Ending Fatigue/Playing With

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Basic Trope: A story has trouble ending, often being artificially dragged out in the process.

• Straight: The climax features Alice and Bob defeating the evil Emperor Evulz in a climactic battle. While this would appear to be a good place to end the story, it actually goes through a Post-Climax Confrontation with Evulz' Dragon Damien, the journey back to Alice and Bob's hometown, and their eventual marriage.
• Exaggerated: Every time it looks like Alice and Bob's story is about to end, something else happens to artificially extend the story; Evulz's is defeated, but Damien springs an attack on them! Damien is defeated, but then they need to defeat Evulz's Lord Chamberlain! They make it home, but their home is under attack, meaning that they must go on another mini-quest to get the tools they need to liberate the village, and so on. It ends up that the ending of the original story could have made a self-contained story all by itself.
• Justified:
  • The author has a lot of loose plot-strands that need to be tied up.
  • In a video game, what looks like an ending is a subtle Disc One Final Boss or Disc One Final Dungeon. (Especially more common with less games that cover multiple discs)
• Inverted: The story has No Ending, and finishes abruptly.
• Subverted: The story seems to have another plot thread to tie up, but the story ends right as the characters begin tackling the thread.
• Double Subverted: The story seems to have another plot thread to tie up, but the story ends right as the characters begin tackling the thread-- only to be picked up in the story's sequel.
• Parodied:
  • Alice and Bob start complaining about how these events never seem to conclude.
  • The end-credits are interrupted by numerous characters desperately -- and unsuccessfully -- attempting to prolong the story.
• Deconstructed: Alice and Bob are as tired of it as the audience, so they give up and go home before the world is fully saved.
• Reconstructed: Alice and Bob love adventuring so much that, whenever one journey ends, they seek another.
• Zig Zagged: Alice and Bob defeat the villain, only for him to come back to life during the end credits, in which they fight him again, and again, and again...
• Averted: The story ends at an appropriate point following the climax.
• Enforced:
  • The author has several possible endings to choose from, but can't decide on one in particular, so decides to throw them all in.
  • The work is an adaptation of an earlier work which faced this problem. Rather than face a backlash from the fans by attempting to correct this problem, the writer includes all the endings from the original, ensuring that the adaptation also experiences this problem.
• Lampshaded: "You noticed how this adventure just seems to keep goin', Bob?"
• Invoked: "And they all lived happily ever after... not!"
• Defied: Alice and Bob try to tie up as many loose plot threads as possible during the main plot, in order to prevent this trope.
• Discussed: The characters in voice-over narration discuss the lengthy ending.
• Conversed: "Just end the damn story already!"
• Plotted A Good Waste:
  • The author is attempting to make a point about life; that an 'ending' is an artificial and arbitrary point placed on a series of events which do not conclude quite so satisfactory in Real Life as they do in fiction.
  • The story is an ongoing one, or the ending is for a current plot arc; the author tricks-out the audience into thinking it's all over by concluding the current plot arc, but effectively introduces a new plot-line to replace the old one.
• Played For Laughs: Bob and Alice are beset by Eddie, who keeps attempting to prolong the story. They eventually get around this problem by beating up Eddie.

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