Messiah Complex ending [spoilers]

grinningdemon <grinningdemon.TakeThisOut@austin.rr.com> wrote in
news:hir1s3t8fea3ar671s6ejcoq508hn95cq7@4ax.com:

> On Sat, 23 Feb 2008 21:04:30 -0000, Billy Bissette
> <baines.TakeThisOut@coastalnet.com> wrote:
>
>>grinningdemon <grinningdemon.TakeThisOut@austin.rr.com> wrote in
>>news:n8pvr35d9m9udugfbi7b7uqil9n08addvo@4ax.com:
>>
>>> I actually liked Messiah Complex quite a bit (though the ending
>>> needed some work)...I really liked the way the writers really
>>> worked together on it and they even built up to it rather than
>>> just having it come out of nowhere...it's the first truly
>>> collaborative crossover Marvel has done in a decade..
>>
>> It certainly seemed better structured that some of Marvel's other
>>crossovers.
>
> Agreed...though that's not saying much.
>
>>
>> But the New X-Men's involvement still seemed tacked on. Worse
>>than X-Factor's involvement no less, and that hinged pretty much
>>solely on a couple of characters being brought in to check out
>>alternate future timelines, and sending someone to infiltrate the
>>Purifiers.
>
> X-Factor, I'll grant you (although Peter David used it to set up new
> character directions so it wasn't a total waste) but New X-Men's
> involvement seemed pretty natural to me...aside from them being at the
> mansion (which was basically destroyed), the Purifiers and Predator X
> played a big role in the crossover (both of which came from New X-Men)
> and it established X-23's involvement with X-Force (which is picking
> up on threads from New X-Men)...if anything, their exclusion would
> have seemed like an oversight.

They should be there, but something about the way that they were
there bugged me. It is hard to describe, because they should be
there for "at the mansion" events, and the Purifiers are enemies
that they've faced.

But it just doesn't feel right...

Take Pixie teleporting the New X-Men and Predator X to the
X-Men/Marauders fight. It makes story sense, as Pixie wants to
get Predator X away from the wounded and to the adult X-Men, who
are better suited to fighting such a beast than the kids are.
That she picks a bad time, teleports without warning, and other
issues are all explained by Pixie being inexperienced. But in
the end, it still reads as just an excuse to get the New X-Men
there for the big fight.

That the Purifiers are the big bad human enemies itself seems
to just be an excuse to get the New X-Men involved.

The effort was being made, but it still feels to me like the
New X-Men were just tagging along in the cross-over. They didn't
feel important or an equal part, rather they felt like the kind
of book that would get a banner for the event on the main cover
but tell a tangental story inside.

>> And it still boils down to a bunch of large fight scenes. Made
>>worse in crossovers, because the final battles generally need to
>>involve characters from most if not all the crossover books to
>>"justify" the crossover.
>
> Just what big crossover have you ever read that didn't boil down to a
> bunch of large fight scenes? Why else would they bring them all
> together? To play poker?

Still, I see it as a weakness. It just happens to be a weakness
shared by many crossovers.

To be fair, if the fights are better, I find them more justified.
I wasn't entirely happy with the fights themselves in Messiah
Complex.
 >> Stay informed about: Messiah Complex ending [spoilers] 

On Sun, 24 Feb 2008 05:39:13 -0000, Billy Bissette
<baines RemoveThis @coastalnet.com> wrote:

