Who wants a happy ending?

[elfs]

So, as I've been writing through this silly arc of stories, I've been asking myself, "Which couple here doesn't get the happy ending?" Because, y'know, they can't all have happy endings. Saul & Khrystyne are a good subject for a bad ending, but I really want Dove & The Twins to work, and Polly & Zia, and Illonca & Rhiane can't possibly go wrong; those two were written for each other. I suppose I could come up with new characters and relationships just to have things go sour on some people, but that feels like a cop-out. I disagree with Tolstoy; I think he had it backwards. Everyone is happy in their own unique way; it is in our misery that we are all similar. I think that's endemic to the human state: we are made to be anxious, miserable creatures, struggling against one another and our own natures (or, if you're religious, our own sinful state, or our attachments, or whatever); finding happiness and joy is so unlikely, so hard, and so fragile that it must be unique from human being to human being.

I was reminded of this consistent theme in my life this afternoon, oddly enough, while looking through a vast raft of Mai HiME doujinshi and I realized, after going through it, that the fans really, really wanted a happy ending for the most tragic couple in the series. Yukino and Haruka had two lovely tales; Mai and Mikoto had two jokey stories; there was a smattering of scenes for Chie and Aoi, and one nasty revenge story about Nao. And then there were nearly twenty stories about Haruka and Natsuko. If you don't know the storyline, every female character is a "magical girl," but Haruka is the only lesbian character; When Natusko tells her, "I cannot love you the way you want me to," she goes on a wild rampage with her magical abilities, killing far too many people before she's stopped. It would seem that the audience felt that that relationship, among all, was poorly handled. (Yukino may have been gay, or she may just have had a terrible case of hero worship for Haruka. I think I'd prefer the latter.)

So the big deal, of course, going back to my original point, is that for fiction to "feel right," the losers must deserve to lose, they must have some characteristic that makes them lose. Now I just need to figure out what that characteristic really is.

Comments

[lisakit.livejournal.com]

Not having read anything other than your posts about the story, couldn't it just be a situational thing? Timing, mis-communication, bad hair day... There's millions of reasons why two people in the end just don't fit, it doesn't have to be anything either of them "deserves". Having someone "deserve" unhappiness seems less realistic to me and, I think, would negate what you're trying to do by having a non-happy ending in there.