First off, lemme go ahead and throw this out there; those of you who know me know I think spoilers are the silliest thing in the world. I don't agree at all that you can “spoil” a work by knowing a plot twist. I knew how No Country, The Matrix, Harry Potter (hee hee), and The Dark Tower all ended before I read the book or watched the movie, and it didn't affect my perception at all. Almost everyone has Mulholland Drive or Citizen Kane spoiled for them (particularly Kane, which has been spoiled by the Simpsons, Family Guy, and even Ghostbusters, where they had to bust a sledriding ghost that moaned “Rosebud”) and that never takes away from that first powerful experience of watching the movie.

As a result, I don't really like putting spoiler warnings on anything, but considering my last article confused and angered so many people, I'm going to go ahead and say this: If you have not read the Dark Tower series and do not want it spoiled, please stop here. Do not click on this topic. I didn't do this with Lewis's work because that shit's ancient, but I think the Tower finished in 04 and is garnering some popularity because of Abram's plan to adapt the book and a new comic series based on it, so it's quite possible someone reading this hasn't finished the series.

Right, now on to this.

The Dark Tower is Stephen King's magnum opus, his self-admitted attempt to create an American Lord of the Rings. The story follows Roland Deschain, the last gunslinger of Gilead, as he goes to the center of the world to find the Dark Tower, a lynchpin that holds the multiverse together. Because King is a pretty good writer, the series never fell into Dragonlance territory, although it's far from some amazing work either. It's still one of my favorite guilty pleasures.

The problem was the pacing; books 1-4 were written over periods of five years and were strong works full of neat little symbolism and dread and all that stuff King can do well when he's not introducing a magical retard/negro. After King was hit by a van in 1999, he pumped out the final three books within two years, and it shows. Villains that are regarded as incredibly powerful are dispensed with lazily (Walter, the main villain, is killed in two pages by Mordred, who after two books of buildup, gets killed by a dog and a few gunshots, and the greatest evil in the world is killed by...a deus ex machina of a retard that can draw well), there's a crossover into HARRY POTTER no shit, and worst of all, King used that most noisome tool in the author's box (only Kurt Vonnegut can use it well), the self-insertion. The only reason the self-insertion is slightly forgivable is because even though he writes himself as a god character, he really fucking hates himself. I mean, it's shocking, the level of dislike he holds for his actions.

All of this leads a few fans to tell new readers to just ignore the last three books or power through them with caution. Nothing seems to anger people more, though, than the ending, which is what we're going to talk on.

Another note: surprisingly, this is NOT my opinion. It's opinions I've gathered from others. Unfortunately it's hard to cite internet forums or nerds in a comic book store, so there aren't any, but if you think this was something you said once, go ahead and drop me a line and I'll give credit where it's due.

The ending goes like this: After losing everyone and everything, Roland stands outside the Dark Tower. We get a neat little ending with Susannah and Eddie, and then there's a sudden coda. King writes that the Susannah ending is the real one, and warns not to turn the next page, because there's no way the reader will be satisfied. After this warning, he writes the real ending, as Roland goes up to the gates of the tower, wishing he had brought the horn he's supposed to bring. He climbs up the tower and sees his life all the way till tower top, where a single door stands. He opens the door, only to scream in horror as he's thrown back out to the beginning of the book, only this time, he gets the horn. And the series ends with the sentence that began it: “The man in black fled across the desert, and the gunslinger followed.” The gunslinger will do his quest again, and this time he might succeed (implication is that this is the 19th time he's done it, and 20 will be the time he makes it to the top). The very end of the book is a reprint of Browning's poem that inspired the work, Childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came, and it's implied that this is the final time he goes up the tower.

There are two types of reactions toward the ending. I would like to point out almost no one is fully satisfied by the end; too many deus ex machinas and self-insertions left a bad taste in most reader's mouths. However, some people did enjoy the ending, and others absolutely despised it.

First off, let's go into the apologist's reasoning. Most apologists agree with King; no one could be satisfied by any ending to the Dark Tower. What's been interesting is that many apologists believe the ending is symbolic of the reader. King's coda is the same as the warnings Roland recieves to give up the tower; as a result, the reader is sent back to the beginning. King repeatedly states that the journey was far more important than the ending, and so the reader who demands an ending is forced back on the journey, where as the one who gives up gets the better ending. This is backed up by the original Childe Roland poem, which also cuts off the ending and implies that the journey is far more important. There's also the fact that ka, or fate, is a wheel, and the wheel turns and eventually returns to the same point.

Opponents disagree with this, and say it gives King far too much credit. Most opponents despise the coda, which they feel has an air of arrogance, that the READER is the reason the ending sucks, and not because King himself did not write a good ending. Many opponents also argue that it would in fact be very easy to end the series and leave more people satisfied; I myself have thought of an ending where Roland opens the door, walks through, hears the door close, and feels a hand touch his shoulder. The largest grievance against the ending, though, has to be the fact that it's completely dishonest. By the time Roland reaches the top, they argue, the ONLY mistake he's made is forgetting the horn (an honest mistake not caused by laziness or anger, but just because he had to steal his way out of Gilead and could not pick up the horn from his dead friend's hand).

Roland has given up everything. Some might argue that Roland giving up everything for the tower is exactly why he doesn't get to see it, except he gives up the tower as well. When Jake dies the first time, Roland lets him drop for the Tower, and when he comes back, he doesn't know if he'd do it again. This question is answered when Jake is killed the second time and Roland prays “Not my boy, fuck your Tower, not my boy”, in one of the most heartbreaking scenes in the series. Roland has been a father to two men, he's done right by everyone he could, he's gotten redemption...so why does the Tower send him back? A horn? The only other answer is that Roland should have never kept after the Tower in the first place, which is just silly; why add the horn if he's never supposed to go to the Tower?

Over time, I find myself begrudgingly falling into the second camp. It is lazy, honestly; Roland has redeemed himself and you can write a good ending to an epic. The Lord of the Rings in particular did it well, with Frodo seeing the Grey Havens, and Sam going home alone and ending with his daughter in his arms. This idea that the reader won't be satisfied unless you pull a non-ending just doesn't ring true.

Basically, I know at least a few of you read the series; what do you think of the ending?