>grinningdemon <grinningdemon RemoveThis @austin.rr.com> wrote in
>news:hir1s3t8fea3ar671s6ejcoq508hn95cq7@4ax.com:
>
>> On Sat, 23 Feb 2008 21:04:30 -0000, Billy Bissette
>> <baines RemoveThis @coastalnet.com> wrote:
>>
>>>grinningdemon <grinningdemon RemoveThis @austin.rr.com> wrote in
>>>news:n8pvr35d9m9udugfbi7b7uqil9n08addvo@4ax.com:
>>>
>>>> I actually liked Messiah Complex quite a bit (though the ending
>>>> needed some work)...I really liked the way the writers really
>>>> worked together on it and they even built up to it rather than
>>>> just having it come out of nowhere...it's the first truly
>>>> collaborative crossover Marvel has done in a decade..
>>>
>>> It certainly seemed better structured that some of Marvel's other
>>>crossovers.
>>
>> Agreed...though that's not saying much.
>>
>>>
>>> But the New X-Men's involvement still seemed tacked on. Worse
>>>than X-Factor's involvement no less, and that hinged pretty much
>>>solely on a couple of characters being brought in to check out
>>>alternate future timelines, and sending someone to infiltrate the
>>>Purifiers.
>>
>> X-Factor, I'll grant you (although Peter David used it to set up new
>> character directions so it wasn't a total waste) but New X-Men's
>> involvement seemed pretty natural to me...aside from them being at the
>> mansion (which was basically destroyed), the Purifiers and Predator X
>> played a big role in the crossover (both of which came from New X-Men)
>> and it established X-23's involvement with X-Force (which is picking
>> up on threads from New X-Men)...if anything, their exclusion would
>> have seemed like an oversight.
>
> They should be there, but something about the way that they were
>there bugged me. It is hard to describe, because they should be
>there for "at the mansion" events, and the Purifiers are enemies
>that they've faced.
>
> But it just doesn't feel right...
>
> Take Pixie teleporting the New X-Men and Predator X to the
>X-Men/Marauders fight. It makes story sense, as Pixie wants to
>get Predator X away from the wounded and to the adult X-Men, who
>are better suited to fighting such a beast than the kids are.
>That she picks a bad time, teleports without warning, and other
>issues are all explained by Pixie being inexperienced. But in
>the end, it still reads as just an excuse to get the New X-Men
>there for the big fight.

I thought it was great...there were so many different things going on
in Messiah Complex that this was the only way to bring them all
together...and it was right in line with Pixie's character, acting
without thinking it through.

>
> That the Purifiers are the big bad human enemies itself seems
>to just be an excuse to get the New X-Men involved.

I saw it more as the addition of the Purifiers brought together all
the major elements of the X-Men mythos...they were there to represent
the "world that fears and hates them" while the Mauraders were there
to represent the internal struggle that has kept them down over the
years (the fact that many of the members were former X-Men only added
to this)...through it all, the X-Men (all the X-teams, actually) were
just scrambling to catch up and the baby was the hope that kept them
going...Cable and Bishop were the wild cards (which makes sense given
their vastly different experiences from the other X-Men...and Predator
X was just there to up the body count...it was chaos all
around...great stuff.

>
> The effort was being made, but it still feels to me like the
>New X-Men were just tagging along in the cross-over. They didn't
>feel important or an equal part, rather they felt like the kind
>of book that would get a banner for the event on the main cover
>but tell a tangental story inside.

I'm not sure the New X-Men should be an equal part...they aren't the
equal to the X-Men...they're just getting started...and their
constantly being overwhelmed by things they aren't prepared to face is
totally in keeping with what's been going on in that book.

>
>>> And it still boils down to a bunch of large fight scenes. Made
>>>worse in crossovers, because the final battles generally need to
>>>involve characters from most if not all the crossover books to
>>>"justify" the crossover.
>>
>> Just what big crossover have you ever read that didn't boil down to a
>> bunch of large fight scenes? Why else would they bring them all
>> together? To play poker?
>
> Still, I see it as a weakness. It just happens to be a weakness
>shared by many crossovers.

Again...this is a super hero book...if they don't come together for a
fight, then there isn't a story...and I don't this is true of "many"
crossovers...it's true of ALL of them...at least the big events.

>
> To be fair, if the fights are better, I find them more justified.
>I wasn't entirely happy with the fights themselves in Messiah
>Complex.

I didn't think they were bad but I wasn't happy with the X-Men getting
their buts kicked over and over...this has been a disturbing trend in
the X-books for a long time now...the stories almost never end on a
positive note...the law of averages says they should occasionally face
situations and opponents that they can overcome pretty easily or at
least without serious casualties (most of these guys have been
fighting and working together a long time now) and yet they seem to
barely triumph over every villain or crisis that comes along (if they
do at all)...but that is more of a flaw in Marvel books in general
than any particular storyline...still, it would be nice to get a happy
ending once in a while...don't you think?
 >> Stay informed about: Messiah Complex ending [spoilers] 

jphamlore.DeleteThis@yahoo.com wrote in news:5d2f1460-2089-4a8e-92dc-974c66ce7b34
@m23g2000hsc.googlegroups.com:

> On Feb 23, 10:27 pm, grinningdemon <grinningde....DeleteThis@austin.rr.com>
> wrote:
>
>> I didn't think they were bad but I wasn't happy with the X-Men getting
>> their buts kicked over and over...this has been a disturbing trend in
>> the X-books for a long time now...the stories almost never end on a
>> positive note
>
> That's because the X-Men have apparently never read Isaac Asimov's
> Foundation series, because if they did they would realize that
> childless overpowering telepaths are the enemy of all and must be
> neutralized like the Mule to save civilization.

