What would you change? The worst ending thread.

[rah]

There's been so much whining about how GOT is going to end (even before it ends) that it got me thinking. Is this the worst ever. Probably not.

If you could change an ending to a movie, tv series or even a book, which would it be? Let's not get too obscure please.

For me, it's an easy decision. I would change how the "LOST" series ended. How would I change it. ANYWAY that would have made ANY sense.

Let's hear from you, what was the worst ending for you.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

There's been so much whining about how GOT is going to end (even before it ends) that it got me thinking. Is this the worst ever. Probably not.

If you could change an ending to a movie, tv series or even a book, which would it be? Let's not get too obscure please.

For me, it's an easy decision. I would change how the "LOST" series ended. How would I change it. ANYWAY that would have made ANY sense.

Let's hear from you, what was the worst ending for you.

Define "obscure." There are many supposedly mainstream TV shows and movies that are obscure to me because I've never heard of them until someone on a forum mentions them and suddenly I seem to be the only person on the planet who's never heard of them.

Anyway, there are two shows whose endings I would change:

The Crow: Stairway to Heaven. It was promised a 2nd season, but due to a series of deals and purchases of studios and production companies, the new owners opted not to go ahead with another season. The series ended with one of the main characters jumping off the bridge that links the Land of the Dead to the world of the living, to reunite with another of the undead main characters who is still trapped in the world of the living. There are at least a half-dozen directions I can think of that the second season could have taken, and have written some of these down (I've written a lot of C:StH fanfic). The actual direction would likely have been very different, but no less interesting.

The Borgias. I'm referring to the production with Jeremy Irons and Francois Arnaud, not the other one. Again, this is a show that expected an additional season, and was abruptly cancelled. The producers tried to get a 2-hour movie approved to wrap up the essential storylines (Cesare's conquest of the Romangna, Pope Alexander's death, Lucrezia's marriage into the d'Este family, Cesare's death).

Instead, what we got was a script of that proposed movie, sold on Amazon Kindle. I read it; some of it would have been really good, some was utter crap. It really deserved a full season to do justice to everything. So my change would be to give them that season to do it properly.

 

[rah]

While not exactly mainstream I wouldn't put these in the so obscure that no one would know what you're talking about.
There are a lot of other TV series that got cancelled not by choice but due to low rating which could probably be their own category where you'd be happy for any real ending instead of a cliff hanger.

 

[Lexicus]

At the end of Samurai Champloo I'd have the three main characters stay together instead of going their separate ways

 

[Peuri]

The Walking Dead season 5. Rick and his crew die in the wilderness. The series ends while still having some soul to it.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Not counting stories that straight up don't get finished for one reason or another, and thus have no ending...the one that immediately jumped to mind was Mass Effect 3's, which reasonably could have been contingent on what the player did prior to reaching it with a good outcome requiring near-perfection. NOPE.

While typing this, somewhat bizarrely the ending to "School Days" came to mind also. I've never played the game or seen the related anime. I don't think I could get through them, absent being paid to or something. But the meme ending reached me all the same and it is fantastic. Wouldn't change a thing there.

So Mass Effect 3 is still my answer.

 

[Zkribbler]

Seinfeld The 2-part finale which ended America's No 1 comedy series should have contained more that two funny lines.

 

[Estebonrober]

I just really really hope The Expanse doesn't fall flat.

Also I like GoT enough that this won't ruin it for me and heck who knows, maybe Martin will finish the books and look for redemption personally since his characters never get any.

 

[Phrossack]

I would also add Mass Effect 3, except I think both ME2 and ME3 should've been heavily rewritten. ME2 had great characterization but was a glorified sidequest that derailed Shepard's mission to stop the Reapers for two years and forced him/her to work with hostile terrorists just so Shepard could bring down a little baby Reaper.

I would've written ME2 around Shep's quest to find ways to beat the Reapers and learn more about the geth. Shep could be sent to investigate whether the geth are planning another invasion, and whether there are any more useful Prothean artifacts like the beacon and Vigil. Then 3, of course, would need a better ending--perhaps the extra two years of preparedness gained from Shepard not dying would be enough to have a shot at a conventional victory.

 

[old_andy]

Sean Bean wakes up alive and well in Winterfell, and realizes it was all a terrible dream. Then he rolls over and sees Peter Dinklage making kissy faces at him, and realizes things are a lot worse..

the end.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

The last Jedi could have had something more original than another trench run.

Also vote 3 for ME3

 

[H4run]

At the end of Samurai Champloo I'd have the three main characters stay together instead of going their separate ways

It seems they want to give a space for the audience to interpret and imagine how it will end instead of dictating a narration, however for me, the way they execute it makes the anime series weak instead. The ending is so lazy imho.

I also dont like how James Clavel handle the ending to one of his novel shogun, and the cliche affair between a more gentleman western man vs culturally abusive asian man, this kind of orientalist theme is nausetting for me.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

I also dont like how James Clavel handle the ending to one of his novel shogun, and the cliche affair between a more gentleman western man vs culturally abusive asian man, this kind of orientalist theme is nausetting for me.

I've read the novel and seen the 8-hour miniseries three times (twice in English and once in French). I'm not familiar enough with that period of history to know how much was based on fact and reasonably accurate and how much was just made up. But I did enjoy the miniseries (I enjoy anything with Richard Chamberlain, and any Sliders fans take note: John Rhys-Davies had a small(ish) role as a ship's captain).

