Blog 7: The Underdog's final moments.

The ending of The Underdogs made me kind of angry. I did not really like being given the choice to decide how a story ends when I had not been given the choice to tell the rest of the story. We discussed the motives behind why the rebels were fighting in class, and whether or not Azuela believed the revolution to be inevitable. After thinking about it a lot, getting pretty frustrated with the mind-games that Azuela was playing, and giving up a few times, I have come to the conclusion that Azuela believed that the revolution was inevitable, but the rebels had the choice to decide why it would end. I don't understand why else he would give the readers the opportunity to choose what happens to Macías.

So as I see, there are only a few options for the General; he dies fighting, he hides and goes back home when the fighting moves on, or he is taken prisoner and executed. The choice that the reader makes is ultimately tied to how they believed the revolution would end. If the reader perceives Macías as dying in the battle, then to me, that implies that they believe that the only way to escape the fighting of the revolution is death. The reader may also choose to have Macías live and return home. What is interesting about this ending is whether or not he would return home in disgrace or if his people would honor him. As Grace pointed out in class, the people of his hometown no longer see him as a hero, which would imply that he would not be honored. Here, the reader gives him a way out, but ultimately believes the worst of society and that the revolution has achieved nothing with all of the deaths. Finally, Macías could be taken prisoner. This would imply that the Federal army is acting in a slightly humane manner and practicing some diplomacy by not killing him on the spot. This represents progress to me, because Macías would be respected as a human being.  I believe that Azuela gives the reader these limited choices at the end to show that no matter what, the revolution occurred, and even though the members of the rebel party  could decide what they were fighting for, they were still stuck in the revolution. These are the connections that helped me to make sense of the ending. I have no idea how close I am to being right, I highly doubt that there even is a correct answer, but I am very interested to know what you guys all thought!