Bro really said i can fix her

The real ending of the first book was Theresa waking up from her coma, looking directly into the camera, and saying "Hot Girls Read"

I think the maze is the best part and the next books should have also had mazes. Maybe the next maze is filled with water so they have to swim through it. Then the final maze requires riding a bike through it. And at the end they realize it was just a triathlon they signed up for.

the maze retconner

I think a compromise for a sad/happy ending would be perhaps the “cure” only works on those who aren’t already infected, but if you are then you’re out of luck. Or they were able to release the cure through the air but the boys themselves got swarmed and killed before the cure could take effect.

Halfway through and this already makes much more sense than anything previously written in the scorch trials.

Hi I'm a scientist, there's a pretty easy way to explain the whole flare disease that I can't believe Dashner didn't think about.
1) let's say the flare is a bioweapon that they did release on purpose to cull the population. It's reasonable to assume it was designed to be a quick death brain disease and they had a cure. They may have preemptively vaccinated the youngest generation at the time to ensure the population continues.
2) the flare mutated when it was released into the population, something they weren't prepared for. Also explains why not all the younger generation are immune because the vaccine was against the older version of the disease.
3) they use the younger genertin trials to figure out why some are still immune and why others aren't, focusing on brain patterns since it's a disease of the brain.
4) maybe there was a time of civil war and people found out the disease was released on purpose, blowing up the research facility that housed all the important documentation - that's why they can't just amend the cure or vaccine they had and have lost heaps of knowledge about the virus.

This (in my opinion) is the perfect background set up to not only the disease but the culture of the society at present and the reason why they experiment on kids.

idea for the flare getting out of containment as a bio weapon: the final sample of the virus is being transported to a facility to safely incinerate (or some other method of destroying it entirely) when the solar flares hit the earth

I would fix it by making it a romance and all the boys are into each other and they live happily in the maze

i wasn't this early to my own birth

Yes!! Honestly for the ending (spoiler!!) I would make it so that the cure is really hard to administer (like maybe it's a vaccine that needs to be kept cold etc.) So they can't give it out, and now they need to rebuild society. And THATS the moment that is "like the maze" because what they ACTUALLY needed wasn't to know how to run a maze or be brave, it was to know how to build a society and work together and such. Then camera zooms out and we see almost exactly the same "scene" that Jason saw when he arrived at the glade, just people existing in society and building a life

The dark hair looks GORGEOUS on you girl!!!

the real ending of the maze runner is theresa wakes up from her book 1 coma and it was all a dream...😦

Hearing the word "spread" when talking about protein gave me the prion disease shudders

This is sooooo much more coherent than the originals. I do want to know how you would handle the whole telepathy thing

I also love a not-so-happy ending, so I think it would be interesting if the "cure" was more like a vaccine that prevents people from getting the flare, but it can't help those already infected. It would be especially bittersweet if for some reason it only worked on those that are young, maybe tying into the reason why only younger people were immune in the first place, so that only the next generations are immune, but everyone knows that the people alive today are all still susceptible

i think an ending where the cure works, but the societal impacts stick would make the most sense. like the walls that keep the cranks in a separate area persist and social stratification and distrust persist. it makes sense to me that such a severe brain disease would have lasting stigma on those previously affected.

I think it would have been an interesting concept if the immune children were infected and became immune because they're all born to mothers who were infected whilst pregnant. When their parents had died from the virus, they became the property of the US, being raised as soldiers, with their immunity exploited

this is why copyright shouldn't exist. we need the Merediths MR trilogy.

Your rewrite has turned the Flare into a highly contagious prion disease (like rabies), which is terrifying, and the cure is an airborne prophylaxis/vaccine combo, which is quite funny to envision figuring out how to put it out in a way people will actually get dosed with it, like putting the vaccine in snacks for raccoons. Line a building with those misters they have for really hot days at the zoo but it's spraying you with a vaccine.

I prefer the idea that it works, but maybe the treatment is a miserable experience that also could kill people, or they can only make it in small batches so it has to be distributed carefully, or they don't know if the protein might mutate again after they've dosed everyone with it because they didn't have a way to thoroughly test it before everything got destroyed. There are options for a bittersweet ending without being a straight up downer.