LibriumArcana.Games

Figured this fit better in here than in Sci-Fi.

Just finished it tonight. WTF. That ending almost made me throw the book across the room. Series was awesome, ending was... I don't know. It good be good in a few days when I can digest it, but it seems so empty after such a long story.

Anyone else read it and have any thoughts?

I had the same reaction. In fact I woke up my roommates at the time around 2 or 3 in the morning by yelling out What the fuck! when I got to the ending. I agree, great series the ending just kind of.... there's no way to really describe it. It wasn't a bad ending or a flat ending or even an uninspired ending. It just seemed to end in the most fucked up way the story could possibly end.

Isn't there a section right before the end wherein the author warns the reader that they're not going to like the ending?

I think the warning was more along the lines of "If you want to believe the happy ending, stop here. If you want to know the real ending, keep reading."

I dimly remember the author's notes in the beginning saying that it's entirely possible I won't like the ending, and if I don't sucks to be me, it's the ending KING wanted, and he was right. I DID hate the ending, and it WAS his book series to end any way he saw fit. Especially as he already got my money and there were not going to be any more books in the series anyway so he didn't have to worry about me not buying any more sequels.
That being said I know he got a LOT of flak over that ending (and deserved every bit of it as far as I'm concerned-King killing off main characters is something you resign yourself to after a while, he's ALWAYS done that, and him bringing back Jake and Eddie in another reality was nice, but I'm sorry, the 'HA-HA-you forgot to pick up the rose in level three' reset button ending stunk to high heaven) and given the aforementioned author's notes, I think he expected to.

I never said it was a bad ending Batman. In fact, overall i thought it was an interesting and well done ending, personally. I just thought it was kind of screwed up. But then again, it isn't any worse than what I've done to some of my characters...

Very well. 'I' say it was a bad ending. The readers AND the CHARACTERS went through a lot of shit to get there (a not inconsiderable number of them dieing in the process (the characters-one hopes that DIDN'T happen to the readers), at least one of them repeatedly) and the ending SERIOUSLY STUNK. Roland has to redo from start because of one little item that was NEVER EVER MENTIONED TO BE IMPORTANT BEFORE. EVER. An item that I don't think was mentioned before the 4rth book PERIOD. And NEVER mentioned AGAIN until the LAST.

In case you haven't figured it out by now, yes, I'm a great fan of the Dark Tower series and I was thoroughly pissed by the finale.

I don't know if it was the HORN, or if it was another piece he needed in order to progress. Who knows how many times he's repeated the cycle, gathering small bits required for whatever purpose it is.

I know it's a good way to get your readers to go back to the first book; I'm going to for sure.

Err-the book expressly SAID it was the horn.

It was the horn that time. It wasn't said, or even implied, that it was all that was needed to complete his task. The impression I got was that he had completed it many many times, with each trip gaining a little more of whatever (humanity?) needed to finally achieve his goal.

Granted it's been a bit since I read through them all, however I recall that the implication, at least to me, was not that he was necessarily collecting new pieces he needed or even if it was an emotional/spiritual building process, but rather that the horn was given to him as a sign that change was possible and that the loop would not be forever.