> The constant 4th wall breaking is just bad

IMO Ron Gilbert's biggest weakness as a writer is mainly that he has a tendency to use fourth wall breaking for everything, including the final plot twist in most of his games. It was there in his originally planned ending for The Secret of Monkey Island. That ending sort of came back as the actual ending of Monkey Island 2. Then Monkey Island 3, which didn't involve Gilbert, soft-retconned the previous game's ending, then three games later Ron Gilbert came back for Return to Monkey Island and basically retconned everything to use the original ending he planned for the first game!

And I think the main problem with it is that it tends to make the writing feel like the author doesn't dare to admit that they love the world that they created. It's kind of like how some teenagers discover sarcasm and use it everywhere because it makes them feel more "mature" than younger kids who don't understand it yet, without realizing it actually makes it very obvious to everyone else that they are masking their insecurities by acting "edgy".

To me, Gilbert's tendency for 4th wall breaking often ends up feeling similar, like the story is trying to be self-deprecating to mask insecurities about its own writing (and also, it just feels like a total cop-out to avoid writing a ending that ties all the absurd plot threads together into a satisfying pay-off).

Thimbleweed Park had that problem for me, and it kind of soured me on the ending.

Now, I don't want to suggest that the meta stuff is inherently bad. In fact, the ending of Return to Monkey Island actually was pretty satisfying to me. Mainly because of Elaine. At some point there is a very blatantly fourth-wall breaking dialogue you have with her, but unlike other times it feels more like an honest reflection on nostalgia for old adventure series, its stale tropes, how that represents growing older and having to accept that things change or be stunted forever. And it comes back at the ending in a way that makes it very clear that the implied message is "yeah it's all make-belief nonsense, it has flaws, and it's also fine to admit that you love it anyway". You're Guybrush Threepwood with a loving wife who keeps you grounded despite yourself, and the fourth wall breaking doesn't take that away. It's meta but it's sincere meta.

So I guess Gilbert's a fine writer as long as he manages to keep the fourth wall breaking grounded in sincerity. Return to Monkey Island came out five years after Thimbleweed Park, so maybe Thimbleweed Park 2 will have a similar nuance to it. I hope it does.

Ron Gilbert started production on Thimbleweed Park 2