Nah, Asimov also cast telepathic robots (who by nature would be
childless) as the saviors of civilization. And saving civilization
required breaking the Three Laws, allowing them to harm humans for
an abstract goal of protecting humanity, which should count for
"overpowering".

So it is just telepaths with emotions that are bad?
 >> Stay informed about: Messiah Complex ending [spoilers] 

grinningdemon <grinningdemon.RemoveThis@austin.rr.com> wrote in
news:gd22s3lq0o368go0vjtpc2jb0t3goe37ev@4ax.com:
> On Sun, 24 Feb 2008 05:39:13 -0000, Billy Bissette
> <baines.RemoveThis@coastalnet.com> wrote:
>>grinningdemon <grinningdemon.RemoveThis@austin.rr.com> wrote in
>>news:hir1s3t8fea3ar671s6ejcoq508hn95cq7@4ax.com:

>> They should be there, but something about the way that they were
>>there bugged me. It is hard to describe, because they should be
>>there for "at the mansion" events, and the Purifiers are enemies
>>that they've faced.
>>
>> But it just doesn't feel right...
>>
>> Take Pixie teleporting the New X-Men and Predator X to the
>>X-Men/Marauders fight. It makes story sense, as Pixie wants to
>>get Predator X away from the wounded and to the adult X-Men, who
>>are better suited to fighting such a beast than the kids are.
>>That she picks a bad time, teleports without warning, and other
>>issues are all explained by Pixie being inexperienced. But in
>>the end, it still reads as just an excuse to get the New X-Men
>>there for the big fight.
>
> I thought it was great...there were so many different things going on
> in Messiah Complex that this was the only way to bring them all
> together...

Maybe that is a sign that the plotting could have been better?
I'm not sure. The New X-Men involvement was pretty much a side story
to me.

>>
>> That the Purifiers are the big bad human enemies itself seems
>>to just be an excuse to get the New X-Men involved.
>
> I saw it more as the addition of the Purifiers brought together all
> the major elements of the X-Men mythos...they were there to represent
> the "world that fears and hates them" while the Mauraders were there
> to represent the internal struggle that has kept them down over the
> years (the fact that many of the members were former X-Men only added
> to this)...through it all, the X-Men (all the X-teams, actually) were
> just scrambling to catch up and the baby was the hope that kept them
> going...Cable and Bishop were the wild cards (which makes sense given
> their vastly different experiences from the other X-Men...

> and Predator
> X was just there to up the body count...it was chaos all
> around...great stuff.

I think Predator X was just there to tie up a loose end. It was
a creation of the New X-Men book and tied only to the New X-Men,
so it was thrown into the mix to be dealt with since the New X-Men
book would be ending with Messiah Complex.

Which seemed to fit how it was written in Messiah Complex as
well. It just kind of wandered around as a threat, until it
finally went after the New X-Men, where it was then 'ported to the
big battle, played a small part (chomping Bishop's right arm), and
was killed. It didn't come off as dramatic or anything. Not even
as particularly dangerous, despite the damage it inflicted and how
how hard it was to kill. It was just something to occupy the X-Men
while the New X-Men fought the Marauders. It didn't even come off
as consequential. If it weren't there, then the New X-Men wouldn't
have been there, and the X-Men would simply have beaten the
Marauders themselves.

>> The effort was being made, but it still feels to me like the
>>New X-Men were just tagging along in the cross-over. They didn't
>>feel important or an equal part, rather they felt like the kind
>>of book that would get a banner for the event on the main cover
>>but tell a tangental story inside.
>
> I'm not sure the New X-Men should be an equal part...they aren't the
> equal to the X-Men...they're just getting started...and their
> constantly being overwhelmed by things they aren't prepared to face is
> totally in keeping with what's been going on in that book.

