Author Topic: A Rebuttal to K.A.'s final letter  (Read 11998 times)

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Offline Robcola21

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Re: A Rebuttal to K.A.'s final letter
« Reply #60 on: February 24, 2010, 04:49:06 AM »
THe Last book made me sad, it was mainly in the fact that Jake is perceived as having gone insane. I think it makes sense that he would go insane, but it almost ruins the character, and though honest, it wasn't fair to us as readers. I remember being a kid and crying as tobias became trapped in hawk form, and then again when i realized that he and rachel could never have a normal life together. TO just be in love. I felt that same way years later as i read the last few pages of the series. I didn't cry, but i felt like it. I think she wrapped it up in an honest way, but we didn't read the books because we wanted to know the horrors of war, we read them because we fell in love with the characters, and i don't think she should have ended it like that, no one wants to watch the one's they love die or go insane. And that's why i'm so terribly disappointed.

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Re: A Rebuttal to K.A.'s final letter
« Reply #61 on: February 24, 2010, 10:46:47 AM »
I think that they were trying to save him. Since neither we nor the Animorphs have any knowledge of how the Kelbrid works, we can't say that they would be unable to save him. As someone said, any number of things could happen.

like what, for real, what could have happened? And if they didnt die, thats even stupider IMO.  Animorphs is a 'real' war story right?  ::)

Offline JFalcon

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Re: A Rebuttal to K.A.'s final letter
« Reply #62 on: February 24, 2010, 03:37:09 PM »
I have to admit to being a little surprised because I agree a lot with the original post but at the same time I liked the ending, it was memorable in exactly the way most of the books I read at the time weren't.

For one thing Rachel's death was very well done, the road leading to the event was . . . not grand, I have many issues with the order Jake gave from a tactical and even a practical standpoint. To me it was clear right away that Rachel was going to die and I dreaded it, I hoped she'd been put in that situation for pure misdirection, but in the end it still happened. I was sad of course but as I've said before I've never really been quite so moved by a fictional death, so if nothing else that event will always be untouchably awesome in my mind and a testament to KA's skill. But had I been Jake she'd never have been on that Bladeship to begin with . . . and that's really sort of off topic so I appologize and will stop myself right there on that matter.

The truth is that like others I was a little put off by KA's letter, I felt it was overly agressive towards an audience that was mostly kids, I know I was a kid at the time the story ended, but I never saw her message before coming here (as an adult) so I wasn't exactly traumatized by her irritation so what can I say? Honestly I feel like she had every right to end her story how she wanted but I definately agree, that doesnt mean we have to like it at all, and not liking it doesnt make us immature it just means we have different beliefs, individual personalities, isn't that one of the things Animorphs was all about? Being individuals instead of cogs? Being free instead of Controllers? That people disliked her work just means that individuality wins again . . . might I add "w00t"

As for it not being a realistic war story, well I both agree and disagree, I know that shouldn't be possible but hear me out. It had fanciful themes and what more or less comes off as magic at times so I can see where it seemed unrealistic, and I won't pretend the atmosphere of the final arc didn't feel different than what led up to it. Different yes, but not exactly alien.

The presence of death and realism was always there. Background characters were killed, entire Andalite crews were slaughtered, Yeerk pools were boiled or shot off into deep space, even a few orcas got the axe if I recall, hard decisions were made time and again and not just by our main characters but by villains and supporting characters as well and though our main Animorphs didn't die (permanently) until the end many of us were always worried that they could even though we should have known they couldn't. We worried because that presence of death was there, it just didn't catch up to them until the ending. I mean during the whole David thing I really did expect death to jump out from some corner with a shotgun screaming "BOOM, HEADSHOT!" so in that sense it did feel like a realistic war story.

I think what I agree with is that it wasn't just a war story though, there was more to it than that and towards the end it did feel like some of that was forgotten, or at least left behind.

I hate to make this post any longer but I actually think more than LOTR, Animorphs is similar to Exo-Squad. Exo-Squad, for those who don't know, was a TV show aimed at kids that still had a lot of underlying themes that viewers could either notice or ignore. It was violent, it was mankind's fight against extinction itself, towards the middle there was some episodic bits, and much like Animorphs it ended on an upsetting cliffhanger and it wasn't until the end that a major (good) character finally died . . . except they screwed that up by cloning him in that final episode, but that's neither here nor there, the point is that at no point did Exo-Squad not feel like a war story, and the same is true of Animorphs in my opinion.

