#ambiguous endings

[writerpolls]

Writers: what kind of endings do you generally like to give your work?

Dark / tragic

Light / happy

Bittersweet

Open-ended / ambiguous

It varies for each piece

Other (let us know in the notes?)

I don’t manage to end my projects…

See results / not a writer / illiterate extract

Voting ended onMar 22, 2025

[sunsoaked-living-blog]

I can’t be the only person that hates ambiguous endings right? And cliff hangers?

This is in referenced to fiction writing, but I cannot stand when I read and or watch something and the ending is left up to reader interpretation.

My feeling on it is that if I’m reading a story, I’m there because it’s just that, a story. I feel that that should imply there is a definitive beginning, middle, and end.

Idk that’s just me. I like everything (at least for the main plot line) to be wrapped up by the end, and don’t want to be left hanging when I finish the narrative.

It might be because I go crazy with all the what if’s that follow an ambiguous ending. Either or endings drive me crazy and make me want to tear my hair out wondering about the answers.

I just read Ashley Flowers’ All Good People Here

(HINT/SPOILERS WARNING)

the last chapter, before the epilogue, ending had me throwing air punches about what happened to Margot. I need to know if my good sis got out bc I cannot have her going out like that.

[portinastorm]

(Because an ambiguous ending is better than a bad-vibes one)

Finn is aboard the Millennium Falcon after the celebrations of victory have faded into a soft, quiet glow. He wants to leave, is too aware of the amount of galaxy he hasn’t seen and life he hasn’t lived because of the First Order.

He presses buttons, flicks switches, and is fairly confident he can fly without Rey or Chewie or Lando in his ear, when the door opens. Poe struts in, BB-8 at his side. He throws a travel bag in the vague vicinity of Somewhere and then, easy as you please, sits beside Finn.

Finn gives him a look which roughly translates to ‘uh, dude?’

Poe’s eyes duck and then lift to Finn’s—almost shy. He shrugs. ‘You need a pilot.’

A grin lights Finn’s face. He nods. ‘I need a pilot.’

[kushamisaru]

Hey I'm not a writing expert by any means but you're never gonna please all your audience so maybe possibly consider picking a side and dealing with that instead of making "ambiguous" endings that make no one happy just some food for thought

[blamethewolf]

F*ck ambiguous/open endings

[personalxsafexhaven]

I often like to leave conversations open, because ending one feels so ambiguous. Is this the end for the next couple minutes? For today? For this week? For forever?

"Have a good x" without an attached "talk to you later/soon/tomorrow/etc" feels like its left ambiguous on purpose.

I'm sorry if I've bothered you.

[frodo-of-the-nine-fingers]

i don't believe in a 'correct' ending in a work that has an ambiguous ending, i think that they're written like that so that 1) people can choose whichever ending speaks more to them (and have more people reach catharsis than if there were one set ending) 2) drive other people crazy because they can't pick between the offered endings 3) set the characters freeeee from the gaze of the audience. it's always going to be frustrating to see people who are so married to one particular ending that they can't handle the thought of people preferring the other when that choice, that agency given to audience when it comes at great cost to the characters, is often like the entire point of the work

[frodo-of-the-nine-fingers]

also re ambiguous endings being sexy i think there's something really neat about the audience, who are the interloper here who in a voyeuristic way, being cut off from seeing what happens in those last moments like it's not about you it's never been about you and if you can't see what happens anymore the characters will finally be free