Getting really tired of sci-fi BS

I'm getting really sick of sci-fi stories. All these epic shows and games seem to really just crap out at the end and not give you any real payoff. Lost, Battlestar Galactica, Mass Effect, I'm pretty sick of getting really invested in these stories that bring up so many cool and interesting questions only to have the writers fucking fail at the end. Anyone else feel this way?

Yes. Which is why I only watch doctor who

This is the case with any story that makes itself up as it goes along. Too many questions are set up, and when the end is looming, the creators panic and write everything off in the wishiest-washiest way possible.

I thought the end of BSG was pretty good.

Yes.

Read books if you want good science fiction.

Cool.

Seriously, fucking Stargate Atlantis, everything just turned to shit.

It honestly has nothing to do with Sci-Fi and a lot to do with writing in general. Almost every TV show i've ever cared about has ended worse than it's peak years.

I feel the writers shoud contact me Directly to just make sure that the ending they have in mind ties in with my own expectations on how there story should end.

It's the same with any long-running finite story that isn't at least somewhat well-planned in the first place.

i really just think its a problem with serialized tv shows. it takes alot of effort to tell a story over hundreds of episodes.some of the best tv shows have been episodic in nature. im not saying it cant be done,Deep space nine and Breaking bad are great examples. but i think tv is at it's best when they tell singular stories that are wrapped in a overall arc like dr who,buffy/angel and even next generation.its takes an incredibly strong vision for a show to continue one story over several years.

Writers just need to kill things while the going is good.

This just means we need a new Starship Troopers remake, please no more Paul Verhoeven and Casper Van Diem though.

when you have a rabid fanbase and your show/game series wasn't expected to be that successful so they didnt plan out the story that far ahead (which is what happened in all your examples). then yeah, i can see how the endings get a bit messed up. they also like ot try for those "twist" endings to make it seem better, but those usually backfire and get nerdraging guys on the forums.

that said, im a pretty big fan of everything listed in this thread, and when each one ended i was pretty disappointed with how they did it.

i'd say writers need to get their heads out of their asses and go for simpler endings, not cus the ones they're doing now are too complex, but because they're stupid. you dont always need a twist, or a mind blowing revelation, or a crazy deus ex machina, or something. i mean look at Red Dead Redemption, lots of people praise it for having one of the best endings in any video game ever. the ending is simple as fuck.

i love Sci-Fi its one of my favorite genres. but i'll agree, there is way too much bullshit going on in it lately.

@DoctorDanger99 said:

i really just think its a problem with serialized tv shows. it takes alot of effort to tell a story over hundreds of episodes.some of the best tv shows have been episodic in nature. im not saying it cant be done,Deep space nine and Breaking bad are great examples. but i think tv is at it's best when they tell singular stories that are wrapped in a overall arc like dr who,buffy/angel and even next generation.its takes an incredibly strong vision for a show to continue one story over several years.

You probably have a point here about most serialized TV. I guess I just have a harder time getting into shows that don't have longer story arcs. I guess SG1 kinda rode the line between episodic and serialized arcs, probably my favorite sci-fi show.

@DoctorDanger99 said:

i really just think its a problem with serialized tv shows. it takes alot of effort to tell a story over hundreds of episodes.some of the best tv shows have been episodic in nature. im not saying it cant be done,Deep space nine and Breaking bad are great examples. but i think tv is at it's best when they tell singular stories that are wrapped in a overall arc like dr who,buffy/angel and even next generation.its takes an incredibly strong vision for a show to continue one story over several years.

Dude, don't jinx it. That show isn't over yet.

@Tennmuerti said:

Yes.

Read books if you want good science fiction.

Came here to say this.

I loved the ending of LOST (and Patrick Klepek said he did too when I asked him about it on Twitter a couple months ago). I liked the final season of Stargate Atlantis as well, it had some of the most memorable parts of that series for me; too bad they scrapped the movie that was supposed to fix off some loose ends and explain what they did after the massive change in where things were at the end. I don't think you can really blame Mass Effect 3's ending as representative of all of sci-fi in videogames; the endings of Mass Effect 1 and 2 were pretty bad to begin with, I don't see how someone can really expect them to have ended the series properly after those.