Yes it's about a bunch of people doing impossible things and surviving, winning where they shouldn't, where it should be impossible, getting away just in time, that's part of the fun, we want to think that kind of stuff can happen, we want to pretend that, despite all evidence to the contrary, a single person can really make that much of a difference, but it doesnt mean it's not still a realistic story. It might seem like the ending was one without hope, but to me that hope was Rachel, it was Jake, the hope KA gave us with the ending was the Animorphs themselves.

On balance we humans want to believe there really are people like Jake, Marco, Tobias, Ax, Cassie and indeed most definately Rachel out there, some of us want to believe that we could, ourselves be that brave. Their existance fictional though it may be, is a sort of hope itself. That said that they died doesnt really mean that hope dies too because even dead their example remains and in fact creates a bar, a challenge even; sort of like saying "they gave up this much" and again, yes they're fictional characters in a children's book but they're a reminder to us all and indeed to children that in history we do have real people who've done similar deeds if only for their own countries or families and not for the earth itself.

Well . . . not much else to say at the moment except sorry for the length  ;)
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Offline ThermalRider

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Re: A Rebuttal to K.A.'s final letter
« Reply #63 on: February 25, 2010, 09:52:47 AM »

...

As for it not being a realistic war story, well I both agree and disagree, I know that shouldn't be possible but hear me out. It had fanciful themes and what more or less comes off as magic at times so I can see where it seemed unrealistic, and I won't pretend the atmosphere of the final arc didn't feel different than what led up to it. Different yes, but not exactly alien.

The presence of death and realism was always there. Background characters were killed, entire Andalite crews were slaughtered, Yeerk pools were boiled or shot off into deep space, even a few orcas got the axe if I recall, hard decisions were made time and again and not just by our main characters but by villains and supporting characters as well and though our main Animorphs didn't die (permanently) until the end many of us were always worried that they could even though we should have known they couldn't. We worried because that presence of death was there, it just didn't catch up to them until the ending. I mean during the whole David thing I really did expect death to jump out from some corner with a shotgun screaming "BOOM, HEADSHOT!" so in that sense it did feel like a realistic war story.

I think what I agree with is that it wasn't just a war story though, there was more to it than that and towards the end it did feel like some of that was forgotten, or at least left behind.

...

Yes it's about a bunch of people doing impossible things and surviving, winning where they shouldn't, where it should be impossible, getting away just in time, that's part of the fun, we want to think that kind of stuff can happen, we want to pretend that, despite all evidence to the contrary, a single person can really make that much of a difference, but it doesn't mean it's not still a realistic story. It might seem like the ending was one without hope, but to me that hope was Rachel, it was Jake, the hope KA gave us with the ending was the Animorphs themselves.

I really like what you said here JFalcon, +1 to you!

As JFalcon said, the story is both realistic and unrealistic at the same time. And that's the beauty of it. We can have kids turning into animals and having adventures with aliens which is unrealistic, but have them feel and experience things that clearly are extremely realistic. Main characters don't have to die in every book or every chapter for death and fear and those other emotions that go with them to be present in their, or ours as the readers', minds.

Sometimes the suspense and the waiting fear of what will happen is just as powerful or even more powerful than the death of a character can be.

I think that they were trying to save him. Since neither we nor the Animorphs have any knowledge of how the Kelbrid works, we can't say that they would be unable to save him. As someone said, any number of things could happen.

like what, for real, what could have happened? And if they didnt die, thats even stupider IMO.  Animorphs is a 'real' war story right?  ::)


Maybe they morphed insects before they hit, which would protect them from damage and then they got into the Blade Ship and reeked havoc on the Kelbrid. Maybe they made some last second adjustment that disabled the Blade Ship. Maybe the Ellimist plucked one of his celestial strings to change things and help them. Maybe Crayak did. Maybe they all die and the Kelbrid gets away and terrorizes the entire galaxy. There are numerous possibilities and that's the whole point. K.A. left it open for readers to decide for themselves what happened to the characters that they love so much.

As for the Kelbrid themselves, it's possible that they are another form of parasitic species. The way they infest their hosts is just different. That would allow them to save Ax.

Strange and unpredictable things happen in wars all the time.

esplin

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Re: A Rebuttal to K.A.'s final letter
« Reply #64 on: February 25, 2010, 10:06:30 AM »
Yeah but saying anything could have happened just isn't good enough.  Nothing happened and it's a cop out. A rip off.  A middle finger.  So people say anything could have happened like that makes it ok and it doesn't. 

Also, God could have come down from heaven and stopped them from ramming each other, declared peace in the universe, Rachel comes back from death, they all sing hallelujah, and RL Stein & JK Rowling pop their heads and brag that they sold more books.  I mean, anything could have happened right? 


