THE CIRCULAR STORY FORM
The most popular story design seems to be the circular or closed form, in which the narrative returns to its starting point. In this structure you might bring the hero literally full circle back to the location or world where she started. Perhaps the Return is circular in a visual or metaphoric way, with a replay of an initial image, or the repetition of a line of dialogue or situation from Act One. This is one way of tying up loose ends and making a story feel complete. The image or phrases may have acquired a new meaning now that the hero has completed the journey. The original statement of the theme may be re-evaluated at the Return. Many musical compositions return to an initial theme to rephrase it at the ending.
Having your hero Return to her starting point or remember how she started allows you to draw a comparison for the audience. It gives a measure of how far your hero has come, how she's changed, and how her old world looks different now. To give this circular feeling of completion and comparison, writers will sometimes put their heroes through an experience at the Return that was difficult or impossible for them at the beginning, so the audience can see how they have changed. In Ghost, the hero was unable to say "I love you" in his Ordinary World. But at the Return, having died and passed many tests in the land of death, he is able to say these all-important words so that his still-living wife can hear them.
In Ordinary People, the young hero Conrad is so depressed in his Ordinary World that he can't eat the French toast his mother makes for him. It's an outward sign of his inner problem, his inability to accept love because he hates himself for surviving his brother. In the Return, having passed through several death-and-rebirth ordeals, he goes to apologize to his girlfriend for acting like a jerk. When she asks him to come inside for some breakfast, this time he finds he has an appetite. His ability to eat is an outward sign of his inner change. This actual change in behavior is more dramatically effective than Conrad just saying he feels different, or someone else noticing that he's grown and remarking on it. It communicates change on the symbolic level, and affects the audience indirectly but more powerfully than a blatant statement. In a subtle way it gives a sense that a phase of his life is over, that a circle has been closed, and a new one is about to begin.
ACHIEVEMENT OF PERFECTION
The "happy endings" of Hollywood films link them with the world of fairy tales, which are often about the achievement of perfection. Fairy tales frequently end with a statement of perfection, like "and they lived happily ever after". Fairy tales bring the shattered family back into balance, back to completion.
Weddings are a popular way to end stories. Marriage is a new beginning, the end of an old life of being single and the beginning of a new life as part of a new unit. New beginnings are perfect and unspoiled in their ideal form.
Striking up a new relationship is another way to show a new beginning at the end of a story. In Casablanca, Humphrey Bogart makes a difficult Resurrection sacrifice, giving up the chance to be with the woman he loves. His reward, the Elixir he brings away from the experience, is his new alliance with Claude Rains. As he says, in one of the most famous tag lines in the history of the movies, "Louie, I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship."
THE OPEN-ENDED STORY FORM
Storytellers have thought of many ways to create a circular feeling of completion or closure, basically by addressing the dramatic questions raised in Act One. However, once in a while a few loose ends are desirable. Some storytellers prefer an open-ended Return. In the open-ended point of view, the storytelling goes on after the story is over; it continues in the minds and hearts of the audience, in the conversations and even arguments people have in coffee shops after seeing a movie or reading a book.
Writers of the open-ended persuasion prefer to leave moral conclusions for the reader or viewer. Some questions have no answers, some have many. Some stories end not by answering questions or solving riddles, but by posing new questions that resonate in the audience long after the story is over.
Hollywood films are often criticized for pat, fairy-tale endings in which all problems are solved and the cultural assumptions of the audience are left undisturbed. By contrast the open-ended approach views the world as an ambiguous, imperfect place. For more sophisticated stories with a hard or realistic edge, the open-ended form may be more appropriate.
FUNCTIONS OF THE RETURN
Like the journey's other stages, Return with the Elixir can perform many functions, but there is something special about being the last element in the journey. Return is similar to Reward in some ways. Both follow a moment of death and rebirth and both may depict consequences of surviving death. Some functions of Seizing the Sword may also appear in the Return, such as taking possession, celebrating, sacred marriage, campfire scenes, self-realization, vengeance, or retaliation. But Return is your last chance to touch the emotions of the audience. It must finish your story so that it satisfies or provokes your audience as you intended. It bears special weight because of its unique position at the end of the work, and it's also a place of pitfalls for writers and their heroes.
SURPRISE
A Return can fall flat if everything is resolved too neatly or just as expected. A good Return should untie the plot threads but with a certain amount of surprise. It should be done with a little taste of the unexpected, a sudden revelation. The Greeks and Romans often built a "recognition" scene into the endings of their plays and novels. A young man and woman, raised as shepherds, discover to everyone's surprise they are prince and princess, promised to each other in marriage long ago. In the tragic mode, Oedipus discovers the man he killed in the Ordeal was his father and the woman he joined with in sacred marriage was his own mother. Here the recognition is cause for horror rather than joy.
The Return may have a twist to it. This is another case of misdirection: You lead the audience to believe one thing, and then reveal at the last moment a quite different reality. No Way Out flips you a totally different perception of the hero in the last ten seconds of the film. Basic Instinct makes you suspect Sharon Stone's character of murder for the first two acts, convinces you she is innocent in the climax, then leaps back to doubt again in an unexpected final shot.
There is usually an ironic or cynical tone to such Returns, as if they mean to say, "Ha, fooled ya!" You are caught foolishly thinking that human beings are decent or that good does triumph over evil. A less sardonic version of a twist Return can be found in the work of writers like O. Henry, who sometimes used the twist to show the positive side of human nature, as in his short story "The Gift of the Magi." A poor young husband and wife make sacrifices to surprise each other with Christmas presents. They discover that the husband has sold his valuable watch to buy his wife a clip for her beautiful long hair, and the wife has cut off and sold her lovely locks to buy him a fob for his beloved watch. The gifts and sacrifices cancel each other out but the couple is left with a treasure of love.
REWARD AND PUNISHMENT
A specialized job of Return is to hand out final rewards and punishments. It's part of restoring balance to the world of the story, giving a sense of completion. It's like getting your grades after final exams. Villains should earn their ultimate fate by their evil deeds and they should not get off too easily. Audiences hate that. Punishment should fit the crime and have the quality of poetic justice. In other words, the way the villain dies or gets his just comeuppance should directly relate to his sins.