Your Honest Feelings About the End of the Series

[Dagon Thyne]

My main gripe is about Mat's characterization and Fain's ending.  Both were failures.  Sanderson has admitted he didn't write Matt very well but was too busy with other aspects of the story to realize it at the time.  And Fain's end was a complete joke with how he was built up to epic stature throughout the series.

 

 

 

I actually had a theory years ago that Fain was being built up to serve as the living vessel of the DO.  That the DO needed a body to fully enter the world, that that everything Fain went through was preparing him to die so that the DO could take his body.

[nkjp]

I liked the ending; I think BS certainly did the best he could. It certainly felt like he upped the tempo, and while I liked that as the first 11 books really started to get mired down, I think he could have spent more time wrapping things up. 

 

I thought Demandred was a weak character, but none of the Forsaken were particularly sophisticated so maybe that was by design. 

[Dan G]

Personality , I enjoyed the ending.

 

I tend to not like endings that are too clean or don't show the sacrifices made to reach the goal. To not have loss of life, freedom and emotional stress would have taken me out of the story. 

Also, the exploration of free will of both individuals and nations and not an imposed , unbreakable peace is much more dynamic than "happily ever after " and leads to a further exploration and theories regarding what happens next. 

 

I remained hooked to the very last page. 

 

 

[nsmallw]

On 10/19/2023 at 10:57 AM, Scarloc99 said:

I would love to have something like the Tolkien notes that where released, but, we had a load of drafts and re writes (and christopher tolkien did milk that alot), I think from what BS has said the idea of "notes" is a very very loose thing, there where ideas that had to be formed into a story. 

to the OP, I agree, the first time I read them I liked them, because the series was coming to an end, but I have since re read them about 7 or 8 times and they have to count amongst some of the worst fantasy writing I have read, the worst thing is that there is an essence there, but BS fails to stick the landing (in my opinion) multiple times. I think the fact is we need to live with what we have and be grateful that this is not GOT, to be fair it taught me an important lesson, never start a fantasy series that has not been finished, especially if the Author is a slow writer who is nearer to death then birth 🙂 

I feel the same way about wishing Wheel of Time had our own Christopher Tolkien to dig through everything RJ wrote that either didn't make it into the story, changed etc. Any notes he had for whomever wrote after his passing, all organized ala CT. 

[qlorin]

In 2007 or 2008 after RJ passed away there was a theory manual on the internet. It was around 300 hundred pages and theorized 3-4 alternate endings. None of them were close to the real ending but they were also good. At the time those were the only endings we had for several years so they are like alternate endings for me. Nearly all the characters died in one or the other so i experienced all the deaths and victories before it was written 😄 

If you feel some parts of the real ending is weak you can look for that manual. Some parts like sharans nakomi etc will not be there but there were some more depth endings to established stories like Padan Fain or seanchen (one of the theories highly expolered the continent actually).

If you find the manual also get me a copy 😄 I can't find it anymore but maybe you have the luck of the dark one 😄 

[MauricXe]

I enjoyed the ending. Our main hero was rewarded with a long overdue vacation.

We all want to know what happens next but I'm also satisfied because we got an ending; we got THE ending RJ wanted for the series.

[Sabio]

Fain was never meant to be epic, RJ once said he was caught by surprise at how many readers liked and wanted more Fain.  His early purpose was to push things along, get the characters where they needed to go (Such as in Book2 )  and then you noticed he vanished for long periods.  

[jules1979]

Thom marriage and bonding to Moiraine. I don't like it, I like Siuan Sanche and Moiraine Damodred relationship. I don't like how Siuan and Moiraine are so weakened. I don't like the Killing off Bella 

[driftnet]

I was relieved to get through it. I've never been a fan of Sanderson, but at least things were finally happening, people were moving, events were progressing... I never skimmed a work of fiction before the middle of WoT, and I haven't since.

 

In fairness, writing a good ending to a beloved (or at least popular) series seems to be incredibly difficult. I thought Peter V. Brett did a great job with the Demon Cycle, and Joe Abercrombie did well with the original First Law trilogy, but in my opinion Brent Weeks blew the ending of Lightbringer spectacularly, I wasn't really pleased with the Expanse, and at least one major series (A Song of Ice and Fire) seems unlikely to get a proper ending at all. I'm still waiting on concluding volumes for the Kingkiller Chronicle and Gentleman Bastards, too.

[Samt]

On 12/18/2024 at 11:35 AM, driftnet said:

I was relieved to get through it. I've never been a fan of Sanderson, but at least things were finally happening, people were moving, events were progressing... I never skimmed a work of fiction before the middle of WoT, and I haven't since.

 

In fairness, writing a good ending to a beloved (or at least popular) series seems to be incredibly difficult. I thought Peter V. Brett did a great job with the Demon Cycle, and Joe Abercrombie did well with the original First Law trilogy, but in my opinion Brent Weeks blew the ending of Lightbringer spectacularly, I wasn't really pleased with the Expanse, and at least one major series (A Song of Ice and Fire) seems unlikely to get a proper ending at all. I'm still waiting on concluding volumes for the Kingkiller Chronicle and Gentleman Bastards, too.

In general, I've stopped starting fiction (either watching or reading) unless I know that the ending has already been written and isn't widely panned.  It does mean that I'm not current with new things, but I figure I'm doing my small part to protest against what I see as rather widespread proliferation of premises and world building being allowed to substitute for actual payoff and resolution in fiction writing.  It's worse in TV writing, but written fiction is guilty as well.