But Marvel *did* give them an equal part, or at least presented it
as such. They were a core book of the crossover, getting equal
number billing with X-Men and X-Factor.

Except the plotting didn't really *make* them an equal part.
Story-wise, they were disposable. Attacking the Purifiers didn't
contribute to or advance anything, nor really did the Predator X
stuff (for reasons I gave earlier above.)

At least X-Factor's involvement contributed something, even if it
was just to rule out the involvement of the Purifiers. (Though that
whole investigation of the alternate futures sure seemed to go
nowhere.)

Marvel sold them as an equal part, or at least an important part.
Marvel tried to tie them in, and even did the silly switching of
opponents to try to make them seem important. ("The Marauders have
tons of experience fighting the X-Men, but have never fought the
New X-Men, so while the Marauders are difficult opponents for the
X-Men, they are beatable by the New X-Men!") They just don't end
up as important. But of course if Marvel cut the non-important
teams out of the storyline, then Messiah Complex would only have
been an X-Men arc and not a crossover event... (Though to me the
better solution would have been to make New X-Men and X-Factor
more integral to the story. Or just admit that they were side
stories, ultimately unimportant to the core, and not sold as such.)
 >> Stay informed about: Messiah Complex ending [spoilers] 

jphamlore DeleteThis @yahoo.com wrote in news:6fe0f816-5bb2-437e-a3f1-
4a78f56f319a DeleteThis @d4g2000prg.googlegroups.com:

> On Feb 24, 12:22 am, Billy Bissette <bai... DeleteThis @coastalnet.com> wrote:
>
>>   Nah, Asimov also cast telepathic robots (who by nature would be
>> childless) as the saviors of civilization.  And saving civilization
>> required breaking the Three Laws, allowing them to harm humans for
>> an abstract goal of protecting humanity, which should count for
>> "overpowering".
>>
>>   So it is just telepaths with emotions that are bad?
>
> You're right, I should have also included the Mule's being mortal as a
> factor why his existence was so destructive, unlike the robot R.
> Daneel Olivaw who was able to prolong his life (and memories?) for
> many thousands of years. But the robots were programmed from the
> start with the Three Laws of Robotics, although they of course
> modified (added to) them.
>
> None of these good factors apply to telepathic mutants such as Charles
> Xavier or Emma Frost in Marvel's X-Men universe.

Might count for the Stepford Cuucoos, though.
 >> Stay informed about: Messiah Complex ending [spoilers] 

jphamlore.TakeThisOut@yahoo.com wrote in news:bff75809-2852-4ace-ba33-d09d9ccaed89
@j28g2000hsj.googlegroups.com:

> On Feb 24, 12:53 am, Billy Bissette <bai....TakeThisOut@coastalnet.com> wrote:
>
>> If it weren't there, then the New X-Men wouldn't
>> have been there, and the X-Men would simply have beaten the
>> Marauders themselves.
>
> Wasn't Dust needed to defeat Exodus, who otherwise could have trashed
> the X-Men after disposing of Emma Frost.

You don't think the X-Men would have won without the New X-Men
showing up?

Of course, outside this crossover, the Marauders would have wiped
the floor with the New X-Men as well.


Actually, looking back, once Predator X appeared, the Marauders
were pretty much dropped from the pictured fight. In the final issue,
where the X-Men and New X-Men trade off opponents, the Marauders get
shy of three and a quarter pages, while Predator X gets six-and-a-half.

The Marauders fight the X-Men for two panels, counting for three-
quarters of a page. They score another two and a half pages against
the New X-Men, but one full page is occupied solely with Emma & Dust
versus Exodus, and another half page is devoted to Pixie versus the
controlled Karima. The remaining page comes from two half-page
panels for group shots, one of which is still focused primarily on
Pixie versus Karima.


In Chapter 12 (New X-Men 46), Predator X appears. It immediately
attacks Vertigo, biting both her legs. The art implies she was
either eaten entirely or lost both legs to it, but she is left to
fate unknown as she is never shown again after the initial bite.
(The next panel shows Predator X with part of her outfit in its
mouth and what looks like raw meat beneath.)

In Chapter 13 (X-Men 207), Predator X occupies Bishop and Cable.
From reading the rest of the book, it appears to tear off Bishop's
right arm, but the art for the attack is very misleading. (The
attack itself shows Predator X getting Bishop's head and chest full
on in its mouth, then shows its mouth closed with Bishop's hand
sticking out the side. And then Bishop isn't seen again until
after the fights are over.)