Offline ThermalRider

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Re: A Rebuttal to K.A.'s final letter
« Reply #65 on: February 25, 2010, 12:25:43 PM »
I don't think that I can agree that nothing happened. The war (on Earth at least) ended. The Animorphs won. Andalites and humans begin trading, new agencies and programs are formed. Those are all things that you get in an ending.

Plus the Kelbrid capturing Ax and the Animorphs being reunited is something that happens. The Animorphs are fighting again, and the odds are stacked against them. That yells Animorphs. That's what they do.

I think that having the Animorphs just peter out and fade into life would be denying what they went through. At first they were fighting for a normal life but by the end of the war, their lives are anything but normal. They need something more. That's what the sendoff is. It's the Animorphs being Animorphs because they can't be anything else.

Offline amida41

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Re: A Rebuttal to K.A.'s final letter
« Reply #66 on: February 26, 2010, 08:04:54 AM »
As for myself, I can admire Mrs Applegate for trying to teach us that war is bad, but I humbly believe the series would have been better without the sledgehammer message, or at least with a different execution.
My reasons are simple, and purely a matter of opinion, it doesn't bother me if anyone disagrees. The series is sending a message that 'War Is Bad', but anyone with half a brain will already realise that. The series aims at educating us, but for me all it did was provide crushing emotions. I already knew that war was bad, it's not too difficult to figure out. I was hoping for a message of hope when you have absolutely no choice but to defend yourself.

'War Is Bad' is aimed at reducing the number of conflicts we take part in. This is a noble goal, but the Animorphs is a series where the war is a necessity: the liberty and lives of our entire species is threatened by an unprovoked act of aggression - what message does that send to the audience if the author is downplaying the results of fighting for a cause that noble? I agree that it is unrealistic that six teenage guerilla warriors should defeat an alien empire, but:

a) I don't read science-fiction to be told things I already know and be left emotionally dissappointed at the end.

b) It's simply cruel to allow all 6 characters to survive until the final battle, and only then suffer a loss. It's infuriating to have an author dance away a particular aspect of realism-of-war for 53 books, and then crash it home just when you're starting to hope you might get a happy ending after all. I'm not asking for backslapping and rainbows, I don't mind if the survivors have scars, but Tobias and Rachel were by far the two characters I liked most. One died, the other had to live with that AS a nothlit WITHOUT any other friends or family he was close to UNTIL the eventual Bolivian Army Ending implied kamikaze charge.

c) Pulling the Kelbrid/The One/whatever out of thin air is inexcusable, I don't knw how else to say it. If that plot thread had been developed prior to book 54, or even mentioned, it might have been okay. But it wasn't.

I loved every single book in the series prior to the last, but #54 was just a letdown for myself.
« Last Edit: February 26, 2010, 08:13:20 AM by amida41 »

Offline MegaJ

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Re: A Rebuttal to K.A.'s final letter
« Reply #67 on: February 27, 2010, 03:30:45 AM »
Oh wow, people are STILL mad about #54.

It wasn't my favorite, but I liked it well enough. A good ending for humanity with enough bittersweetness for our heroes. I was upset when Cassie and Jake split, but I understood it. Rachel dying, I called it early on and had she'd lived she probably would've done poorly without an outlet for her anger. Tobias completely falling apart was expected.

I suppose the Kelbrid and such were an asspull, but I didn't really mind it along with the cliffhanger ending. I just saw it as the start of a new war, with the Animorphs surviving the ramming to fight a new war.

Offline delta

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Re: A Rebuttal to K.A.'s final letter
« Reply #68 on: August 02, 2010, 03:01:04 PM »
Sorry to bring up this topic again, but I wanted to say a few words that might provide insight for what KA/MG were thinking when they wrote about ramming the Blade ship.

In the Andalite Chronicles:

Elfangor rams the blade ship because he sees Alloran (which he considers his biggest mistake). He somehow manages to survive and becomes a hero to his people. Remember, he was probably not in the right frame of mind because he'd just got thrown back into a war after a few years of peace. Just ramming the blade ship wasn't going to save anyone: it was just going to give the Andalite Dome ship a chance to self-destruct to do a little more damage to the Yeerks. Perhaps he might kill the Abomination.

In 54:

Jake sees the escaped blade ship as his biggest mistake (where he could neither save his brother nor his cousin). Given the only options (ram, run), he sees it as his chance to right another wrong. It's extremely reckless, and I think it's also because he wasn't in the right frame of mind because he just came out of a few years of peace. Ramming the blade ship wasn't going to save Ax -- it was just going to do a little more damage to the renegade Yeerks who killed Rachel. Perhaps he might kill the one who killed Rachel.

