My initial reaction to their arrival was “now this is dumb”. It just felt too different from the rest, and too unlikely to be taken seriously. But in hindsight, the suddenness and unlikelihood of their arrival work well with the final twist. It’s a nice dark comedic ending, and it puts the story in a larger perspective.
It is abrupt, but to me that wasn’t a bad thing. If them arriving had taken an extra x paragraphs but the story worked out exactly the same way I think that for me that would be worse not better. If there was some clever way of hinting them earlier maybe. The solar flare works quite well for that.
Also to set up the visitors at the end, who I still feel arrived too abruptly
My initial reaction to their arrival was “now this is dumb”. It just felt too different from the rest, and too unlikely to be taken seriously. But in hindsight, the suddenness and unlikelihood of their arrival work well with the final twist. It’s a nice dark comedic ending, and it puts the story in a larger perspective.
It is abrupt, but to me that wasn’t a bad thing. If them arriving had taken an extra x paragraphs but the story worked out exactly the same way I think that for me that would be worse not better. If there was some clever way of hinting them earlier maybe. The solar flare works quite well for that.