I disagree.
The Tommyknockers is one of my favorite King books (opinions are like.....), and Gard is one of my favorite characters, I had no problem with him be shuttled off to undescribed, yet, inevitable death.
I hated the ending of
Cell, while I enjoyed the ending of
The Colorado Kid. Both open ended, but one worked with the story that he had written while the other left the work feeling incomplete.
Stephen King just can plain write a very poor ending. I've read his full catalog, and I love him as an author, but he isn't infallible.
See exhibit 192: From A Buick 8.
If we get into the
Dark Tower series we get to either one of his greatest triumphs, or one of his greatest bungles. I personally hated the final act of the series. And I'm not just talking about Roland walking into the Tower to repeat his life. That for me was fine, albeit really mediocre, but fine.
The ending isn't just the last 10 pages, it's the encompassing events around it. He killed the Crimson King with an effing eraser, and destroyed the Walking Dude out of hand within a page or two without any fight.
He had them doing exactly what you bring up in your thoughts, he made into an effing Christmas party with Jake, Eddie and Suz. These things, coupled with the lack of originality in
Wolves seriously soured me. Seriously, crap out of
Harry Potter? Please.
But
The Dark Tower isn't my point. For the ending of every *insert your favorite King ending here* there's an *insert your least favorite King ending here*, and it's obviously going to vary from person to person.
I do, however, think that you have to keep in mind, that at times, the man just doesn't write well.