I really think anyone who gets bitter on something solely on the ending alone even if they enjoyed everything up to that moment really needs to take a second to step back and realise what they got out of it up to that point. It is the same mindset that frustrates me when it gets people saying things like "I hated Heroes, only season 1 was good" or "I hate the Final Fantasy series, everything after X was horrible" when I have to respond with asking why they don't just get watch and spend their time with the parts of it that they enjoy and ignore everything else - people don't seem to have the same response when it goes into other media which they don't like (For instance, you hear people saying "I like the Star Wars movies, don't look at the extended fiction" instead of saying "Star Wars is really bad, all that extended fiction ruined it" because they can get passed it and love the parts that they love). I would have been really interested to see what the reaction would have been to Christopher Nolan's Batman series if The Dark Knight Rises was a big flop, I wonder if they would later just bunch the entire trilogy together and forget how much they liked The Dark Knight?

I know you weren't saying that, you are just tired of the tropes appearing in endings, but I wanted to let out some frustration against the people who let an ending overshadow an experience which up to that point was really important for them.

@Kidavenger said:

I thought the end of BSG was pretty good.

Seconded, I thought it was pretty good too.

@The_Nubster said:

This is the case with any story that makes itself up as it goes along. Too many questions are set up, and when the end is looming, the creators panic and write everything off in the wishiest-washiest way possible.

I think this is the real answer. This isn't anything to do with sci-fi, this is to do with a certain way of writing a story.

@I_Stay_Puft:

Already happened, though CG.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2085930/

@The_Nubster said:

This is the case with any story that makes itself up as it goes along.

Pretty much, TV writers rarely think further than to the end of the current season, Lost and Battlestar Galactica included. Babylon 5 was a rare exception, it had a 5 year story arc planned from the start, and while there were some changes made along the way, it really ties together excellently.

I feel the writers shoud contact me Directly to just make sure that the ending they have in mind ties in with my own expectations on how there story should end.

I'd rather a bad ending than a premature cancellation.

Yes. Which is why I only watch doctor who

Maybe I'm insane, but I actually liked, or accepted the endings to all the stories you mentioned.

@DoctorDanger99 said:

i really just think its a problem with serialized tv shows. it takes alot of effort to tell a story over hundreds of episodes.some of the best tv shows have been episodic in nature. im not saying it cant be done,Deep space nine and Breaking bad are great examples. but i think tv is at it's best when they tell singular stories that are wrapped in a overall arc like dr who,buffy/angel and even next generation.its takes an incredibly strong vision for a show to continue one story over several years.

It's not so much with serialized shows as it is with the reluctance of TV to properly end a series. Books have a beginning, middle and end but TV often delays the end to make more money. Or the planning of a series can't be fully fleshed out ahead of time because the creators never know for certain that the network will give them another season. The writers might have a well thought out beginning and an idea for a middle with some notion of how they'd like the end it if possible. Because there is no clear and certain structure to a serialized show, at least on American TV, stories lose their focus along the way. I've seen some stuff on the BBC and I know Japanese anime often have a formulated structure where after 24 episodes it's over. That's it. American TV isn't written that way because producers would rather milk a popular property to death than create something worthwhile new to replace it.

I could never get into Lost or Battlestar Galactica; however, I do like Fringe.

It honestly has nothing to do with Sci-Fi and a lot to do with writing in general. Almost every TV show i've ever cared about has ended worse than it's peak years.

It's not so much the fault of the writers but rather corporate. The execs tell them they need to change the show based on market research, polls, testing groups etc. Lost had so many more seasons planned but they got cut short and the writers had to just blaze forward with a rushed and hurried ending because they were forced to. Writers want to give you the best story possible but they are roadblocked by creatively hollow people with a lot of money. Look at all the shitty movie franchises we have. Do you think most of the writers enjoyed working on such inebriated droll? Of course not, they need a paycheck and are forced by a suit to do rewrites and add in some more product placement.

@I_Stay_Puft said:

This just means we need a new Starship Troopers remake, please no more Paul Verhoeven and Casper Van Diem though.

You bite your tongue good sir. The original movie is too good. I know the book is amazing but the movie mutated into something awesome. Sequels could die.

I liked the ending to Batlle Star , Lost I didnt care much for it after season 2 (figured out that they would take eons to go anyware and the focus to characters rather than mysteries lost my interest) and Mass Effect ..... they knew what people wanted yet they went to other places also I blame a more rushed down development due to EA´s nefarious influence. Also most Amereicaan tv shows they dont know squat of where to go and tend to overextend the series to a point that watching another episode becomes more torture than enjoyment or get way too formulaic (House comes to mind) , also american producers cant let go to a good property milking it to death instead of doing the smart thing ..... let the stuff end in a high note and be remembered for a short but awesome show (like another user said anime tends to do , which is very smart)

Lost wasn't about the destination, it was about the journey. I have never been so in love with a piece of media as I was when I first discovered Lost.