Richard's Animorphs Forum
Animorphs Section => Animorphs Forum Classic => Topic started by: Aaronus on April 08, 2009, 12:17:01 AM
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As one who prefers the happy ending, I don't like the way the Animorphs ended. Many of them died, their internal characters changed, and dreams went unfulfilled. I find it very depressing to read the last few books despite highly enjoying the rest. What would you think of rewriting the ending to make it a happy ending? Save Rachel, put Jake and Cassie together, help Tobias reenter society, and don't end vaguely on some mission in space where our main characters seem to get captured or killed.
The ending does seem realistic, however. War does change people. If rewriting is a terrible idea, perhaps you would like to explain to me how the ending is actually good or what you like about it.
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Well...I'm with you on Jake and Cassie. They should've stayed together!
But like you said, it's realistic. I think I do prefer this ending to a happier one, because it's not what you expect. They beat the yeerks, but it wasn't a happy ending.
But yes, it does make you feel a bit down after you've finished reading.
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I agree maybe make it a semi happy ending. not YAY everything is fixed have some issues here and there.
If someone had to die maybe only one . The crazy ending where they all seem to crash and die was just a little to much .
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I'm not in favor of rewriting the ending, because 1) I'm positive it's been done a kaflillion times already on ff.net or wherever and 2) I liked the ending.
Why? because I like very depressing and sad things, and now that I think of it, our choir piece this semester is very depressing and sad and all about the horrors of war and a lot of people hate it but I love it so I guess that's just how I am. I could go more into detail about why I like the depressingness, but it's been discussed in great detail here before.
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I suppose if I can handle VC Andrews I can handle Animorph's ending.
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Applegate wanted to show how war is terrible. If she wrote a happy ending, so what? You fight, you win, you're happy!? Not realistic, and the same message than many many movies and books and other stories... The ending is a part of her message, change it and the sense of the message is changed.
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I know there was a message, but it seemed like she was trying to shove it down oujr throats with the ending. Wheras in the rest of the series, we could take it or not even notice it much.
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It took me years to come to like the ending. I don't jump up and down at it now, but it's a bitter sweet thing that I think was well.
I don't do ff, so I can't think of some wonderous thing were everyone is happy without making myself nauseous. The end we got left the story open. Like I said, it took me a long time to reach that conclusion, but at this point I have little reason to believe more than one of them is gone.
But that's for people to draw on their own I suppose
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I understand how K.A wanted the readers to see how war hurts people on both sides. but i think she kind of over did it.
with the whole crashing with the one thing. and how Aximili died .. that was just to strange to me. it had nothing to do with the whole war that I can see. it was a whole other issue.
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alright, i just finished the series again after like 3 years, i found this site like a month ago and decided to read them again, but i really didnt like the ending. bah!!!! cliffhangers suck. can anyone recomend any good fan fiction?
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personally, i liked the ending.
up until the epic cliff hanger..
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Yes thats what I'm talkin about. I liked the ending up until the cliffhanger, i just wish she had continued and kept writing them. Maybe have have Animorphs: Voyage something. I would like to know what happens after.
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I remember reading the last sentence then turning the page, expecting there to be more, and then being like wth that's it??
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If KA really wanted her message to be "war is terrible" then maybe she shouldn't have waited until the last book. What about the rest of the series? Why do we suddenly need someone to die for shock value in the finale after they get through so much crazy stuff the entire series. I just thought it was cheap, cheesy, and lazy.
If you're going to have a message, actually develop it at some point.
Add the ghostwriter bit, the unnecessary cliffhanger ending that was frankly unfair to dedicated readers, the general stupidity and out-of-character actions of the characters in the last few books(see Jake's vendetta against Tom and the lack of a single good reason for the suicide mission), the implausible and idiotic end sequence, and Cassie's essential abandonment of the rest of the group for the final "mission"...
Needless to say I hated it and will forever.
I did like that Jake and Cassie didn't end up together...Cassie deserved a horrible death though, not happily-ever-after like she got. Unfair.
