What I'm saying is, not that these instances of bad writing should be tolerated, but that they're to be expected. They fit within the formula of western tragedy, even if they're poorly executed.

We are a barely literate society. Our public documents and periodicals are consistently maintained at the 7th grade reading level. If you have enough barely literate people writing novels [because it's profitable to do so], you're going to get exactly the type of sudden character idiocy that this thread is discussing. The authors in qustion take the classical formula, which pervades fiction from the last three thousand years, and follow it blindly and without comprehending its narrative purpose.

It's not [always] just people changing a character to make the story work.

Same.

That's what I do in general. I go into movies, books, etc., intending to like them, and as a result, I usually do. Sometimes boneheaded writing really gets to me, but most of the time I enjoy things for what they are and don't let them bother me.

If found that if you really want to nit-pick, you can find problems with nearly anything. Ophelia's descent into madness in Hamlet: sure, her boyfriend killed her dad, but where was the foreshadowing that something like that was going to just make her snap? Yet, I don't consider myself somebody in a position to criticize Shakespeare of bad writing....

(There are a few things I have more trouble with, though. When people misuse basic science terms, I get my panties in a wad. For example, even though I loved the JJ Abrams Star Trek, Spock's monologue about black holes and supernovae gave me huge fits. The sad thing is, a small amount of rewriting could have made it not bother me without having to change the story one whit.)

Wow. Never thought of it that way. Thanks for the new perspective. *CnC wanders away pondering....*

@Vox, I have to say though, "It's tradition" has never been an adequate excuse for anything in my world

I'm not excusing it, I'm explaining it in terms of literary culture.

and my rebuttle would be then that it's time to grow beyond what once was.

When we find the old ways no longer work, it's time to make new ways

Not to say that a story can't have the hero come out on top, but why not make it more complicated than that? More like life, in that each challenge is just a segway to the next.

It's essentially a tragic device anyway; it's certainly not all about heroes coming out on top.

Out of curiosity is the enemy a certain non human Admiral in the empire? or someone else entirely.

It is Thrawn.