiguous ending still needs to make sense, feel earned, be consistent with\nestablished themes, and make clear if the protagonist got what they <em>needed<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Take, for example, the movie <em>Inception<\/em> and it\u2019s famous \u201cIs he still\nin the dream?\u201d ending<em>.<\/em> It works\nbecause we know the protagonist got what he needed\u2014to be rid of the guilt\naround his wife\u2019s death\u2014after an arduous journey to get there. Also, one of the\nstory\u2019s main themes is the questioning of reality, so an ending where the\naudience questions reality is consistent with that. The only unanswered\nquestion was whether he got what he wanted\u2014to be with his children again\u2014but\nsince the want is only relevant to the need, we can live without knowing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>There\u2019s honestly not a lot to say about endings except they should be a satisfying conclusion of everything that\u2019s come before\u2014but, of course, that can be harder than it sounds. An exceptionally good ending can elevate a story to greatness (The Usual Suspects, The Shawshank Redemption), or ruin it (Season 8 of Game of Thrones, &hellip; <\/p>\n<p class=\"link-more\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.shanafigueroa.com\/blog\/the-4-key-attributes-of-a-good-ending\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;The 4 Key Attributes of a Good Ending&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2},"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[495,559],"tags":[562,560,392,561,563,505,565,566],"class_list":["post-2534","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-construction","category-how-to-end","tag-crappy-endings","tag-endings","tag-game-of-thrones","tag-logical-conclusions","tag-the-godfather","tag-the-rise-of-skywalker","tag-the-shawshank-redemption","tag-the-usual-suspects"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p9Vyi8-ES","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shanafigueroa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2534","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shanafigueroa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shanafigueroa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shanafigueroa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shanafigueroa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2534"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/www.shanafigueroa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2534\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2538,"href":"http:\/\/www.shanafigueroa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2534\/revisions\/2538"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shanafigueroa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2534"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shanafigueroa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2534"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shanafigueroa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2534"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}