Just an amusing musing:
Some stories have fab structure–a storyform even–but I don’t feel much of a pop when the climax occurs. After ruminating on my favorite endings, I noticed a commonality: the story solution, at the time it’s used, seems like the worst idea for success.
Not just a cost to pay along the way, not just hopeless odds overall, and not just a personal flaw to overcome. But an action or decision about which almost any rational person would honestly say (at the time, not in retrospect), “Using the OS solution will be the last thing that will lead to success. The best thing to do is to persevere with the OS response.”
Star Wars pops because: what idiot would just trust himself & eyeball that shot without the targeting computer? That’s worse than useless.
Caveats: I don’t claim this is universal, and I’m focusing only on success/good endings.