OSC (or whoever wrote this insightful analogy) noted that the writer can breach this contract if he chooses, but he must pay the price of the readers' anger. The grand finale of the television series "The Sopranos" provides the best proof of this proposition that I've ever seen.
Not to spoil it for those who haven't seen it and wish to watch it, I will limit my comments to saying that the ending blatantly violates this contract. There are characters that the audience cares about, there are series-long conflicts that affect them deeply, there is an identifiable beginning, middle, and end phase to the story--but no resolution.
The response to this breach of contract has been amazing. Angry fans crashed HBOs website. Phone lines are at full capacity as the disgruntled complain to each other. The ending is incredibly thoughtful, artful, intelligent, and consistent with the story--but it violates the contract. And the people are very, very angry.
It's instructive, to say the least.
But, as they quiped on the Today show, they might be setting themselves up for a movie. And the passion this ending has stirred is probablly, if anything, flattering to the writers. They say that there is no such thing as bad publicity. With this stunt, they generate buzz, free advertising. Game, set and match.
Needless to say, if Lost ends this anticlimacticly, I'll be miffed!
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But, as they quiped on the Today show, they might be setting themselves up for a movie. And the passion this ending has stirred is probablly, if anything, flattering to the writers. They say that there is no such thing as bad publicity. With this stunt, they generate buzz, free advertising. Game, set and match.
Hmm, tell that to scifi channel. They killed Farscape without an ending at all..."To be continued"...and lost a large number of viewers (myself included). They did come back with a mini-series to finish off the show, but at that point it was too late. Once someone looses trust in someone to hold up to their side...you never really get it back.
This is true with writing as well. By breaking the contract with the reader and thus gaining their anger, you can bet that they will not buy anything of yours in the future. I would bet they would make it known to others how they were upset and encourage others to avoid your writing as well.
I don't mind that scifi channel gave me a reason to ignore them. Now the shows I am slightly interested in, I record for when I feel like viewing it. I expect little, and tend to watch much less.
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But, as they quiped on the Today show, they might be setting themselves up for a movie.
From the description, this was my first thought, too.
It is a good point. How hard would it be to resolve things and still leave a small opening for a movie?
But I must be in the minority because these shows continue to be put out. Now we've got The Riches, and The Starter Wife, and who knows what else will follow. Like it or not, a lot of the newer shows are going to follow the same formula, and whether they are cancelled or just end, don't expect them to have a satisfying finish. The trend now is toward the soap opera formula, and it seems to be working. If it wasn't, viewership wouldn't be what it is.
The fact is that this must be what the majority of TV viewers want now, just like a while back Reality shows were the craze. If it wasn't, nobody would be watching them or be so upset with a bad ending.
And books are following TV in some respects. I hate picking up a book thinking I'm buying and reading a self contained story, only to find out that the story actually covers three or more volumes, and nothing truly gets resolved in the one I bought. I get really peeved at this especially when I find out that the rest of the story hasn't even been written yet, knowing it may never get published.
But once again, these books continue to get published and written, and these TV shows get produced and aired, and as long as people continue to buy these books and watch these shows, it'll continue. Then something different will come along to replace it.
What's really sad to me is that old wise axiom of finish what you start seems to be getting lost now. Now it's ok not to really finish anything it seems.
[This message has been edited by nitewriter (edited June 12, 2007).]
I recently read two books - Inkheart and Inkspell - that did what another poster mentioned - they only partially resolve some of the plots, leaving plenty of really wide gaping holes and lack of resolution, to the point where I'm ANNOYED! I will probably read the third (on the hope that it's the final volume) when it comes out, but I won't buy it this time. Too irritated!
I contrast this w/the Harry Potter books (yes, I know not everyone is a fan - please spare that line of argument, I'm using it as a specific example) where I feel that the author does a good job of each book having solid resolution, although of course there are the overall themes of fighting evil, who can/should be trusted, loyalty, etc. that arc throughout all the books.