Deciding how to end things can be a bit tricky for historical dramas. Real history is documented and shouldn't be messed with, so that's what annoyed me greatly about the European production about the Borgias (not the one I mentioned earlier). At the end of Borgia, we see Cesare come ashore in the New World as a Conquistador, when in real history, he was killed in battle at Viana, Spain, and buried there. He never left Europe.

I guess the producers felt that ending the series with his death would have been too much of a downer, so they fudged it by saying, "Nope, history was totally wrong, it was just someone wearing his armor who was killed and everyone thought it was really Cesare Borgia who died..." While emotionally satisfying for some of the audience, it was a cop-out for the rest of us. Sometimes a death scene is something to look forward to, if you know the actors, director, and writers are capable of doing it justice. Cesare's death scene in the American production would have been spectacularly poignant, given how good Francois Arnaud was in the part. But he never got the chance, since the series was cut short by a season.

Oh, well. What the producers don't deliver, fanfic writers will.

 

[EgonSpengler]

Off the top of my head, an epically-bad ending to a recent tv series was what happened to Castle, starring Nathan Fillion and Stana Katic. Rumors were swirling that the two stars had had a falling out, and anyway, most people agreed that the show had lost its touch, and maybe 8 seasons was enough. Still, the calamitous mishandling of the show at the end resulted in a series finale that embarrassed everyone. What would I change? I would go back in time, take over as the show's EP, and announce in the Summer of 2015 that the series' 8th season would be its last. Let the writers give the show a proper ending; don't humiliate Stana Katic and Tamala Jones; give Katic and Fillion a chance to bury the hatchet, if in fact there was a hatchet; get Kevin Smith to emcee a lovely 10-year cast reunion at New York Comic Con in 2025. The End.

 

[H4run]

I've read the novel and seen the 8-hour miniseries three times (twice in English and once in French). I'm not familiar enough with that period of history to know how much was based on fact and reasonably accurate and how much was just made up. But I did enjoy the miniseries (I enjoy anything with Richard Chamberlain, and any Sliders fans take note: John Rhys-Davies had a small(ish) role as a ship's captain

I read the novel and watch the movie just like you, Richard Chamberlain and Toshiro Mifune's acting are gold in the movie. And it is during the end of sengoku period after the death of Hideyoshi culminating in the war of sekigahara. Anjin San or Blackthorne is William Adam while Mariko is the famous Christian daughter of Akechi Mitsuhide, there were never an affair between them, in fact William Adam had descendent over there from a local woman, and his son inherit his position as Hatamoto, however after the purge of Christian in Japan there were not so much information in regard to his descendent. If they just keep loyal to the historical narration it would be better for me.

 

[Lexicus]

It seems they want to give a space for the audience to interpret and imagine how it will end instead of dictating a narration, however for me, the way they execute it makes the anime series weak instead. The ending is so lazy imho.

The real ending is imo fine, the resolution of the plot, just that last scene where they split up makes me so sad

 

[Ajidica]

Farscape.
They ended Season 4 on a tragic cliffhanger in the expectation of getting a 5th season*, but didn't. The entire 5th season got smushed into the Peacekeeper Wars miniseries which, truth be told, wasn't very good.

*In fairness, I can't blame the network for cancelling the show. After Season 3, a lot of the writers who had been around from the beginning of the show left. The showrunners tried to bring in new writers and the result was rocky to say the least. The Season 4 premier, which was intended as a soft launch to a wider American audience, was incoherent, strange, and did a terrible job of making Farscape look cool. The rest of the season was rocky until the final 5 episode stretch which was very good. By then it was too late.

 

[H4run]

The real ending is imo fine, the resolution of the plot, just that last scene where they split up makes me so sad

The flower Samurai right? Yea I agree, after that the author think like "then what? They dont have any reason to be together anymore so why not break the audience heart by having them walk in three seperate direction?"

Thats the thing that you are not satisfied isn't it? Same me too, at least put a good closure with some OVA or something.

Btw please watch Bebop Lexicus

 

[hobbsyoyo]

Farscape.
They ended Season 4 on a tragic cliffhanger in the expectation of getting a 5th season*, but didn't. The entire 5th season got smushed into the Peacekeeper Wars miniseries which, truth be told, wasn't very good.

*In fairness, I can't blame the network for cancelling the show. After Season 3, a lot of the writers who had been around from the beginning of the show left. The showrunners tried to bring in new writers and the result was rocky to say the least. The Season 4 premier, which was intended as a soft launch to a wider American audience, was incoherent, strange, and did a terrible job of making Farscape look cool. The rest of the season was rocky until the final 5 episode stretch which was very good. By then it was too late.

They came out with a movie that resolved the cliffhanger. It was pretty good. Or is that the miniseries you're talking about?


I want to second @rah's recommendation on Lost but truth be told I had given up on the show long before then. Same with Dexter. My wife watched both those shows to the end and was super dissapointed in the endings.


Enterprise had a crappy, rushed ending due to cancellation. They killed a key crew member who just got married and sort of retconned how the Federation was founded. Well, I don't think the Federation foundation had ever been shown on other TV shows and movies so I guess it's not so much a retcon as just kind of crappy storytelling. That show retconned so much about Star Trek that it's hard to tell what was new content they introduced versus what was re-spinning stuff.

The entire last season of Parks and Rec was borderline awful. They were doing fan service and wrapping up all the storylines but it was saccharine sweet and not very funny.

 

[Lexicus]

Btw please watch Bebop Lexicus

I have been actually, I don't like it as much as Champloo but it's good