So, personally, I think that KA was trying to give us another hope because it parallels so nicely with what Elfangor did. Elfangor became a Prince, fought countless battles, and finally, provided new hope to a new people. I found the message of extreme hope in their suicidal attempts (they're like, freakin' invincible unless Jake plans for one of their deaths :P).

With that said, I did expect Rachel to die -- they alluded to it in so many books because of how they worry how she'll be when the war ends. Plus, the Ellimist Chronicles already mentioned someone was going to die. She HAD to die, in my opinion. It didn't blindside me. I was brought to tears with her goodbye to Tobias.

I do agree, however, that the final book felt very rushed. I guess she had a limited amount of time and space, but I would've liked her to have ended it on #54/Animorphs Chronicles... or something.

Offline Kotetsu1442

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Re: A Rebuttal to K.A.'s final letter
« Reply #69 on: August 02, 2010, 11:23:37 PM »
As far as I am concerned about The Response, what annoyed me most was that it started like this:
Quote
Quite a number of people seem to be annoyed by the final chapter in the Animorphs story. There are a lot of complaints that I let Rachel die. That I let Visser Three/One live. That Cassie and Jake broke up. That Tobias seems to have been reduced to unexpressed grief. That there was no grand, final fight-to-end-all-fights. That there was no happy celebration. And everyone is mad about the cliffhanger ending.

So I thought I'd respond.

And I was like: "I totally understand why they would be annoyed about over-criticism of all those other things, if she wants to kill some characters and let others live it is her story, that's up to her. If they want to criticize it, OK, but to say it 'Shouldn't have ended that way' is a bit much. I'd really love to here some justification for the cliffhanger though, because that felt like way too much of an insulting copout..." Then they address everything, well enough I felt, except the cliffhanger.

I think I mostly agree with Terenia and itw as far as my opinion goes, we are certainly welcome to have our own opinions about the ending and to vocalize them as much as we want, but it isn't up to us to say that authors should/shouldn't do anything other than what they want to do in. I liked itw's painting analogy, most importantly the conclusion that "If I want to do the last differently, that's entirely up to me." And I think that should have been more a part of KA's response. I also think it helps to keep in mind when we see that KA was ticked off at the response it wasn't the 'due criticism' that you see here but probably plenty of much more insulting personal e-mails telling them that they were flat out 'wrong'.

As far as responses about it being too harsh/sad/disappointing, or this for example:
... I think it makes sense that he [Jake] would go insane, but it almost ruins the character, and though honest, it wasn't fair to us as readers. I remember being a kid and crying as tobias became trapped in hawk form, and then again when i realized that he and rachel could never have a normal life together. TO just be in love. I felt that same way years later as i read the last few pages of the series. I didn't cry, but i felt like it.

...

and i don't think she should have ended it like that, no one wants to watch the one's they love die or go insane. And that's why i'm so terribly disappointed.
I would say that those sorts of feelings/reactions is a lot of the point of the ending, so if they wanted to do that then that is exactly why they should end it that way. I would appreciate it if people were clear what they don't like rather than just saying they didn't like 'the ending' because there are a lot of different thing that happened in that book.

For example, I really disliked the final spaceship scene, not even because it was a "Bolivian Army Ending," because a "going out in a blaze of glory" ending can be pretty darn cool, but because it was done by setting up something completely disjointed from the rest of the series so it felt like a cop-out; on the other hand even though it was sad (or perhaps additionally because it was sad) I thought that the other elements were rather well done, and that either A. everything post-war could have been expanded in #54 or B. everything post-war up to Ax as a Captain (but not encountering a new enemy out of nowhere) could have been an epilogue to #53; then simply cutting off the encounter with 'The One' and everything that resulted as a consequence.

Again though, though I offer this as my "I didn't like this" and "I would have preferred ideas like this" I still feel that it isn't up to me (or anyone) to actually say "they got it wrong" and even if the whole series is re-released I don't think it should be changed to make anyone happy. (Expanded on... now that's another story, though still up to the author of course).
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Offline Alex Oiknine

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Re: A Rebuttal to K.A.'s final letter
« Reply #70 on: August 03, 2010, 10:38:09 AM »
I hated the ending, but I hated it because the final time-arc seemed to be so out-of-wack compared to the rest of the series, not the ultimate outcome. The ultimate outcome more or less made sense, though perhaps more pessimistic than it needed to be considering there are only six original characters we are working with.