Cyclops tells X-Force to fight Predator X and the New X-Men to
fight the Marauders, but it looks more like nearly all the X-Men
go after Predator X. Colossus, Iceman, Storm, and Angel are all
shown fighting Predator X after the switch-off, while the New X-Men
are still fighting the Marauders. Though Iceman and Colossus are
also shown fighting Marauders. Or at least someone is frozen in
the second group shot, and Colossus is standing over a couple of
fallen Marauders after Emma and Dust drop Exodus.

(Is that Guido punching someone from the air in the second New
X-Men group panel? The poor guy only made it into two panels
across two books. The first when he arrived with the rest of the
X-Men, and the second as background action for a group shot.)

Cyclops himself wanders off to have a peaceful talk to Cable,
as apparently *none* of the Marauders have noticed Cable has the
baby.

Mystique and Gambit remain in the infirmary with Rogue for the
entire battle, and Mystique dropped Sinister earlier, so the
Marauders aren't even at full force. Gambit and Mystique played
key parts in the Marauders' previous victories over the X-Men, and
Sinister was the big threat at the start of the final battle. Of
course, Gambit is back to being a good guy, so he'd be fighting
the Marauders now anyway. And Mystique now has no more reason to
help the Marauders either.



And for anyone counting "blood-thirsty Scott" moments, note that
right before Predator X appeared, Scott ordered Logan to kill anyone
between him and the baby.
 >> Stay informed about: Messiah Complex ending [spoilers] 

On Sat, 23 Feb 2008 23:23:37 -0800 (PST), jphamlore DeleteThis @yahoo.com wrote:

>On Feb 23, 10:27 pm, grinningdemon <grinningde... DeleteThis @austin.rr.com>
>wrote:
>
>> I didn't think they were bad but I wasn't happy with the X-Men getting
>> their buts kicked over and over...this has been a disturbing trend in
>> the X-books for a long time now...the stories almost never end on a
>> positive note
>
>That's because the X-Men have apparently never read Isaac Asimov's
>Foundation series, because if they did they would realize that
>childless overpowering telepaths are the enemy of all and must be
>neutralized like the Mule to save civilization.
>
>Much of the X-Men's problems the past few years would never have
>happened had they just lined Charles Xavier and Emma Frost up against
>the wall and put them down, instead of having Emma Frost suggest that
>Wanda be put down which led to Pietro causing House of M.
>
>> but that is more of a flaw in Marvel books in general
>> than any particular storyline...still, it would be nice to get a happy
>> ending once in a while...don't you think?
>
>You should read McDuffie's Fantastic Four #553: Comics don't have a
>happier ending than that.
>

I did read that...but it's one story out of countless alternate
futures gone wrong...and anyone want to bet that it never gets
mentioned again?
 >> Stay informed about: Messiah Complex ending [spoilers] 

On Sun, 24 Feb 2008 08:53:01 -0000, Billy Bissette
<baines.RemoveThis@coastalnet.com> wrote:

>grinningdemon <grinningdemon.RemoveThis@austin.rr.com> wrote in
>news:gd22s3lq0o368go0vjtpc2jb0t3goe37ev@4ax.com:
>> On Sun, 24 Feb 2008 05:39:13 -0000, Billy Bissette
>> <baines.RemoveThis@coastalnet.com> wrote:
>>>grinningdemon <grinningdemon.RemoveThis@austin.rr.com> wrote in
>>>news:hir1s3t8fea3ar671s6ejcoq508hn95cq7@4ax.com:
>
>>> They should be there, but something about the way that they were
>>>there bugged me. It is hard to describe, because they should be
>>>there for "at the mansion" events, and the Purifiers are enemies
>>>that they've faced.
>>>
>>> But it just doesn't feel right...
>>>
>>> Take Pixie teleporting the New X-Men and Predator X to the
>>>X-Men/Marauders fight. It makes story sense, as Pixie wants to
>>>get Predator X away from the wounded and to the adult X-Men, who
>>>are better suited to fighting such a beast than the kids are.
>>>That she picks a bad time, teleports without warning, and other
>>>issues are all explained by Pixie being inexperienced. But in
>>>the end, it still reads as just an excuse to get the New X-Men
>>>there for the big fight.
>>
>> I thought it was great...there were so many different things going on
>> in Messiah Complex that this was the only way to bring them all
>> together...
>
> Maybe that is a sign that the plotting could have been better?
>I'm not sure. The New X-Men involvement was pretty much a side story
>to me.

