K.A's response to the final book criticsm.

[esplin]

KA's ending was perfect except for the new war!!!! AAGAGAGGGAAAH.
I understand that war doesnt end happily im not that ignorant, but I was a child when the book ended and even now as a more mature person I still think that, the kelbrid and the one could have been done without, I wouldnt have changed anything else but that, maybe i just should have ripped the last few chapters out of my book.

[Phoenix004]

Although I was originally slightly disappointed by the cliffhanger ending (the rest of the book was good), I have since learned that it was the best way and possibly the only way to really end the series. I would have hated a "lived happily ever after" ending or anything like that. That's for fairy tales, not real life (or realistic fiction).

[jsh357]

In short, I agree with Applegate's thoughts, but she probably should not have written them out.  I came to those same conclusions on my own, and would have preferred for other intelligent readers to do the same.  No ending would have satisfied everyone.

[ThermalRider]

The ending was good for the series. Yeah, it wasn't fair, but the Animorphs were never in fair situations throughout the war anyways. The odds were always stacked against them.

I agree with what K.A. said. If you look back at history, you can see that most wars transition right into another war. And the people that fight in them always come out scarred in some way.

[EscafilDevice]

Also, I'm not sure what everyone means about Rachel being one-dimensional (or any of them really). I thought Rachel was extremely one-dimensional in a lot of the ghost-written books, but in the last book we finally got "our" Rachel back for like...three chapters.

The only Rachel book that she was one-dimensional in was #37. It seemed like the ghostwriter was trying to touch on some personal conflict but couldn't quite do it - I'm pretty sure that was the shortest book in the series anyway.

Rachel's character was well-done in all of her early books (2, 7, 12, 17, 21). 32 and 48 were the books where she is directly confronted with her violent tendencies and that was also well-written. The Journey (#42) could be considered a filler book because it's just one of those fun books that involves the Helmacrons, so I really wouldn't count it because it doesn't go into anybody's character at all. The Exposed (#27) dealt more with her relationship with Tobias and introducing the Drode.

I'd say that the only Rachel book that was bad was #37. I hated how Rachel was treated in the last couple of books, but it could be retconned as that being the perception of the other characters - keep in mind how early Rachel's last book was in the final story arc.

I'm always going to think that the ending was terrible. I think that the mindset that a war story has to destroy all of the characters to be a good war story is childish. The notion that an unrealistic story has to have a "realistic ending" is ridiculous - I think that K.A trying to pass off her ****ty book as being "realistic" is the quintessential cop-out. I would rather have a good story that was "unrealistic" than a bad story that was "realistic". Her job is to entertain her readers - maybe if this piece of crap was different, Animorphs wouldn't have died out so many years ago.

As stated earlier, it was beneath her.

[CounterInstinct]

I halfway agree with you Escafil. #37 was one-dimensional.. ooh... i despise that ghostwrite.... T_T
48 showed another side to Rachel... especially at the ending...

However, Grandpa G always made a notion that majority of people from wars, never really come back. I guess its true. Our country has been through a lot of wars due to a lot of nations wanting to colonize as in the past... >_<

I didn't think the story was bad because of the ending. That was made it bittersweet. If it ended out as a good ending, I think it would have died out in our hearts, much, much earlier, feeling at place where everyone was happy at the end. However, making it end like a real war story makes it feel.... bittersweet....

I love K.A as a writer, and I believe that this work of hers is/was one of her best.

[CounterInstinct]

in case someone lazily skips....

Dear Animorphs Readers:

    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.

    Animorphs was always a war story. Wars don't end happily. Not ever. Often relationships that were central during war, dissolve during peace. Some people who were brave and fearless in war are unable to handle peace, feel disconnected and confused. Other times people in war make the move to peace very easily. Always people die in wars. And always people are left shattered by the loss of loved ones.

    That's what happens, so that's what I wrote. Jake and Cassie were in love during the war, and end up going their seperate ways afterward. Jake, who was so brave and capable during the war is adrift during the peace. Marco and Ax, on the other hand, move easily past the war and even manage to use their experience to good effect. Rachel dies, and Tobias will never get over it. That doesn't by any means cover everything that happens in a war, but it's a start.

    Here's what doesn't happen in war: there are no wondrous, climactic battles that leave the good guys standing tall and the bad guys lying in the dirt. Life isn't a World Wrestling Federation Smackdown. Even the people who win a war, who survive and come out the other side with the conviction that they have done something brave and necessary, don't do a lot of celebrating. There's very little chanting of 'we're number one' among people who've personally experienced war.