1. It was always a war story. That it is simultaneously a sci-fi doesn't take away its ability to be a war story. (If she had tried to call it historical fiction or something along those lines then my statement would be invalid, but I'm pretty sure that claim was never made.) That one of the key messages on a "brought up consistently" basis to keep hope doesn't take away that it is a war story. I would be hard-pressed to weigh the message of "hope" over the message of what war - and the peoples within it - are. She didn't say it was a true war story, but it is definitely a sci-fi war story. Not one of the books has nothing about any sort of conflict. The Ellimist and Crayak are in conflict. The Ellimist loses his whole species due to conflict - a conflict where both people think they are in the right. Visser One has to go through a great deal of pain and conflict related to politics and the war. It would be very hard to find a book where the main problem, the main thing they have to overcome, is that of the war. Cassie finds out not all Yeerks are bad.  Ax finds out not all Andalites are good. The war takes people who should be very close and personal to them - except Cassie. (Tobias/Elfangor, Jake/Tom, Rachel/Tom, Marco/Mother, Ax/Elfangor, Cassie/??? - since Jake wasn't gone that long). I would say most of its points throughout the whole series relate to war - that not everyone does all good, not everyone does all bad, sometimes there are misunderstandings, sometimes there are traitors, and that a lot of conflict is more complicated than the participating governments ever act - authority on one side will often tell us things to completely demonize the other side.

2. The ending - even if I feel the timing was completely illogical time-wise to allow such big character changes - is fitting to that effect. No one comes out of that ending thinking anything but "war sucks."

3. I don't find the ending absent of hope. I think it is a parallel to another story, Elfangor's. Also, there's a big plot-hole left in the end that could explain their survival: They do not charge the same ship noted to have taken Aximili earlier. Ax never found the Blade Ship. There are at least two ships involved with The One, then. The Blade Ship (whom the Animorphs attack) and the gigantic ship larger than even Dome Ships (whoever Ax discovered and didn't make the realization quite on time that he and his comrades needed to leave). So I think the attitude "Oh it's impossible for them to have survived/would be totally stupid if they did" is a bit silly - it seems she made it certain they would be going into another conflict, another war. I guess they're the Ellimist's favorite chess pieces or something. Notice, too, that everyone alive is still doing something. Just because things aren't peachy doesn't make it over.
« Last Edit: August 03, 2010, 10:40:16 AM by alexoiknine »
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Offline aguito

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Re: A Rebuttal to K.A.'s final letter
« Reply #71 on: August 11, 2010, 04:14:32 AM »
About that last point, the fact that it doesn't really end is what, to ke, makes it particularly real. Were it all to have an ending, be it happy or sad, if all the loose ends are tied up that makes it seem less real to me. In real life nothing ever really ends, there are always loose ends that don't quite get tied up. Unthinkable that's why I like this ending so much. By leaving us at the cliffhanger it tells us, almost outright, that the story is not yet over, there is a lot more left to be done.
And as far as the theme of the last book goes, yes it says, pretty violently, that war sucks, but more than anything I think that it's the ultimate show of hope. Everyone has problems, most are left crippled in one way or another, and yet they are still able to rise to the call when they are needed. It leaves a bittersweet feeling in your mouth to see the characters we love brought so low, but who am I to say that that doesn't happen to all of us sometimes? But it's one thing to keep fighting when you're already wrapped up in the battle, another thing entirely to be under the weight of regret and remorse while feeling the bite of depression and still be able to enter the ring when your number is calledas Jake did. That, to me, is the true victory that I saw in the ending, the meaning that will stay with me. 

Offline Chad32

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Re: A Rebuttal to K.A.'s final letter
« Reply #72 on: August 11, 2010, 08:21:25 AM »
If they had left out The One and Kelbrid, they would have still had the anti-alien terrorists to deal with. I would have been fine with that. That way they're just dealing with the aftereffects of what happened, instead of starting a whole new thing that won't be expanded on outside of fanfics.


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Offline CounterInstinct

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Re: A Rebuttal to K.A.'s final letter
« Reply #73 on: August 12, 2010, 06:57:50 AM »
As Jara Hamee had said. "Stories have no end."
I'm just a writer, and my main goal was always to entertain. But I've never let Animorphs turn into just another painless video game version of war, and I wasn't going to do it at the end. I've spent 60 books telling a strange, fanciful war story, sometimes very seriously, sometimes more tongue-in-cheek. I've written a lot of action and a lot of humor and a lot of sheer nonsense. But I have also, again and again, challenged readers to think about what they were reading. To th

Offline Chad32

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Re: A Rebuttal to K.A.'s final letter
« Reply #74 on: August 12, 2010, 08:36:32 AM »
Well they kind of do. The story about the war between the Anis and Yeerks is over. The one about the Kelbrid and One is starting. Although if it's just the story of thier lives, then it's over when they die.


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