The difference I see is that the primary conflict of each novel is resolved WITHIN that novel, IMHO. Perhaps the issues I have with inkheart/inkspell is that the author didn't do a good job of distinguishing between the overarching themes she wanted to explore and the detailed conflict for each novel. Or, worse, left the conflict open! In the second book, the characters start in a foreign land, scared and on the run from the bad guys. Guess where they end? In the foreign land (more of them are together now, at least, <rolling eyes> ) - on the run from the bad guys!! Gaa! Annoying.
At any rate, back to Sopranos, I don't watch the show so I don't really know (but my husband does, so I saw the ending - several times as he rewound and replayed in disbelief.) My sense from him was that the problem was a gradual and growing tension the director was crafting in those final scenes that was geting to an unbearable level...and then the show cut out, almost mid-thought/scene/etc. He was left feeling cheated - all that tension built, but no resolution, no release, no relief.
As to continuing stories, I have hated books that ended with what amounts to saying "I will tie up all these loose ends in the next book."
I like series where each book stands on its own, but builds on previous stories. Series like Peirs Anthony's XANTH series, or Anne McCaffrey's PERN series, operated like this. Each book separate, readable on their own, but adds to the whole history.
I'll add two things. (1) It's a bad thing to cheat, confuse, or otherwise disrespect your viewers (or readers) when bringing something to an end, and, from what I've seen, this is what the producers of "The Sopranos" have done. (2) But you can take cold comfort in the fact that, probably, no more than one in ten Americans actually saw the damned thing---probably more people read or heard or watched TV stories on it than actually watched it.
http://www.cnn.com/2007/SHOWBIZ/TV/06/14/television.lost.reut/index.html
It's not everyone's cup of tea here, I know. There's no one-size-fits-all show. Pleasing everyone, pleases nobody. It's the ticket to mediocrity.
But, the lesson, we all can learn, is to listen to feedback from your audience. Assuming any of us will ever get an audience, don't be a George Lucas!!!
Okay, disclaimer here. Never seen the Sopranos. Never had any desire to. That said, I've kept up on the controversy surrounding the last episode. Yeah, they want a movie. So what. I think they had seven or eight seasons, and they just stopped it. You can tie up things and leave enough open for a movie without doing what they did.
Yes, as a writer you want to leave your audience wanting more. But you don't want to completely tick off your audience either. You have to give them some of what they want.
I was listening to a guy named Rusty Humphries on the radio, and he said the last episode of the Sopranos was nothing more than an hour long commercial for the movie. He said that the right way to end that show would to have his kids get killed in mob violence, then have the dad mourning and wondering if the life he chose was right. If all the violence and death were worth it. THAT would have been an ending.
I'm just glad I didn't invest my time and emotion in that show. Anyone remember the ending to Sliders? No ending. Very upsetting.
Matt
Matt
[This message has been edited by ChrisOwens (edited June 18, 2007).]
But, I guess with Michael Richards, I felt betrayed somehow. Maybe it was the degree of virulence and hate. Then again, one can hear the same in rap, but for some reason, few turn away from that with the same fervor.
On a non-political issue, closer to the thrust of this thread...I thought the ending of "Newhart" was a classic. Funny, clever, harked back to other work Bob Newhart had done...and, above all, didn't insult the viewers.
Heroes, 24, and Babylon 5 have all had very satsifying season endings. If you missed Heroes, buy the DVD. On the other hand most tv serials are just playing the viewer along for as many seasons as they can keep the viewer hooked. I'm watching Season Seven of The X-Files now on DVD, and it's awful.
In sf, Gene Wolfe is one of my favorite writers, because even when I can't figure out what he is doing, I am sure that he knows exactly what he is doing. On the other hand, George R. R. Martin seems to be just writing, and most of the other long fantasy writers are worse.
I know that I loose some readers when, for example, I have a character say something that is not true, or have a character speak differently depending on who he is talking to. But people do talk differently when speaking to people of their own social class, than they do speaking to people of a different social class. My dialog has got to reflect that. And people do lie to themselves and to others. If my character is in a situation where a real person would lie, he lies. And god forbid I should say, "I'm innocent," Joe lied.