    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 think about the right and wrong, not just the who-beat-who. And to tell you the truth I'm a little shocked that so many readers seemed to believe I'd wrap it all up with a lot of high-fiving and backslapping. Wars very often end, sad to say, just as ours did: with a nearly seamless transition to another war.

    So, you don't like the way our little fictional war came out? You don't like Rachel dead and Tobias shattered and Jake guilt-ridden? You don't like that one war simply led to another? Fine. Pretty soon you'll all be of voting age, and of draft age. So when someone proposes a war, remember that even the most necessary wars, even the rare wars where the lines of good and evil are clear and clean, end with a lot of people dead, a lot of people crippled, and a lot of orphans, widows and grieving parents.

    If you're mad at me because that's what you have to take away from Animorphs, too bad. I couldn't have written it any other way and remained true to the respect I have always felt for Animorphs readers.

    K.A. Applegate

In case, again, anyone lazily skips.

[Estelore]

I find it dreadfully appalling that some of you seem to believe it to be the author's 'job' to ENTERTAIN the READERS.

Forgive me for saying so, but that is quite possibly the single most ridiculous thing that I've ever read, and I've read a LOT.

It is YOUR job to try to understand HER. NOT the other way around, fools.
If you believe otherwise, than you are an arse among idiots, heartily-begging-yer-pardon.

It is as though you are telling Michelangelo to put some clothes on David, ordering Picasso to draw a normal-looking face, or demanding that Tchaikovsky take those cannon shots out of his 1812 Overture, because YOU think that it should be that way. Utterly ridiculous. She is an ARTIST, and it is her RIGHT to do WHATEVER-THE-HELL-SHE-WANTS with HER characters. They are her CREATIONS. She has artistic license, and you need to learn to respect that, or you are going to be sorely disappointed for the rest of your life.

I freely admit that I wept my eyes out when Rachel died. I'll tell you right now that I gained MUCH more from that catharsis than I'd have gained from a 'happy ending'. If you expect happily-ever-after from everything that you read, I sorely pity you for being a  Lazy Reader. If you can't contribute emotionally to the art that you observe, what are you gaining from it? It's unconscionable, but unlike being blind and tone-deaf in an opera house, you can DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT. You have enough of a brain to read this series.

Now USE it.

[morfowt]

I find it dreadfully appalling that some of you seem to believe it to be the author's 'job' to ENTERTAIN the READERS.

Forgive me for saying so, but that is quite possibly the single most ridiculous thing that I've ever read, and I've read a LOT.

It is YOUR job to try to understand HER. NOT the other way around, fools.
If you believe otherwise, than you are an arse among idiots, heartily-begging-yer-pardon.

It is as though you are telling Michelangelo to put some clothes on David, ordering Picasso to draw a normal-looking face, or demanding that Tchaikovsky take those cannon shots out of his 1812 Overture, because YOU think that it should be that way. Utterly ridiculous. She is an ARTIST, and it is her RIGHT to do WHATEVER-THE-HELL-SHE-WANTS with HER characters. They are her CREATIONS. She has artistic license, and you need to learn to respect that, or you are going to be sorely disappointed for the rest of your life.

I freely admit that I wept my eyes out when Rachel died. I'll tell you right now that I gained MUCH more from that catharsis than I'd have gained from a 'happy ending'. If you expect happily-ever-after from everything that you read, I sorely pity you for being a  Lazy Reader. If you can't contribute emotionally to the art that you observe, what are you gaining from it? It's unconscionable, but unlike being blind and tone-deaf in an opera house, you can DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT. You have enough of a brain to read this series.

Now USE it.

I don't know if that was amazing or scary...

[TheFearlessLeader]

Here is my response to her response...

SCREW YOU!

You gave me 6 amazing years of books that inspired, delighted, entrapped, and flat out owned me. Then you take the last few pages of the final book after 6 years, and you ram REALITY down my throat??? WTF?

The series is BUILT on the fact that IT IS NOT REAL. If any of the crazy ideas in your books were real, we would be in trouble big time. But they aren't. And I spent 6 years hoping for it to be real so that I could get taken away into this other reality and forget my own life.

And now you want to tell me that your books were supposed to have a REAL meaning??? Hell no. I won't accept that. There SHOULD have been a fairy tale ending, as the books were based on FANTASY. I can't believe you find it OK to destroy the hearts of young children all over the world who read your books and FED YOUR FAMILY for 6 years waiting for the best conclusion in the world and a happy ending to your series!!! That is selfish and shameless and just all around terrible.