Not to me.

>
>>>
>>> That the Purifiers are the big bad human enemies itself seems
>>>to just be an excuse to get the New X-Men involved.
>>
>> I saw it more as the addition of the Purifiers brought together all
>> the major elements of the X-Men mythos...they were there to represent
>> the "world that fears and hates them" while the Mauraders were there
>> to represent the internal struggle that has kept them down over the
>> years (the fact that many of the members were former X-Men only added
>> to this)...through it all, the X-Men (all the X-teams, actually) were
>> just scrambling to catch up and the baby was the hope that kept them
>> going...Cable and Bishop were the wild cards (which makes sense given
>> their vastly different experiences from the other X-Men...
>
>> and Predator
>> X was just there to up the body count...it was chaos all
>> around...great stuff.
>
> I think Predator X was just there to tie up a loose end. It was
>a creation of the New X-Men book and tied only to the New X-Men,
>so it was thrown into the mix to be dealt with since the New X-Men
>book would be ending with Messiah Complex.
>
> Which seemed to fit how it was written in Messiah Complex as
>well. It just kind of wandered around as a threat, until it
>finally went after the New X-Men, where it was then 'ported to the
>big battle, played a small part (chomping Bishop's right arm), and
>was killed. It didn't come off as dramatic or anything. Not even
>as particularly dangerous, despite the damage it inflicted and how
>how hard it was to kill. It was just something to occupy the X-Men
>while the New X-Men fought the Marauders. It didn't even come off
>as consequential. If it weren't there, then the New X-Men wouldn't
>have been there, and the X-Men would simply have beaten the
>Marauders themselves.

These writers were planning this crossover for quite a while now and
they were all leading up to it...it's not like New X-Men's addition
was a last minute change and they just had to find a way to stick them
in somewhere.

>
>>> The effort was being made, but it still feels to me like the
>>>New X-Men were just tagging along in the cross-over. They didn't
>>>feel important or an equal part, rather they felt like the kind
>>>of book that would get a banner for the event on the main cover
>>>but tell a tangental story inside.
>>
>> I'm not sure the New X-Men should be an equal part...they aren't the
>> equal to the X-Men...they're just getting started...and their
>> constantly being overwhelmed by things they aren't prepared to face is
>> totally in keeping with what's been going on in that book.
>
> But Marvel *did* give them an equal part, or at least presented it
>as such. They were a core book of the crossover, getting equal
>number billing with X-Men and X-Factor.
>
> Except the plotting didn't really *make* them an equal part.
>Story-wise, they were disposable. Attacking the Purifiers didn't
>contribute to or advance anything, nor really did the Predator X
>stuff (for reasons I gave earlier above.)
>
> At least X-Factor's involvement contributed something, even if it
>was just to rule out the involvement of the Purifiers. (Though that
>whole investigation of the alternate futures sure seemed to go
>nowhere.)
>
> Marvel sold them as an equal part, or at least an important part.
>Marvel tried to tie them in, and even did the silly switching of
>opponents to try to make them seem important. ("The Marauders have
>tons of experience fighting the X-Men, but have never fought the
>New X-Men, so while the Marauders are difficult opponents for the
>X-Men, they are beatable by the New X-Men!") They just don't end
>up as important. But of course if Marvel cut the non-important
>teams out of the storyline, then Messiah Complex would only have
>been an X-Men arc and not a crossover event... (Though to me the
>better solution would have been to make New X-Men and X-Factor
>more integral to the story. Or just admit that they were side
>stories, ultimately unimportant to the core, and not sold as such.)

The alternative would have been to leave them out entirely (which
would have made no sense) or else put them in and not acknowledge it
in there own book (which would have been stupid)...and they had as
much of a role in the storyline as many of the X-Men did...only a
handful of characters had key roles in Messiah Complex...as with any
crossover...certain characters get the emphasis more than
others...maybe their role was somewhat peripheral but it made the
story more complex and interesting...at least to me.
 >> Stay informed about: Messiah Complex ending [spoilers]