Sometimes we watch a movie or read a book where from the start we can say “this is how it will end.” Frequently, we see it through until the end anyway, because we’re most interested in the journey, not the destination.
We want to feel with the characters, see the events through their eyes, fall in love with them, hate them, escape out of our worlds and into theirs for a little while.
Sometimes, the journey isn’t worth it. We can make every plot point prediction moments before it happens, because it’s so cliche, and so overly foreshadowed, that we see it coming and can dodge long before it smacks us in the face.
My two least favorite movies of all times (which is a shame because they have two of my favorite – based on looks anyway – actors): Valentine, and SWAT. Because they fell into this predictability issue. I’m not one of those people who tries to predict what’s going to happen next in a story, and always walks out of the theater going “I saw that coming two minutes in”, but these movies pushed my limits for ‘wow, saw that coming a mile away’.
On the other hand, sometimes we read/watch and at the end go “What the hell?” Because the character acted so completely out of character to arrive at that ending, that it was just implausible and destroyed everything(there’s an old full-length cartoon called Wizards. The ending is funny as hell, but so very out of character and inappropriate to the rest of the story).
On the reading front, there are a couple of books that I adored the way they ended. Not because it was happy, or because it was what I would have chosen for the characters, but because it was appropriate to the story that had been told, and to the characters created. I’m told there are other people who don’t like the way these stories end. They’re welcome to their opinion, but I won’t agree. (The Hunger Games books, and The Siren by Tiffany Reisz).
On the other hand, I was reading a book that I just had to put down and walk away from (I won’t list the book or author), because everything the characters did was predictable. It was a beautiful story. Stunning prose. Great emotion, setting, characters, all that. On a technical level, it was probably an 8 or 9 out of 10. But nothing surprised me. It wasn’t that I found myself saying “Oh, this will happen next” It was that when it did happen, I wasn’t shocked or moved.
It was so technically accurate, following all the appropriate paces and steps and plot points and character arcs an author is told to follow to make a compelling story, that it never sucked me in.
Or maybe there was something else about the story that I can’t identify and this is just an excuse. What do you think? Is there a difference between a story that’s appropriate to the characters and plot, and a story that’s predictable?
Discuss, enlighten, I’m very curious about this.
Honestly for me it comes down to whether I like the characters. I don’t mind figuring out what is going to happen if I genuinely enjoy hanging out with these people and care about them. As long as it doesn’t seem like THEY should know what’s going to happen, we’re cool.
(FWIW I hate it when I can read a book and all I can see is that the writer is following the perfect formula–you know, “and now we’re 15% in, time for the hook! and there it is!” It makes the book feel less organic; I need a sense that at some point the characters took over. But that’s just me.)
I can’t help but love a happy ending. Even if I figure out how a story is going to end early on, I still want to read about the journey, especially if there are surprises thrown in
I’m okay with predicting a dire or happy ending, but I hate it when I can practically write the thing. And I so saw the end of “Valentine” coming (you’re writing about the one with the guy from “Buffy”, right?).
I find that my endings often have to happen in a reasonably predictable way, simply because I like elements of circularity and completeness. I try to make up for it in the middle, mostly.
There’s nothing I love more than surprising twists that leave me gasping, so a predictable book wouldn’t interest me.
I know what you mean. A book can be technically well done, but you’re always aware that you’re reading a book. It’s all perfectly done, well paced, subtly foreshadowed, the characters are well developed and stay firmly within character. The story makes sense, but it never compells. It never feels real, it always feels like a story.
Perhaps the one thing the author is missing in that case, is a voice. They’ve done every technically write, but they can’t get across that one thing that I believe is impossible to teach. Their own voice. Without a voice, writing has no soul.
I can usually peg who did it and endings, so I love being fooled in a logical way.
Teresa
I think what you’re describing is the difference in the VOICE of the author. I will stick with a predictable story if I love the VOICE. I’ll put a book down if I hate the VOICE.
I know it’s a complicated idea … “voice” … but I believe it’s the difference you’re pointing out here.
This is such a fine line to walk. I agree that you don’t want it to be crazy predictable, but you also don’t want it to make no sense because it’s all over the place. I think characters make or break it for me. Put people anywhere as long as I like them:)