caliban
This review may contain spoilers
Excellent buildup, terrible ending
Let me preface this by saying that Lovely Writer is one of the best series I’ve seen. It has its flaws and inconsistencies, but all can be forgiven thanks to the magnetism of its two leads, and the progression of their cat-and-mouse game.
So you can imagine my disappointment when they gave us THAT ending. I’ve been trying to figure out what I hate about it, and there’s a lot, and I can go scene by scene explaining how they could’ve made it better.
SPOILERS AHEAD
But ultimately, I think it’s because the whole final episode was a disservice to the show’s characters. The last major decisions happened at the end of episode 11, where it all fell apart. We can think of episode 12 as simply the aftermath of all those terrible decisions.
While we see Gene and Nubsib actually end up together, it wasn’t because of their own decisions. Rather, it was due to a jump forward to a time when they were no longer newsworthy. It was business-as-usual after the time-jump.
My problem with that is that it invalidates everything that led up to it. There were no stakes. It was just a wait-it-out scenario that happens in real life, not in a finale episode of a fictional story.
In every story, character development and growth is important. Lovely Writer did not give any of its characters that privilege. Everything and everyone remained the same.
Gene, per usual, remained a pushover and just accepted the situation, no matter how it’s gonna hurt him. Nubsib, in his refusal to compromise, remained a childish character and seemingly did not learn anything from the experience.
This makes their reunion underwhelming and devoid of emotion — and it actually played out underwhelming and devoid of emotion. It was just the next logical step to neatly tie up loose ends.
But did it stop there? No. They had to include a series of imaginary ending scenarios, which I think were not there to serve as a nod-and-wink, but a cry for help that they actually had no idea how to end the story.
From the time-jump onwards, it all felt like betrayal after betrayal as they were peeling off the layers one by one. It was as if they were telling us that all our emotional investment was stupid and unnecessary, and it was, after all, just a novel that is adapted into a series.
So you can imagine my disappointment when they gave us THAT ending. I’ve been trying to figure out what I hate about it, and there’s a lot, and I can go scene by scene explaining how they could’ve made it better.
SPOILERS AHEAD
But ultimately, I think it’s because the whole final episode was a disservice to the show’s characters. The last major decisions happened at the end of episode 11, where it all fell apart. We can think of episode 12 as simply the aftermath of all those terrible decisions.
While we see Gene and Nubsib actually end up together, it wasn’t because of their own decisions. Rather, it was due to a jump forward to a time when they were no longer newsworthy. It was business-as-usual after the time-jump.
My problem with that is that it invalidates everything that led up to it. There were no stakes. It was just a wait-it-out scenario that happens in real life, not in a finale episode of a fictional story.
In every story, character development and growth is important. Lovely Writer did not give any of its characters that privilege. Everything and everyone remained the same.
Gene, per usual, remained a pushover and just accepted the situation, no matter how it’s gonna hurt him. Nubsib, in his refusal to compromise, remained a childish character and seemingly did not learn anything from the experience.
This makes their reunion underwhelming and devoid of emotion — and it actually played out underwhelming and devoid of emotion. It was just the next logical step to neatly tie up loose ends.
But did it stop there? No. They had to include a series of imaginary ending scenarios, which I think were not there to serve as a nod-and-wink, but a cry for help that they actually had no idea how to end the story.
From the time-jump onwards, it all felt like betrayal after betrayal as they were peeling off the layers one by one. It was as if they were telling us that all our emotional investment was stupid and unnecessary, and it was, after all, just a novel that is adapted into a series.
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