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Why do so many people overlook the fact that, had Rachel not stopped Tom's Yeerk on the blade ship, everyone would have died? What did you think the Yeerk was planning tio do after flying to the Pool Ship? Gloat, then fly away?
Otherwise, I agree with you. Why spoil Ax and Marco's happiness, and jake's beginnings of coping with a Bolivian Army ending?
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My only major gripe with the ending is the cliffhanger, other than that I like the ending. That said a continuation to the series would suit me, I mean it wouldn't feel the same without their fallen friend(s) but I think it would still be enjoyable just because of what it is.
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Why spoil Ax and Marco's happiness, and jake's beginnings of coping with a Bolivian Army ending?
Hahahahaha! Priceless.
I'd like to see a second generation (or later) continuation. Not necessarily the offspring of the animorphs (as they're presumably all dead save the coward) but some kind of futuristic equivalent...though with the near total destruction of the Yeerks I don't think anything like that would be practical as the dynamic is kinda ruined. The ending really left little room for continuation unless you want a "hey, let's conquer the galaxy" or "hey, let's fight those random enemies" series.
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I agree with almost everyone here (excluding the Cassie-bashing), the final book didn't feel complete at all to me.
Everyone acted out of character at least a little (but I guess we could chalk that up to the war changing them) and it kind of seems like Rachel's death was just tacked on as a last minute addition. Plus, cliff-hangers ALWAYS suck, especially when they don't really end. She knew she was going to piss off a lot of her readers (hell, she even apologized in her Author's Notes at the end), I kind of have respect for her for making such a gutsy move (that takes balls, especially when she immediately promoted her new series 2 paragraphs later), but I still think it was unfair and a bit of a cop out.
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Why do so many people overlook the fact that, had Rachel not stopped Tom's Yeerk on the blade ship, everyone would have died? What did you think the Yeerk was planning tio do after flying to the Pool Ship? Gloat, then fly away?
Otherwise, I agree with you. Why spoil Ax and Marco's happiness, and jake's beginnings of coping with a Bolivian Army ending?
Uh...what exactly did Rachel accomplish that realistically would have stopped the Bladeship from destroying the poolship? She killed a few Yeerks. Wow. In reality the rest that remained would have blown up the Poolship anyway instead of just "flying off" like they did. Completely unrealistic. I would have been much happier had they all just died right there. At least that would be conclusive.
Plus, cliff-hangers ALWAYS suck, especially when they don't really end.
I agree! I actually found the self promotion (in wake of the travesty that was the finale) offensive. I never considered reading anything of hers ever again.
But at least she didn't wimp out like Rowling did with Harry Potter. That was yet another AWFUL and anti-climactic ending.
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I guess it's a bit unrealistic that absolutely no other Yeerk decided to shoot anyway. But it still doesn't make her death pointless in-universe. Out of universe it is pointless, because there's no reason to kill someone off. And having a happier ending where all the Anis find themselves better off after the war would not be wimping out.
In the end, about the only really good thing was that Earth was saved. However, we all expected that to happen. If KA had the world destroyed or enslaved, she'd find a raging lynch mob outside her door.
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wimping out
Poor choice of words on my part. I don't think a happier ending would have been "wimping out" for the Animorphs. I do however belief it was for Harry Potter as the progression of the story dictated an ending that she was unwilling to follow through on. But I digress...
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the only thing i hated about the ending was...you really dont know what happened to them on that ship. and it felt rushed.
after the last sentence i just sat there forever. thinking, "that was IT?"
seriously it took me 10 years from when i started to get to the end.. i was disappointed.
it wasnt enough for me.. even after putting the books off for years and rebuying them, i guess i never was ready for the animorphs to end.
((i just am reading the replies and it looks like a lot of us agree on that))
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alright, i just finished the series again after like 3 years, i found this site like a month ago and decided to read them again, but i really didnt like the ending. bah!!!! cliffhangers suck. can anyone recomend any good fan fiction?
http://members.shaw.ca/jcmlott/index.html
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the only thing i hated about the ending was...you really dont know what happened to them on that ship. and it felt rushed.
after the last sentence i just sat there forever. thinking, "that was IT?"