I don't care what kind of message you are trying to portray! I would have been just FINE knowing that they won and the bad guys lost and everyone lived happily ever after. Of course, I'm fine the way it ended, but it still left a void in my world. It felt like a Girlfriend who you truly love just dumped you for the guy down the street. And it wasn't a pretty breakup.

Bah. Bah. Bah. I am a bitter person about this situation. I have not let it bother me save for about a week of feeling like crap after finishing the series, but it is still the principal of the matter. So go ahead and feel Smug about teaching kids about real life and wars, you taught me NOTHING! All you taught me is not to get wrapped up in any more fantasy series.


Sorry to offend anyone, but I had to get that out. It has been brewing for years in the back of my mind and heart.

I want to be entertained, which is the PURPOSE OF BUYING A BOOK and spending MONEY on a series of 60+ books! Why else? To learn? To experience an artists expertise?

NO! To be ENTERTAINED!

And I don't expect a HAPPY ending to EVERYTHING I read, but from a children's series based on fantasy and relationships between characters that had been built from book 1, I would expect SOME kind of happiness when I close the last book! I would NOT expect to be sad about the ending, confused, and pissed off.

But I am wrong for having an opinion and having a desire for what I want in the end? WHY?

I spent the MONEY and TIME to buy and read all of the books. Why should it be that I cannot complain about the ending? That is wrong.

She can do whatever she pleases, even if it hurts others, just because she is an artist???

OK FINE, with that logic, anybody can be innocent for going around shooting people in the streets, as long as when they line up the bodies, it makes a form of art, right?

WRONG. Artists need to be VERY aware of the wants and needs of their audience, just like anyone else trying to SELL something.

Which brings up the question, if you are selling it to others, is it truly art? Or is it only art when you do it for your own satisfaction and do NOT profit off the work. If there is an audience for 6 years worth of artwork, and a loyal dedicated fan base, then those people SHOULD be considered when creating the finishing touches. After all, without them, the series is NOTHING. Without US, she is looking for a new job and no longer writing the books. Right?


OK I'm done. I will limit my posts from now on to better flavored discussions.

[morfowt]

well first of all, animoprhs is science fiction, not fantasy.

[CounterInstinct]

It doesn't hurt others... 
I loved the way she made her ending.. it wasn't bad, literature-wise... I don't understand why people do not enjoy uneasy endings... really...
the book wasn't based on fantasy, it's a SCIENCE fiction.... plus, doesn;t mean its a children's series means it is for children. It is merely the rating of how easy to read it is, i think. Of Mice and Men is... well.... a children's story... but still.... you know what happened to Mice and Men.

I want to be entertained too, but not to the point that I can control and shapen the story to my liking.

There is some Hapiness in the ending, I'm surprised no one seems to point this out.

Tobias's grief.
Jake's uneasiness.
Rachel's death.
Ax's ultimate destiny.

The cost for... what else?

Freedom. I guess.... isn;t that happy?

[Estelore]

Here is my response to her response...

SCREW YOU!

A bit tetchy, now, en't we, laddie? You're new-ish here, so I'll try not to be terribly snarky with you.

1. WHO, exactly, are you suggesting be screwed? Ms. Applegate, or me? Answer that one very carefully, oh FearlessLeader.

2. Unless you are EAGER to make a LOT of enemies here, very, VERY quickly, you need to learn some manners. We don't say things like 'screw you' on this forum. If you want to debate, do it nicely. If you want to argue and sling insults, kindly get the heck out of here.

Thank-you.

Edit: Oh, yes. One more thing.

This is a series about a WAR. In what possible universe can you exist, that wars do not have casualties?

[ANItiger13]

Here is my response to her response...

SCREW YOU!

A bit tetchy, now, en't we, laddie? You're new-ish here, so I'll try not to be terribly snarky with you.

1. WHO, exactly, are you suggesting be screwed? Ms. Applegate, or me? Answer that one very carefully, oh FearlessLeader.

2. Unless you are EAGER to make a LOT of enemies here, very, VERY quickly, you need to learn some manners. We don't say things like 'screw you' on this forum. If you want to debate, do it nicely. If you want to argue and sling insults, kindly get the heck out of here.

Thank-you.

Exactly what she said. For one thing, not a good idea to say "Screw you" at all. And a worse idea to say it either a well liked member or the AUTHOR of the series this forum is for.

K.A. ended the story in the way a war would end. She didn't end it happily and not many authors seem to do that. And honestly, could you imagine Animorphs ending nicely at all?

[morfowt]

screw you is not something you should tell ANYONE. Even worse if you tell it to a popular member or an even more popular author.