Welcome to the final lesson in our module on writing critical reviews. In our last session, you practiced crafting balanced arguments by acknowledging both a work's strengths and its weaknesses. This skill is crucial for building credibility, and it also sets you up perfectly for today's topic: delivering a powerful final verdict.
This lesson focuses on how to write a compelling closing that reinforces your review's central argument. The ending of your review, often called a "kicker" in journalism, is your last chance to connect with the reader. It’s what they will remember most, and it should crystallize your entire critique into a final, memorable thought.
1. The Importance of the 'Final Taste'
Just like a film's ending can make or break the entire experience, a review's conclusion determines the final impression you leave. An ending that wanders, introduces new points, or simply trails off can weaken an otherwise strong review. The goal is to be concise, impactful, and conclusive.
This concept is explored beautifully in the following video, which analyzes storytelling in film. While the subject is filmmaking, the principles about impact and satisfying closure are directly applicable to the craft of writing.
The video "How To Write A Great Ending" from The Closer Look discusses why powerful conclusions are so effective.
Please watch two short segments: First, watch from the beginning to the problem. Pay attention to the idea of "ending fatigue"—the danger of an ending that overstays its welcome. In writing, this means your conclusion should be swift and decisive once your main argument is complete. Then, watch the part explaining the final impression. The creator emphasizes the importance of the "final taste" left in the viewer's mouth. This is exactly what a good kicker should do for your reader.
The key takeaway is that your conclusion isn't the place for more analysis; it's the place for impact. It should land with confidence and reinforce the central argument you've spent the review building.
2. Three Strategies for Powerful Kickers
Professional writers use several proven techniques to craft memorable endings. The article below from The Open Notebook, a fantastic resource for journalists, breaks down a few of the most effective strategies. We will focus on three.
Good Endings: How to Write a Kicker Your Editor—and Your ...
This article analyzes kickers from published works, with commentary from both the writers and their editors. It provides concrete examples of what makes an ending work.
Read the introduction and the three main sections that follow, focusing on the core strategy of each one: "Circle Back to the Beginning": This is perhaps the most classic and satisfying technique. "Tie Everything Together": This is especially useful for a complex, balanced review. "Make It Personal": This works well when you want to leave an emotional or visceral impression.
Let's unpack these three techniques.
Strategy 1: The Circle Back
This involves returning to an image, anecdote, quote, or theme from your introduction (your lede). This creates a sense of wholeness and closure, making your review feel deliberately and elegantly constructed.
Another term for this is a "cosmic kicker," as described in the resource "Nut-grafs & Cosmic Kickers" (LINK), where a closing image or anecdote perfectly illustrates the article's core message.
- Example in a review: If you started a review of a historical biopic by describing a specific, dusty photograph of its subject, you might end by referring back to that photograph, now re-contextualized by the film's story.
Lede: "The film opens as the biography does: with a faded photograph of Amelia Earhart, squinting confidently at a future she seems to have already conquered."
Kicker: "In the end, we are left where we started, with that faded photograph. But after two hours of soaring ambition and crushing compromise, her confident squint now looks less like certainty and more like a brave, desperate hope."
Strategy 2: The Synthesis
This ending is perfect for the kind of balanced review we discussed in the last lesson. It gathers the different threads of your argument—the good and the bad—and weaves them into a final, decisive judgment. It answers the "so what?" question.
- Example in a review: For a video game with brilliant mechanics but a weak story, you could synthesize these two points in your conclusion.
Kicker: "While its narrative ambitions may fall short, Cyber-Runner succeeds where it counts: in the exhilarating, moment-to-moment gameplay. It may not be the story you’ll remember, but the rain-slicked digital streets and the thrill of the chase will linger long after the credits roll."
Strategy 3: The Personal or Anecdotal
This kicker connects to the reader on a more emotional or sensory level. It zooms in on a specific, telling detail or a personal reflection that encapsulates the work's overall impact. Ray Ring's ending in the High Country News article, where he describes swimming with salmon, is a masterclass in this.
- Example in a review: After reviewing a horror film, you might end not with a summary, but with a description of your walk home.
Kicker: "Walking out of the theater, the familiar shadows of my own neighborhood seemed to lengthen and deepen. The film's greatest trick isn't what it shows you on screen; it's how it makes you look over your shoulder on the way home."
3. Your Turn: Writing a Kicker
Let's put this into practice. Below is the bulk of a mock review for a fictional sci-fi film, Starlight Echo. It has a lede, a nut graf, and a body that presents a balanced argument.
Your task is to write a 2-3 sentence kicker for this review using the Circle Back technique.
Review Draft:
(Lede)
The opening shot of Starlight Echo is a masterpiece of quiet grandeur: a lone exploratory starship, the Odyssey, hangs silently in the void, dwarfed by the swirling, hypnotic colors of the Callisto Nebula. It’s a promise of cosmic wonder, of humanity’s smallness against the infinite beauty of space.
(Nut Graf)
Unfortunately, that promise is the only thing the film truly delivers. While Starlight Echo is an undeniable feast for the eyes, its breathtaking visuals are anchored to a story so emotionally hollow that the film collapses in on itself like a dying star.
(Body)
Director Anya Sharma has crafted a universe of staggering beauty. The alien landscapes are painterly, the ship designs are inspired, and the nebula itself feels like a living character. Every frame is a testament to the power of visual effects to create worlds beyond our imagination. Yet this artistry is in service of a cliché-ridden plot about a stoic captain searching for a lost colleague, populated by characters who speak in tired platitudes about sacrifice and destiny. The human element, which should be the film's core, feels as cold and empty as the vacuum of space itself.
Now, write a kicker that circles back to the opening image of the starship and the nebula, reinforcing the review's central argument about beautiful emptiness.
Click here to see a sample revision.
Here is one possible kicker:
We are left at the end with the same image from the beginning: the Odyssey drifting alone in its gorgeous, colorful nebula. The ship, like the film itself, is a stunning vessel to look at, but there’s no one home inside.
This kicker works because it:
- Directly references the lede ("the same image from the beginning").
- Uses the central images (the ship, the nebula) as metaphors for the film's core flaw.
- Provides a final, concise judgment that reinforces the nut graf's argument ("beautiful but empty").
Conclusion
You've now completed the entire journey of writing a critical review, from formulating a thesis and gathering evidence to structuring a balanced argument and, finally, landing a powerful conclusion. A great kicker doesn't just end a review; it completes it.
Key Takeaways:
- A review's ending should be concise and impactful, reinforcing the central argument without introducing new information.
- The "Circle Back" technique creates a satisfying sense of closure by returning to an idea from the lede.
- A "Synthesis" ending ties together the strengths and weaknesses of a work into a final, summary judgment.
- A "Personal/Anecdotal" ending uses a vivid detail or reflection to leave a lasting emotional impression.
This concludes our module on Writing Critical Reviews. In the next module, we will shift gears to Writing Profiles and Interview-Based Pieces. While reviewing focuses on evaluating a work of art, profile writing centers on capturing the essence of a person. Many of the skills you've honed here—structure, descriptive language, and finding a central theme—will be essential as we move into this new and exciting form of journalistic storytelling.