The impression that I got from reading the last book was that KA got lazy. I felt like the entire book was "Ok, Animorphs is done, here's my brand-new series Remnants."
I re-read Animorphs every summer and I love it more than Harry Potter or Star Wars or any of the other fantasy/sci-fi/children's series that I read. I really hope that if Animorphs is made into a movie series that the ending will be better. I'd like it to be retconned somehow and for the loose ends to be tied up.
It really bothered me when I found out that she didn't even bother to write half of the series. I don't buy the claim that she "looked over" all of them before publishing or else they wouldn't have been so drastically different from the earlier books.
If she let the series suffer because of her "contract", then she shouldn't claim that she wrote this terrible ending for the sake of "being faithful to the nature of the series." If you cared about Animorphs so much, you wouldn't have started other projects at the same time and/or you would've been a better editor to the ghostwriters.
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Amen to that. It might be a little exagerrating, but I felt traumatized by the ending. Yeah she advertised remnants, but there was no way I was going to read another series. I was afraid the same thing would happen again. I had taken a break from reading Everworld, and never went back after that. I gave away all of my Ani books to the local library because it just hurt me so much. I also felt surprised coming here, and seeing people who actually liked the ending completely, or people who managed to convince themselves that the ending was good after their initial reactions. And then they sometimes say the rest of us aren't true fans.
Though the vast majority of fans feel the same way I do. Which makes me feel better. I also feel better knowing there are still active boards like this. It was like the final arc was from a whole different series of books.
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the only thing i hated about the ending was...you really dont know what happened to them on that ship. and it felt rushed.
after the last sentence i just sat there forever. thinking, "that was IT?"
The impression that I got from reading the last book was that KA got lazy. I felt like the entire book was "Ok, Animorphs is done, here's my brand-new series Remnants."
I re-read Animorphs every summer and I love it more than Harry Potter or Star Wars or any of the other fantasy/sci-fi/children's series that I read. I really hope that if Animorphs is made into a movie series that the ending will be better. I'd like it to be retconned somehow and for the loose ends to be tied up.
It really bothered me when I found out that she didn't even bother to write half of the series. I don't buy the claim that she "looked over" all of them before publishing or else they wouldn't have been so drastically different from the earlier books.
If she let the series suffer because of her "contract", then she shouldn't claim that she wrote this terrible ending for the sake of "being faithful to the nature of the series." If you cared about Animorphs so much, you wouldn't have started other projects at the same time and/or you would've been a better editor to the ghostwriters.
You know, I said the same thing a couple of months ago and people immediately jumped down my throat.
It's clear that she was done with Animorphs, and I think she had become trapped under the monster that she had created. Some people may like the ending, I can deal with the direction of it, but that book did NOT feel complete. There were so many loose ends that were left untied it was almost mediocre. I feel like if I gave you three years of dedication and spent countless dollars on the merchandise, the least she could've done was end it completely.
Also, Chad28, I had a similar experience. I read the first book of Remnants and never continued forward. The book was actually good, but I don't easily forget when I'm "gipped".
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Like I just posted in another thread I personally hate it when authors start killing of main characters! I mean the only reason I'm reading what they wrote and buying their books is because I like the story and characters that they created. I know the argument is that its not realistic for no one to die in a book series, but you know what? I have enough reality in my real life, that's why I read books is to escape from reality! So yeah I dislike character death and there's a number of book I would change that in!
So far I have read all the Animorph books but the last three. I just got to disgusted with the way the story was going. It was less and less like the story I feel in love with and that drew me into the books. In my mind it had just strayed to far from the winning formula. I mean not to mention that this was supposed to be a book for children, not YA's Children! They should have a happy ending regardless of the point or message of the book.. I mean they'll have plenty of time for reality when their older. Because of what I know is coming at the end. (If it bothers me as an adult that much,) there's no way I'm going let my children read it. :( It's just such a shame, I love the series 95% of it is great, but as I said before, there's enough reality in real life. Children deserve happy endings!!!
