People watch tragedies on purpose. People watch stories about hope on purpose. Pulling the rug on the narrative promise of your story and switching tracks isn’t clever or interesting, it’s just lying about the genre.
If Midsummer Night’s Dream ended with everyone brutally dying, I’d feel kind of betrayed. If Macbeth ended with everyone getting happily married, I’d also feel kind of betrayed.
Yes! You have to earn your ending. They’re not supposed to be twists. They have to be built to throughout the story
You need to have the payoff match the kind of investment you set your audience up with.
To clarify, twists can be well done! But they shouldn’t be “Gotcha! You thought you were watching Type A show but you’re really watching Type B show!”
Like, the Red Wedding is an appropriate twist for Game of Thrones.
It would not be a good twist for something like Doctor Who.
Also, a good twist should feel random, but make sense in retrospect.
*hits every single TV writer over the head with this post*