Mark Doherty here.
Yes, it's unfortunate that a portion of the people found the ending confusing. However, the entire fic was always written with a giant question mark over the story - was Emerald an anti-hero or a delusional villain, was the Purification brainwashing or did he misinterpret happiness for stupidity? And so on. I could have explicitly laid out what went on, but didn't because I wanted people to read this fic and make up their own minds on what it was all about - I pointed a signpost in the right direction, but didn't give a map and explicit directions.
After I wrote the first couple of chapters, a reader directed me to the Astro City comicbooks - it's an easy to get example of the same story-telling method of mentioning (in passing) major historical story events that don't actually get covered (or aren't covered in the books until years later). It's an effective technique for quickly building a large world history, although some readers prefer to have things explained as they happen.
If I ever do the (originally planned in 1998 ) sequel, I'll clarify a lot of things. As it stands, though, I'm happier with leaving it as is, with the ending a little unclarified.
On a sidenote - hi Elsa. Unless there's two of you out there, I remember your emails on my fics from the old days on the FFML.
Yes, it's unfortunate that a portion of the people found the ending confusing. However, the entire fic was always written with a giant question mark over the story - was Emerald an anti-hero or a delusional villain, was the Purification brainwashing or did he misinterpret happiness for stupidity? And so on. I could have explicitly laid out what went on, but didn't because I wanted people to read this fic and make up their own minds on what it was all about - I pointed a signpost in the right direction, but didn't give a map and explicit directions.
After I wrote the first couple of chapters, a reader directed me to the Astro City comicbooks - it's an easy to get example of the same story-telling method of mentioning (in passing) major historical story events that don't actually get covered (or aren't covered in the books until years later). It's an effective technique for quickly building a large world history, although some readers prefer to have things explained as they happen.
If I ever do the (originally planned in 1998 ) sequel, I'll clarify a lot of things. As it stands, though, I'm happier with leaving it as is, with the ending a little unclarified.
On a sidenote - hi Elsa. Unless there's two of you out there, I remember your emails on my fics from the old days on the FFML.