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I also felt surprised coming here, and seeing people who actually liked the ending completely, or people who managed to convince themselves that the ending was good after their initial reactions. And then they sometimes say the rest of us aren't true fans.
If we weren't real fans why would we be so mad? It was as much our series as it was hers. Maybe more so. At least we read them all. ::)
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Yep. I paid over four dollars for each main book of the series, and over 13 for the hardback Chronicle books. I know that the author doesn't really have to write just for the fans, but I spent a lot of money on that series. I should be entitled to a negative opinion if my purchase was unsatisfactory.
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Didn't she release some statement saying "OMG I HAVE MAH REASONS, GET THE **** OVER IT?"
I get major George Lucas vibes from her, seriously. If she does write those 5 additional books she has a LOT of retconning to do.
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Yeah, that's a good summary of what she said.
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Didn't she release some statement saying "OMG I HAVE MAH REASONS, GET THE **** OVER IT?"
I get major George Lucas vibes from her, seriously. If she does write those 5 additional books she has a LOT of retconning to do.
Which didn't help her cause. Her BS explanation only made me that much angrier. She may have had her reasons but what about her debt to her loyal fans? We have our own reasons too. She should be flattered that we just can't "get over it". But then she would have to actually give a $%&* about the series which she made it clear enough that she didn't. (Series over, here's my new one! Bull.)
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Yeah. I was glad to read the response, but it still didn't mend my "wound". Of course the general message was that she wanted her story to be as realistic as possible, and that she respected the fans too much to do it any other way. Maybe she was a Harry Potter ending hater too. Who knows. It's real obvious that she lost interest. Otherwise she wouldn't have started Everworld. I read that she started that in the hopes of not losing fans that grew out of Animorphs, but that's just wrong.
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I've never bought the idea of the ending being realistic. The entire series is unrealistic to begin with, but what's certainly unrealistic is having a character that is inconsistently crazy.
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Yeah the ending sucked hard!
I know the argument is that its not realistic for no one to die in a book series, but you know what? I have enough reality in my real life, that's why I read books is to escape from reality!
I agree whole-heartedly with this statement. I read to get away from reality! I don't want it shoved back in my face.
I think she lost interest because the ghost writers screwed up the series so.
But Remnants was an AWESOME series. Very cool. There are some beloved characters that get the ax, but still the series/story as a whole is amazing. One book will make you hate KA, but then the next book makes you fall back in love with her again. You shouldn't shun it just because you feel gipped by her less passionate work.
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Maybe if she really would have gone over what the ghost writers wrote she would not have let them **** it up
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Well I like the ending because of the emotion it draws up in a reader, but I do agree that if felt like there should have been a few more pages, or a couple more books, and I can understand and again agree that most people read books to escape reality. The series was pretty out there at some points (I mean a bunch of birds of prey saving a guy from jumping out of a building?) so trying to have a "realistic" ending led to utter shell shock, K.A. should probably have been telling the ghost writers to get darker as the series continued to avoid that.
However there's a saying, nothing ventured nothing gained. I can understand not wanting a character to die, I didn't want Rachel or anyone else to die, however to me the fact that they could and did didn't just make the story more realistic it made it more memorable, it still stirs up emotion in most of the people here today, right?
But I do remember being pretty peeved with the advertisement at the end of the book, it kind of felt out of place, I mean it's one thing for a book to advertise for another book in the back few pages, it's another for a writer's final word on one series to be an advertisement for her next, or so I felt the first time I read it . . . I dont think I've read it a second so what I remember of it is probably worse than it really was.
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Well I like the ending because of the emotion it draws up in a reader, but I do agree that if felt like there should have been a few more pages, or a couple more books, and I can understand and again agree that most people read books to escape reality. The series was pretty out there at some points (I mean a bunch of birds of prey saving a guy from jumping out of a building?) so trying to have a "realistic" ending led to utter shell shock, K.A. should probably have been telling the ghost writers to get darker as the series continued to avoid that.
However there's a saying, nothing ventured nothing gained. I can understand not wanting a character to die, I didn't want Rachel or anyone else to die, however to me the fact that they could and did didn't just make the story more realistic it made it more memorable, it still stirs up emotion in most of the people here today, right?
