What is an ending?

Stories have a beginning, middle, and end.  US comics seem to lack the end part, until they get cancelled.  Why do most manga and anime, even if they go on forever, eventually end? 

Because there's (usually) only one person writing and drawing the story, who owns his or her own characters and story. So it's not as simple as assigning another writer/artist to the serial.

Heaps of US comics end these days. The ones that don't end go on forever because they've spiralled out into something beyond just one story. They're all sorts of movies, videogames, tv shows, spinoff comics. There'd be no point to ending Batman to the point where no Batman product is ever made again because there is so little continuity between them that you wouldn't be able to find an ending that fit. You could end individual Batman stories though, and that happens all the time.

The sad thing is that most of the money in "comics" comes from other media. Marvel comics is now Marvel Entertainment Group and their mission statement doesn't even mention comics, just the merchandising and licensing of "character based entertainment". And they probably made more money from the unsuccessful Daredevil, Punisher and Elektra movies than alot of successful comics put together.

>>3

Forgot the point of that last paragraph, which is that it clearly isn't in their best interests to 'end' characters when the real money is in the spinoffs.

The ending is when the girl gets shot with cum all over her face.

>>5
Newscaster Etsuko fan eh? Ain't many of us around.

>>6 HOOKS IT UP

>>1 What is an ending?

A MISERABLE LITTLE PILE OF SECRETS

>>1
 peng!

Most US comics (as well as television, cartoons, etc.) still tend to follow the idea of a situation type of setting, be it comedy, tragedy, drama, etc.  What this means is that the US mindset it to create characters and a setting and come up with a situation for them to be in.  This is why you tend to see the same themed episode between different comics and television shows, or twice in the same show as in the case of the Simpsons (which they did admit to and joke about).  The advantage of this is of course that the show can be run as long as it wants to run since there will be no conclusion.  The disadvantage is that there is no ending, no closure and the series usually runs until it turns sour and alienates the fans.

In the case of the Japanese comics, there tends to be more of a story oriented focus.  Instead of trying to create situations for the characters to go through on a daily basis, there is a story for the characters to traverse through.  The advantage is that you can have a very fulfilling storyline and highly dynamic characters.  The downside is that you will have to end the story which means an end of profit.  In the long run, this tends to be an issue as you see many characters that are strikingly similar (ridiculously so) and stories that can be predicted beginning to end due to some unintentional (or possibly intentional) circumstances (i.e.  you can only tell so many different stories before you have told them all).

Now of course, this does not mean all US comics are situational, nor does it mean that all Japanese comics are plot oriented.  I can easily produce a list of US comics that reach conclusions and end and I can easily produce a list of Japanese comics that are situational.  What I will claim to is that I have been seeing a trend for the US comics, cartoons, TV shows, etc. going more for the storyline focus and less for the situational focus.  I have also seen the same for the Japanese comics.

This is like a 1 story per episode VS 1 super-lineal argument / plot, that you can see from start to end.
(have u ever see Evangelion in 12 hours???)

Bebop was a good mix of both.
DBZ and Inuyasha ran hella long for being "story oriented"
OH LOOK ANOTHER HELPLESS VILLAGE, LET'S DROP EVERYTHING AND SAVE THEM! So much for priority.