But I do remember being pretty peeved with the advertisement at the end of the book, it kind of felt out of place, I mean it's one thing for a book to advertise for another book in the back few pages, it's another for a writer's final word on one series to be an advertisement for her next, or so I felt the first time I read it . . . I dont think I've read it a second so what I remember of it is probably worse than it really was.
I definitely agree with you about Rachel's death making the book more memorable. I also agree about the series not being realistic at all, I mean, the Ellimist giving Tobias his powers back kind of detracted from his tragic-ness.
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However there's a saying, nothing ventured nothing gained. I can understand not wanting a character to die, I didn't want Rachel or anyone else to die, however to me the fact that they could and did didn't just make the story more realistic it made it more memorable, it still stirs up emotion in most of the people here today, right?
Honestly it wasn't just the fact that Rachel died that p*$$&# me off. It was that her death was totally unneccessary and meaningless the way it was written. Write in a storyline where she MUST die for a legit reason and I could have accepted it. I've read many books where great characters die and haven't been nearly so upset.
Dying on an unneccessary suicide mission that had no effect other than to finish Jake's personal war...pathetic. So I agree with you insofar as the death itself wasn't really the problem. It was the writer's execution (or lack thereof) of the awful storyline that really did it. It seemed like she didn't care enough to write something believable to do Rachel justice.
Then she follows it up by saying "now read the new book that stole my attention from the Animorphs and made the ending suck!" Needless to say, I was sooooo angry.
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I have stated before that, had Tom's yeerk not been stopped, he would have killed everyone on the pool ship. Though it is kind of odd that not a single other Yeerk felt like doing the same thing. And that the Bladeship just happens to elude the nearby Andalites.
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I have stated before that, had Tom's yeerk not been stopped, he would have killed everyone on the pool ship. Though it is kind of odd that not a single other Yeerk felt like doing the same thing. And that the Bladeship just happens to elude the nearby Andalites.
Which was, as I previously stated (maybe...) that therefore her mission accomplished practically nothing as the Animorphs were actually bailed out by a stupid plot hole from the author (the other Yeerks just mysteriously deciding to fly off). Thus, she was sent on a mission that had no real purpose other than to kill Tom. Realistically she had nothing to do with saving the pool ship. She just killed Tom to finish off Jake's personal vendetta. Where's the profound meaning (or even relevance) in that?
Not to mention that the entire final "mission" was poorly conceived to begin with and had no business working (culminating in Jake's idiotic backup plan that shouldn't have worked but somehow did).
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So let's pick apart the final plan. Rachel's mission didn't really accomplich much besides Tom not becoming the next Eva. And they lucked out that no one cried "Veangance for our leader!" and fired. The decoy could have been done better, with holograms and perhaps some tanks and stuff that could possibly fly themselves. I don't know why the yeerks suddenly have a device that can detect if someone is alive or not. That came out of left field with little relevance.
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So let's pick apart the final plan. Rachel's mission didn't really accomplich much besides Tom not becoming the next Eva. And they lucked out that no one cried "Veangance for our leader!" and fired. The decoy could have been done better, with holograms and perhaps some tanks and stuff that could possibly fly themselves. I don't know why the yeerks suddenly have a device that can detect if someone is alive or not. That came out of left field with little relevance.
Yeah. That was just wierd. Another reason to just inflate the kill count.
Why not send enough aux animorphs with Rachel (yes, they can sneak in morphing bugs as they have done the entire series) to actually take the bladeship. Or, hmmm..., use one of the save-the-day (not to mention indestructible) androids to get on the bladeship and disable it too! That would seem like the best choice...
Maybe they shouldn't have based so much of their plan on being invited onto the poolship (and banking on the Yeerks not having a living-sensor-thing on board so the hologram of Cassie could work). ome on Visser 3/1. I know you're evil but that's no reason to be so stupid (though he was pretty much that way the entire series so I'm not too bothered by that point).
Oh, and maybe you don't want to disable all the poolships' systems permanently. Could just turn them off for a bit...
I could go on forever.